CHAPTER II.
TRYING TO BECOME A REPORTER

“JOURNALISM!” exclaimed Myles Manning, in answer to Van Cleef’s suggestion. “Why, I never thought of such a thing, and I don’t know the first thing about it. To be sure,” he added, reflectively, “I have helped edit the college Oarsman, and have written one or two little things that got published in our country weekly out home; but I don’t suppose all that would help a fellow much in real journalism.”

Here Myles looked up at his companion, hoping to hear him say that these things would go far toward securing him a position on one of the big dailies. But Van Cleef was too honest a fellow to raise false hopes in another, and he said:

“No; of course all that doesn’t amount to any thing. Everybody does more or less of that sort of thing nowadays, and it’s generally in the poetry line; but there’s nothing practical in it.”

Here Myles blushed consciously as he recalled the fact that most of his own efforts had been in the “poetry line”; but he said nothing.

“At any rate,” continued Van Cleef, “you probably know as much of journalism as you do of Wall Street or any other business, and that is just nothing at all. You’d have to begin at the very bottom, any way, and work up. Now, reporting is the only thing I know of that pays a fellow living wages from the very first, and that is the reason I mentioned it.”

“Reporting!” echoed Myles, pausing in his packing and looking up with an expression of amazement. “You don’t mean to say that your ‘journalism’ means being only a common reporter?”

Now, in Myles’ set reporters were always spoken of, when mentioned at all, as a class of beings to be despised. He had come to regard them as a lot of very common fellows, who spent their time in prying into other people’s business, who were to be avoided as much as possible, but who must be treated decently when met, for fear lest they might “write a fellow up,” or put his name in the papers in some unpleasant connection. When Van Cleef mentioned journalism his hearer’s fancy at once sprang into the position of an editorial writer, a well-paid contributor of graceful verse or witty paragraphs, a critic, foreign correspondent, or something of that sort. But to be only a reporter! Why, the mere thought of such a thing was humiliating.

“Why not?” asked Van Cleef, in reply to Myles’ question, and in surprise at his tone. “A first-class, well-trained, reporter is one of the brightest, smartest, and best-informed men in the city. He knows everybody worth knowing, and every thing that is happening or about to happen. He is as valuable to his paper as the editor-in-chief, and he often earns as much money. A reporter must of necessity learn something of every kind of business, and he meets with more chances than any other man to change his employment, if he wants to, for one that will pay him better.

“Look at the prominent politicians, railroad presidents, and others now occupying the most honorable positions of trust and power in this country, and see how many of them began life as reporters. Our present Secretary of State was once a reporter, and a good one too. The President’s private secretary, who is called the ‘power behind the throne,’ was a reporter. A late Secretary of the Treasury was once a reporter. I have a personal knowledge of six members of Congress who used to be reporters. All the foreign correspondents, who are really the men controlling the destinies of nations, are nothing more nor less than reporters. Stanley was a reporter, and so were hundreds more who are now world-famed. Oh, I tell you what, Manning, there is nothing to be ashamed of in being a reporter, though I will admit that most people seem to think there is.

“Of course, there are a lot of sneaks and worthless fellows in this business, as in every other, but they are decidedly in the minority, and are fast being weeded out. The newspapers now demand the very best men as reporters, and they are getting them, too. You have heard, of course, of the professorship of journalism at C – College? Well, it was established by a man who, only a few years ago, was a reporter on one of the New York papers, and he is making a first-class thing of it. I am a sort of a reporter myself,” he continued, laughing, “and the minute I graduate from here I mean to become a full-fledged one.”

“You a reporter!” cried Myles. “How can you be a reporter and a college man at the same time?”

“Easy enough, or rather by working hard and sacrificing some sleep,” answered Van Cleef. “You see,” he continued, in a slightly embarrassed tone, for he was not given to talking of himself or his own affairs, “I am not one of you wealthy fellows, but have had to hoe my own row ever since I was fifteen. When I came here to enter college I had to find something to do to support myself at the same time. After a lot of disappointments I was fortunate enough to obtain a night-station job on the Phonograph, and, though the pay is small, it is enough to keep me going.”

“What do you mean by a ‘night-station’ job?” asked Myles, now greatly interested in what Van Cleef was saying.

“Why,” laughed the other, “it means that I go at ten o’clock every evening to the police-station nearest Central Park, on either the east or the west side of the city, and walk from there down to the Battery. On the way I stop at every station and at the hospitals to inquire for stray bits of news or interesting incidents. As the route lies through the very lowest and worst parts of town one is also apt to run across something or other of interest that even the police have not found out. I have to be all through and report at the office at sharp one o’clock.”

“I should think that would be fun,” said Myles; “and I should like mightily to take the trip with you some night.”

“I should only be too glad of your company,” returned the other, “and perhaps you would enjoy it for once. I can tell you though, it gets to be awfully monotonous after you have done it for a year or so, and I shall be happy enough to give it up for regular reporting when the time comes that I can do so.”

“Aren’t you in great danger, walking alone so late at night through the slums?” asked Myles.

“Oh, no – that is, not to speak of. A reporter, if he is known to be such, is generally safe enough wherever he goes, and I am pretty well known by this time along the entire line of my route.”

“You carry a pistol, of course?”

“Indeed I do nothing so foolish,” answered Van Cleef. “It would be certain to get me into trouble sooner or later. I only carry this badge, and it affords a better protection than all the pistols I could stuff into my pockets.”

Here the speaker threw open his coat and displayed the silver badge of a deputy sheriff pinned to his vest.

“Yes, I have been regularly sworn in,” he continued, in answer to Myles’ inquiring glance, “and the sight of it acts like magic in quieting a crowd of toughs. It passes me through fire-lines, too, which is often a great convenience.”

“What do you do in vacations?” asked Myles, with the curiosity of one exploring a new world of experience, the very existence of which he had not heretofore dreamed of.

“Do my station-work nights, and in the daytime read law or study English literature in the library,” answered Van Cleef. “Once in a while the city editor offers me an excursion assignment. Then I take a day off from study and get paid for going into the country at the same time.”

“An excursion assignment?” questioned Myles.

“Yes; every job on which a reporter is sent is called an ‘assignment,’ or, in some offices, a ‘detail,’ and if he is sent on a Chinese picnic, or down the bay with the newsboys, or up the Sound with the fat men, or on any other trip of that kind, it is an excursion assignment.”

“Well, look here, Van Cleef, it seems to me that you are one of the most plucky fellows I ever met!” exclaimed Myles, extending a hand that the other grasped heartily, “and I am ashamed of myself not to have known you before.”

“I don’t know that that has been your fault so much as my own. I knew that I had no business with your set of fellows, so I have kept out of your way as much as possible,” remarked the other, quietly.

“And a good thing for you that you have,” cried Myles, bitterly, “for my opinion of that set of fellows is – well,” he added, checking himself, “never mind now what it is. I have done with them, and they with me. The question of present interest is, do you think I could ever make a reporter; and, if so, can you tell me where to find a job at the business?”

By these questions it will be seen that our young man’s ideas concerning business, and the business of reporting in particular, had undergone some very decided changes since he left home that morning.

“You are undoubtedly bright enough and smart enough,” answered Van Cleef, “and I have no doubt that if you should stick to the business long enough, and accept its rough knocks as a desirable part of your training, you could readily become a first-class reporter. As for obtaining a job at it, that is quite another thing. The newspaper offices all over the country, and especially in New York, are besieged by young fellows who want to try their hand at reporting, but not one in a hundred of them is taken on. I’ll tell you, though, what we will do. The only paper on which I know anybody of influence is the Phonograph, and perhaps you wouldn’t like it as well as some other. So you take a run by yourself among the offices of all the big dailies this afternoon. The little ones are not worth trying. Send your card in to the city editors, and apply for work. If you don’t find any that suits you, meet me at the Phonograph office at five o’clock and I’ll introduce you to the city editor there. I don’t say that my introduction will do any good. Probably it won’t; but at any rate it will give you a chance to talk with him, and plead your own case. Afterward we will dine together somewhere, and then, if you choose, you can go with me on my round of stations.”

“Good enough!” cried Myles; “that’s an immense plan, and we will carry it out to the letter. You won’t mind if I say there are one or two papers that I’d rather become connected with than with the Phonograph. That seem just a little more respectable and high-toned, don’t you know.”

“Oh, yes, I know,” laughed Van Cleef, “and my feelings are not in the slightest ruffled by your prejudice, which is quite a popular one. I attribute it wholly to your ignorance, and know that you will outgrow it before you have been many days a reporter.”

“And, by the way,” said Myles, as the other was about to leave the room, “you must dine with me at the Oxygen to-night. It may be the last time I am ever able to take anybody there, you know.”

“All right,” answered Van Cleef. “Good-bye till this evening.”

The sale, to a dealer in such things, of the furniture, pictures, and costly but useless knick-knacks with which his room was crowded, enabled Myles to pay his debts and left him about ten dollars with which to make a start in the business world. It was after two o’clock when he completed his arrangements for leaving college. He was strongly tempted to go to the river and take a look at the crew in their practice spin; but “business before pleasure,” the motto that he had already used once that day, flashed into his mind, and he resolutely turned his face toward downtown and the newspaper offices.

Arrived at the office of the paper which, for some unexplainable reason, he considered the most respectable of all, he naturally turned into the counting-room that was located on the ground floor and inquired for the city editor.

“Editorial rooms up-stairs,” was the curt answer of a busy clerk, who did not even look up from the work upon which he was engaged.

When an elevator had lifted Myles to the very top of the tall building, he found himself in a small, bare room provided with two or three chairs, and a bench upon which two small boys were playing at jackstones. One of them, leaving his game and stepping smartly up to Myles, asked what he wanted there.

“I want to see the city editor,” was the answer.

“What’s your business with him?” asked the boy.

“None of your business what my business is, you impudent young rascal,” answered Myles, angrily. “Go at once and tell the city editor that I wish to see him.”

“And who are you, anyway?” demanded the boy, assuming an aggressive attitude, with arms akimbo and head cocked to one side. The other boy, whose interest was now aroused, came and stood beside his companion in a similar attitude, and they both gazed defiantly at the young man.

The situation was becoming ridiculous, and, to relieve himself from it as quickly as possible, Myles produced his card-case, thrust a card into the hand of the first boy, and said, in a tone of suppressed rage:

“Take that to the city editor this instant, you imp, and say that the gentleman wishes to see him on business, or I’ll throw you out of that window.”

Somewhat frightened by Myles’ tone the boy left the room muttering:

“A fine gentleman he is, ain’t he! A-threatening of a chap not half his size.”

In less than a minute he returned with a renewed stock of impudence. Offering the card back to Myles he said:

“The city editor says that he don’t know you, and you’ll have to send word what your business is with him.”

It was too humiliating. Myles could not confide to the grinning figures before him that he was seeking a reporter’s position, and so, muttering some unintelligible words, he turned to leave. He had to wait several minutes for the elevator, and while he did so he could not help overhearing the jeering comments of the two young rascals upon himself. One of them said:

“He’s out of a job, that feller is, and he came here to offer hisself as boss editor.”

“Naw, he didn’t neither,” drawled the other. “He ain’t after no such common posish as that. What he wants is your place or mine. But he’s too young, and fresh, he is. He wouldn’t suit. No, sir-e-e.” And then the two little wretches exploded with laughter at their own wit.

Myles walked about the City Hall Park for some time before he could summon up sufficient courage for a second venture. When at last he found his way to another editorial waiting-room it was only to be informed that the city editor was out and would not be back until six o’clock.

A third attempt resulted in his being ushered into the presence of a brisk young man, apparently not much older than himself. This self-important individual listened impatiently while Myles hesitatingly made known his desires, and promptly answered:

“Very sorry, sir, but absolutely no vacancy in our staff. Five hundred applicants ahead of you. No chance at all. Good-day.”

Thus dismissed Myles got out of the office somehow, though how he could not have told. His mind was filled with mortification, disappointment, and anger at everybody in general and himself in particular for being so foolish as to imagine that it was an easy thing to obtain a position as reporter on a great daily.

It was after the appointed hour before he was sufficiently calmed down to visit the office of the Phonograph, and he found Van Cleef anxiously awaiting him.

“Well,” he said, questioningly, after he had passed Myles through a boy-guarded entrance into a large, brilliantly lighted room in which a number of young men sat at a long desk busily writing. “How have you got on?”

“Not at all,” answered Myles, “and I don’t believe I am ever likely to.”

“Nonsense! You mustn’t be so easily discouraged. Come and let me introduce you to Mr. Haxall, our city editor. He is a far different kind of a man from any of the others, I can tell you.”

Mr. Haxall was kindly polite, almost cordial in his manner, and listened attentively to Myles’ brief explanation of his position and hopes. When it was finished he, too, was beginning to say, “I am very sorry, Mr. Manning, but we have already more men than we know what to do with,” when Van Cleef said something to him in so low a tone that Myles did not catch what it was.

“Is that so?” said Mr, Haxall, reflectively, and looking at Myles with renewed interest. “It might be made very useful, that’s a fact. Well, I’ll strain a point and try him.”

Then to Myles he said:

“Still, we are always on the lookout for bright, steady young fellows who mean business. So if you want to come, and will report here at sharp eleven o’clock to-morrow morning, I will take you on trial till next Saturday and pay you at the rate of fifteen dollars per week.”