t's why I
celebrated.

EILEEN (_with wide eyes_). I wonder if you really mean----

MURRAY. What I've been sayin'? I sure do--every word of it!

EILEEN (_puzzled_). I can't understand how anyone could---- (_With a
worried glance over her shoulder._) I think I'd better look for Miss
Gilpin, hadn't I? She may wonder---- (_She half rises from her chair._)

MURRAY (_quickly_). No. Please don't go yet. Sit down. Please do. (_She
glances at him irresolutely, then resumes her chair._) They'll give you
your diet of milk and shoo you off to bed on that freezing porch soon
enough, don't worry. I'll see to it that you don't fracture any rules.
(_Hitching his chair nearer hers--impulsively._) In all charity to me
you've got to stick awhile. I haven't had a chance to really talk to a
soul for a week. You found what I said a while ago hard to believe,
didn't you?

EILEEN (_with a smile_). Isn't it? You said you hoped you wouldn't get
well too soon!

MURRAY. And I meant it! This place is honestly like heaven to me--a
lonely heaven till your arrival. (Eileen _looks embarrassed._) And why
wouldn't it be? I've no fear for my health--eventually. Just let me
tell you what I was getting away from---- (_With a sudden laugh full of
a weary bitterness._) Do you know what it means to work from seven at
night till three in the morning as a reporter on a morning newspaper in
a town of twenty thousand people--for _ten years_? No. You don't. You
can't. No one could who hadn't been through the mill. But what it did
to me--it made me happy--yes, happy!--to get out here--T.B. and all,
notwithstanding.

EILEEN (_looking at him curiously_). But I always thought being a
reporter was so interesting.

MURRAY (_with a cynical laugh_). Interesting? On a small town rag? A
month of it, perhaps, when you're a kid and new to the game. But ten
years. Think of it! With only a raise of a couple of dollars every blue
moon or so, and a weekly spree on Saturday night to vary the monotony.
(_He laughs again._) Interesting, eh? Getting the dope on the Social of
the Queen Esther Circle in the basement of the Methodist Episcopal
Church, unable to sleep through a meeting of the Common Council on
account of the noisy oratory caused by John Smith's application for a
permit to build a house; making a note that a tugboat towed two barges
loaded with coal up the river, that Mrs. Perkins spent a week-end with
relatives in Hickville, that John Jones---- Oh help! Why go o