"He must retire before long." There came another visitor.

This time it was a lanky boy, with, a blue bag over his shoulder and a notebook and pencil-stump in his hand.

He nodded to the assistant as to an old friend with whom one may be at ease, set down his bag, opened his notebook, and nibbled his stump.
Then he read aloud, with a comma or semicolon between each, a dozen or twenty titles.

They were the names of the books which his employer wished to pick up.

The red-eyed assistant listened, and shook his head.