But he was not frightened by New York. He knew that this city, of which he was an integral part because he had been born of the stock that had settled it--this city whose bold new growth had been conceived in the brains of a body of men like himself--was a cruel city and would cast him out if he lagged; but he was sure that he would not lag and that he and the city understood each other. He gave a positively affectionate glance from the window and said, under his breath, “The poor old town! The poor bastard!” I knew that he thought us the monsters who did not understand. And yet, Eva had hurt him through the medium of every brick in every great new structure. Through the smoke of my cigarette, I studied him. By his attitude towards what Eva had done he was lying. With him, I fancied, nervousness took the form of an inability to do any creative work at all. But in what he next said he went back to our interchange of remarks on the storming of the fortress by the authors. “You people who come into New York are so marvellous! Such energy! Such apparent ignorance that you could possibly fail to conquer! It’s amazing. I’ve noticed about Eva that she can and does turn on to her work the full force of her storming rages--I don’t mean that in the least the way it sounds, however; but she does tear around the house and bemoan herself--well, then,” he pushed on, now thoroughly involved and, I saw, desperately taking the way out of telling all, “I remember once when she had asked me to read proof sheets to her, and she was cutting up over quite minor mistakes, I assure you--saying that the printers had tampered with her words, and appealing to me in the most agonized way to know if I hadn’t an ear--and the telephone rang in that awfully annoying way it has, off and on, off and on; and she simply screamed to the maid to tell Winnie Conant that she was out--to tell her she was dead--to tell her anything. And, the point is, she gets ahead with her work in, and as a direct result of, her emotional upsets. Sometimes I’m appalled by her vital energy. But when it comes to turning some of that energy into the minutiæ of living she’s horrified at the interruption. She doesn’t,” he concluded helplessly, “open her mail for weeks at a time.” He appeared to look upon this as one of the most inscrutable things about his wife. I asked lazily: “Why should she? You’ve just said that you’re constantly surprised at the way in which her nervous force is made to serve the needs of her work. Why try to reform her? She knows what she’s about.” He stared. “But it isn’t I who is up to reforming! She’s putting her shoulder to the wheel of changing me!” I said to myself: “We’re getting at it!” I asked aloud: “What can you mean?”