I was blissfully unaware that any comment had been made on my effusion until about five in the afternoon, by which time the afternoon editions of the _Post-Dispatch_ had been out several hours. When I entered the office at five, comfortable and at peace with myself in my new position, excited comment was running about the office as to what “the old man” would think and say and do now. He had gone at two, it appeared, to the Southern for luncheon and had not returned. Wait until he saw it! Oh me! Oh my! Wouldn’t he be hopping! Hartung, who was reasonably nervous as to his own share in the matter, was the first to approach and impress me with the dreadfulness of it all, how savage “the old man” could be in any such instance. “Gee, just wait! Oh, but he’ll be hot, I bet!” As he talked the “old man” passed up the hall, a grim and surly figure. I saw my dramatic honors going a-glimmering.
“Here,” I said to Hartung, pretending a kind of innocence, even at this late hour, “what’s all this about? What’s the row, anyhow?”
“Didn’t you see the editorial in the _Post-Dispatch_?” inquired Hartung gloomily. It was his own predicament that was troubling him.
“Why, that criticism you wrote about the Black Patti. They’ve made all sorts of fun of it. The worst of it is that they’ve charged it all up to the old man.”
I smiled a sickly smile. I felt as if I had committed some great crime. Why had I attempted to write anything “fine” anyhow? Why couldn’t I have been content and rested with a little praise? Had I no sense at all? Must I always be trying to do something great? Perhaps this would be the end of me.
Hartung brought me the _Post-Dispatch_, and sorrowfully and with falling vitals I read it, my toes curling, my stomach seeming gradually to retire to my backbone. Why had I done it!
As I was standing there, my eyes glued to the paper, near the door which looked into the main city room in which was Tobe scribbling dourly away, I heard and then saw McCullagh enter and walk up to the stout city editor. He had a copy of the selfsame _Post-Dispatch_ crumpled roughly in his hand, and on his face was gathered what seemed to me a dark scowl.
“Did you see this, Mr. Mitchell?” I heard him say.