Page:The Voice of the City (1908).djvu/144

 was a castle besieged. The city howled and roared and shrieked and beat upon its double doors, and shook white, fluttering checks above the wall, offering terms of surrender. The gray dust settled upon the trees; the siege was pressed hotter, but the drawbridge was not lowered. No further will the language of chivalry serve. Inside lived an old gentleman who loved his home and did not wish to sell it. That is all the romance of the besieged castle.

Three or four times every week came Sammy Brown to Ravenel’s apartment. He belonged to the poet’s club, for the former Browns had been conspicuous, though Sammy had been vulgarized by Business. He had no tears for departed Romance. The song of the ticker was the one that reached his heart, and when it came to matters equine and batting scores he was something of a pink edition. He loved to sit in the leather armchair by Ravenel’s window. And Ravenel didn’t mind particularly. Sammy seemed to enjoy his talk; and then the broker’s clerk was such a perfect embodiment of modernity and the day’s sordid practicality that Ravenel rather liked to use him as a scapegoat.

“I’ll tell you what’s the matter with you,” said Sammy, with the shrewdness that business had taught him. “The magazine has turned down some of your poetry stunts. That’s why you are sore at it.”

“That would be a good guess in Wall Street or in