'No.... N--o,' he mumbled.
'Don't you see that things are different _now_, Charles. Everything
has to pay nowadays, and there aren't great public works for artists to
do. Michael Angelo was an engineer as well.... You couldn't design a
theatre without an architect now, could you?'
'Why should I when there are architects to do it?' He was beginning to
get angry.
'If you could you would be able to carry out your own theories as
well.... People want something more than drawings on paper....'
'You talk as though I had done nothing.'
'It has been too easy.... Appreciation is so easy for the kind of
people who come here. It costs nothing, and they get a good deal in
return.'
'Don't you worry about me, chick. I'm a great deal more practical than
you suppose.'
'I only want to know,' she said, rising to leave the room, 'because, if
you are not going to work, I must.'
'My dearest child,' he shouted, 'don't be so impatient. It is only a
question of time. My book is not out yet. We are arranging for the
reviews now. When that is done then the ball will really be set
rolling.'
'To be quite frank with you,' retorted Clara. 'I hate it all being on
paper. I am going to learn acting, and I'm going on the stage to find
out what the theatre is like.... I don't see how else I can help you,
and if I can't help you I must leave you.'
He protested loudly against that, so loudly and so vehemently that she
pounced and, with her eyes blazing, told him that she intended to make
her own career, and that whether it fitted in with his depended
entirely upon himself.
'I won't have you wasted,' she cried, 'I won't. It has been going on
too long, this writing down on paper, and drawing designs on paper, and
now with all these columns about you in the papers you look like being
smothered in paper. You might as well be a politician or an
adventurer--You have no passion.'
'I! No passion!'
'On paper. The world's choked with paper, and London is stifled with
it. My grandfather told me that. He spent his life travelling and
reading old books--running away from it. I'm not going to run away
from it, and I am not going to let you be smothered by it----'
'How long has this been simmering up in you?'
'Ever since that first day when you were interviewed.... We're not
living our own lives at all, but the lives dictated to us by this
ridiculous machinery that turns out papers ten times a day. We're----'
'Very well,' said Charles submissively. 'What do you want me to do?'
'I want you to keep your appointment with Sir Henry Butcher.'
He pulled a long face.
'You'll hate it, I know,' she added, 'but there is the theatre, and
you've got to make the best of it. I dare say Michael Angelo didn't
care particularly for the Sistine Chapel.'