disappeared I ordered another. I rattled the ice
in the glass. "Ha, ha, ha!" I roared, as the events of the past
twenty-four hours recurred to me. There must have been a suicidal
accent to my laughter, for the bartender looked at me with some
concern. I called for another brandy and shot the soda into it myself.
I watched the foam evaporate, "Ha, ha, ha!"

"Hard luck?" the bartender asked sympathetically.

"Yes," said I. I seemed to be speaking to several bartenders who
looked at me with several varieties of compassion.

"Have another on me," said the bartender.

I had another, and went out into the street. I walked down Broadway,
chuckling to myself. What a glorious farce it all was! My fortune!
Phyllis my wife! What if she had accepted me? I laughed aloud, and
people turned and stared at me. Oh, yes! I was to travel and write
novels and have my pictures in book reviews, and all that! When I
arrived at the office I was on the verge of total insanity. I was
obliged to ask the paragrapher to write my next day's leader. It was
night before I became rational, and once that, the whole world donned
cap and bells and began capering for my express benefit. The more I
thought of it, the more I laughed. What a whimsical world it was! And
was there anything in it so grotesque as my part? I took the check
from my pocket and cracked it between my fingers. A cigar was in my
mouth. Should I light it with the check? It was for $1,000. After
all, it was more than I had ever before held in my hand at once. But
what was a paltry thousand, aye a paltry ten thousand, to a man's
pride? I bit off the end of my cigar, creased the check into a taper,
and struck a match. I watched it burn and burn. I struck another. I
held it within an inch of the check, but for the life of me I could not
light it.

"The devil take it!" I cried. I flung the cigar out of the window and
laid the check on my desk. Courage? Why, it needed the courage of a
millionaire to light a cigar with a $1,000 check!

The office boy, who came in then, was salvation. The managing editor
wanted to see me. I sprang up with alacrity; anything but the sight of
that figure 1 and the three demon eyes of that $1,000 check!

"Winthrop," said the managing editor to me as I entered his office,
"you've got to go to London. Hillars has gone under----"

"Not dead!" I cried.

"No, no! He has had to give up work temporarily on account of drink.
If