"I don’t know, Jim. She _has_ a mind." "It’s a purely imitative one. People she has read about draw, write, compose music. Steve is sensitive to impression, high strung, with a very receptive mind; and the idea attracts her. And what happens? She sees me, for example, scribbling away every day; she knows I’m writing a novel; it makes an impression on her and she takes to scribbling, too. "Oswald Grismer drops in and talks studio and atmosphere and Rodin and Manship. That stirs her up. What occurs within twenty-four hours? Steve orders a box of colours and a modelling table; and she smears her pretty boudoir furniture with oil paint and plasticine. And that’s all it amounts to, Father, just the caprice of a very young girl who thinks creative art a romantic cinch, and takes a shy at it." His father, not smiling, said: "Possibly. But the mere fact that she _does_ take a shy at these things—spends her leisure in trying to paint, model, and write, when other girls of her age _don’t_, worries me a little. I do not want her to become interested in any profession of an irregular nature. I want Steve to keep away from the unconventional. I’m afraid of it for her." "Why?" "Because all intelligence is restless—and Steve is very intelligent. All creative minds desire to find some medium for self-expression. And I’m wondering whether Steve’s mind is creative or merely imitative; whether she is actually but blindly searching for an outlet for self-expression, or whether it’s merely the healthy mental energy of a healthy body requiring its share of exercise, too." Jim laughed: "It’s in the air, Father, this mania for ’doing things.’ It’s the ridiculous renaissance of the commonplace, long submerged. Every college youth, every school girl writes a novel; every janitor, every office boy a scenario. The stage to-day teems with sales-ladies and floor-walkers; the pants-presser and the manufacturer of ladies’ cloaks direct the newest art of the moving pictures. Printers’ devils and ex-draymen fill the papers with their draughtsmanship; head-waiters write the scores for musical productions. Art is in the air. So why shouldn’t Steve believe herself capable of creating a few things? She’ll get over it." "I hope she will." "She will. Steve is a reasonable child." "Steve is a sweet, intelligent and reasonable girl.... Very impressionable.... And sensitive.... I hope," he added irrelevantly, "that I shall live a few years more." "You hadn’t contemplated anything to the contrary, had you?" inquired Jim. They both smiled. Then Cleland Senior said in his pleasant, even way: