Mr. Fisbee twisted up another sheet, and employed his eyes in following
the course of a crack in the plaster, a slender black aperture which
staggered across the dusty ceiling and down the dustier wall to disappear
behind a still dustier map of Carlow County. "That's the trouble!"
exclaimed Parker, observing the other's preoccupation. "Soon as you get to
writing a line or two that seems kind of promising, you begin to take a
morbid interest in that blamed crack. It's busted up enough copy for me,
the last eight days, to have filled her up twenty times over. I don't know
as I ever care to see that crack again. I turned my back on it, but there
wasn't any use in that, because if a fly lights on you I watch him like a
brother, and if there ain't any fly I've caught a mania for tapping my
teeth with a pencil, that is just as good."
To these two gentlemen, thus disengaged, reentered (after a much longer
absence than Miss Selina's quatrain justified) Mr. Ross Schofield, a
healthy glow of exertion lending pleasant color to his earnest visage, and
an almost visible laurel of success crowning his brows. In addition to
this imaginary ornament, he was horned with pencils over both ears, and
held some scribbled sheets in his hand.
"I done a good deal down there," he announced cheerfully, drawing up a
chair to the desk.
Pages:
224
225
226
227
228
229
230
231
232
233
234
235
236
237
238
239
240
241
242
243
244
245
246
247
248