He paused.  The boat glided on.  For a long time neither spoke a word.

After a while Jack broke the silence:  “And are you dreaming of becoming the lyric mouth of the city, of giving utterance to all its yearnings, its ’dreams in iron and its thoughts of stone’?”

“No,” replied Ernest, simply, “not yet.  It is strange to what impressions the brain will respond.  In Clarke’s house, in the midst of inspiring things, inspiration failed me.  But while I was with that girl an idea came to me—­an idea, big, real.”

“Will it deal with her?”

Ernest smiled:  “Oh, no.  She personally has nothing to do with it.  At least not directly.  It was the commotion of blood and—­brain.  The air—­the change.  I don’t know what.”

“What will it be?” asked Jack, with interest all alert.

“A play, a wonderful play.  And its heroine will be a princess, a little princess, with a yellow veil.”

“What of the plot?”

“That I shall not tell you to-day.  In fact, I shall not breathe a word to any one.  It will take you all by surprise—­and the public by storm.”

“So it will be playable?”

“If I am not very much mistaken, you will see it on Broadway within a year.  And,” he added graciously, “I will let you have two box-seats for the first night.”

They both chuckled at the thought, and their hearts leaped within them.

“I hope you will finish it soon,” Jack observed after a while.  “You haven’t done much of late.”

“A similar reflection was on my mind when you came yesterday.  That accounts for the low spirits in which you found me.”

“Ah, indeed,” Jack replied, measuring Ernest with a look of wonder.  “But now your face is aglow.  It seems that the blood rushes to your head swifter at the call of an idea than at the kiss of a girl.”

“Thank God!” Ernest remarked with a sigh of relief.  “Mighty forces within me are fashioning the limpid thought.  Passion may grip us by the throat momentarily; upon our backs we may feel the lashes of desire and bathe our souls in flames of many hues; but the joy of activity is the ultimate passion.”

IX

It seemed, indeed, as if work was to Ernest what the sting of pleasure is to the average human animal.  The inter-play of his mental forces gave him the sensuous satisfaction of a woman’s embrace.  His eyes sparkled.  His muscle tightened.  The joy of creation was upon him.

Often very material reasons, like stone weights tied to the wings of a bird, stayed the flight of his imagination.  Magazines were waiting for his copy, and he was not in the position to let them wait.  They supplied his bread and butter.