“I believe so. I’m just back. Come in, Phil. You got my message?”
“Why else should I be here, old fellow? Is it ‘Laki,’ sure?”
Without answering, Darnel led the way into his tiny room. His trunk lay upon the floor, half-unpacked, the folding-bed was down, for the better accommodation of some of the trunk’s contents, and the desk in the corner, under the single jet of gas, was covered with piles of finely torn paper. Darnel’s manner, usually nervous and somewhat conscious, betrayed a certain exhilaration, but he was under perfect self-control.
“‘Laki?’” he said, seating himself in his revolving chair and whirling around to the desk, while Atkinson threw himself upon the bed, “‘Laki?’ Oh, I had forgotten. It’s probably here.” He pulled over the mail accumulated during his absence. “Yes.” He tore open the big envelope. “‘The editor of The Æon regrets to say,’ etc.;” and he tossed the printed slip, with the manuscript, into his waste-basket, with a laugh.
Atkinson’s heart sank. Poor Darnel; it was not a cheerful welcome home. But Darnel was busied with his letters.
“And here are the others,” he went on. “I thank the Lord none of them were accepted.”
“What!” exclaimed Philander, turning upon his elbow.
Darnel looked at him with a puzzling smile.
“That’s why I sent for you,” said he. “Phil, all that I’ve been writing here for three years is stuff, and I’ve only just found it out. I can do something different now.”
Atkinson stared. Darnel had rarely talked about his own work, and then in a scarcely suppressed fever of excitement and anxiety. Many a time had Atkinson noticed his big hollow eyes turn darker, and his sallow face grow ashy, even in reading over with a shaking voice some of that same “stuff.”