“I am not beastly,” he said, “if you mean that.”
“I did mean that,” he said. “And I beg your pardon.”
Martin stood up.
“I think you had no right to suppose that,” he said.
“No, I had none. I did not suppose it. I warned you, though.”
A tenderness such as he had never known rose like a blush into his old bones, tenderness for this supreme talent that had been placed in his hands.
“I only warned you,” he said. “I looked for burglars under your bed, just because—because it is a boy like you that this stupid world tries to spoil. Aye, and it will try to spoil you. Women will make love to you. They will fall in love with you, too.”
“Things will be made poisonously pleasant for you,” he said. “You can without effort capture brilliant success. But remember all that you get without effort is not, from the point of view of art, conceivably worth anything. Remember also that nothing fine ever grew out of what is horrible. More than that, what is horrible sterilizes the soil,—that soil is you. You will never get any more if you spoil it or let it get sour or rancid. Horror gets rooted there, it devours all that might have been good, all that might have been of the best.”
There was a long silence. Then Karl stepped back and rang the bell. To Martin the silvery tinkle sounded remote. He certainly was thinking now.