He leaned forward to look up through the window on her side of the motor. His arm rested for a moment against Diana's knee.

"Yes, there it is, in golden letters, on the marble slab! 'The earth is the Lord's, and the fulness thereof.' Wasn't it a grand idea? That those words should dominate this wonderful centre of the world's commerce, wealth, and enterprise. As if so great, so mighty, so influential a nation as our own, upon whose glorious flag the sun never sets, is yet humbly proud to look up and inscribe, in letters of gold, upon the very pinnacle of her supremacy: 'The earth is the Lord's!' All this wealth, all this power; these noble colonies, this world-encircling influence, may be mine; but—'The earth is the Lord's.'"

David's eyes glowed. "I am glad I have seen it once more. It is not so clear as when, holding tightly to my father's hand, I first looked up and saw it, twenty-two years ago. The letters are tarnished. If I were a rich man, I should like to have them regilt."

"You are a rich man," said Diana, smiling, "and it shall be done, David, if private enterprise is allowed the privilege."

"Ah, thanks," said David. "That would really please me. You must write and say whether it proved possible. Sometimes when alone, in the utter silence of our great expanse of jungle and forest, I like to picture the rush and rumble, the perpetual movement of this very heart of our grand old London, going on—on—on, all the time. It is my final farewell to it, to-day. Ah, here is the Mansion House. On the day my old dad showed me the Royal Exchange, we also saw the Lord Mayor's show. I remember I was much impressed. I fully intended then to be Lord Mayor, one day! I always used to imagine myself as being every important personage I admired."

"You remind me," said Diana, "of a very great man of whom it has been said that he never enjoys a wedding, because he cannot be the bride; and that he hates attending funerals, because he cannot be the corpse."

David laughed. "A clever skit on an undoubted trait," he said; "but that trait makes for greatness. All who climb high see themselves at the top of the tree, long before they get there." Then suddenly he remarked: "There won't be any éclat about my funeral. It will be a very simple affair; just a stowing away of the worn-out suit of clothes, under a great giant tree in our silent forests."

"Please don't be nasty," said Diana; and, though the words were abrupt, there was such a note of pain in her voice, that David turned and looked at her. There was also pain in her sweet grey eyes. David put out his hand, impulsively, and laid it on Diana's muff.