'Well, then, it cannot be anything to you--so great and high, with your beautiful stories and your splendid pictures. What is a poor little set of verses to you?' 'Go on--go on.' His face clouded and his eyes hardened. 'In the paper it doesn't matter a bit. It is--it is--later--when they come out all together in a little volume--with--with----' 'Go on, I say.' He sat upright, his chair half turned, his hands on the arms, his face severe and judicial. 'With your name on the title-page.' 'Oh! that is troubling your mind, is it?' 'When the critics praise the poems and praise the poet--oh! is it right, Mr. Feilding? Is it right?' 'Upon my word!' He pushed back his chair and rose, a tall man of six feet, frowning angrily--so that the girl trembled and tottered. 'Upon my word! This--from you! This from the girl whom I have literally kept from starvation! Miss Effie Wilmot, perhaps you will tell me what you mean! Haven't I bought your verses? Haven't I polished and corrected them, and made them fit to be seen? Am I not free to do what I please with my own?' 'Yes--yes--you buy them. But I--oh!--I write them!' 'Look here, child; I can have no nonsense. Before I took these verses of you, had you any opening or market for them?' 'No. None at all.' 'Nobody would buy them. They were not even returned by editors. They were thrown into the basket. Very well. I buy them on the condition that I do what I please with them. I give you three pounds--three pounds--for a poem, if it is good enough for me to lick into shape. Then it becomes my own. It is a bargain. When you leave off wanting money you will leave off bringing me verses. Then I shall look for another girl. There are thousands of girls about who can write verses as good as these.' The girl remained silent. What her employer said was perfectly true. And yet--and yet--it was not right. 'What more do you want?' he asked brutally. 'I am the author of these poems,' she said. 'And you are not.' 'Within these walls I allow you to say so--this once. Take care never to say so again. Outside these walls, if you say so, I will bring an action against you for libel and slander and defamation of character. Remember that. You had better, however, take these verses and go away.' He flung them at her feet. 'We will put an end to the arrangement.' 'No, no--I consent.' She humbly stooped and picked them up. 'Do what you like with them. I am too poor to refuse. Do what you please.' 'It is your interest, certainly, to consent. Why, I paid you last year a hundred pounds. A hundred pounds! There's an income for a girl of twenty! Well, Effie, I forgive you. But no more nonsense. And give over crying.' For now she was sobbing and crying. 'Look here, Effie'--he laid his hand on hers--'some day, before long, I will put your verses in another column, with your name at the end--"Effie Wilmot." Come, will that do?' 'Oh! if you would! If you really would!'