And first work is likely to be valuable chiefly as indication."

"I'll mail it to you. Before I go, would you mind telling me more definitely why you advise me against the newspaper business?"

"I advise? I never advise as to questions of morals or ethics. I have too much concern with keeping my own straight."

"Then it _is_ a question of morals?"

"Or ethics. I think so. For example, have you tried your hand at editorials?"

"Yes."

"Successfully?"

"As far as I've gone."

"Then you are in accord with the editorial policy of The Ledger?"

"Not in everything."

"In its underlying, unexpressed, and immanent theory that this country can best be managed by an aristocracy, a chosen few, working under the guise of democracy?"

"No; I don't believe that, of course."

"I do, as it happens. But I fail to see how Christian Banneker's son and _eleve_ could. Yet you write editorials for The Ledger."

"Not on those topics."

"Have you never had your editorials altered or cut or amended, in such manner as to give a side-slant toward the paper's editorial fetiches?"

Again and most uncomfortably Banneker felt his color change. "Yes; I have," he admitted.

"What did you do?"

"What could I do? The Chief controls the editorial page."

"You might have stopped writing for it."

"I needed the money. No; that isn't true. More than the money, I wanted the practice and the knowledge that I could write editorials if I wished to."

"Are you thinking of going on the editorial side?"

"God forbid!" cried Banneker.

"Unwilling to deal in other men's ideas, eh? Well, Mr. Banneker, you have plenty of troubles before you. Interesting ones, however."

"How much could I make by magazine writing?" asked Banneker abruptly.

"Heaven alone knows. Less than you need, I should say, at first. How much do you need?"

"My space bill last week was one hundred and twenty-one dollars. I filled 'em up on Sunday specials."

"And you need that?"

"It's all gone," grinned Banneker boyishly.

"As between a safe one hundred dollars-plus, and a highly speculative nothing-and-upwards, how could any prudent person waver?" queried Mr.

Gaines as he shook hands in farewell.

For the first time in the whole unusual interview, Banneker found himself misliking the other's tone, particularly in the light emphasis placed upon the word prudent. Banneker did not conceive kindly of himself as a prudent person.

Back at the office, Banneker got out the story of which he had spoken to Mr. Gaines, and read it over. It seemed to him good, and quite in the tradition of The New Era. It was polite, polished, discreet, and, if not precisely subtle, it dealt with interests and motives lying below the obvious surfaces of life. It had amused Banneker to write it; which is not to say that he spared laborious and conscientious effort. The New Era itself amused him, with its air of well-bred aloofness from the flatulent romanticism which filled the more popular magazines of the day with duke-like drummers or drummer-like dukes, amiable criminals and brisk young business geniuses, possessed of rather less moral sense than the criminals, for its heroes, and for its heroines a welter of adjectives exhaling an essence of sex. Banneker could imagine one of these females straying into Mr. Gaines's editorial ken, and that gentleman's bland greeting as to his own sprightly second maid arrayed and perfumed, unexpectedly encountered at a charity bazar. Too rarefied for Banneker's healthy and virile young tastes, the atmosphere in which The New Era lived and moved and had its consistently successful editorial being! He preferred a freer air to the mild scents of lavender and rose-ash, even though it might blow roughly at times. Nevertheless, that which was fine and fastidious in his mind recognized and admired the restraint, the dignity, the high and honorably maintained standards of the monthly. It had distinction. It stood apart from and consciously above the reading mob. In some respects it was the antithesis of that success for which Park Row strove and sweated.

Banneker felt that he, too, could claim a place on those heights. Yes; he liked his story. He thought that Mr. Gaines would like it. Having mailed it, he went to Katie's to dinner. There he found Russell Edmonds discussing his absurdly insufficient pipe with his customary air of careworn watchfulness lest it go out and leave him forlorn and unsolaced in a harsh world. The veteran turned upon the newcomer a grim twinkle.

"Don't you do it," he advised positively.

"Do what?"

"Quit."

"Who told you I was considering it?"

"Nobody. I knew it was about time for you to reach that point. We all do--at certain times."

"Why?"

"Disenchantment. Disillusionment. Besides, I hear the city desk has been horsing you."

"Then some one _has_ been blabbing."

"Oh, those things ooze out. Can't keep 'em in. Besides, all city desks do that to cubs who come up too fast. It's part of the discipline. Like hazing."

"There are some things a man can't do," said Banneker with a sort of appeal in his voice.

"Nothing," returned Edmonds positively. "Nothing he can't do to get the news."

"Did you ever peep through a keyhole?"

"Figuratively speaking?"

"If you like. Either way."

"Yes."

"Would you do it to-day?"

"No."

"Then it's a phase a reporter has to go through?"