Barry Pain

“ You can't possibly do this column, and you'd better write to your editor and say so."
He would not take my advice.
"A good all-round journalist can write an article on anything," he said obstinately. "I'm going off to write my article now—this minute."
"But do be reasonable," I said. "Why attempt the impossible?"
"It's not impossible," be answered, as he picked up his hat. "Observation is no good. I've found that out. Study is also no good. The male man can find out nothing about the female fashions in those ways. ”

“ I said, "you must know some good-natured woman of the world—one of the kind that likes young men one of the kind that believes that journalism is connected with authorship, and authorship is connected with romance. ”

“ I cannot escape from my unspeakable shame. Fate reaches out a long arm of coincidence and collars me at every turn. That attempt to write the thirteenth column seems to have swelled up and filled my entire life. Before the sun has set I shall probably find myself in the same railway carriage with the proud girl that sold me so much elastic. But I must risk that. England has become too small for me, and I must go."
The remainder of the letter was purely personal. That week Home Happiness announced that its fashion article was unavoidably crowded out, but would appear in the next number. ”

“ Well, I write eight columns for every number myself now, and the editor does most of the rest. Of course, it's no hardship to me; a good all-round journalist does not want to be tied down to one subject. ”

“ Then again, when the third number did not sell quite so well as the second, he advertised Home Happiness at all the railway stations as "A success unprecedented in the history of journalism!" Some people called this also enterprise, and some called it something shorter. And, finally, the editor did a very clever thing when he secured, at a moderate salary, the services of Charles Backerton Salemaker. Salemaker loved work; he worked willingly, and he was—at one time, at any rate—a conscientious man. ”

“ In return for his salary, Salemaker was asked to write only one column a week, a column entitled "Politics for Papa." I know that he was uneasy about this, thinking and saying that he was afraid he was not really doing enough for the money he received. However, he did that column well. Any Liberal or any Conservative who read it would have found nothing with which it was possible to disagree. Salemaker said that it was written from the independent standpoint. ”

“ She said, 'Certainly, and what kind of elastic?' How was I to know that there were two kinds of elastic? However, I said, 'The kind they use for catapults.' She went behind a sort of desk, and stopped there patiently for some time. She may have gone there to laugh, or she may not. After a few minutes she came back and remarked, 'Elastic you said, I think?' Then she began to measure it out. I took it away in a whitey-brown paper parcel, and everybody stared at me. When I got outside the shop I threw the parcel down on the pavement, in a fit of irritation, I suppose. ”

“ Now the editor, on the plea of economy, has turned her off, or, rather, asked her to write gratuitously. She says she won't work for nothing, and she doesn't care. She says she shall go and be a new woman, and write an improper novel. ”

“ But that was honesty itself compared with what the editor wants now. Besides," he added, more quietly and reflectively, "it will be a very difficult thing to write that article without being bowled out."
I said that the subject was probably much easier than was generally supposed. I had known some girls who appeared to be singularly, impressively stupid, and yet they thoroughly understood fashions.
"Ah, yes," he said, "it is not so much a question of brains as a question of instinct. All women have the instinct. You think the subject easy? ”