“Hullo,” he said.  “I knew they were coming on younger every year; but I didn’t know we had gone into the kindergarten business yet.  You don’t want a job?  Now don’t tell me you want a job?”

The little person lifted a pair of very sober eyes beneath the brim of some faded plush headgear.

“Is thus th’ rha-porther’s room?”

“Sure! you bet!” Bat wheeled on both heels.  The little person looked at him very steadily and solemnly.

“A’ wannt,” she said in that mongrel dialect of German-American and Cockney-English, “A wawnt an iteem.”

“Sure,” says Bat, “nothing easier.”

“Wull thur be eny chaarge?”

“Not for ladies,” says Bat, saluting, hand to hat, and grinning more sleepily than ever.

“Then, A wull guve it t’ y’:  wull y’ write it, sor?”

“Sure!” Bat squared himself to one of the reporters’ high desks.

“Mestriss Leez-y O’Fannigan,” dictated the little publicity agent.

“Miss O’Funny Girl,” with a look to his fat cheeks as of a bag blown full of air.

“No Sor, O’Fan-ni-gan-”

“Perhaps,” said Bat, “You’d like to know we’re in the same boat, except that you’re seeking exactly what I’m trying to avoid, Miss O’Finnigan?”

“Wull dance t’ night—­” continued the little publicity seeker.

“Will she dance in her copper-toe boots?” asks Bat.

“Wull dance at the H——­ i-o-f lodge meetin’ at—­”

“That’ll do, get her out of this,” ordered the news-man.  “It grows worse every day.  Every damphool thinks the world is aching for an interview with himself, from the mining fakirs to the Shanty Town brats:  it’s seeped down to the kids.  You go home, kid, and tell your mother to spank you special extra—­”

They heard the fat little legs stumping down the stairs.  “That kid belongs to Shanty Town.  She dances for the bar room buffers now; she’ll dance later, like you and me, Bat, for bigger bluffers.  Freedom of the press!  Damn it, I’m sick of the bunco game, Bat—­”

“Draw it easy,” drawled Bat.  “If you’re sick of it, it’s dead easy to get out.  I guess the kid is doing the same thing as you and me:  ’Give us this day our daily bread.’  How’s the story?  Will you give it a flare head?”

“Will there be any charge?” ironically repeated the news-man.

“Not for Moyese,” smiled the handy man sleepily, “and say, if I were you, I’d do one of two things, get rid of my conscience or get a tonic for my nerves.”

The telephone rang.  The news-man ran to the receiver and a moment later slammed it back on the hook.

“Old frump, giving namby pamby talks on woman’s influence in politics without votes.”  The news editor spat aimlessly.

Bat tapped the story of the Rim Rocks with his pencil.  “Well,” he asked.

“We’ll give this flare.”

The news man put heavy underscores in blue beneath the words TEN THOUSAND DOLLARS REWARD, BY THE VALLEY CATTLE ASSOCIATION FOR PROOF OF THE PERPETRATORS OF LAST NIGHT’S VILE CRIME.