prenomen of Conde,
which, however, upon Anglo-Saxon tongues, had been promptly modified to
Condy, or even, among his familiar and intimate friends, to Conny.
Asked as to his birthplace--for no Californian assumes that his
neighbor is born in the State--Condy was wont to reply that he was
"bawn 'n' rais'" in Chicago; "but," he always added, "I couldn't help
that, you know." His people had come West in the early eighties, just
in time to bury the father in alien soil. Condy was an only child. He
was educated at the State University, had a finishing year at Yale, and
a few months after his return home was taken on the staff of the San
Francisco "Daily Times" as an associate editor of its Sunday
supplement. For Condy had developed a taste and talent in the matter
of writing. Short stories were his mania. He had begun by an
inoculation of the Kipling virus, had suffered an almost fatal attack
of Harding Davis, and had even been affected by Maupassant. He "went
in" for accuracy of detail; held that if one wrote a story involving
firemen one should have, or seem to have, every detail of the
department at his fingers' ends, and should "bring in" to the tale all
manner of technical names and cant phrases.

Much of his work on the Sunday supplement of "The Times" was of the
hack order--special articles, write-ups, and interviews. About once a
month, however, he wrote a short story, and of late, now that he was
convalescing from Maupassant and had begun to be somewhat himself,
these stories had improved in quality, and one or two had even been
copied in the Eastern journals. He earned $100 a month.

When Snooky had let him in, Rivers dashed up the stairs of the
Bessemers' flat, two at a time, tossed his stick into a porcelain
cane-rack in the hall, wrenched off his overcoat with a single
movement, and precipitated himself, panting, into the dining-room,
tugging at his gloves.

He was twenty-eight years old--nearly ten years older than Travis; tall
and somewhat lean; his face smooth-shaven and pink all over, as if he
had just given it a violent rubbing with a crash towel. Unlike most
writing folk, he dressed himself according to prevailing custom. But
Condy overdid the matter. His scarfs and cravats were too bright, his
colored shirt-bosoms were too broadly barred, his waistcoats too
extreme. Even Travis, as she rose to his abrupt entrance? told herself
that of a Sunday evening a pink shirt and scarlet tie were a
c