He feverishly began a drawing for the Knickerbocker the next morning. Craig, the art editor, had said that he could use six drawings as good as the two he was shown, and they had decided on scenes that would give variety to the series. But that was before a Teevan had come into his life, and now he had lost a month in the dream of satisfying that patron critic.
It was good to prove that he could still draw in his own way; he had suffered so long in that rage of impotence; and he kept to the work until dusk, making no stop for food, even when the noise of falling bodies came to mark the luncheon hour.
When Teevan sauntered in at six the two went to dine at a restaurant. Ewing had no longer dreaded the meeting. He was ready to show Teevan that there had been no true failure. But Teevan merely listened to the bare outline of fact as they threaded a way through the evening crowd. He made no comment, and Ewing thought this might be due to the difficulty of conversing in a noisy street.
But after ordering dinner with a nice deliberation, Teevan spoke determinedly of other matters. Ewing ventured a humorous reference to his despair when he left the school, meaning to compel the inference that he no longer despaired. Teevan languidly mentioned a violinist he had heard the evening before.
"—Two Bach numbers, the suite in F minor rather exquisitely done. Bach wrote tremendously well for the fiddle. Technical skill in the performer, you ask? Yes, entirely adequate; indeed, he gave rather a warm reading, really not lacking a certain elevation of style, even a nobility of utterance. That was quite all of interest, though. The Dvorak humoresque—a thing transcribed from a piano piece and made sentimental—has one of those effective passages in double notes, certain to win an encore from the mob; and the twenty-fourth caprice of Paganini was merely a smart exhibition of harmonic playing—mere squibs and firecrackers and rockets, the veriest fireworks. Ah, it's small wonder the world has so few artists when it demands so little." And Teevan sighed significantly.
Ewing was chilled by this avoidance of himself, though he could not yet believe it intentional.
"I haven't given up," he declared, by way of reminding Teevan. "You shall see that I'm stubborn."
Teevan affected to study a group of diners at a neighboring table as he replied:
"Oh, yes, I gather that you left the school when you found it difficult."
"But you see——"