“I never told you that I’ve been reading some of the ’steen thousand books in the library. I started it about a month ago. And somehow they’ve got me going.”
“No, you have not mentioned it,” his grace answered, and laughed a little. “You frequently fail to mention things. When first we knew each other I used to wonder if you were naturally a secretive fellow; but you are not. You always have a reason for your silences.”
“It took about ten years to kick that into me--ten good years, I should say.”
“I have often thought that if books attracted you the library would help you to get through a good many of the hundred and thirty-six hours a day you’ve spoken of, and get through them pretty decently,” commented the duke.
“That’s what’s happened,” Tembarom answered. “There’s not so many now. I can cut ’em off in chunks.”
He listened with much pleasure while Tembarom told him how it had begun and how it had gone on.
“I’d been having a pretty bad time one day. Strangeways had been worse--a darned sight worse--just when I thought he was better. I’d been trying to help him to think straight; and suddenly I made a break, somehow, and must have touched exactly the wrong spring. It seemed as if I set him nearly crazy. I had to leave him to Pearson right away. Then it poured rain steady for about eight hours, and I couldn’t get out and ‘take a walk.’ Then I went wandering into the picture-gallery and found Lady Joan there, looking at Miles Hugo. And she ordered me out, or blamed near it.”
“You are standing a good deal,” said the duke.
“Yes, I am--but so is she.” He set his hard young jaw, and stared once more at the velvet shadows.
“I tell you, for a fellow that knows nothing this novel-reading is an easy way of finding out a lot of things,” he resumed. “You find out what different kinds of people there are, and what different kinds of ways. If you’ve lived in one place, and been up against nothing but earning your living, you think that’s all there is of it--that it’s the whole thing. But it isn’t, by gee!” His air became thoughtful. “I’ve begun to kind of get on to what all this means”--glancing about him--“to you people; and how a fellow like T. T. must look to you. I’ve always sort of guessed, but reading a few dozen novels has helped me to see _why_ it’s that way. I’ve yelled right out laughing over it many a time. That fellow called Thackeray--I can’t read his things right straight through--but he’s an eye-opener.”