"
"How do you know?"
"Well, I shouldn't have done, but for an old letter I turned up by
chance the other day. How old are you?"
"Five-and-twenty."
"H'm. I am sixty-nine. You'll be a wiser man when you get to my age.
--Well, if you can find room anywhere for that book there, perhaps
you'd like to keep it!"
Waymark looked up in astonishment.
"A birthday present!" he exclaimed. "It's ten years since I had one.
Upon my word, I don't well know how to thank you!"
"Do you know what the thing was published at?" asked Abraham in an
off-hand way.
"No."
"Fifty pounds."
"I don't care about the value. It's the kindness. You couldn't have
given me anything, either, that would have delighted me so much."
"All right; keep it, and there's an end of the matter. And what do
you do with yourself all day, eh? I didn't think it very likely I
should find you in."
"I'm writing a novel."
"H'm. Shall you get anything for it?"
"Can't say. I hope so."
"Look here. Why don't you go in for politics?"
"Neither know nor care anything about them."
"Would you like to go into Parliament?"
"Wouldn't go if every borough in England called upon me to-morrow?"
"Why not?"
"Plainly, I think myself too good for such occupation.
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