Some of the provincial cities said the play was disgustingly immoral and the police ought to stop it. The accusation hurt. Was it immoral? A certain clergy man said   
the play was a sermon; a certain critic said it was vile. Which was true? It is not pleasant to be called vile even though the epithet has been hurled at many of the 
 
noblest.
 
The bitter discussion it aroused wounded Vickery mortally. Eldon told him that nothing was better for success than to arouse discussion, and that the final proof of 
 
great art is its ability to make a lot of people ferociously angry.
 
But Vickery would not be cheered up. He said that the bumps were killing him.
 
“You see, I’m so lean and weak, I’ve got no shock-absorbers. I can’t do anything but cough like a damned he-Camille.”
 
Sheila and Batterson and even Reben begged him to leave the company and go back to town. But he was in a frenzy for perfection. He was relentless with his own lines 
 
and scenes. He denounced them rabidly. He tore out pages of manuscript from the prompt-copy, and sat at the table writing new scenes while the rehearsals went on. 
 
Between the acts he wrote new lines. He wrote in a terrible hurry. He was in a terrible hurry.
 
But he was in a frenzy for perfection. He was relentless with the actors. Every word, every silence, was important to him as a link in his chain of gold.
 
Batterson and Reben and Sheila questioned many of his words, phrases, and even whole scenes. Everybody had a more or less respectful criticism, a more or less 
 
brilliant contribution, but Vickery had had enough of this piecemeal microscopy.
 
“A play succeeds or falls by its big idea,” he said, “by its big sweep, and nothing else matters. The greatest play in the world is ‘Hamlet,’ and it’s so full of 
 
faults that a whole library has been written about it. But you can’t kill its big points. What difference does it make how the shore-line runs if your ocean is an 
 
ocean? Let me alone, I tell you. Do my play the best you can, then we’ll soon know if the public wants it.
 
“You ruined one play for me, Mr. Reben, but you can’t monkey with this one. I thought of all the objections you’ve made and a hundred others when I was writing it. 
 
I liked it this way then, and I knew as much then as I do now—only I was red-hot at the time, and I’m not going to fool with it in cold bloo............