Omaha daily bee. (Omaha [Neb.]) 187?-1922, 1919-06-28
CHAPTER VII
Handouts in the Air

fnlnp Trent Hdu, "'iiie w III ms
twenties, achieved some reputation
within the world of English art.
Moreover, his pictures sold. An
original, forcible talent and a habit
of leisurely but continuous work
ing, broken by fits of strong crea-
tive enthusiasm, were at the bot
tom of it. His fathers name had
helped; a patrimony large enough
to relieve him of the perllous I'M
putation of being struggling man
had certainly not hindered. But
his best aid to success had been an
unconscious power OF getting HIM
self liked Good spirits and lively,
humorous fancy will always be pop
ular. Trent joined to these gen
uine interest In others that gained
him something deeper than popu-
larity. His judgment OF persons
twas penetrating, but its process was
internal; no one felt on good be-
havior with man who seemed al
ways to be enjoying himself.
Whether he was in mood tor
floods Of nonsense or applying him
self vigorously to a task, his face
seldom lest its expression OF con-
tanned vivacity. Apart from a
sound knowledge of his art and
its history, his culture was large
and loose, dominated by love OF
poetry. At 81 he had not yet passed
the age of laughter and adventure,
His rise to a celebrity 100 times
greater than his proper work had
won for him came of a momentary
impulse. One day he had taken up
newspaper to find it chiefly con-
cerned with crime of sort curl
ously rare in our country: murder
done in a railway train. The cir
cumstances were puzzling; two per-
sons were under arrest upon sus-
picion. Trent, to whom an interest
in such affairs was new sensation,
heard the thing discussed among
his friends, and set himself in
purposeless mood to read up the
accounts given in several journals.
He became intrigued; his magma
ton begain to work, in manner
strange to him, upon facts; an ex-
citement took hold of him such as
he had only known before in his
bursts of art-inspiration or of per-
sonal adventure. At the end of the
day he wrote and dispatched long
letter to the editor of the Record,
which he chose only because it had
contained the fullest and most in
telligent version of the facts.
In this letter he did very much
what Poe had done in the case of
the murder of Mary Rogers. With
nothing but the newspapers to guide
him, he drew attention to the sig
nificance of certain apparently neg
ligible facts, and ranged the evidence
such a manner as to throw grave
suspicion upon a man who had pre-
scented himself as a witness. Sir
James Molloy had printed his let
ter in loaded type. The same even
ing he was able to announce in the
Sun the arrest and full confession
of the incriminated man.
Sir James, who knew all the
worlds Of London, had lost no time
in making Trent's acquaintance. The
two men got on we'll; for Trent
possessed some secret of native tact
which had the effect of almost abol-
ishing differences of age between
himself and others. The great ro-
tary presses in the basement Of the
Record building had filled him with
a new enthusiasm: he had painted
there, and Sir James had bought at
sight, what he called a machinery
scape in the manner of Heinrich
Kley.
Then a few months later came the
affair known as the Ilkley mystery.
Sir James had invited Trent to an
emollient dinner, and thereafter Of
fered him what seemed to the young
man a Enthusiastically large sum for
his temporary services as special
representative of the Record at
Ilkley. you could do it," the
editor had urged. you can write
good stuff, and you know how to
talk to people, and I can teach you
all the technicalities of reporters
job in half an hour. And you have
a head for mystery; you have i'm
agination and cool judgment along
with it. Think how it would feel if
you pulled it off" Trent had ad-
mitted that it would be rather
lark; he had smoked, frowned, and
at last convinced himself that the
only thing that held him back was
fear Of an unfamiliar task. To
react against fear had become
fixed moral habit with him, and he
had accepted Sir James offer.
He had pulled it off. For the
second time he had given the author
tiles a start and beating, and his
name was on all tongues. He
withdrew and painted pictures. He
felt no leaning towards journalism,
and Sir James, who knew a good
deal about art, honorably refrained
as other editors did not-from
tempting him with a good salary.
But in the course of a few years
he had applied to him perhaps 80
times for his services in the /un-
raveling of similar problems at
home and abroad. Sometimes Trent,