At
nine thirty the boy brought him his share of the mail from the back
office, and in ten minutes he was deeply absorbed in sorting the
"daily reports" from the various agencies. He worked steadily,
interrupted by an occasional phone call, an order from the chief
clerk, the arrival and departure of business associates and clients.
Above the hum of subdued office conversation the click of typewriting
machines and the incessant buzzing of the desk telephones, he was
conscious of hearing the same question repeated with monotonous
fidelity:

"Hello! What's new with you?"

And as surely, either through his own lips or the lips of another, the
identical reply always came:

"Not a thing in the world!"

At half past eleven he stopped deliberately and stood for a moment,
nervously fingering his tie. He was thinking about the course of
action that he had decided upon in that long, unusual vigil of the
night before. His uncertainty lasted until the remembrance of his
wife's scornful question swept over him:

"Why aren't you doing something?... Everybody else is!"

But it was the answer he had made that committed him irrevocably to
his future course:

"Perhaps I am. You don't know everything."

He had felt a sense of fatality bound up in these words of defiant
pretense, once they had escaped him...a fatality which the blazing
contempt of his wife's retort had emphasized. Even now his cheeks
burned with the memory of that unleashed insult:

"What can _you_ do?"

No, there was no turning back now. His own self-esteem could not deny
so clear-cut a challenge.

He called his assistant. "I wish you'd go into the private office and
see if Mr. Ford is at leisure," he ordered. "I want to have a talk
with him."

The youth came back promptly. "He says for you to come," was his brief
announcement.

Fred Starratt stared a moment and, recovering himself, walked swiftly
in upon his employer. Mr. Ford was signing insurance policies.

"Well, Starratt," he said, looking up smilingly, "what's the good
word?... What's new with you?"

Starratt squared himself desperately. "Nothing...except I find it
impossible to live upon my salary."

Mr. Ford laid aside his pen. "Oh, that's unfortunate!... Suppose you
sit down and we'll talk it over."

Starratt dropped into the nearest seat.

Mr. Ford let his eyeglasses dangle from their cord. He was not in the
least disturbed. Indeed, he seemed to be approaching the issue with
unqualified