Page:Harvey O'Higgins--Silent Sam and other stories.djvu/84

72 stopped, tears in her eyes, her lips trembling; and with one of those sudden changes of mood that had made her acting so heart-tickling, she quavered: "And you 're probably sitting there thinking: 'What a beautiful bit for a play! If I could only get her to act it like that!'"

"You were thinking it yourself," he said to the ash of his cigar, "or it never would have occurred to you. However, you could marry and keep your private life to yourself. Your public life—"

"I don't want any public life. I 've had all the public life I want. I don't want two lives. I want it all one—and this one."

"Very well," he said. "If that 's the way you feel about it. Nevertheless, there 's no reason why a man or a woman can't be a great artist and live a real life as well."

"'Nevertheless'! Nevertheless, what sort of life do you lead?"

He put that question aside with his hand. "My life is what I 'm able to make it. If I were a bigger man, I might lead a bigger life. You—"

"I 'm not half as big as you are. This is big enough for me—this life."

"You 'll eat it up. You 're wolfing it down now, and smacking your lips over it. When you 've devoured it, you 'll go back to the other, too."

She settled back in her chair rather languorously—as if exhausted by the emotions that had thrilled her—and looked down at the spoon which she had begun to