“This is fine, uncle,” said Sam cordially. “I thought you were going to drive me out into the snow.”
“Do you remember meeting an Englishman named Lord Tilbury at dinner at my house?”
Sam did indeed. His Lordship had got him wedged into a corner after the meal and had talked without a pause for more than half an hour.
“He is the proprietor of the Mammoth Publishing Company, a concern which produces a great many daily and weekly papers in London.”
Sam was aware of this. Lord Tilbury’s conversation had been almost entirely autobiographical.
“Well, he is returning to England on Saturday on the Mauretania, and you are going with him.”
“He has offered to employ you in his business.”
“But I don’t know anything about newspaper work.”
“You don’t know anything about anything,” Mr. Pynsent pointed out gently. “It is the effect of your English public-school education. However, you certainly cannot be a greater failure with Lord Tilbury than you have been with me. That wastepaper basket over there has been in my office only four days, and already it knows more about the export and import business than you would learn if you stayed here fifty years.”