Then G. G. blushed.
"And when I am well can I live where I please—and—and get married—and all that sort of thing?"
"You can live where you please, marry and have children; and if you aren't a good husband and a good father I dare say you'll live to be hanged at ninety. But if I were you, G. G., I'd stick by the Adirondacks until you're old enough to—know better."
And G. G. went back to his rooms in great glee and typewrote a story that he had finished as well as he could, and sent it to a magazine. And six days later it came back to him, with a little note from the editor, who said:
"There's nothing wrong with your story except youth. If you say so we'll print it. We like it. But, personally, and believing that I have your best interests at heart, I advise you to wait, to throw this story into your scrap basket, and to study and to labor until your mind and your talent are mature. For the rest, I think you are going to do some fine things. This present story isn't that—it's not fine. At the same time, it is so very good in some ways that we are willing to leave its publication or its destruction to your discretion."
G. G. threw his story into the scrap basket and went to bed with a brand-new notion of editors.
"Why," said he to the cold darkness—and his voice was full of awe and astonishment—"they're—alive!"