I said I didn't doubt it, if my womenfolk encouraged every infernal old dead-beat in the colony to come and loaf upon me. Two large tears at once ran down Kate's nose, and dropped into the custard on her plate. I softened at once and went out.
'Permit me, sir,' he said, in a wobbly kind of voice, as he lurched to and fro in the doorway, and tried to jab the point of his umbrella into a knot-hole in the verandah boards in order to steady himself, 'permit me, sir, to thank you for your kindness and to tender you my private card. Perhaps I may be able to serve you in some humble way'—here the umbrella point stuck in the hole, and he clung to the handle with both hands—'some humble way, sir. Like yourself, I am a literary man, as this will show you.' He fumbled in his breast pocket with his left hand, and would have fallen over on his back but for the umbrella handle, to which he clung with his right. Presently he extracted a dirty card and handed it to me, with a bow, which he effected by doubling himself on his stomach over the friendly gamp, and remained in that position, swaying to and fro, for quite ten seconds. I read the card:—
MR HORATIO BILGER
Journalist and Littérateur
Formerly Editor of the 'Barangoora News'
Real Aylesbury Ducks for Sale
Book-keeping Taught in Four Lessons
4a Kellet Street,
Darlinghurst, Sydney
I said I should bear him in mind, and, after helping him to release his umbrella, saw him down the steps and watched him disappear.
'Thank Heaven!' I said to Kate, 'we have seen the last of him.'
I was bitterly mistaken, for next morning when I entered the office, Bilger was there awaiting me, outside the sub-editor's room. He was wearing a new pair of boots, much larger than the old ones, and smiled pleasantly at me, and said he had brought his son Edward to see me, feeling sure that I would use my influence with the editor and manager to get him put on as a canvasser.
I refused point blank to see 'Edward' then or at any other time, and said that even if there was a vacancy I should not recommend a stranger. He sighed, and said that I should like Edward, once I knew him. He was 'a noble lad, but misfortune had dogged his footsteps—a brave, heroic nature, fighting hard against unmerited adversity.' I went in and shut the door.
Two days later Kate asked me at supper if I couldn't do something for old Bilger's son.
'Has that infernal old nuisance been writing to you about his confounded son?'