"What does food matter?" he expostulated. "What does anything else in the world matter?"
Nevertheless, he was eager to take up my suggestion concerning the writing of a booklet upon his new craft and he has been sending it out broadcast. But so intensely devotional is his attitude to the whole business that I have not the face to suggest payment for the work, nor has he referred to it again. I know little of his art, but I know that his returns are increasing. It is obvious that I cannot burden a soul, burning with that gemlike flame of Blackden's, with any such confidence as the impending return of Pendleton. At times I think that Minot Blackden and Gertrude Bayard ought to marry each other. They are both so single-minded and so absolutely sure of themselves. But in the meantime there is no one I can talk to.
No—absolutely no one.
Walking to Grand Central station these brilliant afternoons is a thing I cannot resist. It is the only exercise I get. Crossing Washington Square, I strike into Fifth Avenue and by the time I reach Fourteenth Street I have a delicious sense of losing myself, of merging into the crowd, that is very soothing after a day in the office. There is nothing so stimulating as the energetic crowd in Fifth Avenue. At Brentano's bookstore I usually pause and scrutinize the window. I am very sound in the latest novels and the newest developments in stationery.
To-day, as my eyes were feasting on the cover jacket of Mr. Arnold Bennett's latest, a lady coming down the avenue likewise paused before the window and as we glanced at each other I found I was facing Gertrude. Of course she had a perfect right to cut me. She smiled uncertainly instead and put out her hand.
"Hello, Ranny," she murmured casually. "No reason why we can't meet as friends, is there?"
"Not the least in the world," I returned hastily. "Why should there be?"
"I didn't know—but of course you always were a sensible person."
I grinned in my guilty fashion.
"How is everything?" she continued brightly. "I heard—about your firm. You in business now?"