“But on what do you base such a very unwarrantable belief?”

“I just feel like that.”

“And if you are ever quite without success—­and nothing to fall back on?”

“I can work at something.”

“In case of illness, for example?”

“I can go to a hospital—­or die.”

“Dear me!  However, you are more logical than Lilly.  He seems to believe that he has the Invisible—­call it Providence if you will—­on his side, and that this Invisible will never leave him in the lurch, or let him down, so long as he sticks to his own side of the bargain, and NEVER works for his own ends.  I don’t quite see how he works.  Certainly he seems to me a man who squanders a great deal of talent unworthily.  Yet for some reason or other he calls this true, genuine activity, and has a contempt for actual work by which a man makes provision for his years and for his family.  In the end, he will have to fall back on charity.  But when I say so, he denies it, and says that in the end we, the men who work and make provision, will have to fall back on him.  Well, all I can say is, that SO FAR he is in far greater danger of having to fall back on me, than I on him.”

The old man sat back in his chair with a little laugh of triumph.  But it smote almost devilishly on Aaron’s ears, and for the first time in his life he felt that there existed a necessity for taking sides.

“I don’t suppose he will do much falling back,” he said.

“Well, he is young yet.  You are both young.  You are squandering your youth.  I am an old man, and I see the end.”

“What end, Sir William?”

“Charity—­and poverty—­and some not very congenial ‘job,’ as you call it, to put bread in your mouth.  No, no, I would not like to trust myself to your Providence, or to your Chance.  Though I admit your Chance is a sounder proposition than Lilly’s Providence.  You speculate with your life and your talent.  I admit the nature which is a born speculator.  After all, with your flute, you will speculate in other people’s taste for luxury, as a man may speculate in theatres or trains de luxe.  You are the speculator.  That may be your way of wisdom.  But Lilly does not even speculate.  I cannot see his point.  I cannot see his point.  I cannot see his point.  Yet I have the greatest admiration for his mentality.”

The old man had fired up during this conversation—­and all the others in the room had gone silent.  Lady Franks was palpably uneasy.  She alone knew how frail the old man was—­frailer by far than his years.  She alone knew what fear of his own age, what fear of death haunted him now:  fear of his own non-existence.  His own old age was an agony to him; worse than an agony, a horror.  He wanted to be young—­to live, to live.  And he was old, he was breaking up.  The glistening youth of Aaron, the impetuousness of Lilly fascinated him.  And both these men seemed calmly to contradict his own wealth and honours.