The record-union., 1894-09-29
MANAGING EDITORS VACATION.
copyright, 1894, by Edgar L. Wakeman. All
rights reserved

Copyright, 1894, by Edgar L. Wakeman. All
rights reserved.
I.
The Board of Directors of the ''Daily
Public Motor Printing and Publishing
Company" fivei in number. met annually
on the first day of July.
Their duties usually comprised the de-
claring of very large dividend, ordering
certain handsome improvements, elect
ing a President, Secretary and Treasu-
rer for the ensuing year, and adjourn
ment to Vinley's for luncheon.
This was partaken of in comfortable
gusto, when they went their several
ways, as befitted their various social and
commercial dignities, complacently car
rying fresh copies of the "Daily Motor"
in their hands, with acceptable motor"
dividend checks in their pockets and
with the sunshine of the MOTORS" great
prosperity radiating from their bland and
pleasant faces.
But this year the Directors, as Mr..
Elijah Whitaker truthfully remarked,
had ''struck a powerful snag."
Mr.. Whitaker was in the towing line,
and this was natural favorite form of eX-
preston. He had boarded" the Motor
Company" when it had needed a few
thousands sorely, and his journalistic
associations had made him quick in simile
and comparison,
Indeed similar conditions were true of
the entire directory.
Gregg Lomster, wholesale leather; Lu-
cius Shotwell, banker; Addison Schooley,
importer, and Rufus Backus, retired cap
italist, were all, like Mr.. Whitaker, sud-
. den acquisitions on various occasions
when the MOTORS" affairs were iii peril
Gus condition.
These farsighted gentlemen had be-
come associated in this commercial way
so long before, that the founders of this
powerful engine of civilization, following
the invariable and ineXplicable fate of
originatorS, had, with one exception,
passed from sight into wonted beggary
and oblivion.
The directory, as now formed, had ex-
listed for years, placid in its equable and
ample returns, serene in its unctuous
honors, undisturbed by its almost ripple
less harassments, in the genial and
mellow atmosphere of proprietary jour
nalism.
The one exception was Kirtley Breem,
the DAILY MOtOrs' managing editor.
He was a thin, dark little man, with
bushy brows and sunken eyes and
cheeks. His clothing hung loosely upon
him. He came and went as softly and
silently as the night. From 9 in the
morning until at night, and often much
later, during every day of the year for
more than twenty years, he had sat at
the same desk in his shirt sleeves, with
an old straw hat shading his eyes and
cob pipe in his mouth, and he had
never uttered an unnecessary word in all
that time.
You could not find his address in the
city directory. The general publc knew
nothing of him. His name never ap-
peared in panels OF prominent citizens,
drawn for great public platform occa-
sions.
Not a soul connected with the DAILY
Motor" knew where he lived, or how; or
whether he was bachelor or was hui
man enough to have divers little Breems
dangling and romping about him in the
morning hour, or hour Of lampiight he
might know the sacred retreat which
wise men have in homes.
He was ineXplicable, inextricable, ine-
radicable. Entirely aside from his pow
erful though frictionless sway, his unob-
trusive personality had become as insep-
arabic a presence, or fixture, in the
''Daily Motor" system as its engine
fires, its press thunderings, its copy, its
types, its supernal odor Of printers ink,
its hundreds OF ragged newsboys or its
loitererS for nickels or notices.
Social systems had changed; this de-
partment editor and that, had come and
gone: newspaper management had been
reyolutioniZed; monarchies had become
republics; Biographies OF continents had
been readluSted, but hlrtley Breem, who
had come in with the founders of the
s'Daily Motor" still sat there coatless al
his desk under an old straw hat, smoking
a short cob pipe and doing his work as
noiselessly as though he were the ghost
of the human who had begun his silent
though mighty toll at the self-same desk,
more than twenty years before.
whats the trouble about Breem, any.
how, Editor Whittaker?" asked the other
Motor director editors concernedly.
ears before they had begun calling each
each other editor partly seriously, parity
in lest, and the title was OF such pleasant
sound and significance that il would have
been something OF a hardship to have il
overlooked in the city directories by
their contemporaries or by each other
now.
"Weu," replied Editor Whitaker
stoutly, tits jest case of git kirtley
Breem out o. commission, long enough
for repairs, or we kin look round FOL
some other craft in his place"
Failing powers?" asked Editor Backus
casually.
gested Editor Shotwen crisply.
t'Or reduce his wages ana his hours,
added Editor Lomster cautiously. 81
have found that to be quite an excellen
SOUR to tagging help"
tsWbat appear to be the chop marks on
his invoice of trouble?" inquired Editor
Scboolev, with his huge importations
1lpnermost in his own mind.
ttKinder general goneness pd call it, ,
raturned Editor Whitaker anxiously
s.The other day l come up here 70 the
hoard room to figure up little, an
Breem rode up in the elevator 'iong witt
me He lest nodded. Nothin' cordia
or hearty about 1t. L thought TO myself
.YoI,re stoopin' more'n common, Kirt-
lev Breemv but didn't mention it; he's
SO cussed touchy."
"Cussed touchyi' echoed the other
director editors sympathetically.
ssWell, when he got of at his floor ht
kinder whirled 'round dazed like as
though he'd forgot where his room was
whats the matter with Breem?' l said
thinlin' out loud. 'Terbackyr piped VI
that iackanapes o. an elevator boy
sBosh!' says L; AM no more remarks like
that about your betters, or ye'll git your
envelope at the office, that's what you'll
oit' sonny says L. / went to tigurin'
hnt ken thinkin' o. Kirtley Breem."
ssIt does you honor" remarked one o
1ha director editors encouragingly.
SIT don't do US honor that we hahn