nd the public, I suppose, have read them. I have dressed up
puppets of wood and stone, and set them moving like mechanical
dolls--over-gilded, artificial, vulgar. And all the time the real thing
knocks at our doors."

Mabane stepped back from his canvas to examine critically the effect of
an unexpected dash of colour.

"The public, my dear Greatson," he said abstractedly, "do not want the
real thing--from you. Every man to his _metier_. Yours is to sing of
blue skies and west winds, of hay-scented meadows and Watteau-like
revellers in a paradise as artificial as a Dutch garden. Take my advice,
and keep your muse chained. The other worlds are for the other writers."

I was annoyed with Mabane. There was just sufficient truth in his words
to make them sound brutal. I answered him with some heat.

"Not if I starve for it, Allan? The whole cycle of life goes humming
around us, hour by hour. It is here, there, everywhere. I will bring a
little of it into my work, or I will write no more."

Mabane shook his head. He was busy again upon his canvas.

"It is always the humourist," he murmured, "who is ambitious to write a
tragedy--and _vice versa_. The only sane man is he who is conscious of
his limitations."

"On the contrary," I answered quickly, "the man who admits them is a
fool. I have made up my mind. I will dress no more dolls in fine
clothes, and set them strutting across a rose-garlanded stage. I will
create, or I will leave alone. I will write of men and women, or not at
all."

"It will affect your income," Mabane said. "It will cost you money in
postage stamps, and your manuscripts will be declined with thanks."

His gentle cynicism left me unmoved. I had almost forgotten his
presence. I was standing over by the window, looking out across a
wilderness of housetops. My own thoughts for the moment were sufficient.
I spoke, it is true, but I spoke to myself.

"A beginning," I murmured. "That is all one wants. It seems so hard, and
yet--it ought to be so easy. If one could but lift the roofs--could but
see for a moment underneath."

"I can save you the trouble," Mabane remarked cheerfully, strolling over
to my side. "Where are you looking? Chertsey Street, eh? Well, in all
probability mamma is cooking the dinner, Mary is scrubbing the floor,
Miss Flora is dusting the drawing-room, and Miss Louisa is practising
her scales. You have got a maggot in your brain, Greatson. Life such as
you are thinking of is the m