There would be a little more money from Sparta, perhaps
one hundred and fifty dollars. It would come in a week,
and after that there would be none. But a supply of it,
however modest, must be arranged somehow--there were the
"frais" of the atelier, to speak of nothing else. The
necessity was irritatingly absolute. Elfrida wished that
her scruples were not so acute about arranging it by
writing for the press. "If I could think for a moment
that I had any right to it as a means of expression!"
she reflected. "But I haven't. It is an art for others.
And it _is_ an art, as sacred as mine. I have no business
to degrade it to my uses." Her mental position when she
went to see Frank Parke was a cynical compromise with
her artistic conscience, of which she nevertheless
sincerely regretted the necessity.
The correspondent of the _Daily Dial_ had a club for one
side of the river and a cafe for the other. He dined
oftenest at the cafe, and Elfrida's card, with "urgent"
inscribed in pencil on it, was brought to him that evening
as he was finishing his coffee. She had no difficulty
in getting it taken in. Mr. Parke's theory was that a
newspaper man gained more than he lost by accessibility.
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