“You’ve hit it!” cried Richard Norton, bringing his flat hand down on the table.  “We are free!”

“Now I’ll tell you,” said Gabriel.  “This time last year we had horrible lodgings in Bloomsbury.  Father went every day to drudgery in a dirty office, helping another man to rob his fellow-creatures; aunt there gave lessons,—­she can’t teach a bit; she was only putting nonsense into the heads of future men and women, and, such as it was, putting it there wrong.  I was doing likewise, and I teach worse than she does.  Of an evening I wrote drivel for the papers.  We were, every one of us, useless and miserable.  At last one day I said—­”

“You did!” interrupted his father.  “You may live to be a hundred, you’ll never say anything so wise again.”

“I said:  ‘Look here!  How many lives have we?’ ‘One,’ replied father.  ‘What are we alive for?’ ‘I don’t know,’ replied father.  ’Neither do I; only I know that life’s not worth living as we live it.  Let’s go into the country.’”

“I beg your pardon, Gabriel,” interrupted his father again; “it was not quite so, it was better than that.  The boy lectured me, Miss Fletcher,—­pitched into me, and I deserved it.  He told me I was fifty-five and a fool for my years.  So I was.  There was I, grinding away,—­what for?  We never saw each other, we never saw the fields, we were selling all the joys of life for three farthings.  So we decided to drudge no more.  Gabriel would have continued, but I could not allow that; I wanted him here.  We found we should have just enough money to rent a cottage, buy body-covering and plain food.  So here we are.  And we are happy.  As Gabriel said, What is the use of toiling for more, when the unprofitable work that brings us a few extra shillings takes away our capacities for enjoying life?  Here we are, happy all day, eh, Gabriel?  He writes his poetry and devours his books, I devour mine, Jane devours hers; we are learning now all the beauties of Nature, and man’s best thoughts.  We are very happy.”

A vision of my present life flitted across me, like a cloud on a sunlit field.

“Oh!” said I, “how I envy you!  Nothing useless, not a clog about you, no stupid formalities, stifling luxuries, no daily lies and false duties.”

“Have you all these?” asked Gabriel.

“Not so badly as some people, but badly enough.  I have money, and no end of respectable relations.”

He laughed, and made a wry face.

When I found that it was time to wend my way home, Gabriel offered to walk with me.  I was very glad.  On the way out, he stopped in the hall and knocked half the things off the pegs.

“Beloved aunt!” he cried, “there used to be a hat somewhere!”

I assured him that he need not discomfort himself for my sake, and he bounded forth bareheaded, with a yell of exultation.  On the road we had a long and somewhat warm discussion on suicide, which was started by an essay of Montaigne’s he happened to be reading.  Every now and again he pulled the book from his pocket and read me extracts, until it was too dark to see; even then he once struck a match to find a passage.