"And you want to compose?"
"When I know enough. Not till then."
"It takes something besides the knowing, to make a composer, Arlt," Thayer said warningly.
"I know. But I think I have something to say, when I am ready," the boy answered, with simple directness.
"But, if you wanted to study counterpoint, why didn't you say so? You knew I would lend you the money."
"Yes, you would give me everything; but I could never accept this."
"Why not?"
Arlt looked up, and even Thayer, well as he knew him, was surprised at the sudden concentration of character in the boy's face.
"One will be helped in the small things, never in accomplishing the real purpose of his life. Each one of us must work that out for himself. Then, if he succeeds or fails, at least the result is of his own making."
Dismissing four or five importunate cab drivers with a brief shake of his head, Thayer went striding away up the Avenue towards Miss Gannion's house. As he went, he was half-consciously applying Arlt's words to the question of his own future. It was true enough that he must work out his own real purpose for himself; and, in one sense the unsuccessful boy was happier by far than the successful man. Arlt's purpose was single. Thayer's was two-fold, and as yet he could not determine which of them would prove to be the dominant impulse of his life.