THE MAN

I certainly do!

THE BOY

But I thought—­

THE MAN

You thought because I left one woman and hadn’t found another that I didn’t care for women?  Others believe that, too, but it isn’t so.  On the contrary.  You see, I didn’t so much leave her as get away from my own failure.  Of course, there is such a thing as the wrong woman.  She makes a man a fraction.  The better she is in herself, the less she leaves him to live by.  One twentieth is less than one half.  But the right woman!  She multiplies a man....

THE BOY

Oh!

THE MAN

Why, you might have told from my poems how I believe in love.

THE BOY

I don’t remember any love poems.

THE MAN

Bless your heart!  Every one of them was a love poem.  Not the old-fashioned kind, about fading roses and tender hearts....  I sent that book out as a cry for the mate.  It is charged with the fulness of love.  That’s why I could write about trees and storms.

THE BOY

I suppose if I had been older....

THE MAN

It isn’t one’s age but one’s need. She will understand.  Look, the sun has gone round the corner of the house.  Is that lunch you have in the parcel?

THE BOY

Yes.

THE MAN

Would you like to make it a picnic?  I’ll get something from the house, and then we can walk to the woods.

THE BOY

I’d love to!

THE MAN

All right, I’ll be ready in no time.  Come, Rex!

SURVIVAL

The garden of a home in the suburbs.  A man is walking up and down alone at dusk, occasionally stopping to water a plant, but more often falling into deep thought, unconscious of his surroundings.  About the place there is an air of newness and prosperity.

A young woman enters the garden from the lawn next door.

MARGARET

Look here, Roger, you can’t keep this up!

ROGER

No, I can’t keep this up.  Besides, it’s going to rain to-morrow.

MARGARET