He liked having a reputation for amiability among the ateliers, but he must not let it cost too much.
Elfrida felt none of that benumbing shame which sometimes seizes those who would try literature confessing to those who have succeeded in it, and the occasion was too important for the decorative diffidence that might have occurred to her if it had been trivial.

She had herself well gathered together, and she would have been concise and direct even if there had been more than fifteen minutes.
"One afternoon last September, at Nadie Palicsky's--there is no chance that you will remember, but I assure you it is so--you told me that I might, if I tried--write, monsieur." The concentration of her purpose in her voice made itself felt where Frank Parke kept his acuter perceptions, and put them at her service.
"I remember perfectly," he said.
"_Je m'en felicite_.

It is more than I expected.

Well, circumstances have made it so that I must either write or scrub.

Scrubbing spoils one's hands, and besides, it isn't sufficiently remunerative.