The Cub Reporter Page #3

"The Cub Reporter" by Rex Ellingwood Beach is a compelling novel that explores the challenges and adventures faced by a young aspiring journalist. The story follows the protagonist’s journey as he navigates the competitive world of newspaper reporting, uncovering stories that delve into both the mundane and the extraordinary aspects of society. Through his experiences, the reader gains insight into the ethics of journalism, the pursuit of truth, and the impact of media on public perception. With a blend of action, drama, and character development, Beach captures the excitement and trials of pursuing a career in journalism during a dynamic time in history.

• Short story

								

sake and the sake of The Intelligencer. Yes, yes, I'm sure you will,
because you're a good newspaper man--you told me so yourself." His
appreciation of the jest threatened to strangle him.

"Mr. Burns," began the other, "I--I'm up against it. I guess you don't
know it, but I'm hungry. I haven't eaten for three days."

At this the editor became positively apoplectic.

"Oh yes--yes, I do!" He nodded vigorously. "You show it in your face.
That's why I went out of my way to help you. He! He! He! Now you run
along and get me the girl's name and address while I finish this
proof. Then come back and have supper with me at the Press Club."
Again he chortled and snickered, whereupon something sullen and fierce
awoke in young Anderson. He knew of a way to get food and a bed and a
place to work even if it would only last thirty days, for he judged
Burns was the kind of man who would yell for the police in case of an
assault. Paul would have welcomed the prospect of prison fare, but he
reasoned that it would be an incomplete satisfaction merely to mash
the pudgy face of Mr. Burns and hear him clamor. What he wanted at
this moment was a job; Burns's beating could hold over. This suicide
case had baffled the pick of Buffalo's trained reporters; it had
foiled the best efforts of her police; nevertheless, this fat-paunched
fellow had baited a starving man by offering him the assignment. It
was impossible; it was a cruel joke, and yet--there might be a chance
of success. Even while he was debating the point he heard himself say:

"Very well, Mr. Burns. If you want her name I'll get it for you."

He crammed his hat down over his ears and walked out, leaving the
astonished editor gazing after him with open mouth.

Anderson's first impulse had been merely to get out of Burns's office,
out of sight of that grinning satyr, and never to come back, but
before he had reached the street he had decided that it was as well to
starve striving as with folded hands. After all, the dead girl had a
name.

Instead of leaving the building, he went to the files of the paper
and, turning back, uncovered the original story, which he cut out with
his pen-knife, folded up, and placed in his pocket. This done, he
sought the lobby of a near-by hotel, found a seat near a radiator, and
proceeded to read the clipping carefully.

It was a meager story, but it contained facts and was free from the
confusion and distortions of the later accounts, which was precisely
what he wished to guard against. Late one afternoon, so the story
went, the girl had rented a room in a Main Street boarding-house, had
eaten supper and retired. At eleven o'clock the next day, when she did
not respond to a knock on her door, the room had been broken into and
she had been found dead, with an empty morphine-bottle on the bureau.
That was all. There were absolutely no clues to the girl's identity,
for the closest scrutiny failed to discover a mark on her clothing
or any personal articles which could be traced. She had possessed no
luggage, save a little hand-satchel or shopping-bag containing a few
coins. One fact alone stood out in the whole affair. She had paid for
her room with a two-dollar Canadian bill, but this faint clue had been
followed with no result. No one knew the girl; she had walked out of
nowhere and had disappeared into impenetrable mystery. Those were the
facts in the case, and they were sufficiently limited to baffle the
best efforts of Buffalo's trained detective force.

It would seem that there can be no human creature so obscure as to
have neither relatives, friends, nor acquaintances, and yet this
appeared to be the case, for a full description of this girl had
been blazoned in the papers of every large city, had been exposed in
countless country post-offices, and conveyed to the police of every
city of the States and Canada. It was as if the mysterious occupant of
the Morgue had been born of the winter wind on that fateful evening
two weeks before. The country had been dragged by a net of publicity,
that marvelous, fine-meshed fabric from which no living man is small
or shrewd enough to escape, and still the sad, white face at the
Morgue continued to smile out from its halo of gold as if in gentle
mockery.

For a long time Paul Anderson sat staring into the realms of
speculation, his lips white with hunger, his cheeks hollow and
feverish from the battle he had waged. His power of exclusion was
strong, therefore he lost himself to his surroundings. Finally,
however, he roused himself from his abstraction and realized the irony
of this situation. He, the weakest, the most inexperienced of all the
men who had tried, had been set to solve this mystery, and starvation
was to be the fruit of his failure.

He saw that it had begun to snow outside. In the lobby it was warm and
bright and vivid with jostling life; the music of a stringed orchestra
somewhere back of him was calling well-dressed men and women in to
dinner. All of them seemed happy, hopeful, purposeful. He noted,
furthermore, that three days without food makes a man cold, even in
a warm place, and light-headed, too. The north wind had bitten him
cruelly as he crossed the street, and now as he peered out of the
plate-glass windows the night seemed to hold other lurking horrors
besides. His want was like a burden, and he shuddered weakly,
hesitating to venture out where the wind could harry him. It was a
great temptation to remain here where there was warmth and laughter
and life; nevertheless, he rose and slunk shivering out into the
darkness, then laid a course toward the Morgue.

While Anderson trod the snowy streets a slack-jowled editor sat at
supper with some friends at the Press Club, eating and drinking
heartily, as is the custom of newspaper men let down for a moment from
the strain of their work. He had told a story, and his caustic way
of telling it had amused his hearers, for each and every one of them
remembered the shabby applicant for work, and all of them had wasted
baffling hours on the mystery of this girl with the golden hair.

"I guess I put a crimp in him," giggled Mr. Burns. "I gave him a
chance to show those talents he recommends so highly."

"The Morgue, on a night like this, is a pretty dismal place for a
hungry man," said one of the others. "It's none too cheerful in the
daytime."

The others agreed, and Burns wabbled anew in his chair in appreciation
of his humor.

Young Anderson had never seen a morgue, and to-night, owing to his
condition, his dread of it was child-like. It seemed as if this
particular charnel-house harbored some grisly thing which stood
between him and food and warmth and hope; the nearer he drew to it the
greater grew his dread. A discourteous man, shrunken as if from the
chill of the place, was hunched up in front of a glowing stove. He
greeted Anderson sourly:

"Out into that courtyard; turn to the left--second door," he directed.
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