. "You must write it up while it is
fresh in your mind. You'll do it better while the feeling is on you."

Lark gazed at him stupidly, not comprehending.

"Write it up?" she repeated confusedly.

"Yes, for the paper. How they looked, what they said, how it
happened,--everything. We want to scoop on it."

"But I don't think they--would want it told," Lark gasped.

"Oh, probably not, but people want to know about it. Don't you remember
what I told you? The PRESS is a powerful task master. He asks hard
duties of us, but we must obey. We've got to give the people what they
want. There's a reporter down from Burlington already, but he couldn't
get anything out of them. We've got a clear scoop on it."

Lark glanced fearfully over her shoulder. A huge menacing shadow lowered
black behind her. THE PRESS! She shuddered again.

"I can't write it up," she faltered. "Mrs. Daly--she--Oh, I held her in
my arms, Mr. Raider, and kissed her, and we cried all morning, and I
can't write it up. I--I am the minister's daughter, you know. I can't."

"Nonsense, now, Lark," he said, "be sensible. You needn't give all the
sob part. I'll touch it up for you. Just write out what you saw, and
what they said, and I'll do the rest. Run along now. Be sensible."

Lark glanced over her shoulder again. The PRESS seemed tremendously big,
leering at her, threatening her. Lark gasped, sobbingly.

Then she sat down at Mr. Raider's desk, and drew a pad of paper toward
her. For five minutes she sat immovable, body tense, face stern,
breathless, rigid. Mr. Raider after one curious, satisfied glance,
slipped out and closed the door softly after him. He felt he could trust
to the newspaper instinct to get that story out of her.

Finally Lark, despairingly, clutched a pencil and wrote

"Terrible Tragedy of the Early Morning.
Daly Family Crushed with Sorrow."

Her mind passed rapidly back over the story she had heard, the father's
occasional wild bursts of temper, the pitiful efforts of the family to
keep his weakness hidden, the insignificant altercation at the breakfast
table, the cry of the startled baby, and then the sudden ungovernable
fury that lashed him, the two children--! Lark shuddered! She glanced
over her shoulder again. The fearful dark shadow was very close, very
terrible, ready to envelope her in its smothering depths. She sprang to
her feet and rushed out of the office. Mr. Raider was in the doorway.
She flung