the room possessed.
Praise, he reflected, which was not intended for the author's ear was
praise indeed. No man could tell to what it might lead. No one indeed,
Cecil Banborough least of all, though he was destined to find out before
he was many hours older; for down in the editorial sanctum of the _Daily
Leader_ O'Brien was being instructed:

"And if you touch a drop during the next week," reiterated the chief,
"I'll put a head on you!"

"But supposin' this dago conspiracy should turn out to be a fake?"
objected the Irishman.

"Then," said the reporter with determination, "you'll have to hatch one
yourself, and I'll discover it. But two things are certain. Something's
got to be exposed, and I've got to get that editorship."

CHAPTER II.

IN WHICH CECIL BANBOROUGH ATTEMPTS TO DRIVE PUBLIC OPINION.

It is a trifle chilly in the early morning, even by the first of May,
and Cecil shivered slightly as he paced the rustic platform at
Meadowbrook with his publisher and host of the night before.

"You see," the great man was saying, "there's an etiquette about all
these things. We can't advertise our publications in the elevated trains
like tomato catsup or the latest thing in corsets. It's not dignified.
The book must succeed, if at all, through the recognised channels of
criticism and on its own merits. Of course it's a bad season. But once
the war's well under way, people will give up newspapers and return to
literature."

"Meantime it wants a boom," contended the young Englishman, with an
insistence that apparently jarred on his hearer, who answered shortly:

"And that, Mr. Banborough, it is not in my power to give your book, or
any other man's."

There was an element of finality about this remark which seemed to
preclude further conversation, and Cecil took refuge in the morning
paper till the train pulled into the Grand Central Station, when the two
men shook hands and parted hurriedly, the host on his daily rush to the
office, the guest to saunter slowly up the long platform, turning over
in his mind the problems suggested by his recent conversation.

The busy life of the great terminus grated upon him, and that is perhaps
the reason why his eye rested with a sense of relief on a little group
of people who, like himself, seemed to have nothing particular to do.
They were six in number, two ladies and four gentlemen, and stood
quietly discussing some interesting problem, apparently unconscious of
t