gratifying his curiosity about his affairs--"not the
slightest. I simply tried to think of something which I should be
sure to sell, because people would be sure to buy, and I thought
of--butter and cheese. It all seems exceedingly simple to me, the
principle of obtaining enough money wherewith to live and buy the
necessaries of life. It is only to look about and possibly within and
see what wares you can command, for which people will be willing to
give their own earnings. It is all a question of supply and demand.
First you must study the demand, and then your own power of supply.
If you can interpret law like Rufus Choate, why, sell that; if you
can edit like Horace Greeley, sell that; if you can act like Booth or
sing like Patti, sell that; if you can dance like Carmencita, sell
that. It all remains with you, what you can do, sing or dance, or
sway a multitude, or sell butter and eggs; or possibly, rather, it
remains with the public and what it decides you can do--that is
better for one's vanity."

"Decidedly," agreed Carroll, with an odd, reflective expression.

"If the public want your song or your novel or your speech, they will
buy it, or your dance, and if they don't they won't, and you cannot
make them. You have to sell what the public want to buy, for you
yourself are only a unit in a goodly number of millions."

"And yet how extremely all-pervading that unit can feel sometimes,"
Carroll said, with a laugh.

He was silent again, puffing at his cigar, and again Anderson,
leaning back opposite and also smoking, wondered why he was there.
Then Carroll removed his cigar and spoke. His voice was a little
constrained, but he looked at Anderson full in the face.

"Mr. Anderson," he said, "I want to know if you will kindly tell me
how much I owe you, for I am one of the consumers of butter and eggs."

Anderson continued to smoke a second before answering. "I cannot
possibly tell you here, Mr. Carroll," he replied then.

"Of course I know I should have written and asked for the bill,"
Carroll said, "but I knew some had been paid, and--you have been most
kind, and--"

Anderson waited.

"In short," said Carroll, speaking quickly and brusquely, "I am under
a cloud here, and--your mother called to see my daughter this
afternoon, and I thought that possibly you would pardon me if I put
it all on a little different basis."

Carroll stopped, and again Anderson waited. He was becoming more and
more puzzled.

T