work with the best instead of with the inferior, Howard never felt that he
was "entitled to a living." He had a lively sense of gratitude for the
money return for his services which prudence presently taught him to
conceal.

"Space" meant to him eighty dollars a week at least--circumstances of ease.
So vast a sum did it seem that he began to consider the problem of
investment. "I have been not badly off on twenty-five dollars a week," he
thought. "With, well, say forty dollars a week I shall be able to satisfy
all my wants. I can save at least forty a week and that will mean an
independence with a small income by the time I am thirty-four."

But--a year after he was put "on space" he was still just about even with
his debts. He seemed to himself to be living no better and it was only by
careful counting-up that he could see how that dream of independence had
eluded him. A more extensive wardrobe, a little better food, a more
comfortable suite of rooms, an occasional dinner to some friends, loans to
broken-down reporters, and the mysteriously vanished two thousand dollars
was accounted for.

Howard tried to retrench, devised small ingenious schemes for saving money,
lectured himself severely and frequently for thus trifling away his chance
to be a free man. But all in vain. He remained poor; and, whenever he gave
the matter thought, which was not often, gloomy forebodings as to the
future oppressed him. "I shall find myself old," he thought, "with nothing
accomplished, with nothing laid by. I shall be an old drudge." He
understood the pessimistic tone of his profession. All about him were men
like himself--leading this gambler's life of feverish excitement and
evanescent achievement, earning comfortable incomes and saving nothing,
looking forward to the inevitable time of failing freshness and shattered