The white-haired man rose as David entered and smiled a kindly, spectacled smile. "I'm very glad to see you, Mr. Aldrich. If you'll excuse me for a minute, I'll be right with you." David sat down in the chair Mr. Osborne indicated and waited with pulsing suspense for the two men to go. There, on one corner of Mr. Osborne's desk, which was littered with letters, manuscripts and magazine page-proofs, he saw his book. He felt, as he waited, almost as he had felt five years before during the suffocating minutes between the return of the jury with its verdict and the verdict's reading. The verdict on the book was ready. What was it to be? At length the two men went away. Mr. Osborne turned from the door and came toward David, smiling cordially, his hand outstretched. "Let me congratulate you, Mr. Aldrich!" he said heartily. David rose and put a nerveless hand into Mr. Osborne's. "You mean--you like it?" "Indeed I do! If you and I can come to an agreement, we shall be proud to publish it." David gazed swimmingly at him. There was a whirling, a bubbling, within him--but he managed to say with fair control: "It's hardly necessary to tell an old publisher how happy a new author is to hear that." Mr. Osborne sat down and David automatically did likewise. "You, Mr. Aldrich, have particular reason to feel happy. We print a great many well-written, dramatic stories--stories which are just that, and no more. That, of course, is a great deal. But when a book, without impairment to its dramatic and artistic quality, leaves a profound impression regarding some aspect of life--that book has an element of bigness that the other stories lack. Mr. Aldrich, yours is such a story." David felt he was reeling off his chair. "Yes?" he said. Mr. Osborne went on to praise the book in detail. After a time he proposed terms. David took in hardly a word of the offer; his mind was over-running with his success, his praise. But he accepted the terms instantly. This settled, Mr. Osborne picked up several yellowed type-written sheets from his disordered desk. "By the way, are you the David Aldrich that submitted us a novel five or six years ago called 'The Master Knot?'" "Yes," said David. "I thought you might be interested in the readers' opinions on that story, so I had them brought in." He handed the sheets to David, and when he saw David had glanced them through, he remarked: "You see they all amount to the same. 'The author knows how to write, but he does not know life.'" He gazed steadily at David through the kindly spectacles. "Since then, Mr. Aldrich, you have come to know life." "I think I have." David strained to keep his voice natural. "Yes, you have come to know life--to feel it." He paused, and considered within himself. For all his warmth, there had been in his tone and manner, caution, reserve. Suddenly these fell away, and he radiated enthusiasm.