“You dear boy, I am going to tell you something.  You said to me once that if ever the time came when I thought you visionary, I was to let you know.  Of course I understand you are worth a thousand Gregorys; but don’t you think you would get on faster if you were a little more aggressive in your work?—­if you weren’t so afraid of being superficial or sensational?  You were intimating a few minutes ago,” she added, speaking rapidly under the stress of the message she burned to deliver, “that I seemed changed.  I don’t believe I am changed.  But, if I seem different, it is because I feel so strongly that those who wish to succeed must assert themselves and seize opportunities.  There is where it seems to me that Mr. Williams has the advantage over you, Wilbur.  One of the finest and most significant qualities of our people, you know, is their enterprise and aggressiveness.  Architecture isn’t like the stock business, but the same theory of progress must be applicable to both.  Don’t you think I may be right, Wilbur?  Don’t you see what I mean?”

He stroked her hair and answered gently, “What is it that I am not doing which you think I might do?”

Selma snuggled close to him, and put her hand in his.  She was vibrating with the proud consciousness of the duty vouchsafed to her to guide and assist the man she loved.  It was a blissful and a precious moment to her.  “If I were you,” she said, solemnly, “I should build something striking and original, something which would make everyone who beheld it ask, ‘what is the architect’s name?’ I would strike out boldly without caring too much what the critics and the people of Europe would say.  You musn’t be too afraid, Wilbur, of producing something American, and you mustn’t be too afraid of the American ways of doing things.  We work more quickly here in everything, and—­and I still can’t help feeling that you potter a little.  Necessarily I don’t know about the details of your business, but if I were you, instead of designing small buildings or competing for colleges and churches, where more than half the time someone else gets the award, I should make friends with the people who live in those fine houses on Fifth Avenue, and get an order to design a splendid residence for one of them.  If you were to make a grand success of that, as you surely would, your reputation would be made.  You ask me why I like to entertain and am willing to know people like that.  It is to help you to get clients and to come to the front professionally.  Now isn’t that sensible and practical and right, too?”

Her voice rang triumphantly with the righteousness of her plea.

“Selma, dear, if I am not worldly-wise enough, I am glad to listen to your suggestions.  But art is not to be hurried.  I cannot vulgarize my art.  I could not consent to that.”

“Of course not, Wilbur.  Not worldly-wise enough is just the phrase, I think.  You are so absorbed in the theory of fine things that I am sure you often let the practical opportunities to get the fine things to do slip.”