Each felt aggrieved
that the other had not modified his habits to secure his society a
little longer; but as Roger voiced it in his thoughts:
'Always a stubborn beggar, Nick!'
And as Nicholas expressed it to himself:
'Cantankerous chap Roger--always was!'
There was little sentimentality about the Forsytes. In that great
London, which they had conquered and become merged in, what time had
they to be sentimental?
CHAPTER II--OLD JOLYON GOES TO THE OPERA
At five o'clock the following day old Jolyon sat alone, a cigar between
his lips, and on a table by his side a cup of tea. He was tired, and
before he had finished his cigar he fell asleep. A fly settled on his
hair, his breathing sounded heavy in the drowsy silence, his upper lip
under the white moustache puffed in and out. From between the fingers
of his veined and wrinkled hand the cigar, dropping on the empty hearth,
burned itself out.
The gloomy little study, with windows of stained glass to exclude the
view, was full of dark green velvet and heavily-carved mahogany--a suite
of which old Jolyon was wont to say: 'Shouldn't wonder if it made a big
price some day!'
It was pleasant to think that in the after life he could get more for
things than he had given.
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