Chapter 10

I had a pretty bad night after that, and was not much in the mood for
Fox on the morrow. The sight of her had dwarfed everything; the thought
of her disgusted me with everything, made me out of conceit with the
world--with that part of the world that had become my world. I wanted to
get up into hers--and I could not see any way. The room in which Fox sat
seemed to be hopelessly off the road--to be hopelessly off any road to
any place; to be the end of a blind alley. One day I might hope to
occupy such a room--in my shirt-sleeves, like Fox. But that was not the
end of my career--not the end that I desired. She had upset me.

"You've just missed Polehampton," Fox said; "wanted to get hold of your
'Atmospheres.'"

"Oh, damn Polehampton," I said, "and particularly damn the
'Atmospheres.'"

"Willingly," Fox said, "but I told Mr. P. that you were willing if...."

"I don't want to know," I repeated. "I tell you I'm sick of the
things."

"What a change," he asserted, sympathetically, "I _thought_ you would."

It struck me as disgusting that a person like Fox should think about me
at all. "Oh, I'll see it through," I said. "Who's the next?"

"We've got to have the Duc de Mersch now," he answered, "De Mersch as
State Founder--written as large as you can--all across the page. The
moment's come and we've got to rope it in, that's all. I've been
middling good to you.... You understand...."

He began to explain in his dark sentences. The time had come for an
energetically engineered boom in de Mersch--a boom all along the line.
And I was to commence the campaign. Fox had been good to me and I was to
repay him. I listened in a sort of apathetic indifference.

"Oh, very well," I said. I was subconsciously aware that, as far as I
was concerned, the determining factor of the situation was the
announcement that de Mersch was to be in Paris. If he had been in his
own particular grand duchy I wouldn't have gone after him. For a moment
I thought of the interview as taking place in London. But
Fox--ostensibly, at least--wasn't even aware of de Mersch's visit; spoke
of him as being in Paris--in a flat in which he was accustomed to
interview the continental financiers who took up so much of his time.

I realised that I wanted to go to Paris because she was there. She had
said that she was going to Paris on the morrow of yesterday. The name
was pleasant to me, and it turned the scale.

Fox's eyes remained upon my face.

"Do you good, eh?" he dimly interpreted my thoughts. "A run over. I
thought you'd like it and, look here,