"If there's any romance in a man himself, he's apt to find the world rather full of it."
"Do you mean to say there isn't any romance in me?" demanded George Z. Green hotly.
"I don't know, George. Is there?"
"Plenty. Pl-en-ty! I'm always looking for romance. I look for it when I go down town to business; I look for it when I go home. Do I find it? No! Nothing ever happens to me. Nothing beautiful and wealthy beyond the dreams of avarice ever tries to pick me up. Explain that!"
Williams, much abashed, ventured no explanation.
"And to think," continued Green, "that you, my old school friend, should become a celebrity merely by writing such stories! Why, you're as celebrated as any brand of breakfast food!"
"You don't have to read my books, you know," protested Williams mildly.[198]
"I don't have to—I know it. But I do. Everybody does. And nobody knows why. So, meeting you again after all these unromantic years, I thought I'd just ask you whether by any chance you happen to know of any particular section of the city where a plain, everyday broker might make a hit with the sort of girl you write about. Do you?"
"Any section of this city is romantic enough—if you only approach it in the proper spirit," asserted Williams.
"You mean if my attitude toward romance is correct I'm likely to encounter it almost anywhere?"