“Stop declaiming those self-written press notices of your unapproachable superiority,” Larry interrupted.  “If you use your breath up like that you’ll drown on dry land.  Besides, I just heard something better than this mere articulated air of yours.  Better because from a person in her senses.”

“Heard it from whom?”

“Miss Sherwood.”

“Miss Sherwood!  What did she say?”

“That you were a really great painter.”

“Huh!” snorted Hunt.  “Why shouldn’t she say that?  I’ve proved it!”

“Hunt,” said Larry evenly, “you are the greatest painter I ever met, but you also have the distinction of being the greatest of all damned fools.”

“What’s that, young fellow?”

“You love Miss Sherwood, don’t you?  At least you’ve the same as told me that in words, and you’ve told me that in loud-voiced actions every time you’ve seen her.”

“Well—­what if I do?”

“If you had the clearness of vision that is in the glassy eye of a cold boiled lobster you would see that she feels the same way about you.”

“See here, Larry”—­all the boisterous quality had gone from Hunt’s voice, and it was low-pitched and a bit unsteady—­“I don’t mind your joshing me about myself or my painting, but don’t fool with me about anything that’s really important.”

“I’m not fooling you.  I’m sure Miss Sherwood feels that way.”

“How do you know?”

“I’ve got a pair of eyes that don’t belong to a cold boiled lobster.  And when I see a thing, I know I see it.”

“You’re all wrong, Larry.  If you’d heard what she said to me less than a year ago—­”

“You make me tired!” interrupted Larry.  “You two were made for each other.  She’s waiting for you to step up and talk man’s talk to her—­ and instead you sulk in your tent and mumble about something you think she might have thought or said a year ago!  You’re too sensitive; you’re too proud; you’ve got too few brains.  It’s a million dollars to one that in your handsome, well-bred way you’ve fallen out with her over something that probably never existed and certainly doesn’t exist now.  Forget it all, and walk right up and ask her!”

“Larry, if I thought there was a chance that you are right—­”

“A single question will prove whether I’m right!”

Hunt did not speak for a moment.  “I guess I’ve never seen my part of it all in the way you put it, Larry.”  He stood up, his whole being subdued yet tense.  “I’m going to slide back into town and think it all over.”

Larry followed him an hour later, bent on routine business of the Sherwood estate.  Toward seven o’clock he was studying the present decrepitude and future possibilities of a row of Sherwood apartment houses on the West Side, when, as he came out of one building and started into another, a firm hand fell upon his shoulder and a voice remarked: 

“So, Larry, you’re in New York?”