Hearts to mend?--oho--I do that, too! Truth is (_confidentially_), it’s come to be my main business. For if you’d believe it, there’s more hearts to mend and souls to mend than pots and kettles to mend in this old world of ours. Fact, my dear sir, fact! (_Sits down_) And you can’t throw hearts away when they begin to show wear--now can you?--like you throw away an old pot? No siree! (_Impressively_) You got to mend ’em. And there’s tricks about mendin’ them, sir--tricks in all trades, say I. You can mend ’em so’s they’s worse’n they was in the beginning. And you can mend ’em so careful and so clever, you can’t tell they was ever mended at all. In fact, I’ve mended some of them so they was better that way than they was in the beginning. Seems curious, but it’s true. If there was a kettle now you wanted me to work on while I was talkin’, it’d keep me busy. (_Pierrot looks about; gets up and tosses him a kettle._) PIERROT There! Bang away at that! (_He sits down again. The Tins-to-mend man hammers away for awhile, Pierrot watching him gloomily._) MAN You see--pots and kettles is curious things. Y’ can’t just let ’em set there and be. They rust. That’s what they do. Y’ got t’ keep shinin’ ’em--keep polishin’ ’em up. And they like it, sir--oh, they do! They kinda get a hold on life. And when they hang in your kitchen all bright and happy like, they just seem to sing away like birds. Now you’re a singer, sir--why don’t you make a song about that? PIERROT I can’t sing any more. MAN Lost your voice, sir? PIERROT No--worse than that--I’m married! MAN (_solicitously_) That’s bad, sir; that’s bad--if you’re not married right. They take it out of a man, them wicked ones! PIERROT (_firing up_) Who said she was a wicked one? MAN But if she’s good-- PIERROT (_hopelessly_) Ah, that’s the trouble. She’s good. A man can’t live on goodness alone. It gets on his nerves. MAN And what else should he live on? PIERROT (_passionately_) Thrills--passions--longings! The kisses that make dreams--the touches of hands that make the songs come tumbling out of you-- MAN (_laughing_) Oho, but it ought to be easy enough for a handsome young master like you to get those things! PIERROT It’d break her heart. MAN (_lifting his eyes_) Then you’re fond of her, sir? PIERROT (_roughly_) Of course I’m fond of her. That’s just the trouble! (_pause_) But I’m tired to death of her--and that’s the trouble, too. First, when I loved her, just a peep of her out of a window would set my heart dancing. Now, when I see her--it’s just like seeing--the butcher boy--or the bakeshop woman. (_Rises excitedly_) I tell you when things are like that, something’s got to be done. An artist can’t live that way. Ordinary men can. All they want of their wives is to be cushions--soft--so’s they can go to sleep. Artists are different. They want the sky and all the quivering stars in the sky. When they marry (_he makes a grimace_)--it’s good-bye to the stars!