"I never walk up Broad Street, anyway," said Bones, annoyed. "It is a
detestable street, a naughty old street, and I should ride up it--or,
at least, I shall in a day or two."
"Buying a car?" asked Hamilton, interested.
"I'll tell you about that later," said Bones evasively, and went on: "Now, putting two and two together, you know the conclusion I've
reached?"
"Four?" suggested Hamilton.
Bones, with a shrug ended the conversation then and there, and carried
his correspondence to the outer office, knocking, as was his wont,
until his stenographer gave him permission to enter. He shut the
door--always a ceremony--behind him and tiptoed toward her.
Marguerite Whitland took her mind from the letter she was writing, and
gave her full attention to her employer.
"May I sit down, dear young typewriter?" said Bones humbly.
"Of course you can sit down, or stand up, or do anything you like in
the office. Really," she said, with a laugh, "really, Mr. Tibbetts, I
don't know whether you're serious sometimes."
"I'm serious all the time, dear old flicker of keyboards," said Bones,
seating himself deferentially, and at a respectful distance.
She waited for him to begin, but he was strangely embarrassed even for
him.
"Miss Marguerite," he began at last a little huskily, "the jolly old
poet is born and not----"
"Oh, have you brought them?" she asked eagerly, and held out her hand.
"Do show me, please!"
Bones shook his head.
"No, I have not brought them," he said. "In fact, I can't bring them
yet."
She was disappointed, and showed it.
"You've promised me for a week I should see them."
"Awful stuff, awful stuff!" murmured Bones disparagingly. "Simply
terrible tripe!"
"Tripe?" she said, puzzled.
"I mean naughty rubbish and all that sort of thing."
"Oh, but I'm sure it's good," she said. "You wouldn't talk about your
poems if they weren't good."
"Well," admitted Bones, "I'm not so sure, dear old arbitrator
elegantus, to use a Roman expression, I'm not so sure you're not right.
One of these days those poems will be given to this wicked old world,
and--then you'll see."
"But what are they all about?" she asked for about the twentieth time.
"What are they about?" said Bones slowly and thoughtfully. "They're
about one thing and another, but mostly about my--er--friends. Of
course a jolly old poet like me, or like any other old fellow, like
Shakespeare, if you like--to go from the sublime to the ridiculous--has
fits of poetising that mean absolutely nothing. It doesn't follow that
if a poet like Browning or me writes fearfully enthusiastically and all
that sort of thing about a person... No disrespect, you understand,
dear old miss."
"Quite," she said, and wondered.
"I take a subject for a verse," said Bones airily, waving his hand
toward Throgmorton Street. "A 'bus, a fuss, a tram, a lamb, a hat, a
cat, a sunset, a little flower growing on the river's brim, and all
that sort of thing--any old subject, dear old miss, that strikes me in
the eye--you understand?"