Page:Lynch Williams--The stolen story and other newspaper stories.djvu/111

 experience of men and motives, and he was getting it.

He was getting more than he had bargained for. Sometimes it was hard to realize that it was himself going about doing these things, son of so-and-so and grandson of so-and-so. Whether it was snobbish or not, it did seem very odd that he was the one, and sometimes he had a longing to break away from it all and never look at a newspaper again. "But it is not I doing all this," he told himself; "it's a newspaper reporter. I'm playing the part of a newspaper reporter for the experience. It's a very instructive experience."

He had an earnest sociological friend, who, to learn some truth at first-hand, had worked his way across the country as a day-laborer, doing everything that came in his way, from cleaning cuspidors to binding wheat. For a similar motive, Linton told himself, he too was digging out and gathering together more or less interesting truths about men and their wives, from lawyers and others who wanted advertising.

All the same he kept away from the neigh-