the familiar significance of the books. He smiles affectionately and his amused voice recites the words with a rhetorical resonance]
Sanctum Sanctorum!
[His voice takes on a monotonous musing quality, his eyes stare idly at his drifting thoughts]
How perfectly the Professor’s unique haven! . . .
[He smiles]
Primly classical . . . when New Englander meets Greek! . . .
[Looking at the books now]
He hasn’t added one book in years . . . how old was I when I first came here? . . . six . . . with my father . . . father . . . how dim his face has grown! . . . he wanted to speak to me just before he died . . . the hospital . . . smell of iodoform in the cool halls . . . hot summer . . . I bent down . . . his voice had withdrawn so far away . . . I couldn’t understand him . . . what son can ever understand? . . . always too near, too soon, too distant or too late! . . .
[His face has become sad with a memory of the bewildered suffering of the adolescent boy he had been at the time of his father’s death. Then he shakes his head, flinging off his thoughts, and makes himself walk about the room]
What memories on such a smiling afternoon! . . . this pleasant old town after three months . . . I won’t go to Europe again . . . couldn’t write a line there . . . how answer the fierce question of all those dead and maimed? . . . too big a job for me! . . .
[He sighs—then self-mockingly]
But back here . . . it is the interlude that gently questions . . . in this town dozing . . . decorous bodies moving with circumspection through the afternoons . . . their habits affectionately chronicled . . . an excuse for weav-