“I’m about as diplomatic as a punch in the eye,” admitted her companion. “The old lady considered it plumb disgusting of me not to take to refined international mendacity. But then I did n’t take to much of anything else that she laid out for me. I had vulgar tastes. I wanted to go into the newspaper business, and when I’d learnt it, have Great-Aunt kindly buy me a paper to play with. Great-Aunt did n’t see it that way. She cut me off with a small amount of hard cash and a large amount of hard talk, and I took a School of Journalism course and eventually drifted out here because I liked what I remembered of the town and wanted to bore in where I was n’t hampered by friends and acquaintances. Does that strike you as a record of glowing success? Considering that I’m nearly twenty-seven years old, and have n’t made a scratch on the face of the world yet?” “But you began late,” condoned his companion. “And you are still learning. But I cannot see why your aunt should object to your wishing to own a newspaper. One would say, a harmless ambition.” “One that I’m quite unlikely to realize, now. As for its being harmless, why, my dear child--excuse the freedom of an aged golf-professor--there’s a charge of dynamite in every font of type.” “Then you have a penchant for high explosives?” “Have I? I don’t think I’d put it that way,” mused Jeremy. “I’ve a taste for adventure. And running a newspaper of your own has always seemed to me about the liveliest and most adventurous job going. But I don’t want to blow things up.” “What do you want to do?” “Oh, just to have a hand in things, in a real, live American community like this, where the soil is good and new ideas sprout. I’d like to get into the political fight, too. A really good one, I mean, with something worth aiming at.” “That I can understand. But I still fail to make you fit into this environment.” “What about yourself?” he countered “Have n’t you rather the air of coming out of the great world and condescending to this raw and rural town?” “Have I? Have I been condescending to you?” “If you had, it would be more than I deserve,” he said contritely. “I’d no business to say that. And I did n’t mean it, anyway. But this is a queer place for you to be, is n’t it?” “Not for my purposes?” “Are you specializing at Old Central?” “One might call it that. I made inquiries for the most typically American college, and a list was made up for me. I chose the University of Centralia to be with my mother’s cousin, Miss Pritchard.” “Just like that? All yourself?” “All myself,” she assented gravely. “You came here to get Americanized?”