in a bottle, its "poorhouse" dishes and its unpainted kitchen chairs. But the place had come to have a home-like and familiar look to Don; and it had, for him, a tone of youthful defiance of adversity that was loudest in Pittsey's contemptuous display of the editor's regrets that they had not found his contributions "available."
Having put his bread in the oven, Don stood before these letters with the smile which they always encouraged in him. He wished that he might add to them similar letters from all the offices at which he had applied for work; they would fill the wall! When Pittsey became famous—as he would, of course, some day—what a comment on editorial incapacity this collection would be!
Pittsey put his head in at the door. "Excuse me for intruding. King Alfred," he said, "but I thought you might like to know that your toast's in flames."
III
Don found no work that he could do. Conroy, obviously, was no longer even looking for any. And when Pittsey at last sold a "special" to a Saturday "supplement," the sight of his $8 cheque—received in the morning mail and produced triumphantly at the breakfast table—was like the first nugget to a camp of despairing prospectors. "Money!" he gloated. "Eight of them! Hully Gee, look at it, boys! The
