15a The Prince and Betty

He went out, closing the door behind him with a bang that added emphasis to his words.

“All very painful and disturbing,” murmured Smith. “Comrade Brown!” he called.

Betty came in.

“Did our late visitor bite a piece out of you on his way out? He was in the mood to do something of the sort.”

“He seemed angry,” said Betty.

“He was angry,” said Smith. “Do you know what has happened, Comrade Brown? With your very first contribution to the paper you have hit the bull’s-eye. You have done the state some service. Friend Parker came as the representative of the owner of those Broster Street houses. He wanted to buy us off. We’ve got them scared, or he wouldn’t have shown his hand with such refreshing candor. Have you any engagements at present?”

“I was just going out to lunch, if you could spare me.”

“Not alone. This lunch is on the office. As editor of this journal I will entertain you, if you will allow me, to a magnificent banquet. Peaceful Moments is grateful to you. Peaceful Moments,” he added, with the contented look the Far West editor must have worn as the bullet came through the window, “is, owing to you, going some now.”

When they returned from lunch, and reentered the outer office, Pugsy Maloney, raising his eyes for a moment from his book, met them with the information that another caller had arrived and was waiting in the inner room.

“Dere’s a guy in dere waitin’ to see youse,” he said, jerking his head towards the door.

“Yet another guy? This is our busy day. Did he give a name?”

“Says his name’s Maude,” said Master Maloney, turning a page.

“Maude!” cried Betty, falling back.

Smith beamed.

“Old John Maude!” he said. “Great! I’ve been wondering what on earth he’s been doing with himself all this time. Good-old John! You’ll like him,” he said, turning, and stopped abruptly, for he was speaking to the empty air. Betty had disappeared.

“Where’s Miss Brown, Pugsy?” he said. “Where did she go?”

Pugsy vouchsafed another jerk of the head, in the direction of the outer door.

“She’s beaten it,” he said. “I seen her make a break for de stairs. Guess she’s forgotten to remember somet’ing,” he added indifferently, turning once more to his romance of prairie life. “Goils is bone-heads.”

CHAPTER XVII

THE MAN AT THE ASTOR

Refraining from discussing with Master Maloney the alleged bone-headedness of girls, Smith went through into the inner room, and found John sitting in the editorial chair, glancing through the latest number of Peaceful Moments.

“Why, John, friend of my youth,” he said, “where have you been hiding all this time? I called you up at your office weeks ago, and an acid voice informed me that you were no longer there. Have you been fired?”

“Yes,” said John. “Why aren’t you on the News any more? Nobody seemed to know where you were, till I met Faraday this morning, who told me you were here.”

Smith was conscious of an impression that in some subtle way John had changed since their last meeting. For a moment he could not have said what had given him this impression. Then it flashed upon him. Before, John had always been, like Mrs. Fezziwig in “The Christmas Carol,” one vast substantial smile. He had beamed cheerfully on what to him was evidently the best of all possible worlds. Now, however, it would seem that doubts had occurred to him as to the universal perfection of things. His face was graver. His eyes and his mouth alike gave evidence of disturbing happenings.

In the matter of confidences, Smith was not a believer in spade-work. If they were offered to him, he was invariably sympathetic, but he never dug for them. That John had something on his mind was obvious, but he intended to allow him, if he wished to reveal it, to select his own time for the revelation.

John, for his part, had no intention of sharing this particular trouble even with Smith. It was too new and intimate for discussion.

It was only since his return to New York that the futility of his quest had really come home to him. In the belief of having at last escaped from Mervo he had been inclined to overlook obstacles. It had seemed to him, while he waited for his late subjects to dismiss him, that, once he could move, all would be simple. New York had dispelled that idea. Logically, he saw with perfect clearness, there was no reason why he and Betty should ever meet again.

To retain a spark of hope beneath this knowledge was not easy and John, having been in New York now for nearly three weeks without any encouragement from the fates, was near the breaking point. A gray apathy had succeeded the frenzied restlessness of the first few days. The necessity for some kind of work that would to some extent occupy his mind was borne in upon him, and the thought of Smith had followed naturally. If anybody could supply distraction, it would be Smith. Faraday, another of the temporary exiles from the News, whom he had met by chance in Washington Square, had informed him of Smith’s new position and of the renaissance of Peaceful Moments, and he had hurried to the office to present himself as an unskilled but willing volunteer to the cause. Inspection of the current number of the paper had convinced him that the Peaceful Moments atmosphere, if it could not cure, would at least relieve.

“Faraday told me all about what you had done to this paper,” he said. “I came to see if you would let me in on it. I want work.”

“Excellent!” said Smith. “Consider yourself one of us.”