5
'We're printing that poem of yours in next month's Antichrist,' said Ravelston from his first–floor window.
Gordon, on the pavement below, affected to have forgotten the poem Ravelston was speaking about; he remembered it intimately, of course, as he remembered all his poems.
'Which poem?' he said.
'The one about the dying p********e. We thought it was rather successful.' Gordon laughed a laugh of gratified conceit, and managed to pass it off as a laugh of sardonic amusement.
'Aha! A dying p********e! That's rather what you might call one of my subjects. I'll do you one about an aspidistra next time.'
Ravelston's over–sensitive, boyish face, framed by nice dark–brown hair, drew back a little from the window.
'It's intolerably cold,' he said. 'You'd better come up and have so
