Mr. Weil uttered a low whistle.
"I don't know what the family friends will say of it," he replied, "but I call it pretty warm stuff. If the list includes many prudes they will hardly thank the girl for sending such a firebrand into their houses."
"Pshaw!" said Gouger. "The world is getting used to that sort of thing, and they won't mind it a bit. Besides, they will be so lost in admiration of their cousin's name on the cover that they will think of nothing else. What did you make out of her? Is she as innocent as I predicted?"
Archie poured out a glass of Bass' ale and sipped it slowly.
"Quite," he said, as he put it down on the table. "And she's no dunce, either." He went on to tell of the trap he had fallen into. "I'm dying with impatience to get her and Roseleaf together. They'd make an idealic couple."
Mr. Gouger inquired what he was waiting for.
"Oh, I want to do the thing right," said Weil. "I want to learn her as thoroughly as I can, before I bring him upon the stage. It will take three or four evenings more to hear the rest of her novel, and another to discuss it. I shall get around to him in about a fortnight, at the rate things are going. He will keep. What do you suppose he is doing now? Writing poetry! He sent a piece a few days ago to the Century, and they accepted it."
"He will be gray when it appears," said the critic. "It takes a long time for anything to see the light in that publication."
"But in this case an exception will be made," said Weil. "They have assured him that it will come out in their very next issue. He will be so proud to see his name in print that I expect to find difficulty in holding him back. A poet who appears in the Century has certainly stepped a little higher on the ladder."
The critic agreed to this, and remarked that such a man as Roseleaf should give his whole attention to poetry.