lishing house to be at least interested in some form of literary expression."
"You should worry! That's what we hires you for. Besides he has a literary passion, too—Walt Mason. He thinks Walt is the greatest poet in the world."
"Walter Mason?" murmured Lester. "I don't think I know his work."
"Hasn't Walt made Oxford yet?" asked Miss Denver. "He writes the prose poems in the evening papers, syndicate stuff, you know. Printed to look like prose, just the opposite of the free-verse gag." She smiled reminiscently, and quoted:
When I am as dry as a fish up a tree, then I to the hydrant repair, and fill myself up, without ticket or fee, with the water that's eddying there. I drink all I want—half a gallon or more—and then I lie down on my couch; when I rise in the morning my head isn't sore and I don't wear a dark brindle grouch———"
"Is there any free-verse stuff that can cover that?" she asked.
Lester was somewhat disconcerted. His assessment of Female Mind did not seem to be proceeding methodically. He played for time.
"I thought you enjoyed the Oblique?"
"As a joke, yes: I laugh myself giddy over it. But I know darn well that kind of junk won't last.
