His abused eyes floated uneasily behind a double pair of lenses ... a dissenting minister ... of the old school ... he seemed to me far more youthful, more invigorating, than any of my other more youthful friends in the literary and magazine world. We talked and talked of poetry. He brought down a huge treatise on English versification, translated from some German scholar's life-research--to prove a point ... he discussed what Sidney Lanier--whom he had known--might have done with metrics, had he only lived longer.... And "no ... no ... take my advice," he said, "don't go down to Eden." There was something so vaguely deprecatory in his voice that it brought from me the question--"why not? isn't Penton Baxter all right?" "Oh, yes," in the same deprecatory tone,--"he's all right enough, alone--but, together, you'd be like two balloons without ballast. He might get you, or you might get him, into some sort of mess." "Why Dr. Ward, what do you mean?" "Penton is always protesting about something or other,--always starting fantastic schemes ... he's just finished with his Parnassus Palace experiment, which brought him a lot of newspaper notoriety ... which is to me distasteful, extremely distasteful ... yet Baxter," he added hastily, "is a real force ... he can think of more original projects in a given space of time than anyone else I know." "I look on him as a great and wonderful man!" "Mark my word, Mr. Gregory, you'll find yourself in some sort of mix-up if you go down to Eden to live with him. You're both too mad and inflammable to be in the same neighbourhood." Using all his powers of persuasion, Dr. William Hayes Ward tried to explain to me how I owed it both to Mr. Derek and Mr. Mackworth to finish my play. "Have you no place else to go to, beside Eden?" "I could run out to Perfection City--and camp out there." "Now that's a good idea ... why not try that?" * * * * * "Johnnie, had your lunch yet?" it was Dr. Percival Hammond, the managing editor, who was asking, leaning out from his cubbyhole where he sat before his desk. "No, sir!" "Come and share mine!" I said good-bye to Dr. Ward and walked down the corridor to where Hammond sat. He looked more the fashionable club man than ever, though he did have a slight sprinkling of dandruff on his coat collar. I was quick to notice this, as I had been quick to notice Miss Martin's few, close-scizzored hairs on her fine, thinking face. Lunch! But I was not to be taken out to a meal in a restaurant, as anyone might expect, but Hammond sat me down on a chair by his side, and he handed me a glass of buttermilk and a few compressed oatmeal cakes. * * * * *