der, and visions of literary fame dancing in his head.
But Slayton did not stop at love-making. This, he said to himself, was the turning point of his life; and, like a true sportsman, he “went the limit.” On Thursday night he and Miss Puffkin walked over to the Big Church in the Middle of the Block and were married.
Brave Slayton! Châteaubriand died in a garret, Byron courted a widow, Keats starved to death, Poe mixed his drinks, De Quincey hit the pipe, Ade lived in Chicago, James kept on doing it, Dickens wore white socks, De Maupassant wore a strait-jacket, Tom Watson became a Populist, Jeremiah wept, all these authors did these things, for the sake of literature, but thou didst cap them all; thou marriedst a wife for to carve for thyself a niche in the temple of fame!
On Friday morning Mrs. Slayton said she would go over to the Hearthstone office, hand in one or two manuscripts that the editor had given to her to read, and resign her position as stenographer.
“Was there anything—er—that—er—you particularly fancied in the stories you are going to turn in?” asked Slayton with a thumping heart.
“There was one—a novelette, that I liked so much,” said his wife. “I haven’t read anything in years that I thought was half as nice and true to life.”
That afternoon Slayton hurried down to the Hearthstone office. He felt that his reward was close at hand. With a novelette in the Hearthstone, literary reputation would soon be his.
The office boy met him at the railing in the outer
