"_You're_ not!" which remark made him laugh in a rather mirthless sort
of way, and he said:
"You don't know me, my child." Then, as if to change the subject: "But
now, what do you want to do? Where do you want to go?"
"I'd like to go to some big city in America," I said. "I think, if I
got a chance, I'd succeed as a poet or author."
"Oh, that's your idea, is it?" he asked half good-humoredly, half
rather cynically. I nodded.
"Well, what big city have you decided upon?"
"I don't know. You see, I know very little about the States."
"How about New York or Chicago?"
"Which is the nearest to you?" I asked, timidly.
He laughed outright at that.
"Oh, so you expect to see _me_, do you?"
"I _want_ to," I said. "You _will_ come to see me, won't you?"
"We'll see about it," he said slowly. "Then it's Chicago? I have
interests there." I nodded.
"And now," he went on, "how much money do you need?"
That question hurt me more than I suppose he would have believed.
Certainly I would need money to go to Chicago, but I hated to think of
taking any from him. I felt like a beggar. Young, poor, ignorant as
I was, even then I had an acute feeling of reluctance to permit any
sordid considerations to come between this man and me. I was so long in
answering him that he said lightly:
"Well, how many thousands or millions of shekels do you suppose it will
take to support a little poetess in Chicago?"