Precisely at nine o'clock on the following morning Antonia presented
herself at the office of the new review; and was forthwith conducted to
the editor's room.
Here Owen and Barry were waiting for her; and at the sight of the trim
little figure in the doorway the faces of both men brightened.
In truth Toni was pleasant to look upon. She had taken off her hat and
coat in the little ante-room, and as she stood there in her black frock,
with its demure little white turn-down collar, she looked very young,
very shy, and if the truth must be told, very pretty. Whereupon Barry,
who loved all pretty girls in a harmless, kindly fashion, rejoiced
exceedingly; while even Owen, to whom things feminine were at present
anathema, owned to himself that she was certainly more attractive to
have about the place than her sour-faced predecessor.
It was Barry who put her at her ease, of course. Not being troubled with
shyness he greeted her in friendly fashion, bade her come in, and
pointed out to her the chair, behind the typewriter, which she was
expected to fill.
Yes, she said, in answer to questioning, she was used to a Remington.
No, she had never been connected with journalism before. Yes, she was
well up in ordinary office work, and--in answer to Owen, this--she knew
pretty well the rules of composition, grammar, etc.
"That's good." Owen spoke formally, and Toni decided instantly that she
liked Mr. Raymond the better of the two. "Well, I have here an article I
want you to type at once, and then--can you read proof?"
Blushing, she owned her inability to do so. Privately, she was not at
all sure what he meant, but dread of Miss Hardy's wrath should she be
returned to the office marked "Incompetent" forced her to add quickly:--
"But I'm sure I could learn if--if you wouldn't mind showing me how to
do it."
"I'm sure you could." Barry spoke kindly and she turned to him with a
feeling of relief. "When you have typed that article for Mr. Rose I'll
show you how, and then you'll manage all right."
"Teach her now," advised Rose, looking up from the manuscript he was
scanning. "This stuff wants a bit of revising, and you might as well do
something for your living, Barry, you lazy wretch."
Barry smilingly disclaimed any right to the title.
"I'm ready to work as hard as anyone," he said gaily.
"But as I'm only considered fit to do the theatrical criticisms and play
office-boy to you, Owen, naturally I find time to make holiday now and
then. Well, Miss ... er ..."
"Gibbs." She supplied him with the name as he hesitated.
"Gibbs? You won't mind being known as 'Our Miss Gibbs,' will you?" His
tone was free of all offence, and Toni smiled in response. "Now, here's
a chair for me, and if only our chief will hold his peace for half an
hour, I'll soon put you wise, as the Yankees say."
He sat down beside her, and pulling a couple of galley proof-sheets
towards him, began to initiate her into the mysteries of "reading." For
all his laughing manner he was an excellent teacher; and after twenty
minutes of his clear and lucid exposition the girl felt she was
beginning to grasp her lesson thoroughly. She proved, too, wonderfully
quick at detecting mistakes, and Barry, who had petitioned the heads of
the office they had selected not to send him any Council School product,
was pleased to find that her spelling was admirable, her grammar
passable, and her memory retentive.
As to the meaning which the article they were correcting conveyed to
her, Barry was a little doubtful.
It was a short summary, by a famous Catholic writer, of some of the
lesser-understood aspects of mysticism; and Barry suspected that a good
deal of it was Greek to her, though she did her best to answer him
intelligently when he questioned her, rather artfully, on the correct
reading of a somewhat involved sentence.
As a matter of fact, Toni was wondering inwardly what on earth it was
all about. Her education, though sound so far as it went, had been
thoroughly old-fashioned; and at this period of her development it is to
be feared there were whole tracts of mind and brain left vacant--for
Toni belonged, by adoption at least, to a class who read only for
amusement and occupation, and are not in the least anxious to try their
mental teeth on any abstract theories or philosophies of life. She was
at present all for the concrete. Things seen and known were of
importance, things unseen were alike uninteresting and incredible. The
abstract virtues were all very well, but life was much too vivid and
important to allow itself to be ousted by dreams and speculations.
Something of this Barry, who had an almost femininely swift intuition,
guessed as he sat beside Toni on this first morning; but Toni was much
too intent on her work to wonder what he thought of her; and by the time
she had done a little typing, taken down a few letters, and read a short
proof all by herself, it was one o'clock, and she was dismissed in
search of lunch.
When she returned, nearly an hour later, she found Owen alone, studying
a dummy copy of the review; and seeing she was interested, Owen handed
it over for her to see.
"The _Bridge_." She quoted the title a little dubiously. "Is that what
you call it? But--what does it mean?"
Taking it back into his own hands, Owen pointed with a pencil to the
design on the cover.
"Here is the Bridge, you see, and this stream of people passing over it
symbolize the present generation. This side of the bridge represents the
past, from which the present comes; this, over the bridge, is the
future, towards which the pilgrims are hastening. The idea is to bridge
the gulf between past and future, between the old worlds and the new;
and with that in mind we try, while never neglecting the storehouse of
the past, to point to the future, with all its wonderful, and as yet
unwon, rewards and discoveries."
She murmured a word or two, and he went on with a note of enthusiasm in
his voice.
"Personally, I look to the future with confidence. Some people say
the golden age of poetry, of music and letters generally, is past;
but I don't agree. I think that there will be a fresh Renaissance
presently, that there will be found fresh hands to pass on the sacred
torch ... there's a flood of brilliant youth let loose in the world just
now; and every bit of help the _Bridge_ can give is at the service of
that marvellous band."
He broke off suddenly, the light of the visionary gleaming in his eyes;
but seeing, with a slight pang of disappointment, that his outburst was
unintelligible to his hearer, he threw down the paper and laughed.
"There, Miss Gibbs, I have finished! Don't start me on the subject
unless you're ready to be bored. Talk to Barry about it--he is able to
look upon the _Bridge_ quite sanely, as a means of providing bread and
butter; but I'm afraid I'm a bit of a fanatic."
Toni, uncertain of her ground, but desperately anxious to appear
intelligent, murmured something shyly, and Rose pulled out his watch
with a smile.
"After two already! Well, Miss Gibbs, I'm off for lunch. You might just
sort these papers out a bit, will you? We seem to have let things get
into rather a muddle."
"I'll do it at once. There would be plenty of room for everything if
some of these papers wore tidied up."
"Yes, I suppose you're right." Owen, who loved order, but was too
impatient to preserve it, spoke dubiously. "Of course some of those
papers are done with, but you wouldn't know which to keep, would you?"
"Perhaps Mr. Raymond would help me?"
Owen's face cleared.
"Of course--do the idle young beggar good. All right, Miss Gibbs, he
shall give you a hand this afternoon when he gets back. He's an awfully
good sort, you know, though I pretend to rag him. He's as clever as you
please, and with it all as obliging and unspoilt as possible. Well, I'd
better go. You can get along all right, can you?"
Receiving her reply, he lit a cigarette and went out, assuring himself
that so far she promised well.
"Pretty little thing, and anxious to please us. Shallow, I expect,
emotional probably, and not brainy enough to appreciate the symbolism of
the _Bridge_. Well, we don't want too brilliant a typist, after
all--Miss Jenkins and her 'culture' were a bit trying at times!"
And then meeting by chance an old friend who insisted on carrying him
off to lunch, Owen speedily forgot that such a person as Miss Antonia
Gibbs existed in the world.