Lily came in with the supper-tray. She was smiling. "Warm work, eh, Lily?" he said, scarcely knowing that he spoke. "Yes, sir, it's that hot in the kitchen you wouldn't believe." Setting down the tray, she handed him a foolscap envelope, and he saw his own handwriting as if in a dream. "For me?" he murmured carelessly, and placed the letter on the mantelpiece. Lily took his orders for breakfast, and with a pleasant, timid "Good-night, sir," left the room. He opened the envelope. In the fold of his manuscript was a sheet of the best cream-laid note-paper bearing these words in flowing copperplate: "The Editor presents his compliments to Mr. Larch [written] and regrets to be unable to use the enclosed article, for the offer of which he is much obliged." The sight of this circular, with the offices of the magazine illustrated at the top, and the notification in the left-hand corner that all letters must be addressed to the editor and not to any member of the staff individually, in some mysterious way mitigated Richard's disappointment. Perhaps the comfort of it lay in the tangible assurance it afforded that he was now actually _a literary aspirant_ and had communications, however mortifying, with _the press_. He read the circular again and again during supper, and determined to re-write the article. But this resolve was not carried out. He could not bring himself even to glance through it, and finally it was sent to another magazine exactly as it stood. Richard had determined to say nothing in the office about his writing until he could produce a printed article with his name at the foot; and frequently during the last few days his mouth had watered as he anticipated the sweetness of that triumph. But next day he could not refrain from showing to Jenkins the note from the "Trifler." Jenkins seemed impressed, especially when Richard requested him to treat the matter as confidential. A sort of friendship arose between them, and strengthened as time went on. Richard sometimes wondered how precisely it had come about, and why it continued. CHAPTER VII