"Look here, Rex, you've got to stop this moping."

"I'm not moping," said Rex, coloring up.

"What do you call it, then?" Braith spoke with some sharpness, but
continued kindly, "You know I've been through it all. Ten years ago,
when I sent in my first picture, I confess to you I suffered the
torments of the damned until -- "

"Until?"

"Until they sent me my card. The color was green."

"But I thought a green card meant `not admitted."'

"It does. I received three in three years."

"Do you mean you were thrown out three years in succession?"

Braith knocked the ashes out of his pipe. "I gave up smoking for
those three years."

"You?"

Braith filled his pipe tenderly. "I was very poor," he said.

"If I had half your sand!" sighed Rex.

"You have, and something more that the rest of us have not. But you