That night at Smith's room things began to fall apart for Michael. As they were sitting there playing bridge, smoking cigars and drinking gin, someone brought up the subject of impulses, the kind of impulses like kissing a girl. But it was Michael who brought up the "bad" impulses like stealing and slashing fur coats with razor blades. He talks about these things like he really wants to do it, almost like a crazy man. Michael says, "It isn't that we do it, it's only that we want to do it. Why, Christ, there's been times when I thought to hell with everything, I"ll kiss that woman if it's the last thing I do" (p3). Aiken is just showing the reader the kind of ambition and what almost feels like hate toward society Michael has. As Michael is saying this his friends are becoming a little curious towards him as if they were thinking he is a little out of touch with society. Michael trying not to feel too out of place, says, "Of course, everybody has those feelings,"-But suppose you did yield to them?" (p4). His friends thought this was silly and tried to stop talking about it but Michael kept on pressing the subject. .
At this point Michael was so caught up in the idea of impulses; he thought the one particular idea of stealing was just "amusing" (p4) and "fascinating" (p4). He thought, "the impulse everywhere- why not be a Columbus of the moral world and really do it?" (p4). Then he remembers a time when he stole a conch shell from his neighbor's house when he was ten. He was so proud of his thievish achievement in the way he was describing how he perpetrated the steal. Then when they were catching on to him, he crushed the shell in his back yard to erase any evidence of the job. Aiken leaves the reader to see that Michael has become so obsessed with his impulse that he remembers a time of stealing in his past. And this later on, the reader finds, just gets him into trouble.
