New Grub Street - 23

‘I have felt that,’ returned her father, after a slight pause to command his voice, that it might be suave instead of scornful. ‘I greatly fear that I have made your life something of a martyrdom——’

‘Don’t think I meant that, father. I am speaking only of the general question. I can’t be quite so zealous as you are, that’s all. I love books, but I could wish people were content for a while with those we already have.’

‘My dear Marian, don’t suppose that I am out of sympathy with you here. Alas! how much of my work has been mere drudgery, mere labouring for a livelihood! How gladly I would have spent much more of my time among the great authors, with no thought of making money of them! If I speak approvingly of a scheme for a new periodical, it is greatly because of my necessities.’

He paused and looked at her. Marian returned the look.

‘You would of course write for it,’ she said.

‘Marian, why shouldn’t I edit it? Why shouldn’t it be your property?’

‘My property—?’

She checked a laugh. There came into her mind a more disagreeable suspicion than she had ever entertained of her father. Was this the meaning of his softened behaviour? Was he capable of calculated hypocrisy? That did not seem consistent with his character, as she knew it.

‘Let us talk it over,’ said Yule. He was in visible agitation and his voice shook. ‘The idea may well startle you at first. It will seem to you that I propose to make away with your property before you have even come into possession of it.’ He laughed. ‘But, in fact, what I have in mind is merely an investment for your capital, and that an admirable one. Five thousand pounds at three per cent.—one doesn’t care to reckon on more—represents a hundred and fifty a year. Now, there can be very little doubt that, if it were invested in literary property such as I have in mind, it would bring you five times that interest, and before long perhaps much more. Of course I am now speaking in the roughest outline. I should have to get trustworthy advice; complete and detailed estimates would be submitted to you. At present I merely suggest to you this form of investment.’

He watched her face eagerly, greedily. When Marian’s eyes rose to his he looked away.

‘Then, of course,’ she said, ‘you don’t expect me to give any decided answer.’

‘Of course not—of course not. I merely put before you the chief advantages of such an investment. As I am a selfish old fellow, I’ll talk about the benefit to myself first of all. I should be editor of the new review; I should draw a stipend sufficient to all my needs—quite content, at first, to take far less than another man would ask, and to progress with the advance of the periodical. This position would enable me to have done with mere drudgery; I should only write when I felt called to do so—when the spirit moved me.’ Again he laughed, as though desirous of keeping his listener in good humour. ‘My eyes would be greatly spared henceforth.’

He dwelt on that point, waiting its effect on Marian. As she said nothing he proceeded:

‘And suppose I really were doomed to lose my sight in the course of a few years, am I wrong in thinking that the proprietor of this periodical would willingly grant a small annuity to the man who had firmly established it?’

‘I see the force of all that,’ said Marian; ‘but it takes for granted that the periodical will be successful.’

‘It does. In the hands of a publisher like Jedwood—a vigorous man of the new school—its success could scarcely be doubtful.’

‘Do you think five thousand pounds would be enough to start such a review?’

‘Well, I can say nothing definite on that point. For one thing, the coat must be made according to the cloth; expenditure can be largely controlled without endangering success. Then again, I think Jedwood would take a share in the venture. These are details. At present I only want to familiarise you with the thought that an investment of this sort will very probably offer itself to you.’

‘It would be better if we called it a speculation,’ said Marian, smiling uneasily.

Her one object at present was to oblige her father to understand that the suggestion by no means lured her. She could not tell him that what he proposed was out of the question, though as yet that was the light in which she saw it. His subtlety of approach had made her feel justified in dealing with him in a matter-of-fact way. He must see that she was not to be cajoled. Obviously, and in the nature of the case, he was urging a proposal in which he himself had all faith; but Marian knew his judgment was far from infallible. It mitigated her sense of behaving unkindly to reflect that in all likelihood this disposal of her money would be the worst possible for her own interests, and therefore for his. If, indeed, his dark forebodings were warranted, then upon her would fall the care of him, and the steadiness with which she faced that responsibility came from a hope of which she could not speak.

‘Name it as you will,’ returned her father, hardly suppressing a note of irritation. ‘True, every commercial enterprise is a speculation. But let me ask you one question, and beg you to reply frankly. Do you distrust my ability to conduct this periodical?’

She did. She knew that he was not in touch with the interests of the day, and that all manner of considerations akin to the prime end of selling his review would make him an untrustworthy editor.

But how could she tell him this?

‘My opinion would be worthless,’ she replied.

‘If Jedwood were disposed to put confidence in me, you also would?’

‘There’s no need to talk of that now, father. Indeed, I can’t say anything that would sound like a promise.’

He flashed a glance at her. Then she was more than doubtful?

‘But you have no objection, Marian, to talk in a friendly way of a project that would mean so much to me?’

‘But I am afraid to encourage you,’ she replied, frankly. ‘It is impossible for me to say whether I can do as you wish, or not.’

‘Yes, yes; I perfectly understand that. Heaven forbid that I should regard you as a child to be led independently of your own views and wishes! With so large a sum of money at stake, it would be monstrous if I acted rashly, and tried to persuade you to do the same. The matter will have to be most gravely considered.’

‘Yes.’ She spoke mechanically.

‘But if only it should come to something! You don’t know what it would mean to me, Marian.’

‘Yes, father; I know very well how you think and feel about it.’

‘Do you?’ He leaned forward, his features working under stress of emotion. ‘If I could see myself the editor of an influential review, all my bygone toils and sufferings would be as nothing; I should rejoice in them as the steps to this triumph. Meminisse juvabit! My dear, I am not a man fitted for subordinate places. My nature is framed for authority. The failure of all my undertakings rankles so in my heart that sometimes I feel capable of every brutality, every meanness, every hateful cruelty. To you I have behaved shamefully. Don’t interrupt me, Marian. I have treated you abominably, my child, my dear daughter—and all the time with a full sense of what I was doing. That’s the punishment of faults such as mine. I hate myself for every harsh word and angry look I have given you; at the time, I hated myself!’

‘Father—’

‘No, no; let me speak, Marian. You have forgiven me; I know it. You were always ready to forgive, dear. Can I ever forget that evening when I spoke like a brute, and you came afterwards and addressed me as if the wrong had been on your side? It burns in my memory. It wasn’t I who spoke; it was the demon of failure, of humiliation. My enemies sit in triumph, and scorn at me; the thought of it is infuriating. Have I deserved this? Am I the inferior of—of those men who have succeeded and now try to trample on me? No! I am not! I have a better brain and a better heart!’

Listening to this strange outpouring, Marian more than forgave the hypocrisy of the last day or two. Nay, could it be called hypocrisy? It was only his better self declared at the impulse of a passionate hope.

‘Why should you think so much of these troubles, father? Is it such a great matter that narrow-minded people triumph over you?’

‘Narrow-minded?’ He clutched at the word. ‘You admit they are that?’

‘I feel very sure that Mr Fadge is.’

‘Then you are not on his side against me?’

‘How could you suppose such a thing?’

‘Well, well; we won’t talk of that. Perhaps it isn’t a great matter. No—from a philosophical point of view, such things are unspeakably petty. But I am not much of a philosopher.’ He laughed, with a break in his voice. ‘Defeat in life is defeat, after all; and unmerited failure is a bitter curse. You see, I am not too old to do something yet. My sight is failing, but I can take care of it. If I had my own review, I would write every now and then a critical paper in my very best style. You remember poor old Hinks’s note about me in his book? We laughed at it, but he wasn’t so far wrong. I have many of those qualities. A man is conscious of his own merits as well as of his defects. I have done a few admirable things. You remember my paper on Lord Herbert of Cherbury? No one ever wrote a more subtle piece of criticism; but it was swept aside among the rubbish of the magazines. And it’s just because of my pungent phrases that I have excited so much enmity. Wait! Wait! Let me have my own review, and leisure, and satisfaction of mind—heavens! what I will write! How I will scarify!’

‘That is unworthy of you. How much better to ignore your enemies! In such a position, I should carefully avoid every word that betrayed personal feeling.’

‘Well, well; you are of course right, my good girl. And I believe I should do injustice to myself if I made you think that those ignoble motives are the strongest in me. No; it isn’t so. From my boyhood I have had a passionate desire of literary fame, deep down below all the surface faults of my character. The best of my life has gone by, and it drives me to despair when I feel that I have not gained the position due to me. There is only one way of doing this now, and that is by becoming the editor of an important periodical. Only in that way shall I succeed in forcing people to pay attention to my claims. Many a man goes to his grave unrecognised, just because he has never had a fair judgment. Nowadays it is the unscrupulous men of business who hold the attention of the public; they blow their trumpets so loudly that the voices of honest men have no chance of being heard.’

Marian was pained by the humility of his pleading with her—for what was all this but an endeavour to move her sympathies?—and by the necessity she was under of seeming to turn a deaf ear. She believed that there was some truth in his estimate of his own powers; though as an editor he would almost certainly fail, as a man of letters he had probably done far better work than some who had passed him by on their way to popularity. Circumstances might enable her to assist him, though not in the way he proposed. The worst of it was that she could not let him see what was in her mind. He must think that she was simply balancing her own satisfaction against his, when in truth she suffered from the conviction that to yield would be as unwise in regard to her father’s future as it would be perilous to her own prospect of happiness.

‘Shall we leave this to be talked of when the money has been paid over to me?’ she said, after a silence.

‘Yes. Don’t suppose I wish to influence you by dwelling on my own hardships. That would be contemptible. I have only taken this opportunity of making myself better known to you. I don’t readily talk of myself and in general my real feelings are hidden by the faults of my temper. In suggesting how you could do me a great service, and at the same time reap advantage for yourself I couldn’t but remember how little reason you have to think kindly of me. But we will postpone further talk. You will think over what I have said?’

Marian promised that she would, and was glad to bring the conversation to an end.

When Sunday came, Yule inquired of his daughter if she had any engagement for the afternoon.

‘Yes, I have,’ she replied, with an effort to disguise her embarrassment.

‘I’m sorry. I thought of asking you to come with me to Quarmby’s. Shall you be away through the evening?’

‘Till about nine o’clock, I think.’

‘Ah! Never mind, never mind.’

He tried to dismiss the matter as if it were of no moment, but Marian saw the shadow that passed over his countenance. This was just after breakfast. For the remainder of the morning she did not meet him, and at the mid-day dinner he was silent, though he brought no book to the table with him, as he was wont to do when in his dark moods. Marian talked with her mother, doing her best to preserve the appearance of cheerfulness which was natural since the change in Yule’s demeanour.

She chanced to meet her father in the passage just as she was going out. He smiled (it was more like a grin of pain) and nodded, but said nothing.

When the front door closed, he went into the parlour. Mrs Yule was reading, or, at all events, turning over a volume of an illustrated magazine.

‘Where do you suppose she has gone?’ he asked, in a voice which was only distant, not offensive.

‘To the Miss Milvains, I believe,’ Mrs Yule answered, looking aside.

‘Did she tell you so?’

‘No. We don’t talk about it.’

He seated himself on the corner of a chair and bent forward, his chin in his hand.

‘Has she said anything to you about the review?’

‘Not a word.’

She glanced at him timidly, and turned a few pages of her book.

‘I wanted her to come to Quarmby’s, because there’ll be a man there who is anxious that Jedwood should start a magazine, and it would be useful for her to hear practical opinions. There’d be no harm if you just spoke to her about it now and then. Of course if she has made up her mind to refuse me it’s no use troubling myself any more. I should think you might find out what’s really going on.’

Only dire stress of circumstances could have brought Alfred Yule to make distinct appeal for his wife’s help. There was no underhand plotting between them to influence their daughter; Mrs Yule had as much desire for the happiness of her husband as for that of Marian, but she felt powerless to effect anything on either side.

‘If ever she says anything, I’ll let you know.’

‘But it seems to me that you have a right to question her.’

‘I can’t do that, Alfred.’

‘Unfortunately, there are a good many things you can’t do.’ With that remark, familiar to his wife in substance, though the tone of it was less caustic than usual, he rose and sauntered from the room. He spent a gloomy hour in the study, then went off to join the literary circle at Mr Quarmby’s.






CHAPTER XXIV. JASPER’S MAGNANIMITY

Occasionally Milvain met his sisters as they came out of church on Sunday morning, and walked home to have dinner with them. He did so to-day, though the sky was cheerless and a strong north-west wind made it anything but agreeable to wait about in open spaces.

‘Are you going to Mrs Wright’s this afternoon?’ he asked, as they went on together.

‘I thought of going,’ replied Maud. ‘Marian will be with Dora.’

‘You ought both to go. You mustn’t neglect that woman.’

He said nothing more just then, but when presently he was alone with Dora in the sitting-room for a few minutes, he turned with a peculiar smile and remarked quietly:

‘I think you had better go with Maud this afternoon.’

‘But I can’t. I expect Marian at three.’

‘That’s just why I want you to go.’

She looked her surprise.

‘I want to have a talk with Marian. We’ll manage it in this way. At a quarter to three you two shall start, and as you go out you can tell the landlady that if Miss Yule comes she is to wait for you, as you won’t be long. She’ll come upstairs, and I shall be there. You see?’

Dora turned half away, disturbed a little, but not displeased.

‘And what about Miss Rupert?’ she asked.

‘Oh, Miss Rupert may go to Jericho for all I care. I’m in a magnanimous mood.’

‘Very, I’ve no doubt.’

‘Well, you’ll do this? One of the results of poverty, you see; one can’t even have a private conversation with a friend without plotting to get the use of a room. But there shall be an end of this state of things.’

He nodded significantly. Thereupon Dora left the room to speak with her sister.

The device was put into execution, and Jasper saw his sisters depart knowing that they were not likely to return for some three hours. He seated himself comfortably by the fire and mused. Five minutes had hardly gone by when he looked at his watch, thinking Marian must be unpunctual. He was nervous, though he had believed himself secure against such weakness. His presence here with the purpose he had in his mind seemed to him distinctly a concession to impulses he ought to have controlled; but to this resolve he had come, and it was now too late to recommence the arguments with himself. Too late? Well, not strictly so; he had committed himself to nothing; up to the last moment of freedom he could always—

That was doubtless Marian’s knock at the front door. He jumped up, walked the length of the room, sat down on another chair, returned to his former seat. Then the door opened and Marian came in.

She was not surprised; the landlady had mentioned to her that Mr Milvain was upstairs, waiting the return of his sisters.

‘I am to make Dora’s excuses,’ Jasper said. ‘She begged you would forgive her—that you would wait.’

‘Oh yes.’

‘And you were to be sure to take off your hat,’ he added in a laughing tone; ‘and to let me put your umbrella in the corner—like that.’

He had always admired the shape of Marian’s head, and the beauty of her short, soft, curly hair. As he watched her uncovering it, he was pleased with the grace of her arms and the pliancy of her slight figure.

‘Which is usually your chair?’

‘I’m sure I don’t know.’

‘When one goes to see a friend frequently, one gets into regular habits in these matters. In Biffen’s garret I used to have the most uncomfortable chair it was ever my lot to sit upon; still, I came to feel an affection for it. At Reardon’s I always had what was supposed to be the most luxurious seat, but it was too small for me, and I eyed it resentfully on sitting down and rising.’

‘Have you any news about the Reardons?’

‘Yes. I am told that Reardon has had the offer of a secretaryship to a boys’ home, or something of the kind, at Croydon. But I suppose there’ll be no need for him to think of that now.’

‘Surely not!’

‘Oh there’s no saying.’

‘Why should he do work of that kind now?’

‘Perhaps his wife will tell him that she wants her money all for herself.’

Marian laughed. It was very rarely that Jasper had heard her laugh at all, and never so spontaneously as this. He liked the music.

‘You haven’t a very good opinion of Mrs Reardon,’ she said.

‘She is a difficult person to judge. I never disliked her, by any means; but she was decidedly out of place as the wife of a struggling author. Perhaps I have been a little prejudiced against her since Reardon quarrelled with me on her account.’

Marian was astonished at this unlooked-for explanation of the rupture between Milvain and his friend. That they had not seen each other for some months she knew from Jasper himself but no definite cause had been assigned.

‘I may as well let you know all about it,’ Milvain continued, seeing that he had disconcerted the girl, as he meant to. ‘I met Reardon not long after they had parted, and he charged me with being in great part the cause of his troubles.’

The listener did not raise her eyes.

‘You would never imagine what my fault was. Reardon declared that the tone of my conversation had been morally injurious to his wife. He said I was always glorifying worldly success, and that this had made her discontented with her lot. Sounds rather ludicrous, don’t you think?’

‘It was very strange.’

‘Reardon was in desperate earnest, poor fellow. And, to tell you the truth, I fear there may have been something in his complaint.

I told him at once that I should henceforth keep away from Mrs Edmund Yule’s; and so I have done, with the result, of course, that they suppose I condemn Mrs Reardon’s behaviour. The affair was a nuisance, but I had no choice, I think.’

‘You say that perhaps your talk really was harmful to her.’

‘It may have been, though such a danger never occurred to me.’

‘Then Amy must be very weak-minded.’

‘To be influenced by such a paltry fellow?’

‘To be influenced by anyone in such a way.’

‘You think the worse of me for this story?’ Jasper asked.

‘I don’t quite understand it. How did you talk to her?’

‘As I talk to everyone. You have heard me say the same things many a time. I simply declare my opinion that the end of literary work—unless one is a man of genius—is to secure comfort and repute. This doesn’t seem to me very scandalous. But Mrs Reardon was perhaps too urgent in repeating such views to her husband. She saw that in my case they were likely to have solid results, and it was a misery to her that Reardon couldn’t or wouldn’t work in the same practical way.

‘It was very unfortunate.’

‘And you are inclined to blame me?’

‘No; because I am so sure that you only spoke in the way natural to you, without a thought of such consequences.’

Jasper smiled.

‘That’s precisely the truth. Nearly all men who have their way to make think as I do, but most feel obliged to adopt a false tone, to talk about literary conscientiousness, and so on. I simply say what I think, with no pretences. I should like to be conscientious, but it’s a luxury I can’t afford. I’ve told you all this often enough, you know.’

‘Yes.’

‘But it hasn’t been morally injurious to you,’ he said with a laugh.

‘Not at all. Still I don’t like it.’

Jasper was startled. He gazed at her. Ought he, then, to have dealt with her less frankly? Had he been mistaken in thinking that the unusual openness of his talk was attractive to her? She spoke with quite unaccustomed decision; indeed, he had noticed from her entrance that there was something unfamiliar in her way of conversing. She was so much more self-possessed than of wont, and did not seem to treat him with the same deference, the same subdual of her own personality.

‘You don’t like it?’ he repeated calmly. ‘It has become rather tiresome to you?’

‘I feel sorry that you should always represent yourself in an unfavourable light.’

He was an acute man, but the self-confidence with which he had entered upon this dialogue, his conviction that he had but to speak when he wished to receive assurance of Marian’s devotion, prevented him from understanding the tone of independence she had suddenly adopted. With more modesty he would have felt more subtly at this juncture, would have divined that the girl had an exquisite pleasure in drawing back now that she saw him approaching her with unmistakable purpose, that she wished to be wooed in less off-hand fashion before confessing what was in her heart. For the moment he was disconcerted. Those last words of hers had a slight tone of superiority, the last thing he would have expected upon her lips.

‘Yet I surely haven’t always appeared so—to you?’ he said.

‘No, not always.’

‘But you are in doubt concerning the real man?’

‘I’m not sure that I understand you. You say that you do really think as you speak.’

‘So I do. I think that there is no choice for a man who can’t bear poverty. I have never said, though, that I had pleasure in mean necessities; I accept them because I can’t help it.’

It was a delight to Marian to observe the anxiety with which he turned to self-defence. Never in her life had she felt this joy of holding a position of command. It was nothing to her that Jasper valued her more because of her money; impossible for it to be otherwise. Satisfied that he did value her, to begin with, for her own sake, she was very willing to accept money as her ally in the winning of his love. He scarcely loved her yet, as she understood the feeling, but she perceived her power over him, and passion taught her how to exert it.

‘But you resign yourself very cheerfully to the necessity,’ she said, looking at him with merely intellectual eyes.

‘You had rather I lamented my fate in not being able to devote myself to nobly unremunerative work?’

There was a note of irony here. It caused her a tremor, but she held her position.

‘That you never do so would make one think—but I won’t speak unkindly.’

‘That I neither care for good work nor am capable of it,’ Jasper finished her sentence. ‘I shouldn’t have thought it would make you think so.’

Instead of replying she turned her look towards the door. There was a footstep on the stairs, but it passed.

‘I thought it might be Dora,’ she said.

‘She won’t be here for another couple of hours at least,’ replied Jasper with a slight smile.

‘But you said—?’

‘I sent her to Mrs Boston Wright’s that I might have an opportunity of talking to you. Will you forgive the stratagem?’

Marian resumed her former attitude, the faintest smile hovering about her lips.

‘I’m glad there’s plenty of time,’ he continued. ‘I begin to suspect that you have been misunderstanding me of late. I must set that right.’

‘I don’t think I have misunderstood you.’

‘That may mean something very disagreeable. I know that some people whom I esteem have a very poor opinion of me, but I can’t allow you to be one of them. What do I seem to you? What is the result on your mind of all our conversations?’

‘I have already told you.’

‘Not seriously. Do you believe I am capable of generous feeling?’

‘To say no, would be to put you in the lowest class of men, and that a very small one.’

‘Good! Then I am not among the basest. But that doesn’t give me very distinguished claims upon your consideration. Whatever I am, I am high in some of my ambitions.’

‘Which of them?’

‘For instance, I have been daring enough to hope that you might love me.’

Marian delayed for a moment, then said quietly:

‘Why do you call that daring?’

‘Because I have enough of old-fashioned thought to believe that a woman who is worthy of a man’s love is higher than he, and condescends in giving herself to him.’

His voice was not convincing; the phrase did not sound natural on his lips. It was not thus that she had hoped to hear him speak. Whilst he expressed himself thus conventionally he did not love her as she desired to be loved.

‘I don’t hold that view,’ she said.

‘It doesn’t surprise me. You are very reserved on all subjects, and we have never spoken of this, but of course I know that your thought is never commonplace. Hold what view you like of woman’s position, that doesn’t affect mine.’

‘Is yours commonplace, then?’

‘Desperately. Love is a very old and common thing, and I believe I love you in the old and common way. I think you beautiful, you seem to me womanly in the best sense, full of charm and sweetness. I know myself a coarse being in comparison. All this has been felt and said in the same way by men infinite in variety. Must I find some new expression before you can believe me?’

Marian kept silence.

‘I know what you are thinking,’ he said. ‘The thought is as inevitable as my consciousness of it.’

For an instant she looked at him.

‘Yes, you look the thought. Why have I not spoken to you in this way before? Why have I waited until you are obliged to suspect my sincerity?’

‘My thought is not so easily read, then,’ said Marian.

‘To be sure it hasn’t a gross form, but I know you wish—whatever your real feeling towards me—that I had spoken a fortnight ago. You would wish that of any man in my position, merely because it is painful to you to see a possible insincerity. Well, I am not insincere. I have thought of you as of no other woman for some time. But—yes, you shall have the plain, coarse truth, which is good in its way, no doubt. I was afraid to say that I loved you. You don’t flinch; so far, so good. Now what harm is there in this confession? In the common course of things I shouldn’t be in a position to marry for perhaps three or four years, and even then marriage would mean difficulties, restraints, obstacles. I have always dreaded the thought of marriage with a poor income. You remember?

Love in a hut, with water and a crust, Is—Love forgive us!—cinders, ashes, dust.

You know that is true.’

‘Not always, I dare say.’