Laban nodded, slowly. “I've read a good deal,” he said quietly. “Readin' is one of the few things I ain't made a failure of in this life. Um-hm. One of the few. Yes yes--yes.” He dipped his pen in the inkwell and carefully made an entry in the ledger. His assistant felt a sudden pang of compunction. “I beg your pardon, Mr. Keeler,” he said. “That was pretty fresh of me. I'm sorry.” Laban looked up in mild surprise. “Sorry?” he repeated. “What for? . . . Oh, that's all right, Al, that's all right. Lord knows I'm the last one on earth who'd ought to criticize anybody. All I had in mind in sayin' what I did was to--well, to kind of keep you from bein' too well satisfied and not try harder on the next one. It don't pay to be too well satisfied. . . . Years ago, I can remember, _I_ was pretty well satisfied--with myself and my work. Sounds like a joke, I know, but 'twas so. . . . Well, I've had a nice long chance to get over it. Um-hm. Yes--yes. So I have, so I have.” Only Captain Zelotes at first said nothing about the poem. He read it, his wife saw to that, but his comment even to her was a non-committal grunt. “But don't you think it's real sort of pretty, Zelotes?” she asked. The captain grunted again. “Why, I guess likely 'tis if you say so, Mother. I don't know much about such things.” “But everybody says it is.” “Want to know! Well, then 'twon't make much difference whether I say it or not.” “But ain't you goin' to say a word to Albert about it, Zelotes?” “Humph! I don't know's I know what to say.” “Why, say you like it.” “Ye-es, and if I do he'll keep on writin' more. That's exactly what I don't want him to do. Come now, Mother, be sensible. This piece of his may be good or it may not, _I_ wouldn't undertake to say. But this I do know: I don't want the boy to spend his time writin' poetry slush for that 'Poets' Corner.' Letitia Makepeace did that--she had a piece in there about every week--and she died in the Taunton asylum.” “But, Zelotes, it wasn't her poetry got her into the asylum.” “Wan't it? Well, she was in the poorhouse afore that. I don't know whether 'twas her poetryin' that got her in there, but I know darned well it didn't get her out.” “But ain't you goin' to say one word? 'Twould encourage him so.” “Good Lord! We don't want to encourage him, do we? If he was takin' to thievin' you wouldn't encourage him in that, would you?” “Thievin'! Zelotes Snow, you don't mean to say you compare a poet to a THIEF!” The captain grinned. “No-o, Mother,” he observed drily. “Sometimes a thief can manage to earn a livin' at his job. But there, there, don't feel bad. I'll say somethin' to Al, long's you think I ought to.” The something was not much, and yet Captain Zelotes really meant it to be kindly and to sound like praise. But praising a thing of which you have precious little understanding and with which you have absolutely no sympathy is a hard job. “See you had a piece in the Item this week, Al,” observed the captain.