She could visualize Abner Fownes, smug, fatuous, in a place of power which he did not know how to use, a figurehead and cat’s-paw for abler and wickeder men.... It must be confessed that her interest in him was not civic, but personal. He was, at that moment, of no importance to her except as the man who held a chattel mortgage on her plant and whose influence over her uncle had withered the possible prosperity of the paper. She was saying to herself: “I’ve got to find a way. I’ve got to make a success of this. I can’t go back home and admit I couldn’t do it.... Everybody said I couldn’t run a paper. But I can. I _can_.” The field was there, a prosperous town with a cultivated countryside to the south and rich forest lands to north and west. There was a sufficient population to support well a weekly paper; there was all of Main Street, two dozen merchants large and small, whose advertising patronage should flow in to the _Free Press_. “What it needs,” she told herself, “is somebody to get behind and push.” As a matter of fact she was convinced the failure of the paper was not due to Abner Fownes, nor to politics or outside influences, but to the lack of initiative and ability of her uncle. So much of the town as she had seen was rather pleasing; it had no appearance of resting over subterranean caverns of evil, nor had the men and women she saw on the streets the appearance of being ground down by one man’s wealth, or of smarting under the rule of an evil political ring. On the contrary, it seemed an ordinary town, full of ordinary people, who lived ordinary lives in reasonable happiness. She discounted Tubal’s disclosures and jumped to a conclusion. No, she told herself, if she proved adequate, there was no reason why she could not succeed where Uncle Nupley failed. The telephone interrupted her reflections and she lifted the receiver. “Is this the _Free Press_?” asked a voice. “Yes.” “Wait a moment, please.” After some delay another voice, a large, important voice, repeated the question, and Carmel admitted a second time the identity of the paper. “This,” said the voice, evidently impressed by the revelation it was making, “is Abner Fownes.” “Yes,” said Carmel. “Are you the young woman--Nupley’s niece?” “I am.” “Will you step over to my office at once, then. I want to see you?” Carmel’s eyes twinkled and her brows lifted. “Abner Fownes,” she said. “The name has a masculine sound. Your voice is--distinctly masculine?” “Eh?... What of it?” “Why,” said Carmel, “the little book I studied in school says that when a gentleman wishes to see a lady he goes to her. I fear I should be thought forward if I called on you.” “Not at all.... Not at all,” said the voice, and Carmel knew she had to deal with a man in whom resided no laughter. “I shall be glad to see you whenever you find it convenient to call,” she said--and hung up the receiver.