Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: CHAPTER HI. THE OLD GENTLEMAN OF THE OXYGEN. POOR Myles had met with so many rebuffs and disappointments, and his own opinion of himself had been so decidedly lowered that afternoon, that he was fully prepared to have his offer of service refused by the city editor of the Phono ffraph. He was therefore not at all surprised when Mr. Haxall began in his kindly but unmistakable way to tell him that there was no vacancy. He had already made up his mind to give up trying for a reporter’s position and make an effort in some other direction, when, to his amazement, he found himself accepted and ordered to report for duty the following day. It was incomprehensible. What had Van Cleef said to influence the city editor so remarkably ? There was no chance to ask just then, for Mr. Haxall had already resumed his reading of the evening papers, a great pile of which lay on his desk, andMyles realized that the short interview, by which the whole course of his life was to be affected, was at an end. So he merely said:
Thank, you, sir, I ‘11 be on hand, and turned to follow Van Cleef, who had already started toward the door. The boy’s mind was in a conflicting whirl of thoughts, and he was conscious of a decided sense of exaltation. He had actually got into business and was to receive a salary. To be sure, it was only promised for one week; but even in that short time he felt that he could prove so useful that the city editor would wonder how he had ever got along without him. As they passed into the anteroom of the office Van Cleef introduced his companion to a Mr. Brown, a stout, middle-aged man, who occupied a dingy little den, in which he was busily writing by the light of a single gas-jet. Mr. Brown was affably condescending, was pleased to make Mi-. Manning’s acquaintance, an…