O, very well," said Gringo, turning away with a shade of contempt,

you'll find if you are going into literature and newspaper work that you

can't afford a conscience like that."

But Philip did afford it, and he wrote, thanking his friends, and

declining because he said the political scheme would fail, and ought to

fail. And he went back to his books and to his waiting for an opening

large enough for his dignified entrance into the literary world.

It was in this time of rather impatient waiting that Philip was one

morning walking down Broadway with Henry Brierly. He frequently

accompanied Henry part way down town to what the latter called his office

in Broad Street, to which he went, or pretended to go, with regularity

every day. It was evident to the most casual acquaintance that he was a

man of affairs, and that his time was engrossed in the largest sort of

operations, about which there was a mysterious air. His liability to be

suddenly summoned to Washington, or Boston or Montreal or even to

Liverpool was always imminent. He never was so summoned, but none of

his acquaintances would have been surprised to hear any day that he had

gone to Panama or Peoria, or to hear from him that he had bought the Bank

of Commerce.

The two were intimate at that time,--they had been class, mates--and saw

a great deal of each other. Indeed, they lived together in Ninth Street,

in a boarding-house, there, which had the honor of lodging and partially

feeding several other young fellows of like kidney, who have since gone

127

The Gilded Age