[V]
THE DYNASTY OF THE DIME NOVEL
My neighbour ran in at the basement door as was his wont. Coming lightly up the stairs he entered the library, and not finding me there, but hearing a voice beyond, he walked across the room and looked in at the open doorway of my den, where he stood for a moment, unobserved.
This is what he saw:
The boy, then scarcely nine, stretched out comfortably on a sofa, reading aloud; I reclining in an easy-chair with my slippered feet in another, and listening intently; a bright light shining over the boy’s shoulder and flooding the room.
My neighbour paused long enough to hear these words fall from the reader’s lips in boyish monotone:
“The crack of a Winchester sounded on the night air and the engineer fell dead!”
Then he interrupted.
“Well, in the name of reason,” he said, “what are you folks reading?”