"What a mess I have been making of my life! What waste! What folly! I've
behaved like a child, an impulsive, irresponsible child. And now I must get
to work, really to work."

"With your talents a year or so of work would free you."

"Oh, I'm free." Howard hesitated and flushed. "Yes, I'm free," he repeated
bitterly. "We are all free except for the shackles we fasten upon ourselves
and can unlock for ourselves. I don't agree with you that earning one's
daily bread is drudgery."

"Well, let's see you work--work for something definite. Why don't you try
for some higher place on the paper--correspondent at Washington or
London--no, not London, for that is a lounging job which would ruin even an
energetic man. Why not try for the editorial staff? They ought to have
somebody upstairs who takes an interest in something besides politics."

"But doesn't a man have to write what he doesn't believe? You know how
Segur is always laughing at the protection editorials he writes, although
he is a free-trader."

"Oh, there must be many directions in which the paper is free to express
honest opinions."

Howard began that very night. As soon as he reached his club where he was
living for a few days he sat down to the file of the _News-Record_ and
began to study its editorial style and method. He had learned a great deal
before three o'clock in the morning and had written a short editorial on a
subject he took from the news. In the morning he read his article again and
decided that with a few changes--adjectives cut out, long sentences cut up,