law. He had only to say: "I will not take the house in Manchester
Square," and nobody could thwart him. He powerfully desired not to take
it. There was no sensible reason why he should take it. And yet he would
take it, under the inexplicable compulsion of circumstances. In those
sombre hours he had a fellow-feeling for Oriental tyrants, who were
absolute autocrats but also slaves of exactly the same sinister force
that had gripped himself. He perceived that in practice there is no such
thing as an autocrat....

Not that his defeat in regard to the house really disturbed him. He
could reconcile himself to the house, despite the hateful complications
which it would engender. What disturbed him horribly was the drains
business, the Doy and Doy business, the Mimi business; he could see no
way out of that except through the valley of humiliation. He remembered,
with terrible forebodings, the remark of his daughter after she heard of
the heritage: "You'll never be as happy again."

When the household day began and the familiar comfortable distant noises
of domestic activity announced that the solar system was behaving much
as usual in infinite and inconceivable space, he decided that he was
too tired to be scientifically idle that day--even though he had a
trying-on appointment with Mr. Melchizidek. He decided, too, that he
would not get up, would in fact take everything lying down, would refuse
to descend a single step of the stairs to meet trouble. And he had a
great wish to be irritated and angry. But, the place seemed to be full
of angels who turned the other cheek--and the other cheek was
marvellously soft and bewitching.

Eve, Sissie (who had called), and Machin--they were all in a state of
felicity, for the double reason that Sissie was engaged to be married,