"But why?" asked Jasmine, somewhat indignantly. "I have particular business with him; it is most necessary that I should see him. Pray, let him know that I am here." "Very sorry," replied the boy, "but can't." "Why not?" "'Cause he ain't in town." "Oh!" Poor Jasmine fell back a pace or two; then she resumed in a different tone-- "I am very much disappointed; there is a story of mine in _The Joy-bell_, and I wanted to speak to him about it. It was very important, indeed," she added, in so sad a voice that the red-haired boy gazed at her in some astonishment. "My word," he said, "then you do not know?" "Don't know what?" "Why, we has had a funeral here." "A funeral--oh, dear! oh, dear! is the editor of _The Joy-bell_ dead?" Here the red-haired boy burst into a peal of irrepressible laughter. "Dead! he ain't dead, but _The Joy-bell_ is; we had her funeral last week." Poor Jasmine staggered against the wall, and her pretty face became ghastly white. "Oh, boy," she said, "do tell me about it; how can _The Joy-bell_ be dead, and have a funeral? Oh, please, don't jest with me, for it's so important." The genuine distress in her tones touched at last some vulnerable point in the facetious office-boy's breast. "I'm real sorry for you, miss," he said, "particular as you seems so cut up; but what I tell you is true, and you had better know it. That editor has gone, and _The Joy-bell_ is decently interred. I was at her birth, and I was at her funeral. She had a short life, and was never up to much. I never guessed she'd hold out as long as she did; but the editor was a cute one, and for a time he bamboozled his authors, and managed to live on them. Yes, _The Joy-bell_ is in her quiet grave at last, and can't do no more harm to nobody. Lor', miss, I wouldn't take on if I was you, you'd soon get accustomed to it if you had a desk at an office like this. In at the births, and in at the deaths am I, and I don't make no count of one or t'other. Why, now, there was _The Stranger_--which went in for pictorial get up, and was truly elegant--it only lasted six months; and there was _The Ocean Wave_, which did not even live as long. And there was _Merrie Lassie_--oh, their names is legion. We'll have another started in no time. So you must be going, miss? Well, good morning. If I was you, miss, I wouldn't send no more stories to this yere office." CHAPTER XLVIII. ONE SHOE OFF AND ONE SHOE ON. "I must see you, Poppy--I must see you, and I can't come into the house. I could not face Mrs. Mortlock, nor Mrs. Dredge, nor Miss Slowcum. I am a dreadful failure, Poppy, a dreadful, dreadful failure, and I cannot look any one in the face. Do come out with me, dear Poppy, and at once; for if I can't speak to you at the present moment my heart will break."