“Then think about it now. Don’t spoil a fine work through artistic slackness and drift.”
“I like your enthusiasm.”
“You’d like my production better. Now, look here, I overheard Levis talking to Leonard Passmore about your play tonight. These are some of Passmore’s ideas. Tell me if you like ’em.”
Word for word he repeated the conversation of a couple of hours before.
“Were those your intentions, Mr. Quiltan?”
“No, not exactly.”
“What were?”
“I’m not a producer.”
“Of course you are not. You’re an author, and an author never knows where the good or bad in his own work lies. Your work is shining good—if the good can be brought out,—and you’d entrust it, without a thought, to a couple of merchants, with no more artistry or selection between ’em than a provincial auctioneer. Let me produce the play, and I’ll give you this—”
There was something dazzling in the sparkle of thoughts Wynne gave voice to as he discussed the possibilities of the play. He seemed to have grasped its living essence, and to have impregnated it with a spirit of higher worth than even the author had believed possible.