As he did so, a darkish young man, with a slim boyish figure, a thin face, and a discontented expression, rose from an armchair, held out his hand, and, with a saturnine smile, said:-- "Jack!" "Fred!" The two men remained gazing at each other with a half-amused, half-guarded expression.

Mr.Hamlin was first to begin.

"I didn't think YOU'D be such a fool as to try on this kind of thing, Fred," he said, half seriously.
"Yes, but it was to keep you from being a much bigger one that I hunted you up," said the editor, mischievously.

"Read that.

I got it an hour after you left." And he placed a little triumphantly in Jack's hand the letter he had received from White Violet.
Mr.Hamlin read it with an unmoved face, and then laid his two hands on the editor's shoulders.