XII. — THE STATESMAN AND THE SUMMER-HOUSE
At this point of the conversation that particular corner of the garden was filled with the broad and breezy presence of Julian Archer in resplendent evening dress; he entered with a swing and then stopped dead, staring at Michael Herne.
“I say,” he cried, “are you never going to change.”
Perhaps the sixth repetition of this single sentence was what drove the librarian of Seawood mad.
Anyhow he swung round, staring also, and suddenly cried out in a voice that rang down the garden path.
“No. I am never going to change.”
After glaring for a moment he went on “You all love change and live by change; but I shall never change. It was by change you fell; it is by this madness of change you go on falling. You had your happy moment, when men were simp
