"We'll sit indoors," I said. "It's pretty cool in the surgery."
He followed me into the room, glancing curiously about him.
"So this is where old Lennox hung out ... the place has a look of
him. What's that, butterflies? He always had a weakness for things
he could stick a pin into and label nicely!"
"Have you never been here before?"
"Never. He used to come to my place. I have an idea you know, that
Lennox still thinks I'm not right in the head."
I lit the student lamp on the table and set out whisky and a couple
of glasses. Lessing settled himself in the shabby armchair opposite
me, and for a little while we smoked in silence. In the half-shadow
beyond the ring of lamplight I could see his face, fine and clear cut
against the shabby morocco of the chair back, the dark hair tumbled
over his forehead. He was staring up at the smoke wreaths in a
curious intensity of abstraction.
"I suppose," he began at last, "that I owe you some sort of an
explanation, as things go."
I made a little gesture of indifference. I was beginning to know my
man. If it pleased him to work upon my curiosity I was prepared to
give him the least possible satisfaction.
"You offered me one," I corrected him. "I believe we decided to let
it go at that."
He turned his gaze upon me, with a rather charming impertinence.
"That was when I took you for a fool. As I admit the error you ought
to forgive my expression of it. The truth is..." He paused so long
that I reached for a fresh cigarette to break the interval. "I'll be
damned if I know what the truth is myself!" He finished almost
violently. "I can give you facts--all you want. When it comes to
putting things together.... Do you know how maddening it is to have
your hand on a thing--actually on it--and feel it all the while
slipping through your fingers?"
He threw his cigarette away. "Let's drop all this nonsense, anyway.
I came over here tonight to have a talk with you. I tell you
frankly, because you're about the only sane man I'm likely to cross
down here. I tried Lennox once, and Lennox thought I was batty, and
there the matter ended. But I've got to a point now where it's
absolutely necessary, for the sake of my own mental balance, that I
should have someone else's opinion about things. I'm going to put
certain facts before you, and you'll say what you think about them."