"I am visiting friends here," began Fitzgerald. "Rear Admiral Killigrew was an old friend of my father's. I did not expect to remain, but the admiral and his daughter insisted; so I am sending to New York for my luggage, and will go up this morning." He saw no reason for giving fuller details.
"So it must have been you who brought the admiral's note. It is fate.
Thanks. Some day that casual dinner may give you good interest"
The little man with the butterfly bent lower over his prize.
"Do you believe in curses?" asked Breitmann.
"Ordinary, every-day curses, yes; but not in Roman anathemas."
"Neither of those. I mean the curse that sometimes dogs a man, day and night; the curse of misfortune. I was hungry that night in Paris; I have been hungry many times since, I have held honorable places; to-day, I become a servant at seventy-five dollars a month and my bread and butter. A private secretary."
"But why aren't you with some newspaper?" asked Fitzgerald, breaking his eggs.
Breitmann drew up his shoulders. "For the same reason that I am renting my brains as a private secretary. It was the last thing I could find, and still retain a little self-respect. My heart was dead when the admiral told me he had already engaged a secretary. But your note brought me the position."
"But the newspapers?"
"None of them will employ me."