"Wouldn't it be better," he suggested, mildly, "to submit your play to a manager before we--before you try to put it on yourself? I have never invested any money in my own plays, and really I...." "My dear John, far be it from me to appear to cast the least slur--to speak in the faintest way at all slightingly of your plays, but I do not quite see the point of the comparison. Your plays--excellent as they are, most excellent--are essentially commercial transactions. My play is not a commercial transaction." "Then why should I be invited to lose my money over it?" Laurence smiled compassionately. "I thought you would be glad of the opportunity to show a disinterested appreciation of art. In years to come you will be proud to think that you were one of the first to give practical evidence of your belief in _Thomas_." "But perhaps I'm just as skeptical as your hero was. I may not believe in your play's immortality." Laurence frowned. "Come, my dear fellow, this is being petty. We are all counting on you. You wouldn't like to hear it said that out of jealousy you had tried to suppress a rival dramatist. But I must not let my indignation run away with me, and you must forgive my heat. I am overstrained. The magnitude of the subject has almost been too much for me. Besides, I should have explained at once that I intended to invest in _Thomas_ all that is left of my own little capital. Yes, I am even ready to do that. Then I shall spend a year as an actor, after which I shall indulge my more worldly self by writing a few frankly commercial plays before I begin my next great tragedy entitled _Paul_." John decided that his brother-in-law had gone mad; unable to think of any action more effective at such a crisis, he rang the bell. But when Maud came to inquire his need he could not devise anything to tell her except that Mr. Armitage was staying to lunch. It was a most uncomfortable meal, because Miss Hamilton in order to keep herself from laughing aloud had to be preternaturally grave, and John himself was in a continuous state of nervous irritation at Laurence, who would let everything on his plate grow cold while he droned on without a pause about the simplicity of the best art. It was more than tantalizing to watch him gradually build up a mouthful upon his fork, still talking; slowly raise it to his lips, still talking; and wave the overloaded fork to and fro before him, still talking. But it was an agony to watch the carefully accumulated mouthful drop back bit by bit upon his plate, until at last very slowly and still talking he would insert one cold and tiny morsel into his patient mouth, so tiny a morsel that the mastication of it did not prevent him from still talking. "I'm afraid you're not enjoying your lunch," his host said.