"I hope you have succeeded to your own satisfaction?"

"It may amuse you to know that though I had many good letters of introduction to editors in this country, I could not get a single article accepted till some friends of mine in Asia came to my aid."

"You speak in riddles."

"Perhaps you remember reading, last August, of an outbreak of some tribes in the Hindoo Kush? Those hill peoples are in a state of perennial ferment, and usually Europe pays no attention to their bellicose proceedings; but luckily for me, the English premier, at that particular moment, was holding his unwilling Parliament together in an attempt to pa.s.s something, and finding it intractable in that matter, he cleverly used this outbreak to divert attention and excite enthusiasm.

Rising in the House of Commons, he virtually charged the outbreak to Russian machination against the beloved Emir, and pledged the nation to support that civilized humanitarian against the barbaric despot of Russia. At once the papers were full of unintelligible cablegrams telling of the doings in those far-away mountains; and my hurriedly written editorials and articles, which nevertheless showed some comprehension of the geography and people, were snapped up avidly, and from that time I have found papers or periodicals glad to print what I write."

You laughed, and said, "How strangely the world is tied together in these days, that the speech of an English prime minister about some Asian septs should give a German author entree to New York editorial sanctums!"

"The cables have done more in aid of the brotherhood of man than all the efforts of the missionaries."

"I thought you were a conservative, and disapproved of modern innovations," you suggested archly.

"With innovators, yes."

"Then the Levantine does not entirely disapprove of our Hesperian city?"

"My knowledge of New York is about as deep," I answered, smiling, "as my Eastern blood."

"Only skin-deep," you said.

"Just sufficient for a disguise."

"As long as you are silent, yes."

"Is my English so unmistakable?"

"Not your tongue, but your thought. Of course your vicinage, costume, and complexion made me for a moment accept your joke of nationality, at that first meeting, but before you had uttered half your defense of the older races I felt sure that you were not a product of one of them."

"Why was that?"

"Because it is only Christians who recognize and speak for the rights of other peoples."

"You forget that the religion of Buddha is toleration. We Christians preach the doctrine, but practice extermination, forgiving our enemies after killing them," I corrected. "I do not think we differ much in works from even El Mahdi."

"Would El Mahdi ever have spoken for other races?"

"You know the weak spot in my armor, Miss Walton," I was obliged to confess.

"That is due to you, Dr. Hartzmann. What you stated that night interested me so deeply that I have been reading up about the Eastern races and problems. I wonder if you have seen this new book of travel, The Debatable Lands between the East and West?"

"Yes," I a.s.sented, thinking that twenty over-lookings of it in ma.n.u.script and proof ent.i.tled me to make the claim.

"You will be amused to hear that, when reading it, I thought of you as the probable writer, not merely because it begins in the Altai range and ends at Tangier, but as well because some of the ideas resemble yours.

Mr. Whitely, however, tells me he has private information that Professor Humzel is the author. Do you know him?"

"He was my professor of history at Leipzig."

"That accounts for the agreement in thought. You admire the book?"

"I think it is a conscientious attempt to describe what the author saw."

"Ah, it is much more than that!" you exclaimed. "At a dinner in London, this autumn, I sat next the Earl---- next a member of the Indian Council, and he told me he considered it a far more brilliant book than Kinglake's Eothen."

I knew I had no right to continue this subject, but I could not help asking, "You liked it?"

"Very much. It seems to me a deep and philosophic study of present and future problems, besides being a vivid picture of most interesting countries and peoples. It made me long to be a nomad myself, and wander as the author did. The thought of three years of such life, of such freedom, seems to stir in me all the inherited tendency to prowl that we women supposedly get from Mother Sphinx."

"Civilization steals nature from us and compounds the theft with art."

"Tell me about Professor Humzel," you went on, "for I know I should like him, merely from the way he writes. One always pictures the German professor as a dried-up mind in a dried-up body, but in this book one is conscious of real flesh and blood. He is a young man, I'm sure."

"Sixty-two."

"He has a young heart, then," you a.s.serted. "Is he as interesting to talk with as he makes himself in his book?"

"Professor Humzel is very silent."

"The people who have something to say are usually so," you sighed.

"A drum must be empty to make a noise," I said, smiling, "and perhaps the converse is true."

I cannot say what there was in that walk which cheered me so, except your praise of my book,--sweeter far though that was than the world's kindly opinion; yet over and above that, in our brief interchange of words, I was made conscious that there was sympathy between us,--a sympathy so positive that something like our old-time friendship seemed beginning. And the thought made me so happy that for a time my troubles were almost forgotten.

Good-night, Maizie.

XII

_March 3._ Fate seemed determined that our lives should be closely connected. In December Mr. Blodgett wrote asking me to call at his office, and he was already smiling when his boy pa.s.sed me through the door at which so many had to tarry.

"There are a good many kinds of fools," was his welcoming remark, "but one of the commonest is the brand who think because they can do one thing well, they ought to be able to do the exact opposite. I've known men who could grow rich out of brewing beer, who kept themselves poor through thinking they knew all about horses; I've known women who queened it in parlors, who went to smash because they believed themselves inspired actresses; I've sat here in this office thirty years, and grown rich through the belief of clergymen, doctors, merchants, farmers,--the whole box and dice,--that they were heaven-born financiers, and could play us Wall Street men even at our own game.

Whatever else you do in this world, doctor, don't think that because you can talk a dozen languages, they fit you to be a successful mute."

"When you are in this mood, Mr. Blodgett, I can be nothing else," I interpolated, as he paused a moment for breath.

"Alexander Whitely," he went on, smiling, "probably knows more about petroleum and kerosene than any other man in the world, and he's made himself rich by his knowledge. But it doesn't satisfy him to be on the top of his own heap; he wants to get on the top of some other fellow's.

In short, he has an itch to be something he isn't, and the darned fool's gone and bought a daily newspaper with the idea that he is going to be a great editor!"

"His lamp of genius will not go out for want of oil," I remarked.

"For a moment he showed one glimmer of sense: he came to me for advice,"

said Mr. Blodgett in evident enjoyment. "I told him to get an A 1 business manager, to make you chief editor, let you pick your staff, and then blow in all the money you and the business end asked for, and never go inside the building himself. It was too good sense for him, for he's daft with the idea of showing the world how to edit a paper. But my advice simmered down to this: if you want to be his private secretary, at four thousand a year, and pretend to revise his editorials, but really write them for him, I guess you can have the position. Of course he is to think he writes the rubbish."