CHAPTER IV

VIVE LE ROI!


When, an hour later, John landed in New York from the ferry, his mood
had changed. The sun and the breeze had done their work. He looked on
life once more with a cheerful and optimistic eye.

His first act, on landing, was to proceed to the office of the
_News_ and enquire for Rupert Smith. He felt that he had urgent
need of a few minutes' conversation with him. Now that the painter had
been definitely cut that bound him to the safe and conventional, and he
had set out on his own account to lead the life adventurous, he was
conscious of an absurd diffidence. New York looked different to him. It
made him feel positively shy. A pressing need for a friendly native in
this strange land manifested itself. Smith would have ideas and advice
to bestow--he was notoriously prolific of both--and in this crisis both
were highly necessary.

Smith, however, was not at the office. He had gone out, John was
informed, earlier in the morning to cover a threatened strike somewhere
down on the East Side. John did not go in search of him. The chance of
finding him in that maze of mean streets was remote. He decided to go
uptown, select a hotel, and lunch. To the need for lunch he attributed
a certain sinking sensation of which he was becoming more and more
aware, and which bore much too close a resemblance to dismay to be
pleasant. The poet's statement that "the man who's square, his chances
always are best; no circumstance can shoot a scare into the contents of
his vest," is only true within limits. The squarest men, deposited