The White Shield

by Myrtle Reed

"She hasn't suffered yet," he said grimly, "and that is the thing that tells."

Months passed and summer shaded imperceptibly into autumn. Then, with little sharp flurries of cold, winter took its place. Arnold was hard at work in that merciless slavery which is found only at the newspaper desk.

"You're just a cog in the machine," he said to Clayton one day. "Some day the thing goes wrong, and they find out it's your particular cog, and they get a new one. That's all there is to it."

Clayton laughed at his friend's cynicism, as he could well afford to do, for he had just been called to a distant city to fill an important position upon the staff of a larger and more influential journal.

For some time, Arnold's particular cog did yeoman service. He ground out more "copy" than any man on the staff. He had the keenest nose for news—the most delicate way of handling a good story.

Sometimes as he wrote at his desk, the face of the young Salvationist intruded itself between him and his work. He smiled at his foolish fancy, but dramatic incidents began to take shape about the image of that girl. He planned "The Great American Novel"—there is no newspaper man who could not write it, if he only had the time—and she was to be the central figure.

All the possibilities of womanhood lay in that sweet Madonna-like face. Thinking along the lines of art the new century seemed to have laid down, he struck the key-note of his theme—the development of the individual. His Madonna might suffer or not, but she must grow into her highest and best. He turned the story over in his mind, studying it from every standpoint. It was not yet ready for paper and pen.

A year went by, and various kinds of trouble came to Arnold. Something eventually became wrong with the newspaper machine, for he worked only by fits and starts, and at last he was asked for his resignation. His face was white and determined when he handed it in, but he felt that he was facing failure.

He had a little money laid by for an emergency; at all events, it was enough to supply his wants until he could write his book. He went at it feverishly, but the work soon began to drag. The far-off, elusive phantom of his ideal mocked at him behind its expression. Then he went more slowly still, and, by almost imperceptible degrees, he went steadily down the pitiful ladder which leads from bad to worse. Ambition faded, hope died, and at last he found himself on a level with humanity at its worst—an outcast of the slums. Strong drink had done its work.