yours?"
"I'll answer that question later, if you please. At least he's the one
adult to date I can remember who ever called me by my first name. Did
you know that he'd returned to town?"
"Yes. He was here last night."
"Responsible, was he?"
"Mr. Roberts!" Randall flushed like a woman with strangers. "Pardon me,
but there are some questions I can't answer--at least until you answer my
own of a moment ago."
"I understand perfectly. Also, contrary to your suspicion, I didn't avoid
your question to make it difficult for you. It requires two to be
friends. Enmities I, personally, have none. Life's too short and too
busy. If it will assist you any, I met Armstrong in the street this
evening face to face, and he declined to speak. I judge he's no friend to
me. Am I any more clear?"
"Yes," simply.
"Do you wish to answer my question now, then?"
"I judge you have a good reason for asking. He was not responsible,
wholly."
"Not even decently so?"
"Hardly."
"I gathered as much from his appearance to-night. It was the first time
I'd seen him in nearly a year. You know the whole story between
Armstrong and myself, I take it?"
"Yes," once more.
"And your sympathy is naturally with him."
"It has been."
"And now--"
The smile that made Randall's face boyish came into being.
"I'm deferring judgment now--and observing."
"I fear I can't help you much there," said Darley, shortly. "I wished to
discuss the future a bit, not the past. The last time I talked with
Armstrong he was impossible. I think you know what I mean. All men are
that way when they lose their nerve and drown the corpse. What I wish to
ask of you is whether the thing was justified. I'm not artistic. I don't
brag of it--I admit it. You're different; your opinion is of value.
Commercially, he's an impossibility. He couldn't hold a place if he had
it--any place. I don't need to tell you that either. As a writer--can he
write, or can't he?"
Harry Randall took off his big eyeglasses and polished one lens and then
the other.
"In my opinion, yes--and no." He held the glasses to the light, seemed
satisfied, and placed them carefully on his nose. "A great writer--he'll
never be that. It takes nerve and infinite patience to be anything great,
and Steve invariably loses his nerve too soon. He lacks just that much of
being big. As for ability, the spark--he's got it, Roberts, as certainly
as you and I are sitting here. Elementally, he's a
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