'll be running a one-man tailor
shop in some burg about the size of Schoenstrom."

"He will not!"

"That's what he's headed for now all right, and he's twenty-five or -six
and----What's he done to make you think he'll ever be anything but a
pants-presser?"

"He has sensitiveness and talent----"

"Wait now! What has he actually done in the art line? Has he done one
first-class picture or--sketch, d' you call it? Or one poem, or played
the piano, or anything except gas about what he's going to do?"

She looked thoughtful.

"Then it's a hundred to one shot that he never will. Way I understand
it, even these fellows that do something pretty good at home and get to
go to art school, there ain't more than one out of ten of 'em, maybe one
out of a hundred, that ever get above grinding out a bum living--about
as artistic as plumbing. And when it comes down to this tailor, why,
can't you see--you that take on so about psychology--can't you see that
it's just by contrast with folks like Doc McGanum or Lym Cass that this
fellow seems artistic? Suppose you'd met up with him first in one of
these reg'lar New York studios! You wouldn't notice him any more 'n a
rabbit!"

She huddled over folded hands like a temple virgin shivering on her
knees before the thin warmth of a brazier. She could not answer.

Kennicott rose quickly, sat on the couch, took both her hands. "Suppose
he fails--as he will! Suppose he goes back to tailoring, and you're his
wife. Is that going to be this artistic life you've been thinking about?
He's in some bum shack, pressing pants all day, or stooped over sewing,
and having to be polite to any grouch that blows in and jams a dirty
stinking old suit in his face and says, 'Here you, fix this, and be
blame quick about it.' He won't even have enough savvy to get him a big
shop. He'll pike along doing his own work--unless you, his wife, go help
him, go help him in the shop, and stand over a table all day, pushing a
big heavy iron. Your complexion will look fine after about fifteen years
of baking that way, won't it! And you'll be humped over like an old
hag. And probably you'll live in one room back of the shop. And then
at night--oh, you'll have your artist--sure! He'll come in stinking
of gasoline, and cranky from hard work, and hinting around that if it
hadn't been for you, he'd of gone East and been a great artist. Sure!
And you'll be entertaining his relatives----Talk about Uncle Whit!
You'll be having