"So you have said good-bye to ambition?" asked Isabel, curiously. "I used to think you had a good deal."
"So I had. Once I was younger and knew less. Perhaps if I had ever done anything cleverer than a few dashing skits for the Bohemian Club, and somebody had patted me hard enough on the back, I might have made an ass of myself and crossed the continent in the wake of so many that have never been heard of since."
"I don't think you ever gave your creativeness a real chance. If you had shut yourself up in the country for a year—"
"I should have stayed a week. Scenery on a drop curtain is all I want of nature. No, Isabel." He relapsed into sadness for a moment. "I have travelled the logical road and simmered down into my place. It's just this: San Francisco breeds all sorts. A few are born with a drop of iron in their souls. They resist the climate, and the enchantment of the easy luxurious semi-idle life you can command out here on next to nothing, and clear out, and work hard, and make little old California famous. Where they get the iron from God knows. It's all electricity with the rest of us. There are hundreds of my sort. You've seen them at the real Bohemian restaurants; young men mad with life and the sense of their own powers; all of them writing, painting, composing, editing—mostly talking. Then at other tables the old-young men who have shrugged their shoulders and simmered down like myself; lucky if they haven't taken to drink or drugs to drown regrets. Still other tables—the young-old men, quite happy, and generally drunk. Business men and some professional are the only ones that forge steadily ahead; with precious few exceptions. But you don't see them often in the cheap Bohemian restaurants, which have a glamour for the young, and are a financial necessity for the failures. Never was such a high percentage of brains in any one city. But they must get out. And if they don't go young they don't go at all. San Francisco is a disease. You can't shake it off. And you don't want to. To Hades with ambition anyhow," he cried, gayly. "We can admire one another—and we've learned to, instead of knocking the life out of everybody else as we did a few years ago. Now we present the unique spectacle of a city packed to the brim with cleverness and always ready for more. We know how to appreciate. Vive la bagatelle. New York? Why, the spirit and brains would be drained out of nine-tenths of us trying to keep a roof over our heads, and nobody knowing we were there. No, sir. No, madam! The men in this town realize more and more when they are well off, and here is one of them." And he refilled his glass.
Isabel, not knowing that she had been listening to the litany of wasted lives, turned in disgust and cast about for an excuse to leave before Stone ordered another bottle of champagne. She encountered a gleam of amusement in Gwynne's eyes, and it seemed to transfer her to an empty auditorium, while mankind performed its little tricks on the stage for her sole benefit. It was a subtle tribute, and she blushed under it. She was also gratified to observe that Paula was boring him. But she glanced away, lest he should think she had forgiven him. At the same moment she saw a young man that had sat with his back to them, and opposite the famous Mrs. Hofer, suddenly push back his chair, rise to his feet, and look sharply at Gwynne. Then he came rapidly down the room, and Gwynne rose and met him as if lifted to his feet by the hospitality beaming from the large bright shrewd capable face of the Californian.
"This is Mr. Gwynne! Is it really?" he exclaimed, taking the stranger's hand in a large warm grasp. "I am Nicolas Hofer. Your mother wrote you? We have only been back a short time—I had intended running up to see you. I knew you for a Britisher the minute you entered the room, but the word was only just passed about who you were. Do—please—waive formality and lunch with me at my house to-morrow. Then we'll motor about a bit and I'll show you something of the city. Glad the fine weather holds out. No denial. I expect you." And he skilfully took himself off, before Gwynne should feel obliged to introduce him to his party.
"Now, what do you think of that for California manners, and the arrogance of the rich?" demanded Paula, triumphantly.
"Not a bit of it," replied Stone, amiably. "Man was in a hurry. Can't you see his wife waiting for him? Never knew a Californian to put on airs in my life." By this time his optimism was complete. "Only women imagine such things. There are as many poor as rich in San Francisco society. Only some of us are too poor, and Bohemia is better anyway. Well, let's hit the pike. This room is too hot for my head."