“I haven't seen it yet; I don't think it's finished. It's something from the Spanish or the Russian, I'm not sure. I'm to put it into shape when he's done the translation. He wants me to put my name to it as the adaptor.” “Wonder he hasn't asked you to wear his clothes. Has he got any money?” “Of course he has money. How can you run a theatrical company without money?” “Have you seen the money?” “He doesn't carry it about with him in a bag.” “I should have thought your ambition to be to act, not to manage. Managers are to be had cheap enough. Why should he want some one who knows nothing about it?” “I'm going to act. I'm going to play a leading part.” “Great Scott!” “He'll do the management really himself; I shall simply advise him. But he doesn't want his own name to appear. “Why not?” “His people might object.” “Who are his people?” “How do I know? What a suspicious chap you are.” Dan shrugged his shoulders. “You are not an actor, you never will be; you are not a business man. You've made a start at writing, that's your proper work. Why not go on with it?” “I can't get on with it. That one thing was accepted, and never paid for; everything else comes back regularly, just as before. Besides, I can go on writing wherever I am.” “You've got friends here to help you.” “They don't believe I can do anything but write nonsense.” “Well, clever nonsense is worth writing. It's better than stodgy sense: literature is blocked up with that. Why not follow their advice?” “Because I don't believe they are right. I'm not a clown; I don't mean to be. Because a man has a sense of humour it doesn't follow he has nothing else. That is only one of my gifts, and by no means the highest. I have knowledge of human nature, poetry, dramatic instinct. I mean to prove it to you all. Vane's the only man that understands me.” Dan lit his pipe. “Have you made up your mind to go?” “Of course I have. It's an opportunity that doesn't occur twice. 'There's a tide in the affairs--” “Thanks,” interrupted Dan; “I've heard it before. Well, if you've made up your mind, there's an end of the matter. Good luck to you! You are young, and it's easier to learn things then than later.” “You talk,” I answered, “as if you were old enough to be my grandfather.” He smiled and laid both hands upon my shoulders. “So I am,” he said, “quite old enough, little boy Paul. Don't be angry; you'll always be little Paul to me.” He put his hands in his pockets and strolled to the window. “What'll you do?” I enquired. “Will you keep on these rooms?” “No,” he replied. “I shall accept an offer that has been made to me to take the sub-editorship of a big Yorkshire paper. It is an important position and will give me experience.” “You'll never be happy mewed up in a provincial town,” I told him. “I shall want a London address, and I can easily afford it. Let's keep them on together.” He shook his head. “It wouldn't be the same thing,” he said.