"A challenge? Take care! The gods are always listening."
"I know that. I am not afraid."
"So be it, then! I'll watch the duel. But what road do you follow—music? literature? Art of some sort, of course; you are artist all over."
Again the fire leaped to the boy's eyes. He snatched his hand away in quick excitement.
"Look! I will show you!"
With the swiftness of lightning he whipped a pencil from his pocket, pushed aside his coffee-cup, and began to draw upon the marble-topped table as though his life depended upon his speed.
For ten minutes he worked feverishly, his face intensely earnest, his head bent over his task, a lock of dark hair drooping across his forehead; then he looked up, throwing himself back in his chair and gazing up at his companion with the egotistical triumph—the intense, childish satisfaction of the artist in the first flush of accomplished work.
"Look! Look, now, at this!"
The Irishman laughed sympathetically; the artist, as belonging to a race apart, was known by him and liked, but he rose and came round the table with a certain scepticism. Life had taught him that temperament and output are different things.
He leaned over the boy's chair; then suddenly he laid his hand on his shoulder and gripped it, his own face lighting up.