has grit and resource–who can even be unscrupulous on occasion–yes, look into a friend’s trunk and not feel too squeamish. I do need help; but could you go to extreme ends with me patiently and relentlessly? You hardly fill the bill, Hume.”

He had quoted almost Jacqueline’s words. He could have said nothing that would have touched me so deeply. I answered him impetuously:

60“St. Hilary, do you forget that it was you who made me a dreamer? It is you who first preached to me impossible ideals of beauty and art. And when I failed to reach those ideals, you laughed at me; you consoled me with sneers. If I had not a soul to appreciate art and beauty, there was still the sensuous Venice for me to enjoy. And so, month by month, I have sunk into the slough of materialism, until, at last, it is almost too late for me to shake myself free. First, the woman I love flaunts at the dilettante, and then it is my friend.”

60

He stared at me; then, rising, he walked over to where I sat and put his hand on my shoulder.

“What do you mean–that the woman you love has flaunted you?”

I told him quite simply. He passed his hand across his forehead.

“My dear, dear Hume,” he said affectionately, “forgive me. Love is a thing dead and past for me. I am in the sere leaf and brown. I had forgotten that love might come into your life. So your interest in the clock, after all, is simply that you wish to write a legend about it?”

“Yes.”

“Listen to me. Hume. I have a quest that demands patience, courage, faith, a will that is 61relentless. If I shared it with you, could you bring to it these qualities?”

61

“Try me,” I said firmly. “If it is a task that demands action, and if it concerns this clock, I am with you heart and soul.”

“It does concern the clock. But it is a hundred-to-one shot, with the odds all against us. If you fail, at least you will have your legend. If you succeed, you will share equally with myself. I have needed one for this quest in whose honesty I could have absolute faith. I have thought of you, but only to mistrust you. If I trust you now, will you follow where I shall lead?”

“Try me,” I said again.

62

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