He had
been working hard ever since nine o'clock in the morning; but now nobody
could have looked more superlatively lazy than Bastian Cautley as he
stretched himself on two armchairs in an attitude of reckless ease. His
very intellect (the most unrestful part of him) was at rest; all his
weary being merged in a confused voluptuous sensation, a beatific state
in which smoking became a higher kind of thinking, and thought betrayed
an increasing tendency to end in smoke. The room was double-walled with
book-shelves, and but for the far away underground humming of a happy
maidservant the house was soundless. He rejoiced to think that there was
not a soul in it above stairs to disturb his deep tranquility. At six
o'clock he would have to take his legs off that chair, and get into a
frock-coat; once in the frock-coat he would become another man, all
patience and politeness. After six there would be no pipe and no peace
for him, but the knocking and ringing at his front door would go on
incessantly till seven-thirty. There was flattery in every knock, for it
meant that Dr. Cautley was growing eminent, and that at the ridiculously
early age of nine-and-twenty.
There was a sharp ring now. He turned wearily in his chairs.
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