He took it immediately to his chief.

"Ah! this is all right," he said; "read it: you will be pleased. It
quite fulfills the early promise."

Mr. Anderson did glance rapidly over Bertha's paper.

"Miss Florence Aylmer has done good work," he said, when he had finished
reading her pungent and caustic words; "and yet--" A thoughtful
expression crossed his face, he was silent for a moment, then he looked
up at the young man, who was standing near.

"I doubt if in any way such a paper will help our new production," he
said. "It is difficult for me to believe that any girl could write in
what I will call so agnostic a spirit. There is a bitterness, a want of
belief, an absence of all feeling in this production. I admit its
cleverness; but I should be sorry to know much of the woman who has
written it."

"I admire talent in any form," said Tom Franks; "it will be inserted, of
course. People who want smart things will like it, I am sure. Believe
me, you are mistaken; it will do good, not harm."

"It may do good from a financial point of view: doubtless it will," said
Mr. Anderson; "but I wish the girl who has those great abilities would
turn them to a higher form of expression. She might do great things
then, and move the world in a right way."

"I grant you that the whole thing is pessimistic," said Franks; "but its
cleverness redeems it. It will call attention, and the next story by
Miss Aylmer which appears in the _Argonaut_ will be more appreciated
than her last."

"See that that story appears in the next number," said his chief to
Franks, and the young man left the room.

Florence received in due time a proof of her paper for correction. There
was little alteration, however, needed in Bertha's masterly essay; but
Florence was now obliged to read it carefully, and her heart stood still
once or twice as she read the expressions which she herself was supposed
to have given birth to. She had just finished correcting the proofs when
Edith Franks came into the room.

"I have just seen Tom," she said; "he is delighted with your essay. Is
that it? Have you corrected it? May I look through it?"

"I would much rather you did not read it, Edith."

"What nonsense! It is to be published, and I shall see it then."

"Well, read it, if you must, when it is in the paper; only I would
rather you didn't read it at all."

"What do you mean?"

"I don't like it."

"Why do you write what you don't like?" said Edith, fixing h