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“You see, the situation has been complicated,” he answered slowly, with the voice of a loftily enervated teacher. “Complicated. I have tried to save a possible poet from death—always a noble but redundant proceeding—but it seems that his skin must burn. I’ve come back now to make his coffin and stud it with gold. Gold would seem to be a favorite metal of yours, my dear parents. Surely you will be satisfied now. And it is also possible that you may help me with the funeral arrangements, since this burial, unlike plebeian ones, may extend over several years. And what else do you want me to say? I have so many acrobatic words and they would love to perform for you, but I am tired to-night. True, I am a rascal. Can you forget that embarrassing challenge for one evening?”

He broke his stonelike repose into one forward motion as he leaned toward his parents, turning upon them the prominently somnolent eyes that had been the sole gift from his father’s face, and smiling like an exhausted but lightly poised angel. His parents were stunned, for their indignant assurance had suddenly recoiled from an unexpected, blank wall. They could not quite understand his words and yet they felt that he was mocking them. The gracious glibness of his voice dwarfed them with the mystery of its meanings. This monster was not ashamed of himself—what could it signify? But, after all, it was rather difficult to be angry at a man when you were not quite sure whether his words were flattering or sneers. Carl rose abruptly from the chair. Now he controlled the situation for a time. He kissed his mother’s forehead lightly and smiled at his father.