"What are you talking about?" asked Bishop. "Here's your drink. Dip your muzzle into that and - "
"The day will come when we are old to them, when we don't amuse them any longer. When we become passй. We can't keep thinking up new tricks. Take my painting, for example - "
"See here," said Bishop, "you're talking way above my head."
"See me a week from now," she said. "The name's Maxine. Just ask to see Maxine. A week from now, we can talk together. So long, Buster."
She floated off the stool and suddenly was gone.
She hadn't touched her drink.
8
He went up to his rooms and stood for a long time at a window, staring out into the featureless landscape lighted by a moon.
Wonder thundered in his brain, the wonder and the newness and the many questions, the breathlessness of finally being here, of slowly coming to a full realization of the fact that he was here, that he was one of that glittering, fabulous company he had dreamed about for years.
The long grim years peeled off him, the years of books and study, the years of determined driving, the hungry, anxious, grueling years when he had lived a monkish life, mortifying body and soul to drive his intellect.