"When the scorner is punished, the simple is made wise; and when the wise is instructed, he receiveth knowledge," I quoted Solomon.

“That’s it, exactly.  You see,” he explained, “there’s always the right way out, if you’ve got sense enough to find it.  Only you mustn’t get rattled and try to make your getaway out the wrong door or the front window—­that spoils things.  The parson’s given you the right tip.  That old chap Solomon had a great bean on him, didn’t he?”

A few days later there appeared, in the space which for years had been occupied by the bigger of the two advertisements, the following pleasant notice: 

People Who Disapprove of
Civic Cleanliness,
A Better Town,
Better Kiddies,
and
A Square Deal for Everybody,
Also
Disapprove of
Advertising in the Clarion.

And the space once occupied by the other advertiser was headed: 

OBITUARIES

That ghastly poetry in which the soul of the Butterfly Man reveled appeared in that column thereafter.  It was a conspicuous space, and the horn of rural mourning in printer’s ink was exalted among us.  It was not very hard to guess whose hand had directed those counter-blows.

When we met those two advertisers on the street afterward we greeted them with ironical smiles intended to enrage.  They had at Inglesby’s instigation been guilty of a tactical blunder of which the men behind the Clarion had taken fiendish and unexpected advantage.  It had simply never occurred to either that a small town editor might dare to “come back.”  The impossible had actually happened.

I think it was this slackening of his power which alarmed Inglesby into action.

“Mr. Inglesby,” said the Butterfly Man to me one night, casually, “has got him a new private secretary.  He came this afternoon.  His name’s Hunter—­J.  Howard Hunter.  He dresses as if he wrote checks for a living and he looks exactly like he dresses.  Honest, he’s the original he-god they use to advertise suspenders and collars and neverrips and that sort of thing in the classy magazines.  I bet you Inglesby’s got to fork over a man-sized bucket of dough per, to keep him.  There’ll be a flutter of calico in this burg from now on, for that fellow certainly knows how to wear his face.  He’s gilt-edged from start to finish!”

Laurence, lounging on the steps, looked up with a smile.

“His arrival,” said he, “has been duly chronicled in to-day’s press.  Cease speaking in parables, Bughunter, and tell us what’s on your mind.”

The Butterfly Man hesitated for a moment.  Then: