"I appreciate your ambition," he said, more in sorrow than anger, "but I have become so attuned to starving alone that I don't think I could adjust myself to the shock of breaking my fast on you."
Jap was unmoved.
"My dad onct thought he'd be a editor, but he got married," he said calmly.
"Sensible dad," commented the editor, with more truth than he dreamed. "I suppose that he had three meals a day, and a change of socks on Sunday."
"But Ma had to get 'em," argued Jap. "I want to be a editor, and I am agoin' to stay." And stay he did.
CHAPTER II
"Run out and get a box of sardines," ordered the boss of the Washington press. "I've got a nickel. I can't let you starve. I lived three months on them—look at me!"
Jap surveyed him apprehensively.
"I'd hate to be so thin," he complained, "and I don't like sardines nor any fishes. My dad fed us them every day. Allus wanted to taste doughnuts. Can I buy them?"