He knew perfectly well that he had developed this sudden turn for speculative thought because he was baulked of an appointment with a little variety actress.

That he should see through the little variety actress was not to be expected.

Poppy was in her nature impenetrable, woman being the ultimate fact, the inexorable necessity of thought.

Supposing the universe to be nothing more than a dance of fortuitous atoms, then Poppy, herself a fortuitous atom, led the dance; she was the whirligig centre towards which all things whirled.

No wonder that it made him giddy to think of her.
Suddenly out of its giddiness his brain conceived and instantly matured a plan.