"No! a thousand times no! I am trying by every means in my power to prove that he isn't. I hope to succeed, too. But we mustn't go into that subject, as I have an important appointment to keep. Come to see me again, Mr. Douglas, if you like. I'm not unaccustomed to such calls, and I'll be glad to see you again. By appointment, though, for I'm a busy man."
Tom Douglas went back, over to Brooklyn, and, going to a hotel, asked for one John Harrison.
In a short time Peter Boots was eagerly listening to the report of the messenger he had sent to his father.
"I learned a lot, Mr. Harrison," the visitor began. "I think I can give you quite a bit of the local color you need for your novel."
"Not so much local color as mental attitude," Peter returned. "You see, in writing a psychological novel the author has to be careful of shades of feeling in his delineation of the characters. And as this Mr. Crane seemed to be just the type I want to study, I'm glad to have you tell me all the things he said, as nearly as you can recollect his own language."
"Yes, I know. And I was mighty interested on my own account, too."
"He was willing you should write an article about him?"
"Oh, yes, and asked me to come again."
"Go on, tell me all he said—how he looked and acted and everything that happened."
And so the young reporter and free-lance writer told Peter Boots all about his father, under the impression that he was talking to one who had never seen Benjamin Crane.