rld went
grinding on from day to day....

Never had life been so sweet, never had he been so successful, never
had he had so much money, never had he been so exquisitely cared for,
never had so many doors been open to him, never had such pleasant
things been said of him! He went to bed singing, and singing he awoke
in the morning, but in her heart Clara was anxious and suspicious of
London, most suspicious of the artists and literary men who thronged
the house, and gathered at the elaborate supper which Charles insisted
on giving every Sunday night. They were too denunciatory, too much
aloof, too proud of their aloofness, and talked too much. She thought
Charles too good for them and said so.

'Art is a brotherhood,' he said magnificently, 'and the meanest of the
brethren is my equal.'

'That is no reason why you should be familiar with them. You cheapen
yourself. Besides it is a waste of time.... A lot of people never do
anything, and--I don't like it.'

'Ho! ho! Are you in revolt, chicken?'

'I don't want you to fritter away what you have got. It isn't worth
while to spend money on people who can do nothing for you.'

'I don't want anybody to do anything for _me_. It is for art.'

'But they don't understand that. They think all sorts of wonderful
things are going to happen through you.'

'So they are.... Hasn't it been wonderful so far?'

'For us. Yes.'

'Wasn't the exhibition a great success?'

'Yes.'

'Very well then.'

'But you only sold the work you have done during the last ten years.
It is the work you are doing now that matters. What work are you
doing?'

'Plenty--plenty. Mr Clott sends out not less than forty letters a day.
And I have just invented some beautiful designs for _Volpone_.'

'Is it going to be done?'

'It will be when they see my designs.'

Clara bit her lip. This was precisely what she had hoped to scotch by
coming to London. In Paris he had made marvellous designs. Artists
had come to look at them and then they had been put away in a portfolio.

'What I want,' said he, 'is a patron, some one who, having made his
money in soap, or pills, or margarine, wishes to make reparation
through art.... Michael Angelo had a patron and I ought to have one,
so that I can do for my theatre what he did for the Sistine Chapel.'

They didn't build the Sistine Chapel for him.'

'No.... N--o,' he mumbled.

'Don't you see that things are different _now_, Charles. Every