However, he kept on trying. Helen would not have permitted him to give up even if he had wished. She was quite as much interested in his literary aspirations as he was himself and her encouragement was a great help to him. After months of repeated trial and repeated rejection he opened an envelope bearing the name of a fairly well-known periodical to find therein a kindly note stating that his poem, “Sea Spaces” had been accepted. And a week later came a check for ten dollars. That was a day of days. Incidentally it was the day of a trial balance in the office and the assistant bookkeeper's additions and multiplications contained no less than four ghastly errors.
The next afternoon there was an interview in the back office. Captain Zelotes and his grandson were the participants. The subject discussed was “Business versus Poetry,” and there was a marked difference of opinion. Albert had proclaimed his triumph at home, of course, had exhibited his check, had been the recipient of hugs and praises from his grandmother and had listened to paeans and hallelujahs from Mrs. Ellis. When he hurried around to the parsonage after supper, Helen had been excited and delighted at the good news. Albert had been patted on the back quite as much as was good for a young man whose bump of self-esteem was not inclined toward under-development. When he entered the private office of Z. Snow and Co. in answer to his grandfather's summons, he did so light-heartedly, triumphantly, with self-approval written large upon him.
But though he came like a conquering hero, he was not received like one. Captain Zelotes sat at his desk, the copy of the Boston morning paper which he had been reading sticking out of the waste basket into which it had been savagely jammed a half hour before. The news had not been to the captain's liking. These were the September days of 1914; the German Kaiser was marching forward “mit Gott” through Belgium, and it began to look as if he could not be stopped short of Paris. Consequently, Captain Zelotes, his sympathies from the first with England and the Allies, was not happy in his newspaper reading.
Albert entered, head erect and eyes shining. If Gertie Kendrick could have seen him then she would have fallen down and worshiped. His grandfather looked at him in silence for a moment, tapping his desk with the stump of a pencil. Albert, too, was silent; he was already thinking of another poem with which to dazzle the world, and his head was among the rosy clouds.