In the pupils' room of the offices of Lucas & Enwright, architects, Russell Square, Bloomsbury, George Edwin Cannon, an articled pupil, leaned over a large drawing-board and looked up at Mr.Enwright, the head of the firm, who with cigarette and stick was on his way out after what he calleda good day's work. It was past six o'clock on an evening in early July 1901. To George's right was anopen door leading to the principals' room, and to his left another open door leading to more roomsand to the staircase. The lofty chambers were full of lassitude; but round about George, who wasworking late, there floated the tonic vapour of conscious virtue. Haim, the factotum, could be seenand heard moving in his cubicle which guarded the offices from the stairs. In the rooms shortly tobe deserted and locked up, and in the decline of the day, the three men were drawn together likesurvivors."I gather you're going to change your abode," said Mr. Enwright, having stopped."Did Mr. Orgreave tell you, then?" George asked."Well, he didn't exactly tell me...."John Orgreave was Mr. Enwright's junior partner; and for nearly two years, since his advent inLondon from the Five Towns, George had lived with Mr. and Mrs. Orgreave at Bedford Park. TheOrgreaves, too, sprang from the Five Towns. John's people and George's people were closelyentwined in the local annals.Pupil and principal glanced discreetly at one another, exchanging in silence vague, malicious, unutterable critical verdicts upon both John Orgreave and his wife."Well, I am!" said George at length."Where are you going to?""Haven't settled a bit," said George. "I wish I could live in Paris.""Paris wouldn't be much good to you yet," Mr. Enwright laughed benevolently."I suppose it wouldn't. Besides, of course--"George spoke in a tone of candid deferential acceptance, which flattered Mr. Enwright very much, for it was the final proof of the prestige which the grizzled and wrinkled and peculiar Fellow andMember of the Council of the Royal Institute of British Architects had acquired in the estimation ofthat extremely independent, tossing sprig, George Edwin Cannon. Mr. Enwright had recently beenpaying a visit to Paris, and George had been sitting for the Intermediate Examination. "You can joinme here for a few days after the exam., if you care to," Mr. Enwright had sent over. It was George'sintroduction to the Continent, and the circumstances of it were almost ideal. For a week the deeply 6experienced connoisseur of all the arts had had the fine, eager, responsive virgin mind in his power.Day after day he had watched and guided it amid entirely new sensations. Never had Mr. Enwrightenjoyed himself more purely, and at the close he knew with satisfaction that he had put Paris in aproper perspective for George, and perhaps saved the youth from years of gropingmisapprehension. As for George, all his preconceived notions about Paris had been destroyed orshaken. In the quadrangles of the Louvre, for example, Mr. Enwright, pointing to the under part ofthe stone bench that foots so much of the walls, had said: "Look at that curve." Nothing else. Noecstasies about the sculptures of Jean Goujon and Carpeaux, or about the marvellous harmony ofthe East facade! But a flick of the cane towards the half-hidden moulding! And George had felt witha thrill what an exquisite curve and what an original curve and what a modest curve that curve was.