“Yes, got out quicker, and had a heap better story, if I do say it myself. You helped some. Want to go down and see the presses run?”
“I came in to see if there was any chance of getting work,” answered Larry, determined to plunge at once into the matter that most interested him. “My mother and I and the rest of the family came to New York a few days ago, and I need work. Is there any chance at all of a job here?”
“Well, if that isn’t luck!” exclaimed Mr. Newton, without any apparent reference to Larry’s question. “Say,” he called to someone in the next room, “weren’t you asking me if I knew of someone who wanted to run copy, Mr. Emberg?” he asked.
“Yes,” replied the city editor, coming out into the reporter’s room. “Why?”
“Nothing, only here’s a friend of mine who wants the job, that’s all,” said Mr. Newton, as if such coincidences happened every day.
“Ever run copy?” asked the city editor, after a pause.
“I—I don’t know,” replied Larry, wondering what sort of work it was.
“It’s like being an office boy in any other establishment,” said Mr. Newton. “You carry the stuff from the reporters’ desks to the editors’ and copy readers’, and you carry it from them,—that is, what’s left of it—to the tube that shoots it to the composing room.”
“I guess I could do it, I’m pretty strong,” replied Larry, whereat the two men laughed, though Larry could not see why.
“You’ll do,” said the city editor pleasantly. “I’ll give you a trial, anyhow. When can you come in?”