cheap skates. We take this opportunity of once more informing Jim
that he is a liar and a skunk," and whose editor works with a
revolver on his desk and another in his hip-pocket. Graduating from
this, he had proceeded to a reporter's post on a daily paper in a
Kentucky town, where there were blood feuds and other Southern
devices for preventing life from becoming dull. All this time New
York, the magnet, had been tugging at him. All reporters dream of
reaching New York. At last, after four years on the Kentucky paper,
he had come East, minus the lobe of one ear and plus a long scar
that ran diagonally across his left shoulder, and had worked
without much success as a free-lance. He was tough and ready for
anything that might come his way, but these things are a great deal
a matter of luck. The cub-reporter cannot make a name for himself
unless he is favoured by fortune. Things had not come Billy
Windsor's way. His work had been confined to turning in reports of
fires and small street accidents, which the various papers to
which he supplied them cut down to a couple of inches.

Billy had been in a bad way when he had happened upon the
sub-editorship of _Cosy Moments_. He despised the work with all his
heart, and the salary was infinitesimal. But it was regular, and
for a while Billy felt that a regular salary was the greatest thing
on earth. But he still dreamed of winning through to a post on one
of the big New York dailies, where there was something doing and a
man would have a chance of showing what was in him.

The unfortunate thing, however, was that _Cosy Moments_ took up his
time so completely. He had no chance of attracting the notice of
big editors by his present work, and he had no leisure for doing
any other.