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a small table covered with photographs, and two discreet chairs. Here about the middle of the evening I found myself sitting beside the neat grey whiskers of Mr. Austin, of all whiskers in the world! I have not the least idea how I got there. I supposed at the moment that I was entertaining him as a matter of duty, but it has since occurred to me that he may have guided my unconscious steps to a quiet corner where he could say something he had to say, uninterruptedly. I was not paying much attention to his conversation, but dreamily gathered its import mixed with the sound of music and the hum of voices in the different rooms. Clare was playing some of Beethoven’s waltzes in the drawing-room, and whenever I hear that particular waltz I have a curious visionary recollection of a scene in my very early childhood, which, however, has no earthly connection with the music. So many years ago I was driving with my father over one of the boundless inland plains of Australia. It was evening of a sultry day. One huge camel-shaped mountain lay like some Titanic shape crouched darkly against the sunset, guarding the empty crater and grassgrown hearth of the ancient volcano. The dry warm wind blew endlessly over the plains, and faintly rustled the carpet of white everlast-