was a stepson of Pinero, the playwright, and he received occasional moneys from Daniel Frohman, by way of allowance, I supposed, though I never knew exactly. Clever though he was, he was a worse reporter than myself--because he didn't care two straws whether he got the news or did not get it. He had a "pull" of some sort, with Laffan probably, we thought. He came to our boarding-house in East 19th Street. He had a bad stammer. His methods of reporting were peculiar to himself. Often enough, when sent out on a distasteful assignment, he simply went home. He had literary talent and wrote well when he liked. When Frohman handed out his money, he spent it in giving a big dinner to various friends, though he never included Kay, Louis, or myself among his distinguished guests. We had no dress-suits, for one thing.
Hamilton was perhaps twenty-one at the time, a trifle younger than myself, at any rate. He came downstairs sometimes to spend the evening in our room. In spite of his stammer and a certain shyness, he was always very welcome. He liked, above all, to listen to weird stories I used to tell, strange, wild, improbable tales akin to ghost-stories. When the Black Mass failed to attract, when Louis was uninspired by absinthe, or when no argument was afoot, such as whether poet or scientist were the highest type of human being, I discovered this taste for spinning yarns, usually of a ghostly character, and found, to my surprise, that my listeners were enthralled. At a moment's notice, no theme or idea being in my head, I found that I could invent a tale, with beginning, middle and climax. Something in me, doubtless, sought a natural outlet. The stories, at any rate, poured forth endlessly. "May I write that one?" Hamilton would ask. "It's a corker!" And he would bring his written version to read to us a few evenings later. "It ought to sell," he said, though I never heard that it did sell actually. Certainly, it never occurred to me that I might write and sell it myself. And Angus
Hamilton is mentioned here because it was owing to a
