“Lola, it hurts me now you’ve gone. I hate to pass the shop. There’s nothing to do but”—he knew the word and tumbled it out—“yearn.” If only he might have held her hand, say halfway to the house that he hated. “Is that a new cap, Ernie? Take it off. You don’t look like a poet. Nothing to do? Have you forgotten your promise to read and learn? You can’t become a Masefield in a day!” He put his hands up to his face and spoke through sudden sobs. “With you away I shall never become anything, any time. Come back, Lola. Nothing’s the same now you’re away.” And she gave him her hand, poor boy. And he held it all too tight, like a drowning man, as indeed he felt that he was. Since Dover Street had come into life he hadn’t written a line. The urge had gone. Ambition, so high before, had fallen like an empty rocket. Lola,—it was for her that he had worked his eyes to sightlessness far into all those nights. “This will never do,” she said. Inspiration—she could give him that, though nothing else—was almost as golden as love. He was to be Some One,—a modern Paul Brissac. She needed that. And she refired him as the cab ran on, rekindled the cold stove and set the logs ablaze. Work, work, study, feel, express, eliminate, temper down. Genius could be crowded out by weeds like other flowering things. And as the cab drew up the hand was raised to burning lips. But the shame of standing aside while the driver was paid—that added a very big log. “Good night, Poet.” “Good night, Princess.” (Oh-h, that was Simpkins’s word.) Dover Street—and the area steps. PART IV I