! Nothing escapes through your seine. Big
fish or little fish, it is all one. You dress them up with alluring
sauce."

The bard shook his head.

"The net has been coming in dry," he said gloomily. "But that's the
way with the fish. Sometimes you catch a good haul, and then they all
disappear. It's been bad luck lately."

"Perhaps I can make a cast for you," cried the patroon eagerly.

"And bring up what?" asked the hack.

"Something everybody will read; that will set the gossips talking."

"A woman's reputation?"

"No; a man's."

"That is to be regretted," said Straws. "If, now, it were only a
woman's--.However, it's the next best thing to start the town
a-gossiping. I am much obliged to you for taking the trouble of
calling. All those stairs to climb, too!"

"I was sure you would be glad to hear of it," remarked the patroon,
slowly, studying with his bright, insolent glance, the pale,
intellectual face of the scribbler.

"Yes; there's only one thing stands in the way."

"And that?"

"I never publish anything I don't believe. Don't misunderstand me,
please." Pouring out a glass of wine. "Unfortunately I am so
incredulous! Isn't it a pity? I am such a carping cynic; a regular
skeptic that follows the old adage, 'Believe that story false that
ought not to be true.' It's such a detriment to my work, too! A pretty
scandal at the top of my column would make me famous, while a
sprinkling of libels and lampoons would enable me to move down a story
or two. But, after all, I'd feel lost in the luxury of a first floor
front chamber. So, you see, nature adjusts herself to our needs."

"Makes the shell to fit the snail, as it were," commented the land
baron, patronizingly, gazing around the little cupboard of a room. "At
any rate," he added, in an effort to hide his dissatisfaction, "it's a
pleasure to become better acquainted with such a--what shall I
say?--whimsical fellow as yourself?"

"That's it," returned the bard. "Whimsical!"

"I dare say you have had many a chance to turn an honest penny or two,
if you had not been so skeptical, as you call it?" remarked the
patroon, significantly. "People, I presume, have even offered to pay
you for publishing the compliments of the season about their
neighbors?"

"Well," answered the scribbler, laughing, "I may have Midas' longing
for gold, but I also have his ears. And the ears predominate. I am
such an ass I have even returned a fair petitioner's perfumed note!
S