Page:Elizabeth Jordan--Tales of the city room.djvu/53

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The Love Affair of Chesterfield, Jr.

"I'm surprised to find that it's Davidson," the humorous editor was saying. "It's such a sneaking, low sort of performance. I did n't think he was capable of it. But here is proof enough to convict any man. This is a bundle of jokes he sent me, and here among them, like a snake in the grass, is a nasty little joke about the Chief, that he evidently wrote for 'The Funmaker.' Of course, it got among my stuff by mistake, and he 'll want to kick himself when he finds it out. See? It's on different paper from the others and typewritten. I suppose he was getting up a batch for 'The Funmaker' and this slipped out of that bundle into mine. It's a pretty bad slip for the young man."

"So Davidson's the fellow that's been doing that dirty work, is he?" said the Sunday editor. "Davidson, of all men! I did n't think he had it in him. Why, he must have been systematically ridiculing in 'The Funmaker,' for a year and a half, the Chief and the paper he has been writing for! If it had been good-natured stuff it would n't have counted for much, but lots of it is positively libellous. The Chief has been trying

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