Glaum nodded, not unsympathetically. “I also in my time have heard that observation without any active enjoyment. It is, I believe, unanswerable.” Gerald shuddered. “There is, for a Southern gentleman at all events, no really satisfactory reply save murder. And against that solution there is of course a rather general prejudice. Therefore a woman of this bleating sort exacts fidelity, she makes every nature of unconscionable demand, and she pesters you to the verge of lunacy, always upon the unanswerable ground that her claim upon your gratitude, and upon your instant obedience in everything, ought not to exist. Oh, I assure you, my dear fellow, there is no more sensible piece of friendly counsel existent than is the Seventh Commandment!” “Your aphorisms are more or less true, and your predicament I can understand. Nevertheless—” But the Sylan hesitated. “You also understand us Musgraves perfectly!” Gerald applauded. “For I perceive you are now about to wheedle me forward in this business by throwing obstacles in my way.” “I was but going to point out the truism that, nevertheless, it may be wiser to put up with your Eve unresistingly—” “The name,” emended Gerald, “is Evelyn.” At that the Sylan smiled. “Yes, to be sure! Women do vary in their given names. It might be wiser, then, I was about to say, for you to put up with your Evelyn unresistingly, rather than for a student of magic, with so little real practical experience as yours, to go blundering about the doubtful road which leads to Antan.” “But, sir, I have the soul of an artist! Once”—and Gerald pointed to his manuscript,—“once it was the little art of letters. Then, through my acquaintance with Gaston Bulmer, who is no doubt known to you—” The Sylan shook his spectral head, like smoke in a veering wind. “I have not, I believe, that pleasure.” “You astound me. I would have supposed the name of Gaston Bulmer to be in all infernal circles a household word, because the dear old rascal is an adept, sir, of wide parts, of taste, and of sound judgment. Then, too, since Mrs. Townsend is his daughter, he has now for some while been my father-in-law for all practical purposes—But, where was I? Ah, yes! Through Gaston Bulmer, I repeat, I became initiate into the greatest of all arts. Now I desire to excel in that art. I note that I falter in the little art of letters, that my prose is no longer superb and breath-taking in its loveliness, because my heart is not any longer really interested in writing, on account of my heart’s ever-pricking desire to revive in its full former glories the far nobler and—at all events, in the United States of America,—the unjustly neglected art of the magician. And from whom else—just as you have suggested, my dear fellow,—from whom else save the Master Philologist can I get the great and best words of magic? Do you but answer me that very simple question!” “From no one else, to be sure—” “So, now, you see for yourself!”