Page:Lynch Williams--The stolen story and other newspaper stories.djvu/189

 office, find out where some of the other relatives are. We've got to have something about the funeral arrangements, at least. Make your best time, please." The "please" was added, perhaps, because he now remembered what he had said to the new young reporter, who was hurrying wildly down to the ferry, wondering how in the world he was expected to find out the name of the owner of a yacht which was now three miles down the bay.

Then it came Brown's turn to catch it. Brown was the one who had been asked so politely to take the bull story off the 'phone. When you take a story off the telephone you are not paid at space rates but by time, that is, so much—or rather so little—for an hour or a fraction of it. Of course Brown could not take more than half an hour if he wanted to, because the story was to go in the first edition with a spread head, but he did not want to. In fact he was anxious to finish it quickly, so that he might be sent out on some other story before all the good ones were assigned. So he hurried through the work, stepped up to the desk, and