nation of those feared and
arrogant advertisers, the department stores, for endeavoring, with
signal lack of success, to procure the suppression of certain market
news. It became known as independent, honest, unafraid, radical (in Wall
Street circles "socialistic" or even "anarchistic"), and, to the
profession, as dangerous to provoke. Advertisers were, from time to
time, alienated; public men, often of The Patriot's own trend of
thought, opposed. Commercial associations even passed resolutions, until
Banneker took to publishing them with such comment as seemed to him good
and appropriate. Marrineal uttered no protest, though the unlucky Haring
beat his elegantly waistcoated breast and uttered profane if subdued
threats of resigning, which were for effect only; for The Patriot's
circulation continued to grow and the fact to which every advertising
expert clings as to the one solid hope in a vaporous calling, is that
advertising follows circulation.

Seldom did Banneker see his employer in the office, but Marrineal often
came to the Saturday nights of The House With Three Eyes, which had
already attained the fame of a local institution. As the numbers drawn
to it increased, it closed its welcoming orbs earlier and earlier, and,
once they were darkened, there was admittance only for the chosen few.

It was a first Saturday in October, New York's homing month for its
indigenous social birds and butterflies, when The House triply blinked
itself into darkness at the untimely hour of eleven-forty-five. There
was the usual heterogeneous crowd there, alike in one particular alone,
that every guest represented, if not necessarily distinction, at least
achievement in his own line. Judge Willis Enderby, many times invited,
had for the first time come. At five minutes after midnight, the
incorruptible doorkeeper sent an urgent message requesting Mr.
Banneker's personal attention to a party who declined politely but
firmly to be turned away. The host, answering the summons, found Io. She
held out both hands to him.

"Say you're glad to see me," she said imperatively.

"Light up the three eyes," Banneker ordered the doorman. "Are you
answered?" he said to Io.

"Ah, that's very pretty," she approved. "It means 'welcome,' doesn't
it?"

"Welcome," he assented.

"Then Herbert and Esther can come in, can't they? They're waiting in the
car for me to be rejected in disgrace. They've even bet on it."

"They lose," answered Banneker