Nothing could now have stopped me from going to Mr. Stephens, and I climbed to his office and spontaneously burst into affection for him in a fraternal and intellectual way. How generous he was! He took me to tea, he gave me books, wonderful new books for my own that I had not dreamed of possessing. He talked in a whimsical way with twinkles in his eyes, adding to my literary education in every paragraph.

He asked about my future work, and was it true that Mr. Hardy had me in hand? “Would you advise me to make a model of Mr. Hardy?” It was as funny as a circus to hear his views of Mr Hardy. He did not exhibit the vehemence against Mr. Hardy that Mr. Hardy had against Mr. Stephens, but was equally damning. I should not think of such a man at all. His work was thin and vicious, imitative; he had been unable to work in Australian material, so had decamped to London and there echoed a cheap kind of smartness. It would be suicidal for me to ape such a course. Hardy lacked literary or any other ideals.

If some fairy had offered me a gift I should have chosen to be able to draw, so I asked breathlessly for Norman Lindsay. He was young like myself, his drawings were more shocking than my book, and he was equally talked about. Mr. Stephens shook his head. Norman would not be interested in me: I was not his type physically or mentally. He would be contemptuous of me as a bread and butter miss. No coaxing would make him disgorge Norman, but he gave me a book illustrated by him.

Mr. Stephens sent a messenger to Geebung Villa with the parcel of books, but I would not let the Norman Lindsay drawings out of my possession and departed on the adorable little King Street cable tram with them clasped to my bosom. I was to lunch with Zoë de Vesey at Potts Point, and I burst in with the drawings in triumph. Mr. Hardy was also there for lunch. Zoë did not bag social lions: people knew they were in SOCIETY if she noticed them, and so sought her invitations. With opportunity they turned from lions into tame house cats for ever under her feet.

I gurgled inwardly to hear Mr. Hardy fulminate about those drawings. He said to Greville de Vesey that it showed what kind of a swine the fellow was to give such things to a child like Sybylla. Zoë said, “Nonsense! I am so glad, Sybylla, that Mr. Stephens gave you those drawings. I must ask him to lunch. If I had a daughter I would much rather give her Lindsay’s drawings than let her read that sloppy trash of the Greatest Australian Writer for Girls—it is enough to bemuse girls mentally and morally.”

Mr. Hardy wanted to take the Lindsay book from me, but I put it safely on Zoë’s bed. I was looking forward to showing the drawings to Great-aunt Jane.