Erik Dorn

rkened sun and the dim glow of electric bulbs-were already launched upon the nervous routine of their day. An excited jargon filled the place which, wit

bout. They rose indifferently in response to furiously repeated bellows for their assistance-a business of carrying typewritten bi

numerable assistants the amount of space needed for succeeding editions, the possible development in the local scandals. His eye unconsciously watched the clock over his

lice, the wrecks, the criminals, conventions, politicians, reformers, lovers, and haters, and bring back the news of the city's day. A common almost racial sophistication stamped their expression. They pawed over telephone books, ar

ly non-existent. They desired to know in what mysterious manner one could get ten columns of type into a page that held only seven and whether anyone t

e waving smeared bits of printed paper and triump

ss the pregnant details of the news pouring in; and scribbling it down on sheets of

oudly against the dusty window

at isolated in a tiny world of sharpened pencils, pa

excited over items of vast indifference

ink, sauntered in as if on a vacation, uttering some t

despatches from twenty ends of the earth, bellowed items of interest into the air-assassinations in China, probes, quizzes, scandals, accusations in far-aw

tside the opened windows in the rear of the room, the elevated trains stuffed with men and women roared into a statio

rious ritual-the scene, spreading through the four floors of the grimy building with a thousand men and women shrieking, hammering, cursing, writing, squeezing and juggling the monotonous convulsions of life into a scribble of words. Ou

remarked, "is a blind old

ence, propaganda, telegrams, and contributions from Constant Reader lay stuffed into the corners and pigeonholes of his desk. He sat for a mom

y or pathetically into Human Interest yarns.... These were functions he discharged mechanically. A perfect affinity toward his work characterized his attitude. Yet behind the automatic efficiency of his thought lay an ironic

ing. Laws, ambitions, conventions-froth in an empty glass. Tragedies, comedies-all a swarm of nothings. Dreams in the hearts of men-thin fever outlines to which they clung in hope. Nothing ... nothing....

noidal moron in a gulf of high winds; headlines saying a pompous "amen" to asininity and a hopeful "My God!" to confusion-these caressed him, and brought the thought to him, "if there is anythi

as an editor. At thirty-four he had acquired the successful air which distinguishes men who have come to the end of their rope. He had become an editor and a fixture. The office observed an intent, gray-eyed man, straight nosed, fi

sing room, Dorn looked good-humoredly about him. He was ready to go home. Arguments, reprimands, entreaties were over for a space. He walked leisurely down

he passed. Promising young men, both, whose collars would grow slightly soiled as they advanced in their profession. He remembered one of his early observations: "T

Dorn read as he sauntered by. He thought "an emancipated creature who prides herself on being able to drink cocktails without losing caste. She'll marry

he telegraph editor. A face flabby and red with ancien

orn smiled. "The damned idiot crowded the Nancy story off page one in the

is deadened nerves. Inside the flabby, coarsened body with its red face munching out monosyllables, lived a recluse. "Too much living has driven him from life," Dorn thought, "and killed his lusts. So he sits and reads books-the last debauchery: strange, twisted phrases like idols, like totem poles, like Polynesian masks. He sits contemplating them as he once sat drunkenly watching the obscenities of black, white, and yellow bodied women. Thus, the mania for the rouge of life, for the grimace that l

logy in an eastern university. Dorn caught a memory of him sitting in a congenial saloon before a stein and pouring forth hoarsely oracular comments upon the activities of men known and unknown. The man had a gift f

copy desk, was talking-a shriveled little man with a bald face and shoe-button eyes. "You've got to admit people ar

n avenue, take a taxi home-what else was there to do? Nothing, unless talk. But to whom? He thought of his father. A tenacious old man. Probably hang on forever. God, the man had been married three times. If it wasn't for his damned infirmities he'd pro

d along the lake. The day grew abruptly fresher here. An arc of blue sky rising from the east flung a great curve over the buildi

ppeared at the window beside him. He recognized her with elation. His thought gave him an index