* *

Meunier, fulfilling his promise to me, paid my fare to New York. I soon
walked into the office of the _National Magazine_.

Clara Martin was there, and Allsworth Lephil, the managing editor, and
his assistant Galusha Siddon.

As I sat in the office, they gave me a sort of impromptu reception.

Ray Sanford strolled in, as fresh-complexioned as an Englishman. He was,
they said, preparing a series of articles on the negro problem. And I
met a little, bustling, sharp-eyed man, with much of the feminine about
him,--his face lifted as if on an intuitive intellectual scent....
Carruthers Heflin ... he wore a close-cropped salt-and-pepper beard,
like a stage-doctor. He was busy with a series of articles to be
entitled, _Babylons of To-day_ ... exposing the corruption of our modern
American cities.

I spoke to them of my projected trip to Europe.

"I think you're foolish to run off to Europe just at this time in your
life. Now is the time you should establish yourself here. Besides,
Jarvis Mackworth has written us that you're writing a book while Derek,
the Chicago millionaire, stakes you."

"Yes, that's true. But couldn't I write it in Europe as well as here?"

"You'd find too many distractions."

"Where would you go first?" asked Clara Martin.

"Paris!"

"That would be absolutely fatal for a young man of your disposition. You
need to sit quiet and write for a few years ... you've been over the map
too much already."

"Baxter has just been in here ... he's writing us a sensational novel
exposing society. He spoke to me about you," Lephil remarked,--"said he
wished we'd put a tag on you and ship you down to his Eden colony."

There was a pause. Miss Martin thoughtfully tapped her forehead with a
pencil.

"I don't think it would be good for Johnnie to go down to Eden and put
up with Penton," she interjected, "they're too much alike."

"Ally Merton is in New York," Galusha Siddon informed me. "He's working
on the _Express_. He wants you to run down and see him."

* * * * *

Merton had come to New York the year before, to work on the _Express_.
Mackworth had gotten him the job. Ally was as meticulously dressed as
ever. His eyes swept me from head to foot, with an instinctive glance of
appraisal, as he shook hands.

"Come on up on the roof. The paper wants a photo of you ... to go with a
story I'm writing about you."

* * * * *