"Why, nothin'," he replied, an impish twinkle in his eye, "only it depends. One man may be as good as another, but it's up to him to prove it. A bunch of Socialist Democrats, in a town I was in once, put up a hostler for city judge against a couple of old lawyers on the regular tickets. Said a hostler was as good as a lawyer in this free country. True enough, in a limited sense. I know a lot of hostlers that are better hostlers than a lot of lawyers that are lawyers. I suppose you follow me? But, all the same, these fellows were lame in their argument for this reason. Their hostler candidate might have had horse sense to burn, but he hadn't read law. There's a lot of difference between horse sense and the law, Maisie. They finally took the hostler off and put a cobbler on, who came in last. Now don't strike me, Maisie, that last was accidental. Really, I didn't intend it."
"I should hope not!" with sincerity. "But I don't see what all this rigmarole has to do with what we are saying, or were. Have you lost your mind?"
"If ever I did, the finder would return it," he retorted whimsically. "It would make him dizzy. But to return to cases, what I said has got everything to do with what we said. Can't see it? Well, men may be created equal but most of 'em never learn arithmetic. The fellow who does has got 'em stopped. He keeps on addin', while they—oh, they're just multiplyin' every minute. They're all around you, I'm one of 'em myself. The mathematical sharp, who made a specialty on finance and knows the idiosyncrasies of a dollar better than a mother knows her child, keeps on subtractin' the other fellows from their money. When it comes to the division, why they're all workin' for him. That's Rockefeller, and by the same token, that's me. We're the limit on the extremes. He's got everything and I'm livin' on the rest. I've got nothin' and he's got it. See?
"There's a happy medium, but it doesn't help the majority much, for most of us are on pay rolls. For instance, one man owns the Courier and the rest of us are working for him. If I changed to something else, I'd still be workin' for someone. Why? Because the only line in arithmetic in which I could make good was a sequence of ciphers with no bigger figure before it. You catch the point, don't you? It's due to the mercenary age. Nominally I'm free and equal. Actually I'm about a 'steenth of one per cent. See? But what's the dif'? What you need in this dizzy old world is philosophy. I've got it to burn, but Standard Oil can't scorch it. Here's a motto for you, Maisie, and you can paste it in that funny new jigger you call a hat. It'll keep you smilin' on wash day, and that's a test for a woman. It's just this: take it as it comes, and, if it doesn't come, don't take it."
He was gone, this queer little man-gamin of vagrant moods, shifting as the winds, yet for the most bubbling with reckless cheeriness. Humor was the predominant note of his being. Its broad grace mellowed him; would keep him sound and sweet at heart, whatever the sum of the coming years. Did the winds blow fair or ill, he had within him the essence of logical living; a whimsical sense of proportion that enabled him to view himself impartially with all others, one of myriad puppets in the show. A success or a failure he might become, as the world judges, but until the end he would be too large for that littleness which is too often a hallmark of success, the littleness of petty vanity. So, with this greatest gift the Creator can give one of his children, the humorous sense of proportion that can make if need be a joke of futility, Micky would go on to the end, to success or failure; alike with heart uncankered and a laugh on his lips. There would never transpire a misanthropic Micky.
For a long time after O'Byrn's departure, Maisie sat still in the Morris chair, a pensive look on her pretty face, with vague eyes bent dreamily on the flaming wood in the tiny fireplace; for the nights had grown chill with the first presage of winter and the fenders glowed with warm hospitality on company nights. The busy flames licked the blackened slabs; hurrying over the charred, desolate spaces; leaping in triumph as a conquered fragment fell, under the espionage of a shower of scintillant sparks. The tongues of flame, with redoubled energy, again lapped the wood, eating into its vitals, withering its fibres with fiery breath, crumbling it piecemeal in a crematory of elemental ashes. At last, always working upward, the flames burst exultantly from scorched fissures in the topmost slab and curled in weird shapes above it; shapes that now approached a certain sane coherence; that again were indeterminate and distorted, vaguely writhing in a dim haze, like one's future. Finally the fire, spending its force, dulled and died, the ruddy flames slowly paling like the fading roses of a summer sunset. Then there was the black, desolate end; all light extinguished save for the baleful, red-eyed glare of a few scattered embers, dying on the hearth. Maisie sat erect with a sudden start, stealing an apprehensive glance at the clock. With a long sigh and a little shiver, she rose slowly, extinguished the low-turned lamp and departed for bed.
Meanwhile, Micky, a red-eyed cigar in a corner of his mouth, had walked leisurely and thoughtfully toward the city. His hands thrust deep in his overcoat pockets, he strode unheedingly on, lost in a wistful reverie. What a flower was this little girl of his, to be sure! And he—what had he done to deserve her? A little self-examination is good for a man, especially if it be followed by a little proper self-disgust. O'Byrn walked on in singularly chastened mood. The past? Ah, it was done; why waste time in regrets when one is young? The present was of sunshine in a blue sky; the future—
O'Byrn's shoulders rose in a little, involuntary, uneasy shrug. He turned a corner just then and looked up. The next instant he had retired unobtrusively into a dark hallway, where he stood, staring across the street.
O'Byrn could scarcely have explained his definite impulse for doing this. It was simply the half-unconscious manifestation of the news instinct. Without any needed pause for reasoning, Micky's news faculty had connected two apparently irrelevant facts as significantly allied with each other, prompting him to remain in the hope of securing something worth while. The wholesale liquor establishment of Shaughnessy stood just across the street. The curtains of the office were drawn, but O'Byrn saw the reflection of a light behind them. Furthermore, the sound which had brought Micky to a realization of his surroundings, a moment before, was that of a carriage, which had been halted a little way up the dark street, the corner of which O'Byrn had just turned. So O'Byrn stood in the shadow, watching Shaughnessy's office.
He had not long to wait. A few moments and he beheld the corner of one of the office window shades drawn slightly to one side. Somebody was evidently looking out. Nobody was in sight, for the street was a quiet one and was deserted at that hour. The next moment the door was opened cautiously and a man emerged. Crossing the street swiftly he passed by O'Byrn so closely that the reporter could have touched him, and turned the corner. Then was soon audible the sound of receding wheels.