Page:Elizabeth Jordan--Tales of the city room.djvu/197



ISS BANCROFT raised her eyes from her work and turned them absently upon the small messenger who had stopped at her desk. They were beautiful eyes—"like no other eyes in the world," one infatuated young reporter had solemnly affirmed; but to-night they were tired and rather sad. Miss Bancroft had had a trying day. She had pursued an elusive news "story" the length and breadth of the city until late at night before finding it. She had been thrown into contact with a great many disagreeable persons. Moreover, she had had the depressing experience of seeing the individual who knew most about the story walk cheerfully away with a man reporter, ostensibly to have a drink, but in reality, she was sure, to give that youth exclusive information for a rival newspaper.

As she wrote her story to-night in the city room of "The Searchlight," she reflected