"I told you half an hour ago that if I could have a few uninterrupted minutes I'd be with you," answered the other man, without looking up. "They haven't fallen in my way yet."
"It's pity that moves me to speech," rejoined the first speaker, rising and sauntering to the window,—not that one outside of which Lucyet was sitting,—"pity for those young souls throbbing with the consciousness of power who may have forgotten to enclose a stamp for return. I feel when I interrupt you as if I were holding back the remorseless wheel of fate."
His companion allowed this speculative remark to pass without reply. The idler sauntered back to the table.
"What'll you bet, now, before you go any further, that it'll go into the waste-basket?"
"Stamped and addressed envelope enclosed," observed the patient editor, absently.
"Well, what odds will you give me of its being not necessarily devoid of literary merit, but unfitted for the special uses of your magazine?"
The other was still silent as he laid aside another page.
"Half the time," continued the idler, "to look at you, you wouldn't believe that you speak the truth when you express your thanks for the pleasure of reading their manuscripts. It would seem that that, too, was simulated."
The older man picked up a soft felt hat and threw it across the room at his companion, without taking his eyes from the page.
"Oh, well," went on the other, "I can read the newspaper. I can read what is printed, while you're reading what ought to be. Of course you and I know the things are never the same."