“It isn’t quite true,” said Lilly, leaning on the mantelpiece and staring down into the fire.

  “Where isn’t it? You talk, and you make a man believe you’ve got something he hasn’t got? But where is it, when it comes to? What have you got, more than me or Jim Bricknell! Only a bigger choice of words, it seems to me.”

  Lilly was motionless and inscrutable like a shadow.

  “Does it, Aaron!” he said, in a colorless voice.

  “Yes. What else is there to it?” Aaron sounded testy.

  “Why,” said Lilly at last, “there’s something. I agree, it’s true what you say about me. But there’s a bit of something else. There’s just a bit of something in me, I think, which ISN’T a man running into a pub for a drink — ”

  “And what — ?”

  The question fell into the twilight like a drop of water falling down a deep shaft into a well.

  “I think a man may come into possession of his own soul at last — as the Buddhists teach — but without ceasing to love, or even to hate. One loves, one hates — but somewhere beyond it all, one understands, and possesses one’s soul in patience and in peace — ”

  “Yes,” said Aaron slowly, “while you only stand and talk about it. But when you’ve got no chance to talk about it — and when you’ve got to live — you don’t possess your soul, neither in patience nor in peace, but any devil that likes possesses you and does what it likes with you, while you fridge yourself and fray yourself out like a worn rag.”

  “I don’t care,” said Lilly, “I’m learning to possess my soul in patience and in peace, and I know it. And it isn’t a negative Nirvana either. And if Tanny possesses her own soul in patience and peace as well — and if in this we understand each other at last — then there we are, together and apart at the same time, and free of each other, and eternally inseparable. I have my Nirvana — and I have it all to myself. But more than that. It coincides with her Nirvana.”

  “Ah, yes,” said Aaron. “But I don’t understand all that word-splitting.”

  “I do, though. You learn to be quite alone, and possess your own soul in isolation — and at the same time, to be perfectly WITH someone else — that’s all I ask.”

  “Sort of sit on a mountain top, back to back with somebody else, like a couple of idols.”

  “No — because it isn’t a case of sitting — or a case of back to back. It’s what you get to after a lot of fighting and a lot of sensual fulfilment. And it never does away with the fighting and with the sensual passion. It flowers on top of them, and it would never flower save on top of them.”

  “What wouldn’t?”

  “The possessing one’s own soul — and the being together with someone else in silence, beyond speech.”

  “And you’ve got them?”

  “I’ve got a BIT of the real quietness inside me.”

  “So has a dog on a mat.”

  “So I believe, too.”

  “Or a man in a pub.”

  “Which I don’t believe.”

  “You prefer the dog?”

  “Maybe.”

  There was silence for a few moments.

  “And I’m the man in the pub,” said Aaron.

  “You aren’t the dog on the mat, anyhow.”

  “And you’re the idol on the mountain top, worshipping yourself.”

  “You talk to me like a woman, Aaron.”

  “How do you talk to ME, do you think?”

  “How do I?”

  “Are the potatoes done?”

  Lilly turned quickly aside, and switched on the electric light. Everything changed. Aaron sat still before the fire, irritated. Lilly went about preparing the supper.

  The room was pleasant at night. Two tall, dark screens hid the two beds. In front, the piano was littered with music, the desk littered with papers. Lilly went out on to the landing, and set the chops to grill on the gas stove. Hastily he put a small table on the hearth-rug, spread it with a blue-and-white cloth, set plates and glasses. Aaron did not move. It was not his nature to concern himself with domestic matters — and Lilly did it best alone.

  The two men had an almost uncanny understanding of one another — like brothers. They came from the same district, from the same class. Each might have been born into the other’s circumstance. Like brothers, there was a profound hostility between them. But hostility is not antipathy.

  Lilly’s skilful housewifery always irritated Aaron: it was so self-sufficient. But most irritating of all was the little man’s unconscious assumption of priority. Lilly was actually unaware that he assumed this quiet predominance over others. He mashed the potatoes, he heated the plates, he warmed the red wine, he whisked eggs into the milk pudding, and served his visitor like a housemaid. But none of this detracted from the silent assurance with which he bore himself, and with which he seemed to domineer over his acquaintance.

  At last the meal was ready. Lilly drew the curtains, switched off the central light, put the green-shaded electric lamp on the table, and the two men drew up to the meal. It was good food, well cooked and hot. Certainly Lilly’s hands were no longer clean: but it was clean dirt, as he said.

  Aaron sat in the low arm-chair at table. So his face was below, in the full light. Lilly sat high on a small chair, so that his face was in the green shadow. Aaron was handsome, and always had that peculiar well-dressed look of his type. Lilly was indifferent to his own appearance, and his collar was a rag.

  So the two men ate in silence. They had been together alone for a fortnight only: but it was like a small eternity. Aaron was well now — only he suffered from the depression and the sort of fear that follows influenza.

  “When are you going?” he asked irritably, looking up at Lilly, whose face hovered in that green shadow above, and worried him.

  “One day next week. They’ll send me a telegram. Not later than Thursday.”

  “You’re looking forward to going?” The question was half bitter.

  “Yes. I want to get a new tune out of myself.”

  “Had enough of this?”

  “Yes.”

  A flush of anger came on Aaron’s face.

  “You’re easily on, and easily off,” he said, rather insulting.

  “Am I?” said Lilly. “What makes you think so?”

  “Circumstances,” replied Aaron sourly.

  To which there was no answer. The host cleared away the plates, and put the pudding on the table. He pushed the bowl to Aaron.

  “I suppose I shall never see you again, once you’ve gone,” said Aaron.

  “It’s your choice. I will leave you an address.”

  After this, the pudding was eaten in silence.

  “Besides, Aaron,” said Lilly, drinking his last sip of wine, “what do you care whether you see me again or not? What do you care whether you see anybody again or not? You want to be amused. And now you’re irritated because you think I am not going to amuse you any more: and you don’t know who is going to amuse you. I admit it’s a dilemma. But it’s a hedonistic dilemma of the commonest sort.”

  “I don’t know hedonistic. And supposing I am as you say — are you any different?”

  “No, I’m not very different. But I always persuade myself there’s a bit of difference. Do you know what Josephine Ford confessed to me? She’s had her lovers enough. ‘There isn’t any such thing as love, Lilly,’ she said. ‘Men are simply afraid to be alone. That is absolutely all there is in it: fear of being alone.’“

  “What by that?” said Aaron.

  “You agree?”

  “Yes, on the whole.”

  “So do I — on the whole. And then I asked her what about woman. And then she said with a woman it wasn’t fear, it was just boredom. A woman is like a violinist: any fiddle, any instrument rather than empty hands and no tune going.”

  “Yes — what I said before: getting as much amusement out of life as possible,” said Aaron.

  “You amuse me — and I’ll amuse you.”

  “Yes — just about that.”

  “All right, Aaron,” said Lilly. “I’m not going to amuse you, or try to amuse you any more.”

  “Going to try somebody else; and Malta.”

  “Malta, anyhow.”

  “Oh, and somebody else — in the next five minutes.”

  “Yes — that also.”

  “Goodbye and good luck to you.”

  “Goodbye and good luck to you, Aaron.”

  With which Lilly went aside to wash the dishes. Aaron sat alone under the zone of light, turning over a score of Pelleas. Though the noise of London was around them, it was far below, and in the room was a deep silence. Each of the men seemed invested in his own silence.

  Aaron suddenly took his flute, and began trying little passages from the opera on his knee. He had not played since his illness. The noise came out a little tremulous, but low and sweet. Lilly came forward with a plate and a cloth in his hand.

  “Aaron’s rod is putting forth again,” he said, smiling.

  “What?” said Aaron, looking up.

  “I said Aaron’s rod is putting forth again.”

  “What rod?”

  “Your flute, for the moment.”

  “It’s got to put forth my bread and butter.”

  “Is that all the buds it’s going to have?”

  “What else!”

  “Nay — that’s for you to show. What flowers do you imagine came out of the rod of Moses’s brother?”

  “Scarlet runners, I should think if he’d got to live on them.”

  “Scarlet enough, I’ll bet.”

  Aaron turned unnoticing back to his music. Lilly finished the wiping of the dishes, then took a book and sat on the other side of the table.

  “It’s all one to you, then,” said Aaron suddenly, “whether we ever see one another again?”

  “Not a bit,” said Lilly, looking up over his spectacles. “I very much wish there might be something that held us together.”

  “Then if you wish it, why isn’t there?”

  “You might wish your flute to put out scarlet-runner flowers at the joints.”

  “Ay — I might. And it would be all the same.”

  The moment of silence that followed was extraordinary in its hostility.

  “Oh, we shall run across one another again some time,” said Aaron.

  “Sure,” said Lilly. “More than that: I’ll write you an address that will always find me. And when you write I will answer you.”

  He took a bit of paper and scribbled an address. Aaron folded it and put it into his waistcoat pocket. It was an Italian address.

  “But how can I live in Italy?” he said. “You can shift about. I’m tied to a job.”

  “You — with your budding rod, your flute — and your charm — you can always do as you like.”

  “My what?”

  “Your flute and your charm.”

  “What charm?”

  “Just your own. Don’t pretend you don’t know you’ve got it. I don’t really like charm myself; too much of a trick about it. But whether or not, you’ve got it.”

  “It’s news to me.”

  “Not it.”

  “Fact, it is.”

  “Ha! Somebody will always take a fancy to you. And you can live on that, as well as on anything else.”

  “Why do you always speak so despisingly?”

  “Why shouldn’t I?”

  “Have you any right to despise another man?”

  “When did it go by rights?”

  “No, not with you.”

  “You answer me like a woman, Aaron.”

  Again there was a space of silence. And again it was Aaron who at last broke it.

  “We’re in different positions, you and me,” he said.

  “How?”

  “You can live by your writing — but I’ve got to have a job.”

  “Is that all?” said Lilly.

  “Ay. And plenty. You’ve got the advantage of me.”

  “Quite,” said Lilly. “But why? I was a dirty-nosed little boy when you were a clean-nosed little boy. And I always had more patches on my breeches than you: neat patches, too, my poor mother! So what’s the good of talking about advantages? You had the start. And at this very moment you could buy me up, lock, stock, and barrel. So don’t feel hard done by. It’s a lie.”

  “You’ve got your freedom.”

  “I make it and I take it.”

  “Circumstances make it for you.”

  “As you like.”

  “You don’t do a man justice,” said Aaron.

  “Does a man care?”

  “He might.”

  “Then he’s no man.”

  “Thanks again, old fellow.”

  “Welcome,” said Lilly, grimacing.

  Again Aaron looked at him, baffled, almost with hatred. Lilly grimaced at the blank wall opposite, and seemed to ruminate. Then he went back to his book. And no sooner had he forgotten Aaron, reading the fantasies of a certain Leo Frobenius, than Aaron must stride in again.

  “You can’t say there isn’t a difference between your position and mine,” he said pertinently.

  Lilly looked darkly over his spectacles.

  “No, by God,” he said. “I should be in a poor way otherwise.”

  “You can’t say you haven’t the advantage — your JOB gives you the advantage.”

  “All right. Then leave it out with my job, and leave me alone.”

  “That’s your way of dodging it.”

  “My dear Aaron, I agree with you perfectly. There is no difference between us, save the fictitious advantage given to me by my job. Save for my job — which is to write lies — Aaron and I are two identical little men in one and the same little boat. Shall we leave it at that, now?”

  “Yes,” said Aaron. “That’s about it.”

  “Let us shake hands on it — and go to bed, my dear chap. You are just recovering from influenza, and look paler than I like.”

  “You mean you want to be rid of me,” said Aaron.

  “Yes, I do mean that,” said Lilly.

  “Ay,” said Aaron.

  And after a few minutes more staring at the score of Pelleas, he rose, put the score away on the piano, laid his flute beside it, and retired behind the screen. In silence, the strange dim noise of London sounding from below, Lilly read on about the Kabyles. His soul had the faculty of divesting itself of the moment, and seeking further, deeper interests. These old Africans! And Atlantis! Strange, strange wisdom of the Kabyles! Old, old dark Africa, and the world before the flood! How jealous Aaron seemed! The child of a jealous God. A jealous God! Could any race be anything but despicable, with such an antecedent?

  But no, persistent as a jealous God himself, Aaron reappeared in his pyjamas, and seated himself in his chair.

  “What is the difference then between you and me, Lilly?” he said.

  “Haven’t we shaken hands on it — a difference of jobs.”

  “You don’t believe that, though, do you?”

  “Nay, now I reckon you’re trespassing.”

  “Why am I? I know you don’t believe it.”

  “What do I believe then?” said Lilly.

  “You believe you know something better than me — and that you are something better than me. Don’t you?”

  “Do YOU believe it?”

  “What?”

  “That I AM something better than you, and that I KNOW something better?”

  “No, because I don’t see it,” said Aaron.

  “Then if you don’t see it, it isn’t there. So go to bed and sleep the sleep of the just and the convalescent. I am not to be badgered any more.”

  “Am I badgering you?” said Aaron.

  “Indeed you are.”

  “So I’m in the wrong again?”

  “Once more, my dear.”

  “You’re a God-Almighty in your way, you know.”

  “So long as I’m not in anybody else’s way — Anyhow, you’d be much better sleeping the sleep of the just. And I’m going out for a minute or two. Don’t catch cold there with nothing on —

  “I want to catch the post,” he added, rising.

  Aaron looked up at him quickly. But almost before there was time to speak, Lilly had slipped into his hat and coat, seized his letters, and gone.

  It was a rainy night. Lilly turned down King Street to walk to Charing Cross. He liked being out of doors. He liked to post his letters at Charing Cross post office. He did not want to talk to Aaron any more. He was glad to be alone.

  He walked quickly down Villiers Street to the river, to see it flowing blackly towards the sea. It had an endless fascination for him: never failed to soothe him and give him a sense of liberty. He liked the night, the dark rain, the river, and even the traffic. He enjoyed the sense of friction he got from the streaming of people who meant nothing to him. It was like a fox slipping alert among unsuspecting cattle.

  When he got back, he saw in the distance the lights of a taxi standing outside the building where he lived, and heard a thumping and hallooing. He hurried forward.

  It was a man called Herbertson.

  “Oh, why, there you are!” exclaimed Herbertson, as Lilly drew near. “Can I come up and have a chat?”

  “I’ve got that man who’s had flu. I should think he is gone to bed.”

  “Oh!” The disappointment was plain. “Well, look here I’ll just come up for a couple of minutes.” He laid his hand on Lilly’s arm. “I heard you were going away. Where are you going?”

  “Malta.”

  “Malta! Oh, I know Malta very well. Well now, it’ll be all right if I come up for a minute? I’m not going to see much more of you, apparently.” He turned quickly to the taxi. “What is it on the clock?”

  The taxi was paid, the two men went upstairs. Aaron was in bed, but he called as Lilly entered the room.

  “Hullo!” said Lilly. “Not asleep? Captain Herbertson has come in for a minute.”

  “Hope I shan’t disturb you,” said Captain Herbertson, laying down his stick and gloves, and his cap. He was in uniform. He was one of the few surviving officers of the Guards, a man of about forty-five, good-looking, getting rather stout. He settled himself in the chair where Aaron had sat, hitching up his trousers. The gold identity plate, with its gold chain, fell conspicuously over his wrist.