“Well?”

“Well!  Has the reader no duties corresponding to his privileges?  You have paid five cents for that newspaper.  It is yours.  You have the right to read it when and where you will.  Much of what is in it is neither helped nor harmed by time and place and mood; some of it actually requires to be read at once—­while it is fizzing.  But my story is not of that character.  It is not ‘the very latest advices’ from Ghostland.  You are not expected to keep yourself au courant with what is going on in the realm of spooks.  The stuff will keep until you have leisure to put yourself into the frame of mind appropriate to the sentiment of the piece—­which I respectfully submit that you cannot do in a street car, even if you are the only passenger.  The solitude is not of the right sort.  An author has rights which the reader is bound to respect.”

“For specific example?”

“The right to the reader’s undivided attention.  To deny him this is immoral.  To make him share your attention with the rattle of a street car, the moving panorama of the crowds on the sidewalks, and the buildings beyond—­with any of the thousands of distractions which make our customary environment—­is to treat him with gross injustice.  By God, it is infamous!”

The speaker had risen to his feet and was steadying himself by one of the straps hanging from the roof of the car.  The other man looked up at him in sudden astonishment, wondering how so trivial a grievance could seem to justify so strong language.  He saw that his friend’s face was uncommonly pale and that his eyes glowed like living coals.

“You know what I mean,” continued the writer, impetuously crowding his words—­“you know what I mean, Marsh.  My stuff in this morning’s Messenger is plainly sub-headed ‘A Ghost Story.’  That is ample notice to all.  Every honorable reader will understand it as prescribing by implication the conditions under which the work is to be read.”

The man addressed as Marsh winced a trifle, then asked with a smile:  “What conditions?  You know that I am only a plain business man who cannot be supposed to understand such things.  How, when, where should I read your ghost story?”

“In solitude—­at night—­by the light of a candle.  There are certain emotions which a writer can easily enough excite—­such as compassion or merriment.  I can move you to tears or laughter under almost any circumstances.  But for my ghost story to be effective you must be made to feel fear—­at least a strong sense of the supernatural—­and that is a difficult matter.  I have a right to expect that if you read me at all you will give me a chance; that you will make yourself accessible to the emotion that I try to inspire.”