With that name by rights you should be a poet."

Gloom settled on the young man's countenance. "It's a dashed sight
too poetic. It's like Edwin Arnold and Alfred Austin and Dante
Gabriel Rossetti. Great poets have vulgar monosyllables for names,
like Keats. The new Shakespeare when he comes along will probably
be called Grubb or Jubber, if he isn't Jones. With a name like
yours I might have a chance. You should be the poet."

"I'm very fond of reading," said Dickson modestly.

A slow smile crumpled Mr. Heritage's face. "There's a fire in the
smoking-room," he observed as he rose. "We'd better bag the
armchairs before these fishing louts take them." Dickson
followed obediently. This was the kind of chance acquaintance for
whom he had hoped, and he was prepared to make the most of him.

The fire burned bright in the little dusky smoking-room, lighted by
one oil-lamp. Mr. Heritage flung himself into a chair, stretched
his long legs, and lit a pipe.

"You like reading?" he asked. "What sort? Any use for poetry?"

"Plenty," said Dickson. "I've aye been fond of learning it up and
repeating it to myself when I had nothing to do. In church and
waiting on trains, like. It used to be Tennyson, but now it's
more Browning. I can say a lot of Browning."

The other screwed his face into an expression of disgust. "I know
the stuff. 'Damask cheeks and dewy sister eyelids.' Or else the