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“Oh, thank you,” he said. “I think I’ll keep on trying for a paper– I’ll try a little longer. I want to see something of this war, of course, and if I’m not too lazy I’d like to write something about it, but–well–I’m much obliged to you, anyway.”

“Of course, if it were my money, I’d take you on at once,” said Keating, hurriedly.

Channing smiled and nodded. “You’re very kind,” he answered. “Well, good-by.”

A half-hour later, in the smoking-room of the hotel, Keating addressed himself to a group of correspondents.

“There is no doing anything with that man Channing,” he said, in a tone of offended pride. “I offered him a good job and he wouldn’t take it. Because he got a story in the International Magazine, he’s stuck on himself, and he won’t hustle for news–he wants to write pipe-dreams. What the public wants just now is news.”

“That’s it,” said one of the group, “and we must give it to them– even if we have to fake it.”

Great events followed each other with great rapidity. The army ceased beating time, shook itself together, adjusted its armor and moved, and, to the delight of the flotilla of press-boats at Port Antonio, moved, not as it had at first intended, to the north coast of Cuba, but to Santiago, where its transports were within reach of their megaphones.

“Why, everything’s coming our way now!” exclaimed the World manager in ecstasy. “We’ve got the transports to starboard at Siboney, and the war-ships to port at Santiago, and all we’ll need to do is to sit on the deck with a field-glass, and take down the news with both hands.”

Channing followed these events with envy. Once or twice, as a special favor, the press-boats carried him across to Siboney and Daiquiri, and he was able to write stories of what he saw there; of the landing of the army, of the wounded after the Guasimas fight, and of the fever-camp at Siboney. His friends on the press-boats sent this work home by mail on the chance that the Sunday editor might take it at space rates. But mail matter moved slowly and the army moved quickly, and events crowded so closely upon each other that Channing’s stories, when they reached New York, were ancient history and were unpublished, and, what was of more importance to him, unpaid for. He had no money now, and he had become a beach-comber in the real sense of the word. He slept the warm nights away among the bananas and cocoanuts on the Fruit Company’s wharf, and by calling alternately on his Cuban exiles and the different press-boats, he was able to obtain a meal a day without arousing any suspicions in the minds of his hosts that it was his only one.

He was sitting on the stringer of the pier-head one morning, waiting for a press-boat from the “front,” when the Three Friends ran in and lowered her dingy, and the “World” manager came ashore, clasping a precious bundle of closely written cable-forms. Channing scrambled to his feet and hailed him.

“Have you heard from the chief about me yet?” he asked. The “World” man frowned and stammered, and then, taking Channing by the arm, hurried with him toward the cable-office.

“Charlie, I think they’re crazy up there,” he began, “they think they know it all. Here I am on the spot, but they think–“

“You mean they won’t have me,” said Channing. “But why?” he asked, patiently. “They used to give me all the space I wanted.”

“Yes, I know, confound them, and so they should now,” said the “World” man, with sympathetic indignation. “But here’s their cable; you can see it’s not my fault.” He read the message aloud. “Channing, no. Not safe, take reliable man from Siboney.” He folded the cablegram around a dozen others and stuck it back in his hip-pocket.

“What queered you, Charlie,” he explained, importantly, “was that last break of yours, New Year’s, when you didn’t turn up for a week. It was once too often, and the chief’s had it in for you ever since. You remember?”