Chapter V
Cope Is Considered Further
Randolph took the stairs to the second floor, and presently his footfalls were heard on the bare treads that led from the second to the third. At the top landing he paused and looked in through the open door of the picture-gallery.
Over the varnished oak floor of this roomy apartment a middle-aged man who wore a green shade above his eyes was propelling himself in a wheeled chair. Thus did Joseph Foster cover the space where the younger and more fortunate sometimes danced, and thus did he move among works of art which, even on the brightest days, he could barely see.
He knew the step. "Brought anything?" he asked.
He depended on Randolph for the latest brief doings in current fiction; and usually in the background—and often long in abeyance—was something in the way of memoirs or biography, many-volumed, which could fill the empty hours either through retrospect or anticipation.
"Only myself," replied the other, stepping in. Foster dextrously manœuvred his chair toward the entrance and reached out his hand.
"Well, yourself is enough. It's good to have a man
about the place once in a while. Once in a while, I
45
