Eleanor suddenly blushed scarlet. She had known for three weeks that "Willard's Magazine" would publish "Professor Ellenborough's Last Class." "I've written a story." "You have!" Dr. Green brought the seat of his swivel chair down upon the base with a slam. "What sort of story? Where is it?" "I sent it away." She could not help enjoying the telling. She felt her throat swell and her fingers tingle. She forgot even Richard and realized only that her hopes had been realized. She saw herself a little girl in Dr. Green's buggy, traveling along a country road. Her clasped hands lay in her lap and were covered by his strong grasp. "You must amount to something, Eleanor," he had said. It had seemed to her that he was almost crying. "Your story didn't come back, did it?" said Dr. Green now. "Three times. But at last it has been accepted by 'Willard's Magazine.'" Dr. Green gave a little start. Though he was a purist, he allowed himself certain vivid expressions. "The dickens you say!" Again the hungry look came back into his eyes and was gone. He looked Eleanor over from top to toe, as though expecting her triumph to have left some visible mark upon her. "Aren't you surprised?" "I am overwhelmed. Did you bring the story to read to me?" "Oh, no!" "When did you hear from them?" "A Mr. Utterly came to tell me." "That lily of the field! On Commencement Day? And you are telling me _now_! Why, Eleanor!" "I had to get used to it. Then I got worried." "Worried? What about?" "It is a college story, and I wrote it without ever dreaming that Waltonville might read it or that any one would take it. I have represented people here in it." "Not by name!" "No; but I said one professor in the story had dangling shoelaces." "Whose?" "Dr. Lister's." "Do his shoelaces dangle? What else?" "I described a den like Dr. Scott's." "Is that all?" "Yes." "Well, as far as the shoelaces are concerned, perhaps it'll teach Lister to keep his tied. And Scott doesn't have a den; he has a neat, dustless resting-place from terror by day and tempest by night. Tell them it's my den. Does your mother know?" "Of course." After this there was a little silence. Dr. Green looked at the floor. "No one else, I suppose?" "Richard Lister knows." Eleanor believed that she had succeeded in saying the name naturally and easily. "Richard Lister! How does he come to know?" "He has been playing duets with me. I--I just happened to tell him." "Richard is such a nice, sleek, silky mother's boy! I expect he'll be a preacher. Did you read him the story?" "No. Of course not. I wouldn't read it to any one. I only told him it had been accepted."