“I won’t,” replied Galbraithe, stubbornly. “I’m going back home, I tell you. And in ten years I’ll be twenty-five years younger than any of you.”
He spoke with some heat. Harding laughed, but Green grew sober. He placed his hand on Galbraithe’s arm.
“Right,” he said. “Get out, and God bless you, old man.”
“If only Haydon had been here—” choked Galbraithe.
“I expect he’s younger than any of us,” replied Green, soberly. “He’s measuring time by eternities.”
Galbraithe picked up his bag.
“S’long,” he said.
He moved toward the door, and the entire group stood stock still and without a word saw him go out. He hurried along the narrow corridor and past the city editor’s room. He went down the old stairs, his shoulders bent and his legs weak. Fifteen hundred days were upon his shoulders. He went out upon the street, and for a moment stood there with his ears buzzing. About him swarmed the same newsboys he had left five years before, looking no older by a single day. Squinting his eyes, he studied them closely. There was Red Mick, but as he looked more carefully he saw that it wasn’t Red Mick at all. It was probably Red Mick’s younger brother. The tall one, the lanky one and the little lame one were there, but their names were different. The drama was the same, the setting the same, but fifteen hundred days had brought a new set of actors for the same old parts. It was like seeing Shakespeare with a new cast, but the play was older by centuries than any of Shakespeare’s.
Galbraithe hailed a taxi.
“Granderantal stash-un,” he ordered.