Soldier, the Martyred President, the slain God of Harvest, the Bringer of Good Crops. Duke Gant of Westmoreland, Viscount Pondicherry, twelfth Lord Runnymede, who hunts for true love, incognito, in Devon and ripe grain, and finds the calico white legs embedded in sweet hay. Yes, George-Gordon-Noel-Byron Gant, carrying the pageant of his bleeding heart through Europe, and Thomas-Chatterton Gant (that bright boy!), and François-Villon Gant, and Ahasuerus Gant, and Mithridates Gant, and Artaxerxes Gant, and Edward-the— Black-Prince Gant; Stilicho Gant, and Jugurtha Gant, and Vercingetorix Gant, and Czar-Ivan-the-Terrible Gant. And Gant, the Olympian Bull; and Heracles Gant; and Gant, the Seductive Swan; and Ashtaroth and Azrael Gant, Proteus Gant, Anubis and Osiris and Mumbo-Jumbo Gant.
But what, said Eugene very slowly into the darkness, if I’m not a Genius? He did not ask himself the question often. He was alone: he spoke aloud, but in a low voice, in order to feel the unreality of this blasphemy. It was a moonless night, full of stars. There was no thunder and no lightning.
Yes, but what, he thought with a livid snarl, but what if anybody else thinks I’m not? Ah, but they’d like to, the swine. They hate me, and are jealous of me because they can’t be like me, so they belittle me if they can. They’d like to say it, if they dared, just to hurt me. For a moment his face was convulsed with pain and bitterness: he craned his neck, holding his throat with his hand.
Then, as was his custom, when he had burnt his heart out, he began to look nakedly and critically at the question.
Well, he went on very calmly, what if I’m not? Am I going to cut my throat, or eat worms, or swallow arsenic? He shook his head slowly but emphatically. No, he said, I am not. Besides, there are enough geniuses. They have at least one in every high school, and one in the orchestra of every small-town movie. Sometimes Mrs. Von Zeck, the wealthy patroness of the arts, sends a genius or two off to New York to study. So that, he estimated, this broad land of ours has by the census not less than 26, 400 geniuses and 83, 752 artists, not counting those in business
