“Will it succeed?”
“Oh, no!” he laughed.
“You think not?” Her interest in this dull business struck him as astonishing, and yet in character with her as he had known her in Plattville. Then he wondered unhappily if she thought that talking of the “Herald” and learning things about the working of a country newspaper would help her to understand Brainard Macauley.
“Why have you let him go on with it?” she asked. “I suppose you have encouraged him?”
“Oh, yes, I encouraged him. The creature's recklessness fascinated me. A dare-devil like that is always charming.'”
“You think there is no chance for the creature's succeeding with the daily?”
“None,” he replied indifferently.
“You mentioned work-baskets, I think?”
He laughed again. “I believe him to be the original wooden-nutmeg man. Once a week he produces a 'Woman's Page,' wherein he presents to the Carlow female public three methods for making currant jelly, three receipts for the concoction of salads, and directs the ladies how to manufacture a pretty work-basket out of odd scraps in twenty minutes. The astonishing part of it is that he has not yet been mobbed by the women who have followed his directions.”
“So you think the daily is a mistake and that your enterprising idiot should be mobbed? Why?” She seemed to be taking him very seriously.