"My taste might be far worse," I answered.
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"Yes, it might. You might have stooped to liking some of your own verses. I ought really to congratulate you, I suppose," retorted the visitor, with a sneering laugh.
This roused my ire again.
"Who are you, anyhow, that you come here and take me to task?" I demanded, angrily. "I'll like anything I please, and without asking your permission. If I cared more for the Peterkin Papers than I do for Shakespeare, I wouldn't be accountable to you, and that's all there is about it."
"Never mind who I am," said the visitor. "Suffice to say that I am myself. You'll know my name soon enough. In fact, you will pronounce it involuntarily the first thing when you wake in the morning, and then—" Here he shook his head ominously, and I felt myself grow rigid with fright in my chair. "Now for the final trick," he said, after a moment's pause. "Think of where you would most like to be at this moment, and I'll exert my power to put you there. Only close your eyes first."
I closed my eyes and wished. When I opened them I was in the billiard-room of the Gutenberg Club with Perkins and Tompson.
"For Heaven's sake, Spencer," they said, in surprise, "where did you drop in from? Why, man, you are as white as a sheet. And what a necktie! Take it off!"
"Grab hold of me, boys, and hold me fast," I pleaded, falling on my knees in terror. "If you don't, I believe I'll die."
The idea of returning to my sanctum was intolerably dreadful to me.