“I haven’t the time,” returned Banneker with honest indifference.  He sipped his coffee thoughtfully.  “Cressey,” he said, “if I had a newspaper of my own in New York, do you know what I’d do with it?”

“Make money.”

“I hope so.  But whether I did or not, I’d set out to puncture that bubble of the Masters power and supremacy.  It isn’t right for any man to have that power just through money.  It isn’t American.”

“The old man would smash your paper in six months.”

“Maybe.  Maybe not.  Nobody has ever taken a shot at him yet.  He may be more vulnerable than he looks....  Speaking of money, I suppose I’d better take that apartment.  God knows how I’ll pay for it, especially if I lose my job.”

“If you lose your job I’ll get you a better one on Wall Street to-morrow.”

“On the strength of Poultney Masters, Jr., shaking hands with me, I suppose.”

“Practically.  It may not get into your newspapers, but the Street will know all about it to-morrow.”

“It’s a queer city.  And it’s a queer way to get on in it, by being quick on the trigger.  Well, I’m off for the theater.”

Between acts, Banneker, walking out to get air, was conscious of being the object of comment and demonstration.  He heard his name spoken in half whispers; saw nods and jerks of the head; was an involuntary eavesdropper upon a heated discussion; “That’s the man.”—­“No; it ain’t.  The paper says he’s a big feller.”—­“This guy ain’t a reporter.  Pipe his clothes.”—­“Well, he’s big if you size him right.  Look at his shoulders.”—­“I’ll betcha ten he ain’t the man.”  And an apologetic young fellow ran after him to ask if he was not, in truth, Mr. Banneker of The Ledger.  Being no more than human, he experienced a feeling of mild excitation over all this.  But no sooner had the curtain risen on the second act than he quite forgot himself and his notoriety in the fresh charm of the comedy, and the delicious simplicity of Betty Raleigh as the heroine.  That the piece was destined to success was plain, even so early.  As the curtain fell again, and the star appeared, dragging after her a long, gaunt, exhausted, alarmed man in horn-rimmed spectacles, who had been lurking in a corner suffering from incipient nervous breakdown and illusions of catastrophe, he being the author, the body of the house rose and shouted.  A hand fell on Banneker’s shoulder.

“Come behind at the finish?” said a voice.

Turning, Banneker met the cynical and near-sighted eyes of Gurney, The Ledger’s dramatic critic, with whom he had merely a nodding acquaintance, as Gurney seldom visited the office except at off-hours.

“Yes; I’d like to,” he answered.

“Little Betty spotted you and has been demanding that the management bring you back for inspection.”

“The play is a big success, isn’t it?”

“I give it a year’s run,” returned the critic authoritatively.  “Laurence has written it to fit Raleigh like a glove.  She’s all they said of her in London.  And when she left here a year ago, she was just a fairly good ingenue.  However, she’s got brains, which is the next best thing in the theatrical game to marriage with the manager—­or near-marriage.”