"What?"
"That they can't get hold of that story about the Consolidated Traction Company."
"—And damn those foreigners who come over here with their fool notions of dignity!" broke in the voice of the city editor—then stopped and blushed when he saw me within ear-shot, for it's a rule of the office that no one shall say "damn" without blushing, except the society editor and her assistants.
"Who's the foreigner?" I asked, for the sake of warding off apologies. That's why men object so strongly to women mixing up with them in business life. It keeps them eternally apologizing.
"Maitland Tait? But that's not foreign. That's perfectly good English."
"So's he!" the city editor snapped. "It's his confounded John Bullishness that's causing all the trouble."
"But the traction company's no kin to us, is it?" the poet inquired crossly, for he was reporting a double-header in verse, and our chatter annoyed him.
"Trouble will be kin to us—if somebody doesn't break in on Great Britain and make him cough up the story," the city editor warned over his shoulder. "I've already sent Clemons and Bolton and Reade."
"—And it would mean a raise," the poet said, with a tender little smile. "A raise!"