He asked himself, for the thousandth time, why he had
adopted a policy of concealment from the police, why he had
become in any way interested in the Posen matter, and why, at this
present moment, he should be so anxious to prosecute it further?
To the first two questions he replied, rather lamely, that he had
been influenced by Nella, and also by a natural spirit of adventure;
to the third he replied that he had always been in the habit of
carrying things through, and was now actuated by a mere childish,
obstinate desire to carry this one through. Moreover, he was
spendidly conscious of his perfect ability to carry it through. One
additional impulse he had, though he did not admit it to himself,
being by nature adverse to big words, and that was an abstract love
of justice, the Anglo-Saxon's deep-found instinct for helping the
right side to conquer, even when grave risks must thereby be run,
with no corresponding advantage.
He was turning these things over in his mind as he walked about
the vast hotel on that evening of the last day in July. The Society
papers had been stating for a week past that London was empty,
but, in spite of the Society papers, London persisted in seeming to
be just as full as ever. The Grand Babylon was certainly not as
crowded as it had been a month earlier, but it was doing a very
passable business. At the close of the season the gay butterflies of
the social community have a habit of hovering for a day or two in
the big hotels before they flutter away to castle and country-house,
meadow and moor, lake and stream.
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