Page:Lynch Williams--The stolen story and other newspaper stories.djvu/265

 ing to approach a man or woman; he knew how automatically, the men in the office said. It is true that he did it automatically, but it was not from what he knew but what he felt.

The city editor had discovered a way of making Billy's eyes brighten, whether the owner wanted them to or not. That is the reason Woods had been handling so many of the "hard to get" assignments of late instead of the "color" descriptions at which he had made his first hit. "In fact, there is no one in town," the suave city editor would say, "that could handle this story as you could, if you care to take it."

"Well, let me try. I'll do what I can," for Billy was only human.

Not that he spent all his days pulling words out of unwilling people; quite as many fawned upon him and tried to be hail-fellow-well-met with him as did the other thing; as many lied to get themselves in print as to stay out. And he had heard so many of them say, with more or less dignity, "Oh, no, we do not wish you to mention us in the paper," and so often he had seen