All around them lay these snowballs of defeated journalism.
Mr. Parker was a long, loose, gaunt gentleman, with a peremptory forehead
and a capable jaw, but on the present occasion his capability was baffled
and swamped in the attempt to steer the craft of his talent up an
unaccustomed channel without a pilot. "I don't see as it's any use,
Fisbee," he said, morosely, after a series of efforts that littered the
floor in every direction. "I'm a born compositor, and I can't shift my
trade. I stood the pace fairly for a week, but I'll have to give up; I'm
run plumb dry. I only hope they won't show him our Saturday with your
three columns of 'A Word of the Lotus Motive,' reprinted from February.
I begin to sympathize with the boss, because I know what he felt when I
ballyragged him for copy. Yes, sir, I know how it is to be an editor in a
dead town now."
"We must remember, too," said his companion, thoughtfully, "there is the
Thursday issue of this week to be prepared, almost at once."
"_Don't_! Please don't mention that, Fisbee!" Parker tilted far back in
his chair with his feet anchored under the desk, preserving a precarious
balance. "I ain't as grateful for my promotion to joint Editor-in-Chief as
I might be. I'm a middling poor man for the hour, I guess," he remarked,
painfully following the peregrinations of a fly on his companion's sleeve.
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