The Genius Read Online Free PDF Page B

think
it was too fancy." Eugene had seen and in a way studied the ads. in
the magazines. They seemed so much more fascinating to him. Why
couldn't newspaper ads. be different?
    Still it was never given to him to trouble over this problem.
Mr. Burgess dealt with the advertisers. He settled how the ads were
to be. He never talked to Eugene or Summers about them, not always
to Lyle. He would sometimes have Williams explain just what their
character and layout was to be. Eugene was so young that Williams
at first did not pay very much attention to him, but after a while
he began to realize that there was a personality here, and then he
would explain things,—why space had to be short for some items and
long for others, why county news, news of small towns around
Alexandria, and about people, was much more important financially
to the paper than the correct reporting of the death of the sultan
of Turkey. The most important thing was to get the local names
right. "Don't ever misspell them," he once cautioned him. "Don't
ever leave out a part of a name if you can help it. People are
awfully sensitive about that. They'll stop their subscription if
you don't watch out, and you won't know what's the matter."
    Eugene took all these things to heart. He wanted to see how the
thing was done, though basically it seemed to be a little small. In
fact people seemed a little small, mostly.
    One of the things that did interest him was to see the paper put
on the press and run off. He liked to help lock up the forms, and
to see how they were imposed and registered. He liked to hear the
press run, and to help carry the wet papers to the mailing tables
and the distributing counter out in front. The paper hadn't a very
large circulation but there was a slight hum of life about that
time and he liked it. He liked the sense of getting his hands and
face streaked and not caring, and of seeing his hair tousled, in
the mirror. He tried to be useful and the various people on the
paper came to like him, though he was often a little awkward and
slow. He was not strong at this period and his stomach troubled
him. He thought, too, that the smell of the ink might affect his
lungs, though he did not seriously fear it. In the main it was
interesting but small; there was a much larger world outside, he
knew that. He hoped to go to it some day; he hoped to go to
Chicago.

Chapter 3
     
    Eugene grew more and more moody and rather restless under
Stella's increasing independence. She grew steadily more
indifferent because of his moods. The fact that other boys were
crazy for her consideration was a great factor; the fact that one
particular boy, Harvey Rutter, was persistently genial, not
insistent, really better looking than Eugene and much better
tempered, helped a great deal. Eugene saw her with him now and
then, saw her go skating with him, or at least with a crowd of
which he was a member. Eugene hated him heartily; he hated her at
times for not yielding to him wholly; but he was none the less wild
over her beauty. It stamped his brain with a type or ideal.
Thereafter he knew in a really definite way what womanhood ought to
be, to be really beautiful.
    Another thing it did was to bring home to him a sense of his
position in the world. So far he had always been dependent on his
parents for food, clothes and spending money, and his parents were
not very liberal. He knew other boys who had money to run up to
Chicago or down to Springfield—the latter was nearer—to have a
Saturday and Sunday lark. No such gaieties were for him. His father
would not allow it, or rather would not pay for it. There were
other boys who, in consequence of amply provided spending money,
were the town dandies. He saw them kicking their heels outside the
corner book store, the principal loafing place of the elite, on
Wednesdays and Saturdays and sometimes on Sunday evenings
preparatory to going somewhere, dressed in a luxury of clothing
which was beyond his wildest dreams. Ted