Diary of a Drug Fiend

14 The Diary of a Drug Fiend about with freaks. I suppose it is on the same principle as the old kings used to keep fools and dwarfs to amuse them. ‘‘Some men are born great, some achieve greatness, some have greatness thrust upon them.” But whichever way it is, the burden is usually too heavy for their shoulders. You remember Frank Harris's story of the Ugly Duckling? If you don’t, you’d better get busy and do it. That’s really what’s so frightful in flying—the fear of oneself, the feeling that one has got out of one’s class, that all the old kindly familiar things below have turned into hard monstrous enemies ready to smash you if you touch them. The first of these women was a fat, bold, red-headed slut. She reminded me of a white maggot. She exuded corruption. She was pompous, pretentious, and stupid. She gave herself out as a great authority on literature ; but all her knowledge was parrot, and her own attempts in that direction the most deplorably dreary drivel that ever had been printed even by the chattering clique which she financed. On her bare shoulder was the hand of a short, thin woman with a common, pretty face and a would-be babyish manner. She was a German woman of the lowest class. Her husband was an influential Member of Parliament. People said that he lived on her earnings. There were even darker whispers. Two or three pretty wise birds had told me they thought it was she, and not poor little Mati Hara, who tipped off the Tanks to the Boche. Did I mention that my sculptor’s name was Owen ? Well, it was, is, and will be while the name of Art endures. He was supporting himself unsteadily with one hand on the table, while with the other he put his guests in their seats. I thought of a child playing with dolls. : , As the first four sat down, I saw two other girls behind them. One I had met before, Violet Beach. She was a queer little thing—Jewish, I fancy. She