"You know," he went on, "that idea of hers that you tackle the North River piers isn't bad. Why don't you put in the whole Summer there, watching the big liners? I won't ask you to come to my office now, for our work is still in that early stage where we don't want any publicity." I could feel his casual glance, and I wondered whether he noticed my sharp disappointment. "When we are ready," he resumed, "we're sure to be flooded with writers. I hope there'll be one man in the lot who'll stick to the work for a year or more, a man with a kind of a passion in him for the thing we're trying to do. There's nothing we wouldn't do for that man. I hope he's going to be you." At once a vision opened of work with Eleanore's father, of long talks with Eleanore. "I'll try to get ready for it," I said. "You've made a fine start," he continued, "and I think you're going to make good. But first let's see what you'll do by yourself. Get your own view of this place as it is to-day before we talk about plans for to-morrow. And don't hurry. Take your time." As he said this quietly, I suddenly awoke to the fact that we were tearing down the river at a perfectly gorgeous speed. The river was crowding with traffic ahead, all was a rushing chaos of life and we were rushing worst of all. And yet we did not seem to hurry. Old Captain Arty sat at the wheel with the most resigned patient look in his eyes. And drawing lazily on his cigar Dillon was watching a new line of wharves. "You know I've found," he was saying, "the only way to live in this age and get any pleasure out of life is to always take more time than you need for every job you tackle. I'm taking at least seven years to this job. I might possibly do it as well in five, but I'd miss half the fun of it all, I'd be glaring at separate parts of it, each one as it came along, and I'd never have time to see it full size and let it carry me 'round the world--to that baby carriage, for instance, over in Lahore." We were rounding the Battery now. And in that sparkling morning light, with billowy waves of sea green all around us, sudden snowy clouds of spray, we watched for a moment the skyscraper group, the homes of the Big Companies. The sunshine was reflected from thousands of dazzling window eyes, little streamers of steam were flung out gaily overhead, streets suddenly opened to our view, narrow cuts revealing the depths below. And there came to our ears a deep humming.