"But I don't know you, sir," said Wilkins stiffly. "Don't you see I'm busy?"
"It is true I am a stranger, but remember, sir, I shall not be so when I leave. I just want to interview you about that paragraph in the Moon, stating——"
"Look here!" roared Wilkins, letting his feet slide from the table with a crash. "Let me tell you, sir, I have no time to listen to your impertinence. My leisure is scant and valuable. I am a hard-worked man. I can't be pestered with questions from inquisitive busybodies. What next, sir? What I write in the Moon is my business and nobody else's. Damn it all, sir, is there to be nothing private? Are you going to poke and pry into the concerns of the very journalist? No, sir, you have wasted your time as well as mine. We never allow the public to go behind what appears in our paper."
"But this is a mere private curiosity—what you tell me shall never be published."
"If it could be, I wouldn't tell it you. I never waste copy."
"Tell me—I am willing to pay for the information—who wrote the paragraph about Clorinda Bell and the Old Maids' Club."
"Go to the devil!" roared Wilkins.
"I thought you would know more than he," said Silverdale, and left. Wilkins came downstairs on his heels, in a huff, and walked towards Ludgate Hill. Silverdale thought he would have another shot, and followed him unseen. The two men jumped into a train, and after an endless-seeming journey arrived at the Crystal Palace. A monster balloon was going off from the grounds. Herr Nickeldorf, the great aeronaut, was making in solitude an experimental night excursion to Calais, as if anxious to meet his fate by moonlight alone. Wilkins rushed up to Nickeldorf, who was standing among the ropes giving directions.
"Go avay!" said Nickeldorf, when he saw him. "I hafe nodings to say to you. You makes me schwitzen." He jumped into the car and bade the men let go.
Ordinarily Wilkins would have been satisfied with this ample material for half a column, but he was still in a bad temper, and, as the car was sailing slowly upwards, he jumped in, and the aeronaut gave himself up for pumped. In an instant, moved by an irresistible impulse, Silverdale gave a great leap and stood by the Moon-man's side. The balloon shot up and the roar of the crowd became a faint murmur as the planet flew from beneath their feet.