He turned his eyes down at the last words and shook his head. He had perhaps heard some old lady use the same expression.
“This is the spirit,” said another, “who flung down a challenge at the gate of heaven and expected to escape the fire of hell.”
The sudden onslaught would in another place and at another time have provoked me to some answer, but I felt myself incapable of it. I was learning still further that every prisoner here simply endures—having no power, sometimes feeling no wish, to retaliate. This latter was the case with me. I felt a certain coldness clinging round me which numbed the sharper edge of feeling, so I sat there apparently indifferent to their scoffing, and felt inwardly the same.
Following this outburst Plucritus rose, laughing.
“I must go,” he observed. “It is growing late. Genius, I must leave you, but I shall return ere long. Till then, think upon my offer of the ring.”
“Genius?” cried he who had first spoken, “Is this Genius?”
“That cannot be,” exclaimed another, solemnly. “He has produced nothing in blank verse.”
“It’s out of fashion,” urged another. “Love-letters are all that are needed nowadays.”
“You’re getting behind the times,” said another, talking at random. “Read the Daily Scorcher.”
“Is that written in blank verse?”