Osmond could not tell him Rose had been to see him.
"I might," he said, remembering her requisition.
"Come soon. Maybe you could put an oar in. She needs help, poor girl!"
"Help to Electra's favor?"
Peter nodded into the grass.
"You could do it better than I. You can do everything better. You mustn't forget, Pete, that you're the Fortunate Youth."
There was something wistful in his tone. It stirred in Peter old loyalties, old responses, and he immediately wondered what Osmond wanted of him that was not expressed. Osmond had made no emotional demands upon him, as to his profession, but Peter always had a sense that his brother was sitting by, watching the boiling of the pot. This was a cheerful companionship when the pot was active; not now, as it cooled. He threw out a commonplace at random, from his uneasy consciousness.
"Art isn't the biggest thing, old boy."
"What is?"
Now Peter rolled over again, and regarded him with glowing eyes. To Osmond, who was beginning to know his temperament better than he had known it in all the years of the lad's journey upon an upward track, that glance told of remembered phrases and a dominating personality that had made the phrases stick.