fashion now is for swashbuckling tales with a haze of powder
smoke rising to high heaven. The public taste runs to gore and
more gore, and kidnappings of beautiful maidens-bah!"

"Follow the fashion then--if you must write. Get out of your
pink tea and orchid atmosphere, and take your heroines out West-
-away out, beyond the Mississippi, and let them be kidnapped.
Or New Mexico would do."

"New Mexico is also beyond the Mississippi, I believe," Thurston
hinted.

"Perhaps it is. What I mean is, write what the public wants,
since you don't relish failure. Why don't you do things about
the plains? It ought to be easy, and you were born out there
somewhere. It should come natural."

"I have," Thurston sighed. "My last rejection states that the
local color is weak and unconvincing. Hang the local color!"
The foot-rest suffered again.

Reeve-Howard was getting into his topcoat languidly, as he did
everything else. "The thing to do, then," he drawled, "is to go
out and study up on it. Get in touch with that country, and
your local color will convince. Personally though, I like those
little society skits you do--"

"Skits!" exploded Thurston. "My last was a four-part serial. I
never did a skit in my life."