Produced by Roger Frank. [Illustration: Plunk and Tallow were there looking dilapidated and frightened] MARK TIDD, EDITOR BY CLARENCE BUDINGTON KELLAND author of “Mark Tidd” “Mark Tidd in the Backwoods” “Mark Tidd’s Citadel” etc. ILLUSTRATED HARPER & BROTHERS PUBLISHERS NEW YORK AND LONDON Mark Tidd, Editor Copyright, 1917, by Harper & Brothers Printed in the United States of America ILLUSTRATIONS Plunk and tallow were there looking dilapidated and frightened We went to selling papers as hard as we could, and before noon we were cleaned out “Huh!” says the second man, and we recognized him as the man with the black gloves Jethro just rushed at us and grabbed a-holt of Rock, rough-like CHAPTER I “Binney,” says Mark Tidd to me, “the Wicksville _Trumpet_ is b-b-busted.” “Well,” says I, “it’s been cracked for quite a spell. It hain’t been tootin’ loud enough to notice for a year.” “Used to be a g-good newspaper once,” says Mark. “Yes—once,” says I, “but not more ’n once. That hain’t any record. If I’d been gettin’ out a paper fifty-two times a year for twenty years I bet I could ’a’ made more ’n one of those times a good one.” Mark looked at me sudden out of his little eyes that had to sort of _peek_ up over his fat cheeks. “Binney,” says he, “you hain’t as useless as I calc’lated. That’s an idea.” “Oh,” says I, “is that what it is? I sort of figgered maybe it was a notion.” Mark turned the whole of him around so he could face Plunk Smalley and Tallow Martin, who were standing behind him. By rights you ought to have a turn-table to move Mark around on, like they have for locomotives. He’s ’most as heavy as a locomotive, and when he talks sometimes it sounds like a locomotive pulling a load up-hill, snorting and puffing—he stutters so. “Fellows,” says he, “this Binney Jenks is g-g-gettin’ so he talks like a minstrel show. Makes reg’lar j-jokes one right after another. Looks l-like he hain’t got time to be sensible any more.” “But what’s the idea?” says Tallow. “Want to talk to my father first,” says Mark. “C-come on.” Mark’s father didn’t use to have any money at all. He just sat around inventing things and reading Gibbon’s _Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire_. First he’d invent a little, and then he’d read a little, and it was a wonder he didn’t get the two mixed up. But finally he up and invented a turbine-engine, and it made such a pile of money for him that he didn’t need to do a thing but read Gibbon and carry bushel-baskets of dollars to the bank every little while.