Page:Daskam Bacon--Whom the gods destroy.djvu/82

 "Important paper, I suppose?" he inquired lightly.

"Wouldn't want to lose it."

"No—oh, no!"

"Get a wigging at the office?"

"It—it's not—they are my own—it is a poem!" stammered the young man.

Delafield chuckled involuntarily, and then, as a quick red poured over the other's cheeks, he made a hasty gesture of apology.

"No offence—none at all, I assure you, Mr.—Mr. Poet! I was only taken by surprise. One doesn't often assist a poet in catching his works!"

He laughed again, a contented after-dinner laugh.

Then, as the young man fell behind him quietly, the incident being over, an idle desire for company prompted him to delay his own pace.

"Do you write much? Get it printed? Good publisher?" he inquired genially. Few persons could resist Lester Delafield's smile: his very butler warmed to it and the woman who retained her reserve under it he had never met.

Again the young man blushed. "Published? No,