“Dear, dear!” I said, laughing at the slap.  “What a bravo we are!  Really, you’re interesting.  But suppose now you and I get down to brass tacks.  You want to do something interesting, if you can, and get paid for it.  I rather like you, and anyhow you look to me as though you might do the things I want, or some of them.  Now, you want to do the least silly thing you can—­something better than this.  I want the least silly stuff I can get away with in this magazine—­genuine color out of the life of New York, if such a thing can be published in an ordinary magazine.  Roughly, here’s the kind of thing I want,” and I outlined to him the probable policy of the magazine under my direction.  I had taken an anaemic “white-light” monthly known as The Broadway (!) and was attempting to recast it into a national or international metropolitan picture.  He thawed slightly.

“Well, maybe with that sort of idea behind it, it might come to something.  I don’t know.  It’s possible that you may be the one to do it.”  He emphasized the “possible.”  “At any rate, it’s worth trying.  Judging by the snide editors and publications in this town, no one in America wants anything decent.”  His lip curled.  “I have ambitions of my own, but I don’t expect to work them out through the magazines of this town; maybe not of this country.  I didn’t know that any change was under way here.”

“Well, it is,” I said.  “Still, you can’t expect much from this either, remember.  After all, it seeks to be a popular magazine.  We’ll see how far we can go with really interesting material.  And now if you know of any others like yourself, bring them in here.  I need them.  I’ll pay you for that article, only I’ll include it in a better price I’ll give you for something else later, see?”

I smiled and he smiled.  His was a warmth which was infectious when he chose to yield, but it was always a repressed warmth, cynical, a bit hard; heat chained to a purpose, I thought.  He went away and I saw him no more until about a week later when he brought me his first attempt to give me what I wanted.

In the meantime I was busy organizing a staff which should if possible, I decided after seeing him, include him.  I could probably use him as a salaried “special” writer, provided he could be trained to write “specials.”  He looked so intelligent and ambitious that he promised much.  Besides, the little article which he had left when he came again, while not well organized or arranged as to its ideas or best points, was exceedingly well written from the point of mere expression.