Читать книгу The Making of a Soul - Kathlyn Rhodes - Страница 7

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Precisely at nine o'clock on the following morning Antonia presented herself at the office of the new review; and was forthwith conducted to the editor's room.

Here Owen and Barry were waiting for her; and at the sight of the trim little figure in the doorway the faces of both men brightened.

In truth Toni was pleasant to look upon. She had taken off her hat and coat in the little ante-room, and as she stood there in her black frock, with its demure little white turn-down collar, she looked very young, very shy, and if the truth must be told, very pretty. Whereupon Barry, who loved all pretty girls in a harmless, kindly fashion, rejoiced exceedingly; while even Owen, to whom things feminine were at present anathema, owned to himself that she was certainly more attractive to have about the place than her sour-faced predecessor.

It was Barry who put her at her ease, of course. Not being troubled with shyness he greeted her in friendly fashion, bade her come in, and pointed out to her the chair, behind the typewriter, which she was expected to fill.

Yes, she said, in answer to questioning, she was used to a Remington. No, she had never been connected with journalism before. Yes, she was well up in ordinary office work, and—in answer to Owen, this—she knew pretty well the rules of composition, grammar, etc.

"That's good." Owen spoke formally, and Toni decided instantly that she liked Mr. Raymond the better of the two. "Well, I have here an article I want you to type at once, and then—can you read proof?"

Blushing, she owned her inability to do so. Privately, she was not at all sure what he meant, but dread of Miss Hardy's wrath should she be returned to the office marked "Incompetent" forced her to add quickly:—

"But I'm sure I could learn if—if you wouldn't mind showing me how to do it."

"I'm sure you could." Barry spoke kindly and she turned to him with a feeling of relief. "When you have typed that article for Mr. Rose I'll show you how, and then you'll manage all right."

"Teach her now," advised Rose, looking up from the manuscript he was scanning. "This stuff wants a bit of revising, and you might as well do something for your living, Barry, you lazy wretch."

Barry smilingly disclaimed any right to the title.

"I'm ready to work as hard as anyone," he said gaily.

"But as I'm only considered fit to do the theatrical criticisms and play office-boy to you, Owen, naturally I find time to make holiday now and then. Well, Miss … er … "

"Gibbs." She supplied him with the name as he hesitated.

"Gibbs? You won't mind being known as 'Our Miss Gibbs,' will you?" His tone was free of all offence, and Toni smiled in response. "Now, here's a chair for me, and if only our chief will hold his peace for half an hour, I'll soon put you wise, as the Yankees say."

He sat down beside her, and pulling a couple of galley proof-sheets towards him, began to initiate her into the mysteries of "reading." For all his laughing manner he was an excellent teacher; and after twenty minutes of his clear and lucid exposition the girl felt she was beginning to grasp her lesson thoroughly. She proved, too, wonderfully quick at detecting mistakes, and Barry, who had petitioned the heads of the office they had selected not to send him any Council School product, was pleased to find that her spelling was admirable, her grammar passable, and her memory retentive.

As to the meaning which the article they were correcting conveyed to her, Barry was a little doubtful.

It was a short summary, by a famous Catholic writer, of some of the lesser-understood aspects of mysticism; and Barry suspected that a good deal of it was Greek to her, though she did her best to answer him intelligently when he questioned her, rather artfully, on the correct reading of a somewhat involved sentence.

As a matter of fact, Toni was wondering inwardly what on earth it was all about. Her education, though sound so far as it went, had been thoroughly old-fashioned; and at this period of her development it is to be feared there were whole tracts of mind and brain left vacant—for Toni belonged, by adoption at least, to a class who read only for amusement and occupation, and are not in the least anxious to try their mental teeth on any abstract theories or philosophies of life. She was at present all for the concrete. Things seen and known were of importance, things unseen were alike uninteresting and incredible. The abstract virtues were all very well, but life was much too vivid and important to allow itself to be ousted by dreams and speculations.

Something of this Barry, who had an almost femininely swift intuition, guessed as he sat beside Toni on this first morning; but Toni was much too intent on her work to wonder what he thought of her; and by the time she had done a little typing, taken down a few letters, and read a short proof all by herself, it was one o'clock, and she was dismissed in search of lunch.

When she returned, nearly an hour later, she found Owen alone, studying a dummy copy of the review; and seeing she was interested, Owen handed it over for her to see.

"The Bridge." She quoted the title a little dubiously. "Is that what you call it? But—what does it mean?"

Taking it back into his own hands, Owen pointed with a pencil to the design on the cover.

"Here is the Bridge, you see, and this stream of people passing over it symbolize the present generation. This side of the bridge represents the past, from which the present comes; this, over the bridge, is the future, towards which the pilgrims are hastening. The idea is to bridge the gulf between past and future, between the old worlds and the new; and with that in mind we try, while never neglecting the storehouse of the past, to point to the future, with all its wonderful, and as yet unwon, rewards and discoveries."

She murmured a word or two, and he went on with a note of enthusiasm in his voice.

"Personally, I look to the future with confidence. Some people say the golden age of poetry, of music and letters generally, is past; but I don't agree. I think that there will be a fresh Renaissance presently, that there will be found fresh hands to pass on the sacred torch … there's a flood of brilliant youth let loose in the world just now; and every bit of help the Bridge can give is at the service of that marvellous band."

He broke off suddenly, the light of the visionary gleaming in his eyes; but seeing, with a slight pang of disappointment, that his outburst was unintelligible to his hearer, he threw down the paper and laughed.

"There, Miss Gibbs, I have finished! Don't start me on the subject unless you're ready to be bored. Talk to Barry about it—he is able to look upon the Bridge quite sanely, as a means of providing bread and butter; but I'm afraid I'm a bit of a fanatic."

Toni, uncertain of her ground, but desperately anxious to appear intelligent, murmured something shyly, and Rose pulled out his watch with a smile.

"After two already! Well, Miss Gibbs, I'm off for lunch. You might just sort these papers out a bit, will you? We seem to have let things get into rather a muddle."

"I'll do it at once. There would be plenty of room for everything if some of these papers wore tidied up."

"Yes, I suppose you're right." Owen, who loved order, but was too impatient to preserve it, spoke dubiously. "Of course some of those papers are done with, but you wouldn't know which to keep, would you?"

"Perhaps Mr. Raymond would help me?"

Owen's face cleared.

"Of course—do the idle young beggar good. All right, Miss Gibbs, he shall give you a hand this afternoon when he gets back. He's an awfully good sort, you know, though I pretend to rag him. He's as clever as you please, and with it all as obliging and unspoilt as possible. Well, I'd better go. You can get along all right, can you?"

Receiving her reply, he lit a cigarette and went out, assuring himself that so far she promised well.

"Pretty little thing, and anxious to please us. Shallow, I expect, emotional probably, and not brainy enough to appreciate the symbolism of the Bridge. Well, we don't want too brilliant a typist, after all—Miss Jenkins and her 'culture' were a bit trying at times!"

And then meeting by chance an old friend who insisted on carrying him off to lunch, Owen speedily forgot that such a person as Miss Antonia Gibbs existed in the world.