People paused to
observe him; and all unaware of their attention, he suddenly
smiled charmingly, as at some gentle pleasantry in his own
mind--something he had remembered from a book, no doubt. It was
a wonderful smile, and vanished slowly, leaving a rapt look;
evidently he was lost in musing upon architecture and sculpture
and beautiful books. A girl whisking by in an automobile had
time to guess, reverently, that the phrase in his mind was: "A
Stately Home for Beautiful Books!" Dinner-tables would hear,
that evening, how Talbot Potter stood there, oblivious of
everything else, studying the Library!
This slight sketch of artistic reverie completed, he went on,
proceeding a little more rapidly down the Avenue; presently
turned over to the stage door of Wallack's, made his way
through the ensuing passages, and appeared upon the vasty stage
of the old theatre, where his company of actors awaited his
coming to begin the rehearsal of a new play.
II
"First act, please, ladies and gentlemen!"
Thus spake, without emotion, Packer, the stage-manager; but out
in the dusky auditorium, Stewart Canby, the new playwright,
began to tremble.
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