oney. His
prose was clever but irregular; he wasn't always to be depended upon for
grammar; in everything he was unstable; yet the owner's secretary
reported the owner as saying that some day, if Babson married the right
woman, he would "settle down and make good."

Una did not dare to make private reservations regarding what "the right
woman" ought to mean in this case, but she burned at the thought of
Walter Babson's marrying, and for an instant she saw quite clearly the
film of soft dark hair that grew just below his sharp cheek-bone. But
she forgot the sweetness of the vision in scorn of herself for even
thinking of marriage with a weakling; scorn of herself for aspiring to
marry a man who regarded her as only a dull stenographer; and a maternal
anxiety over him that was untouched by passion.

Babson returned to the office, immaculate, a thin, fiery soul. But he
was closeted with the secretary of the company for an hour, and when he
came out his step was slow. He called for Una and dictated articles in a
quiet voice, with no jesting. His hand was unsteady, he smoked
cigarettes constantly, and his eye was an unwholesome yellow.

She said to him suddenly, a few days later, "Mr. Babson, I'd be glad if
I could take care of any papers or anything for you."

"Thanks. You might stick these chassis sketches away some place right
now."

So she was given the chance to keep his desk straight. He turned to her
for everything.

He said to her, abruptly, one dreary late afternoon of April when she
felt immensely languid and unambitious: "You're going to succeed--unless
you marry some dub. But there's one rule for success--mind you, I don't
follow it myself, I _can't_, but it's a grand old hunch: 'If you want to
get on, always be ready to occupy the job just ahead of you.' Only--what
the devil _is_ the job just ahead of a stenog.? I've been thinking of
you and wondering. What is it?"

"Honestly, Mr. Babson, I don't know. Here, anyway. Unless it's
lieutenant of the girls."

"Well--oh, that's just miffle-business, that kind of a job. Well, you'd
better learn to express yourself, anyway. Some time you women folks will
come into your own with both feet. Whenever you get the chance, take my
notes and try to write a better spiel from them than I do.... That won't
be hard, I guess!"

"I don't know why you are so modest, Mr. Babson. Every girl in the
office thinks you write better than any of the other editors."

"Yuh--but th