"
"Are your parents living?"
"No."
"Were they healthy?"
"Fit as fiddles."
"And your grandparents?"
"Perfect bear-cats. I remember my grandfather at the age of about a
hundred or something like that spanking me for breaking his pipe. I
thought it was a steam-hammer. He was a wonderfully muscular old
gentleman."
"Excellent."
"By the way," said Kirk casually, "my life _is_ insured."
"Very sensible. There has been no serious illness in your family at
all, then, as far as you know?"
"I could hunt up the records, if you like; but I don't think so."
"Consumption? No? Cancer? No? As far as you are aware, nothing? Very
satisfactory."
"I'm glad you're pleased."
"Are you married?"
"Good Lord, no!"
"At your age you should be. With your magnificent physique and
remarkable record of health, it is your duty to the future of the race
to marry."
"I'm not sure I've been worrying much about the future of the race."
"No man does. It is the crying evil of the day, men's selfish
absorption in the present, their utter lack of a sense of duty with
regard to the future. Have you read my 'Dawn of Better Things'?"
"I'm afraid I read very few novels."
"It is not a novel. It is a treatise on the need for implanting a sense
of personal duty to the future of the race in the modern young man.
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