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"And you'd teach her to drink beer and she shall grow so fat that the Spalpeens won't know their auntie." At last "How much do they pay?" I asked, in desperation. And the thing that had appeared so absurd at first began to take on the shape of reality. Von Gerhard did speak to Norberg of the Post. And I am to go to Milwaukee next week.
Don't make me do all the social stunts. What's the news? What kind of a rotten cotton sportin' sheet is that dub Callahan gettin' out? Who won to-day Cubs or Pirates? Norberg, you goat, who pinned that purple tie on you?" He was so like the Blackie we had always known that we were at our ease immediately.
And she had kissed Bennie good-by with the knowledge that the little blue-painted bed, with its faded red roses, would again stand empty in the gloom of the Knapf attic. Norberg glanced up quickly as I entered the city room. "Get something good on that south side story?" he asked. "Why, no," I answered. "You were mistaken about that. The the nice old maid is not going to move, after all."
Norberg proceeded to outline the story with characteristic vigor, a cigarette waggling from the corner of his mouth. "Name and address on this slip. Take a Greenfield car. Nice old maid has lived in nice old cottage all her life. Grandfather built it himself about a hundred years ago. Whole family was born in it, and married in it, and died in it, see?
Say, Norberg, tell that fathead, Callahan, if he don't keep the third drawer t' the right in my desk locked, th' office kids'll swipe all the roller rink passes surest thing you know." "I'll tell him, Black," stammered Norberg, and turned away. They said good-by, awkwardly enough. Not one of them that did not owe him an unpayable debt of gratitude.
I had purposely waited until the footfalls of the last departing reporter should have ceased to echo down the long corridor. The city room was deserted except for one figure bent over a pile of papers and proofs. Norberg, the city editor, was the last to leave, as always. His desk light glowed in the darkness of the big room, and his typewriter alone awoke the echoes.
It was such wonderful stuff that I couldn't use it. It was with the charming old maid in mind that Norberg summoned me. "Another special story for you," he cheerfully announced. No answering cheer appeared upon my lunchless features. "A prize-fighter at ten-thirty, and a prima donna at twelve. What's the next choice morsel?
Go home for a week. I'll fix it up with Norberg. No tellin' what a guy like that's goin' t' do. Send your brother-in-law down here if you want to make it a family affair, and between us, we'll see this thing through." I looked up at Von Gerhard. He was nodding approval. It all seemed so easy, so temptingly easy. To run away! Not to face him until I was safe in the shelter of Norah's arms!
"I've come to say good-by to you and Blackie." Norberg looked up quickly. "You feel that way, too? Funny. So do the rest of us. Sometimes I think we are all half sure that it is only another of his impish tricks, and that some morning he will pop open the door of the city room here and call out, 'Hello, slaves! Been keepin' m' memory green?" I held out my hand to him, gratefully.
Three men were waiting for us, and gave a call when we rowed in sight of their camp. One was Lauzon's brother, another was Cecil Dodd, a cowboy who looked after Bass' stock, and the breaking of his horses, the third was John Norberg, an "old timer" and an old friend as well, engaged at that time in working some asbestos and copper claims.
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