“We are not bermidded to divulge who the expert is, but we did not spare money——”
Morning’s eye was held to the desk over the shoulder of Markheim, to a large square envelope, eminent in blue, upon the corner of which was the name “Reever Kennard.”
“I’m sure you did not. He was always a high-priced man,” he said idly.... And so this was the long-delayed answer to his appearance in the World-News to the extent of eighty thousand words. He had heard that Mr. Reever Kennard was back on finance and politics.... Markheim had not followed his mind nor caught the sentence. Morning passed out through the hush. He paused at the door to give the office-boy a present—a goodly present to be divided with the sister, just now occupied with a fresh outbreak of obstreperousness on the part of Gramercy.
Morning had moments of something like the old rage; but the extreme naturalness of the thing, and its touch of humor, helped him over for the next hour or so. Apparently, the opportunity had fallen into the lap of Mr. Reever Kennard; come to him with homing familiarity. The war-expert had spoken, not as one offering his values gratuitously, but as one called and richly paid. Morning reflected that the summer alone on his hill must have subdued him. As a matter of fact, he was doubtful about the play; not because Markheim was afraid; not by any means because Mr. Reever Kennard had spoken, but because it had not come easily, and the three incidents which made the three acts did not stand up in his mind as the exact trinity for the integration of results. But one cannot finally judge his own work.
He wandered straight east from that particular theatre of Markheim’s where the offices were and passed Fourth Avenue. He never went quite that way again, but remembered that there was an iron picket-fence of an old residence to lean against; and at the corner of it, nearer town, the sidewalk sank into a smoky passage where lobsters, chops, and a fowl or two were tossed together in front. It was all but dark. He was averse to taking his present mood across the river. It wasn’t fair to the cabin. Mio Amigo recurred queerly and often to mind....
“Look—there’s Mr. Morning——”
“Sh-sh—oh, Charley—sh-sh!”
Morning was compelled. Could this little shrinking creature, beside whom the under-sized brother now appeared hulking, be the same who had bossed Manhattan to a peak in his presence such a little while ago? She seemed terrified, all pointed for escape, sick from the strain of the street.
“Why, hello!” Morning said.