Upon a high plateau stood a tall white temple with smooth round pillars in front, and to it were drifting throngs of people who had journeyed from places all over the earth where art was loved and cherished; fashionable ones among them, but mostly art people, writers and critics, musicians, actors, producers — celebrities in such numbers that it was impossible to keep track of them. All Lanny's life he had heard their names, and here they were in the flesh. With two friends, a German boy slightly older than himself and an English boy older still, he wandered among the crowd in a state of eager delight.
“There he is!” one would whisper.
“Which?”
“The one with the pink flower.”
“Who is he?”
One of the older boys would explain. Perhaps it was a great blond Russian named Stanislavsky; perhaps a carelessly dressed Englishman, Granville Barker. The boys would stare, but not too openly or too long. It was a place of courtesy, and celebrities were worshiped but not disturbed. To ask for an autograph was a crudity undreamed of in the Dalcroze school.
The three were on the alert for the king of celebrities, who had promised to be present. They spied him at some distance, talking with two ladies. Others also had spied him, and were doing as the boys did, walking slowly past, inclining their ears in the hope of catching a stray pearl of wit or wisdom; then stopping a little way off, watching with half-averted gaze.
“His whiskers look like gold,” murmured Lanny.
“Whiskers?” queried Kurt, the German boy, who spoke English carefully and precisely. “I thought you say beard.”
“Whiskers are beard and mustaches both,” ventured Lanny, and then inquired: “Aren't they, Rick?”