And I might answer, with some insolent feeling: ‘I should wish to discover the _fact_ about it though it proved to me I don’t exist and never existed--that I’m a dust on a moth’s wing, and at that alien--not belonging there.’ Upon which God, for what I know, might only shrug-the-shoulders. In that identity he might shrug-the-shoulders or break-the-world with equal omnipotent plausibleness. But I might try again. I might say: ‘One thing _feels_ realer than my blue vase--this blue-and-green Necklace which my Soul wears. It is rare and recherché but my beautiful Soul is very tired from wearing it. Will you please unclasp it for me?’ And God might say, deprecatory: ‘Pray, Madame, do you consider what portion of the beauty you mention may be in the Necklace? Should I unclasp it--it is doubtful whether you would recognize your soul without it.’ To which I might answer, with more insolent feeling: ‘I don’t know anything of that and I don’t care for it. I only know I want the Necklace off. To wear it makes me languid and frenzied and worn--full of wild goaded saneness and the wish to go violently mad.’ And God might answer: ‘Permit me to express my regrets for those sentiments which, I should add, I neither concur in nor refute nor deny nor share.’ There I might be: conversationally whip-sawed.--God is full of works of beauty, serene and miraculous: Gray Lakes and Blue Mourning Mountains and Deserts beneath the Moon. Those have quietly ravished me many and many a night and day--and will again, and still again, in pacing To-morrows. But I can’t tell What O’Clock it is by them. And if God were by me and I asked him the time the odds are all that he would look at the toy-face of my little ivory toy-clock, which sets on my desk where I can see it myself, and tell me the time by that. But though he is thus perplexing he knows the right time and could tell me it. For that restlessly I wish God would make me one brief visit. I wish that though he should so godlily baffle me and divinely bore me. _A profoundly delicious idea_ To-morrow It is nineteen minutes after one on a summer night. And if only I felt a bit hungry this is what I should wish--spread out on a damask cloth before me in a few gold-medallioned Chinese dishes, with no forks or knives: first of all, two thin _foie-gras_ sandwiches, four grilled snails and maybe a little alligator pear: on top of those, two truffles: on top of those, two slim onions: on top of those, two thin salted biscuits: on top of those, a bit of Camembert cheese: on top of that, two cigarettes: on top of all a hollow-stemmed glass of sparkling Burgundy. I’m not hungry, but it is comforting to think how delightful that supper would taste if I were. Food is a so magic rich gusty gift bestowed on the human race: and is besides a profoundly delicious Idea.