'No, Calverly--none of that. This is literature. Of course, old Boice couldn't print it. Never in the world. But it's sweet stuff. It's a perfect, merciless pen-picture of life on Simpson Street. And those two old crooks behind the lemonade stand--you've opened a jack-pot there. If you only knew it, son, that's evidence. Evidence! You walked right into it. Charlie Waterhouse is short in his town accounts. I know that. Boice and Weston are covering up for him. They work up this neat little purse and give it to Charlie. Why? Because he's the most popular man in Sunbury? Rot! Because they're helping him pay back. Making the town help.' 'Oh, do you really think----' '“Think?” I know. This completes the picture. Tell me--what is Boice paying you?' 'Twelve a week, now.' 'Hm! That's quite a little for a country weekly. I could meet it, though, if--see here: What chance is there of your getting, say, a thousand of your money free and investing in the _Gleaner?_ Now, wait! I want to put this thing before you. It's the turning-point. If we act without delay, we've got 'em. We've got everything. We own the town. Here we are! The _Gleaner_ is just at the edge of success. I take you over from the _Voice_ at the same salary--twelve a week. I'll give you lots of rope. I won't expect routine from you. I'll expect genius. Stuff like this. The real thing. Just when it comes to you, and you feel you can't help writing. With this new evidence I can go after Charlie Waterhouse and break him. I'll finish Boice and Weston at the same time. Show up the whole outfit! Whatever'll be left of the _Voice_ by that time, Boice can have and welcome. The _Gleaner_ will be the only paper in Sunbury.' 'My Uncle Arthur is executor of my mother's estate.' 'You go right after him. No time to lose. We must drive this right through.' 'I'll see him to-morrow.' 'Couldn't you find him to-night?' 5 Uncle Arthur lived in Chicago, out on the West Side. It was a long ride--first by suburban train into the city, then by cable-car through miles upon miles of gray wooden tenements and dingy gray-brick tenements. You breathed in odours of refuse and smoke and coal-gas all the way. Uncle Arthur was as thin as McGibbon, but wholly without the little gleam in the eyes that advertised the proprietor of the _Gleaner_ as an eager and perhaps dangerous man. Uncle Arthur was a man of method who had worked through long years into a methodical but fairly substantial prosperity. His thin nose was long, and prominent. His brow was deeply furrowed. His gaze was critical. He believed firmly that life is a disciplinary training for some more important period of existence after death. He didn't smoke or drink. Nor would he keep in his employ those who indulged in such practices. He was an officer of several organisations aiming at civic and social reform.