“Precisely, precisely,” said Mr. Albemarle in his juicy voice. He was a round, smooth, little man with a head like an egg; he spoke, he moved with a certain pomp, a butlerish gravity, that were evidently meant to be ducal. “That’s what I’ve set myself to recapture,” Lypiatt went on: “the size, the masterfulness of the masters.” He felt a warmth running through him as he spoke, flushing his cheeks, pulsing hotly behind the eyes, as though he had drunk a draught of some heartening red wine. His own words elated him, and drunkenly gesticulating, he was as though drunken. The greatness of the masters—he felt it in him. He knew his own power, he knew, he knew. He could do all that they had done. Nothing was beyond his strength. Egg-headed Albemarle confronted him, impeccably the butler, exacerbatingly serene. Albemarle too should be fired. He struck the table once more, he broke out again: “It’s been my mission,” he shouted, “all these years.” All these years.... Time had worn the hair from his temples; the high, steep forehead seemed higher than it really was. He was forty now; the turbulent young Lypiatt who had once declared that no man could do anything worth doing after he was thirty, was forty now. But in these fiery moments he could forget the years, he could forget the disappointments, the unsold pictures, the bad reviews. “My mission,” he repeated; “and by God! I feel, I know I can carry it through.” Warmly the blood pulsed behind his eyes. “Quite,” said Mr. Albemarle, nodding the egg. “Quite.” “And how small the scale is nowadays!” Lypiatt went on, rhapsodically. “How trivial the conception, how limited the scope! You see no painter-sculptor-poets, like Michelangelo; no scientist-artists, like Leonardo; no mathematician-courtiers, like Boscovitch; no impresario-musicians, like Handel; no geniuses of all trades, like Wren. I have set myself against this abject specialization of ours. I stand alone, opposing it with my example.” Lypiatt raised his hand. Like the statue of Liberty, standing colossal and alone. “Nevertheless,” began Mr. Albemarle. “Painter, poet, musician,” cried Lypiatt. “I am all three. I....” “... there is a danger of—how shall I put it—dissipating one’s energies,” Mr. Albemarle went on with determination. Discreetly, he looked at his watch. This conversation, he thought, seemed to be prolonging itself unnecessarily. “There is a greater danger in letting them stagnate and atrophy,” Lypiatt retorted. “Let me give you my experience.” Vehemently, he gave it.