about how young Bill,
as had a pure white soul, came to New York and had an 'orrible time
till his great novel was accepted. Authors seem to think they're the
only ones that have ideals. Now I'm in the automobile business, and I
help to make people get out into the country--bet a lot more of them
get out because of motoring than because of reading poetry about
spring. But if I claimed a temperament because I introduce the
motorist's soul to the daisy, every one would die laughing."

"But don't you think that art is the--oh, the object of civilization
and that sort of thing?"

"I do _not_! Honestly, Miss Winslow, I think it would be a good stunt
to get along without any art at all for a generation, and see what we
miss. We probably need dance music, but I doubt if we need opera.
Funny how the world always praises its opera-singers so much and pays
'em so well and then starves its shoemakers, and yet it needs good
shoes so much more than it needs opera--or war or fiction. I'd like to
see all the shoemakers get together and refuse to make any more shoes
till people promised to write reviews about them, like all these
book-reviews. Then just as soon as people's shoes began to wear out
they'd come right around, and you'd read about the new masterpieces of
Mr. Regal and Mr. Walkover and Mr. Stetson."

"Yes! I can imagine it. 'This laced boot is one of the most vital and
gripping and wholesome shoes of the season.' And probably all the
young shoemakers would sit around cafes, looking quizzical and
artistic. But don't you think your theory is dangerous, Mr. Ericson?
You give me an excuse for being content with being a commonplace
Upper-West-Sider. And aren't authors better than commonplaceness?
You're so serious that I almost suspect you of having started to be an
author yourself."

"Really not. As a matter of fact, I'm the kiddy in patched overalls
you used to play with when you kept house in the willows."

"Oh, of course! In the Forest of Arden! And you had a toad that you
traded for my hair-ribbon."

"And we ate bread and milk out of blue bowls!"

"Oh yes!" she agreed, "blue bowls with bunny-rabbits painted on them."

"And giants and a six-cylinder castle, with warders and a donjon keep.
And Jack the Giant-killer. But certainly bunnies."

"Do you really like bunnies?" Her voice caressed the word.

"I like them so much that when I think of them I know that there's one
thing worse than having a cut-rate literary sa