quick, accurate, silent, interested, appreciative, intelligent to a
remarkable degree--Good Heavens! I'm doing it! I blush now when I
remember that I engaged Miss Farr's services in the first place from
motives of philanthropy. Is it possible that I was ever fatuous
enough to believe that I was the party who conferred the benefit? If
so, I very soon discovered my mistake. In justice to myself I must
state that I saw at once what a treasure I had come upon. You
remember what a quick, sure judgment my father had? Somehow I seem
to be getting more like him all the time. The moment any proposition
takes on a purely business aspect, I become, as it were, pure
intellect. I see the exact value, business value, of the thing. Aunt
Caroline never agrees with me in this. She insists upon referring to
that oil property at Green Lake and that little matter of South
American Mines. But those mistakes were trifles. Any man might have
made them.

In this case, where I am right on the spot, there can be no
possibility of a mistake. I see with my own eyes. Miss Farr is a
dream of secretarial efficiency. She combines, with ease, those
widely differing qualities which are so difficult to come by in a
single individual. It is inspiring to work with her. I find that her
co-operation actually stimulates creative thought. My notes are
expanding at a most satisfactory rate. My introductory chapter
already assumes form. And--by Jove! I seem to be doing it again.

But one simply does not make these discoveries every day.

The other aspects of the situation here, the non-business aspects,
are not so satisfactory. The menage is certainly peculiar. I had
what amounted to a bloodless duel with mine host the other day.