"Even love?" asked Wladek. "But art appears to me to be a greater and completer expression of the ideal than love . . ." answered Janina. "But it is more alien to human beings and not so necessary to life as is love. Without art the world could exist, but without love . . . never! Moreover, art causes more painful disappointments than love." "But it also gives greater joys. Love is an individual emotion; art is a social emotion, a synthesis. One loves it with one's humanity, one suffers for it, but only through art does one sometimes become immortal!" "Those are dreams. Thousands have given their lives to become convinced of that and thousands have cursed that unattainable mirage." "But those thousands had their lives filled with that mirage and felt more than one can feel, who dreams about nothing." "But since they were not happy, what is it all worth?" "And are most people happy?" "A thousandfold more so than we!" Wladek emphasized that "we" significantly. "Never!" cried Janina, "for our happiness lies in pain as it does in joy, in dejection as well as ecstasy. Even this in itself is happiness: to be able to develop one's self spiritually; to reach far out into infinity with the arms of desire; to create new worlds in our mind, larger and more beautiful than those surrounding us; to chant, even through tears and pain, hymns to beauty and immortality; to dream, but to dream so intensely as to forget about life entirely and to live in dreams alone!" Janina felt so great a flood of happiness and inspiration flowing into her soul that she spoke, as it were, only in periods of her thought, so that she might express herself at least in part. She spoke, entirely forgetful of the fact that some one was listening to her and spun out aloud ever grander and ever more evanescent dreams. Wladek at first listened attentively, but later grew impatient. "A comedienne!" he thought with irony. And he was sure that Janina was unfurling before him the peacock feathers of fervor and enthusiasm merely to fascinate and conquer him. He did not answer or interrupt her, for it finally began to bore him. "That role of 'Mary' is a trifle too sentimental . . ." added Janina after a longer silence. "To me it seemed merely lyrical," answered Wladek. "I should like some time to play 'Ophelia.'" "Are you familiar with Hamlet?" asked Wladek, somewhat surprised. "During the last two years I have read nothing but dramas and dreamed of the stage," she answered simply. "Truly it is worth bending the knee before such enthusiasm!" "Why? All that is necessary is to help it, to give it a field, an opportunity. . . ." "If I only could. . . . Believe me when I say, that with my whole heart I desire to see you reach the heights of art." "I believe you," Janina answered in a quieter tone. "And I thank you very much for Doctor Robin." "May I copy out the role for you?" "I will copy it myself; it will give me a certain pleasure."