“Something may come of them yet,” he said. “And if it doesn’t, I shall simply go on and write another, and another, and another. I shall continue to write so long as I have the strength left in me; I shall be trying to write when I die.” And so, while they argued and pleaded and scolded and wept, he stood in silence. They could not understand him--he smiled bitterly as he realized how impossible it was for them to understand even the simplest thing about him. There was the dapper corporation lawyer and his exquisite young wife, who came to argue about it; and Thyrsis asked them not to tell Corydon why they had come. He saw them look at each other significantly, and he could read their thought--that he was afraid of his wife’s importunities. And how could he explain to them what he had really meant--that if they had told Corydon they had come to persuade him to give up his art, Corydon would probably have found it impossible to be even decently polite to them! Section 2. So Thyrsis went away, carrying the burden of the scorn and contempt of every human soul he knew. It was in truth a dark hour in his life. He was at his wit’s end for the bare necessities. He had reached the city with less money in his pocket than he had had the year before; and all the ways by which he had got money seemed to have failed him at once. All the editors who published book-reviews seemed to have a stock on hand; or else to know of people whose style of writing pleased their readers better. And none of them seemed to fancy any ideas for articles that Thyrsis had to suggest. Worst of all, the editor of the ‘“Treasure Chest” turned down the pot-boiler which he had been writing up in the country. He would not say anything very definite about it--he just didn’t like the story--it had not come up to the promise of the scenario. He hinted that perhaps Thyrsis was not as much interested in his work as he had been before. It seemed to be lacking in vitality, and the style was not so good. Thyrsis offered to rewrite parts of the story; but no, said the editor, he did not care for the story at all. He would be willing to have Thyrsis try another, but he was pretty well supplied with serials just then, and could not give much encouragement. Corydon had yielded to her parents and gone to stay with them for a while; and Thyrsis had got his own expenses down to less than five dollars a week--including such items as stationery and postage on his manuscripts. And still, he could not get this five dollars. In his desperation he followed the cheap food idea to extremes, and there were times when an invitation to an honest meal was something he looked forward to for a week. And day after day he wandered about the streets, racking his brains for new ideas, for new plans to try, for new hopes of deliverance.