Something New

ero gets hold of it, and the priests dog him and send him threatening messages. What else could it be?"

Ashe could not restrain his admiration.

"This is genius!"

"Oh, no!"

"Absolute genius. I see it all. The hero calls in Gridley Quayle, and that patronizing ass, by the aid of a series of wicked coincidences, solves the mystery; and there am I, with another month's work done."

She looked at him with interest.

"Are you the author of Gridley Quayle?"

"Don't tell me you read him!"

"I do not read him! But he is published by the same firm that publishes Home Gossip, and I can't help seeing his cover sometimes while I am waiting in the waiting room to see the editress."

Ashe felt like one who meets a boyhood's chum on a desert island. Here was a real bond between them.

"Does the Mammoth publish you, too? Why, we are comrades in misfortune--fellow serfs! We should be friends. Shall we be friends?"

"I should be delighted."

"Shall we s