“You’ve given me something to think about.” He rose.
“But I haven’t asked you yet what I was going to. Will you do a play for us?”
“I can’t do plays!”
“Oh, yes, you can. You write poetry and stories and things, don’t you?”
“Do I give myself away as plainly as that?”
The girl laughed. “You ought to know that an institution like this is a gathering place for idealists of all sorts and kinds. I know the chief varieties, and you aren’t any of the sociological sorts, so you must be one of the artist kind. Besides, didn’t I hear you talk at dinner?”
Felix grinned shamefacedly. “I didn’t disguise myself very well,” he admitted. “But anyway—”
He walked impatiently across the little room. His mind was in a state of strange upheaval. All his ideas about Chicago and himself were being upset. He ought not to listen to this girl. He must not let her confuse his plans. In particular he must not become interested in writing. He had put all that aside for the present.
His lips twisted in an uneasy grimace. Why, at this moment, when his mind must be braced to meet the impact of realities, should he let himself be drugged with the opium of dreams?
Already, at her mere word, the old numbing desire had come in a new guise—a vague, feverish yearning toward the puppet-world of the stage: fascinating half-formed ideas for plays rose like bubbles in his mind.