AT THE PUBLISHER'S
Arvid Falk decided to try Smith first, the almighty Smith--a name
adopted by the publisher in his youth during a short trip to the great
continent, from exaggerated admiration of everything American--the
redoubtable Smith with his thousand arms who could _make_ a writer in
twelve months, however bad the original material. His method was well
known, though none but he dared to make use of it, for it required an
unparalleled amount of impudence. The writer whom he took up could be
sure of making a name; hence Smith was overrun with nameless writers.
The following story is told as an instance of his irresistible power
and capacity for starting an author on the road to fame. A young,
inexperienced writer submitted his first novel, a bad one, to Smith.
For some reason the latter happened to like the first chapter--he never
read more--and decided to bless the world with a new author. The book
was published bearing on the back of the cover the words: "Blood and
Sword. A novel by Gustav Sjoeholm. This work of the young and promising
author whose highly respected name has for a long time been familiar to
the widest circles, etc. etc. It is a book which we can strongly
recommend to the novel-reading public." The book was published on April
3. On April 4, a review appeared in the widely read metropolitan paper
the _Grey Bonnet_, in which Smith held fifty shares. It concluded by
saying: "Gustav Sjoeholm's name is already well known; the spreading of
his fame does not lie with us; and we recommend this book not only to
the novel-reading, but also to the novel-writing public." On April 5 an
advertisement appeared in every paper of the capital with the following
quotation: "Gustav Sjoeholm's name is already well known; the spreading
of his fame does not lie with us. (_Grey Bonnet_)." On the same evening
a notice appeared in the _Incorruptible_, a paper read by nobody. It
represented the book as a model of bad literature, and the reviewer
swore that Gustav Sjoeblom (reviewer's intentional slip), had no name at
all. But as nobody read the _Incorruptible_, the opposition remained
unheard. The other papers, unwilling to disagree with the venerable
leading _Grey Bonnet_, and afraid of offending Smith, were mild in
their criticisms, but no more. They held the view that with hard work
Gustav Sjoeholm might make a name for himself in the future. A few days
of silence followed, but in every paper--in the _Incorruptible_ in bold
type--appeared the advertisement, shouting: "Gustav Sjoeholm's name is
already well known." Then a correspondence was started in the
_X-koepings Miscellaneous_, reproaching the metropolitan papers with
being hard on young authors. "Gustav Sjoeholm is simply a genius,"
affirmed the hot-headed correspondent, "in spite of all that dogmatic
blockheads might say to the contrary." On the next day the
advertisement again appeared in all the papers, bawling: "Gustav
Sjoeholm's name is already well known, etc. (_Grey Bonnet_)." "Gustav
Sjoeholm is a genius, etc. (_X-koepings Miscellaneous_)." The cover of
the next number of the magazine _Our Land_, one of Smith's
publications, bore the notice: "We are pleased to be in a position to
inform our numerous subscribers that the brilliant young author Gustav
Sjoeholm has promised us an original novel for our next number, etc."
And then again the advertisement in the papers. Finally, when at
Christmas the almanac _Our People_ appeared, the authors mentioned on
the title page were: Orvar Odd, Talis Qualis, Gustav Sjoeholm, and
others. It was a fact. In the eighth month Gustav Sjoeholm was made. And
the public was powerless. It had to swallow him. It was impossible to
go into a bookseller's and look at a book without reading his name;
impossible to take up a newspaper without coming across it. In all
circumstances and conditions of life that name obtruded itself, printed
on a slip of paper; it was put into the housewives' market baskets on
Saturdays; the servants carried it home from the tradespeople; the
crossing-sweeper swept it off the street, and the man of leisure went
about with it in the pockets of his dressing-gown.
Being well aware of Smith's great power, the young man climbed the dark
stairs of the publisher's house close to the Great Church, not without
misgivings. He had to wait for a long time in an outer office, a prey
to the most unpleasant meditations, until suddenly the door was burst
open and a young man rushed out of an inner office, despair on his face
and a roll of paper under his arm. Shaking in every limb, Falk entered
the sanctum, where the despot received his visitors, seated on a low
sofa, calm and serene as a god; he kindly nodded his grey head, covered
by a blue cap, and went on smoking, peacefully, as if he had never
shattered a man's hopes or turned an unhappy wretch from his door.
"Good morning, sir, good morning!"
His divinely flashing eyes glanced at the newcomer's clothes and
approved; nevertheless he did not ask him to sit down.
"My name is--Falk."
"Unknown to me! What is your father?"
"My father is dead."
"Is he? Good! What can I do for you, sir?"
Falk produced a manuscript from his breast pocket and handed it to
Smith; the latter sat on it without looking at it.
"You want me to publish it? Verse? I might have guessed it! Do you
know the cost of printing a single page, sir? No, you don't."
And he playfully poked the ignoramus with the stem of his pipe.
"Have you made a name, sir? No! Have you distinguished yourself in any
way? No!"
"The Academy has praised these verses."
"Which Academy? The Academy of Sciences? The one which publishes all
that stuff about flints?"
"About flints?"
"Yes, you know the Academy of Sciences! Close to the Museum, near the
river. Well, then!"
"Oh, no, Mr. Smith! The Swedish Academy, in the Exchange...."
"I see! The one with the tallow candles! Never mind; no man on earth
can tell what purpose it serves! No, my dear sir, the essential thing
is to have a name, a name like Tegner, like Ohrenschlaegel, like--Yes!
Our country has many great poets, but I can't remember them just at the
moment; but a name is necessary. Mr. Falk? H'm! Who knows Mr. Falk? I
don't, and I know many great poets. As I recently said to my friend
Ibsen: 'Now just you listen to me, Ibsen'--I call him Ibsen, quite
plainly--'just you listen to me, write something for my magazine. I'll
pay you whatever you ask!' He wrote--I paid--but I got my money back."
The annihilated young man longed to sink through the chinks in the
floor when he realized that he was standing before a person who called
Ibsen quite plainly "Ibsen." He longed to recover his manuscript, and
go his way, as the other young man had done, away, far away, until he
came to running water. Smith guessed it.
"Well, I've no doubt you can write Swedish, sir. And you know our
literature better than I do. Good! I have an idea. I am told of great,
beautiful, spiritual writers who lived in the past, let's say in the
reign of Gustav Eriksson and his daughter Christina. Isn't that so?"
"Gustavus Adolfus."
"Gustavus Adolfus, so be it! I remember there was one with a great, a
very great name; he wrote a fine work in verse, on God's Creation, I
believe! His Christian name was Hokan!"
"You mean Haquin Spegel, Mr. Smith! 'God's Works and Rest.'"
"Ah, yes! Well, I've been thinking of publishing it. Our nation is
yearning for religion these days; I've noticed that; and one must give
the people something. I have given them a good deal of Hermann Francke
and Arndt, but the great Foundation can sell more cheaply than I can,
and now I want to bring out something good at a fair price. Will you
take the matter in hand?"
"I don't know where I come in, as it is but a question of a reprint,"
answered Falk, not daring to refuse straight out.
"Dear me, what ignorance! You would do the editing and proof-reading,
of course. Are we agreed? You publish it, sir! What? Shall we draw up a
little agreement? The work must appear in numbers. What? A little
agreement. Just hand me pen and ink. Well?"
Falk obeyed; he was unable to offer resistance. Smith wrote and Falk
signed.
"Well, so much for that! Now, there's another thing! Give me that
little book on the stand! The third shelf! There! Now look here! A
brochure--title: "The Guardian Angel." Look at the vignette! An angel
with an anchor and a ship--it's a schooner without any yards, I
believe! The splendid influence of marine insurance on social life in
general is well known. Everybody has at one time or other sent
something more or less valuable across the sea in a ship. What? Well!
Everybody doesn't realize this. No! Consequently it is our duty to
enlighten those who are ignorant; isn't that so? Well! We know, you and
I; therefore it is for us to enlighten those who don't. This book
maintains that everybody who sends things across the water should
insure them. But this book is badly written. Well! We'll write a better
one. What? You'll write me a novel of ten pages for my magazine _Our
Land_, and I expect you to have sufficient gumption to introduce the
name _Triton_--which is the name of a new limited liability company,
founded by my nephew, and we are told to help our neighbours--twice,
neither more nor less; but it must be done cleverly and so that it is
not at all obvious. Do you follow me?"
Falk found the offer repulsive, although it contained nothing
dishonest; however, it gave him a start with the influential man,
straight away, without any effort on his part. He thanked Smith and
accepted.
"You know the size? Sixteen inches to the page, altogether a hundred
and sixty inches of eight lines each. Shall we write a little
agreement?"
Smith drew up an agreement and Falk signed.
"Well, now! You know the history of Sweden? Go to the stand again--you
will find a cliche there, a wood block. To the right! That's it! Can
you tell me who the lady is meant for? She is supposed to be a queen."
Falk, who saw nothing at first but a piece of black wood, finally made
out some human features and declared that to the best of his belief it
represented Ulrica Eleonora.
"Didn't I say so? Hihihi! The block has been used for Elizabeth, Queen
of England, in an American popular edition. I've bought it cheaply,
with a lot of others. I'm going to use it for Ulrica Eleonora in my
_People's Library_. Our people are splendid; they are so ready to buy
my books. Will you write the letterpress?"
Although Falk did not like the order, his super-sensitive conscience
could find no wrong in the proposal.
"Well then! We'd better make out a little agreement. Sixteen pages
octavo, at three inches, at twenty-four lines each. There!"
Falk, realizing that the audience was over, made a movement to recover
his manuscript on which Smith had all along been sitting. But the
latter would not give it up; he declared that he would read it,
although it might take him some time.
"You're a sensible man, sir, who knows the value of time," he said. "I
had a young fellow here just before you came in; he also brought me
verses, a great poem, for which I have no use. I made him the same
offers I just made to you, sir; do you know what he said? He told me to
do something unmentionable. He did, indeed, and rushed out of the
office. He'll not live long, that young man! Good day, good day! Don't
forget to order a copy of Hoken Spegel! Well, good day, good day."
Smith pointed to the door with the stem of his pipe and Falk left him.
He did not walk away with light footsteps. The wood-block in his pocket
was heavy and weighed him down, kept him back. He thought of the pale
young man with the roll of manuscript who had dared to say a bold thing
to Smith, and pride stirred in his heart. But memories of old paternal
warnings and advice whispered the old lie to him that all work was
equally honourable, and reproved him for his pride. He laid hold of his
common sense and went home to write a hundred and ninety-two inches
about Ulrica Eleonora.
As he had risen early he was at his writing-table at nine o'clock. He
filled a large pipe, took two sheets of paper, wiped his steel nibs and
tried to recall all he knew about Ulrica Eleonora. He looked her up in
Ekelund and Fryxell. There was a great deal under the heading Ulrica
Eleonora, but very little about her personally. At half-past nine he had
exhausted the subject. He had written down her birthplace, and the place
where she died, when she came to the throne, when she abdicated, the
names of her parents and the name of her husband. It was a commonplace
excerpt from a church register--and filled three pages, leaving thirteen
to be covered. He smoked two or three pipes and dragged the inkstand
with his pen, as if he were fishing for the Midgard serpent, but he
brought up nothing. He was bound to say something about her personally,
sketch her character; he felt as if he were sitting in judgment on her.
Should he praise or revile her? As it was a matter of complete
indifference to him, his mind was still not made up when it struck
eleven. He reviled her--and came to the end of the fourth page, leaving
twelve to be accounted for. He was at his wits' end. He wanted to say
something about her rule, but as she had not ruled, there was nothing to
be said. He wrote about her Council--one page--leaving eleven; he
whitewashed Goertz--another--leaving ten. He had not yet filled half the
required space. He hated the woman! More pipes! Fresh steel nibs! He
went back to remoter days, passing them in review, and being now in a
thoroughly bad temper, he overthrew his old idol, Charles XII, and
hurled him in the dust; it was done in a few words, and only added one
more page to his pile. There still remained nine. He anticipated events
and criticised Frederick I. Half a page! He glanced at the paper with
unhappy eyes; he glimpsed half-way house, but could not reach it. He had
written seven and a half small pages; Ekelund had only managed one and a
half.
He flung the wood-block on the floor, kicked it underneath his
writing-table, crawled after it, dusted it and put it in its former
place. It was torture! His soul was as dry as the block. He tried to
work himself up to views which he did not hold; he tried to awaken some
sort of emotion in his heart for the dead queen, but her plain, dull
features, cut into the wood, made no more impression on him than he on
the block. He realized his incapacity and felt despondent, degraded.
And this was the career of his choice, the one he had preferred to all
others. With a strong appeal to his reason, he turned to the guardian
angel.
The brochure was originally written for a German society, the "Nereus,"
and the argument was as follows: Mr. and Mrs. Castle had emigrated to
America, where they acquired a large estate. To make the story
possible, they had sold their land, and, very unpractically, invested
the total amount realized in costly furniture and objects of art. As
the story required that everything should be completely lost and
nothing whatever saved from the shipwreck, they sent off the whole lot
in advance by the _Washington_, a first-class steamer, copper bottomed,
with watertight bulkheads, and insured with the great German Marine
Insurance Company for L60,000. Mr. and Mrs. Castle and the children
followed on the _Bolivar_, the finest boat of the White Star Line,
insured with the great Marine Insurance Company "Nereus" (Capital
$10,000,000), and safely arrived at Liverpool. They left Liverpool and
all went well until they came to Skagen Point. During the whole voyage
the weather had, of course, been magnificent; the sky was clear and
radiant, but at the dangerous Skagen Point a storm overtook them; the
steamer was wrecked; the parents, whose lives were insured, were
drowned, thereby guaranteeing to the children, who were saved, L1500.
The latter, rejoicing at their parents' foresight, arrived at Hamburg
in good spirits, eager to take possession of the insurance money and
the property which they had inherited from their parents. Imagine their
consternation when they were told that the _Washington_ had been
wrecked a fortnight before their arrival on Dogger Bank; their whole
fortune, which had been left uninsured, was lost. All that remained was
the life insurance money. They hurried to the Company's agents. A fresh
disaster! They were told that their parents had not paid the last
premium which--oh, fateful blow!--had been due on the day preceding
their death. The distressed children bitterly mourned their parents,
who had worked so hard for them. They embraced each other with tears
and made a solemn vow that henceforth all their possessions should be
insured, and that they would never neglect paying their life insurance
premiums.
This story was to be localized, adapted to a Swedish environment and
made into a readable novelette; and with this he was to make his debut
in the literary world. The devil of pride whispered to him not to be a
blackguard and to leave the business alone, but this voice was silenced
by another, which came from the region of his empty stomach, and was
accompanied by a gnawing, stinging sensation. He drank a glass of water
and smoked another pipe. But his discomfort increased. His thoughts
became more gloomy; he found his room uncomfortable, the morning dull
and monotonous; he was tired and despondent; everything seemed
repulsive; his ideas were spiritless and revolved round nothing but
unpleasant subjects; and still his discomfort grew. He wondered whether
he was hungry? It was one o'clock. He never dined before three. He
anxiously examined his purse. Threepence halfpenny! For the first time
in his life he would have to go without dinner! This was a trouble
hitherto unknown to him. But with threepence halfpenny there was no
necessity to starve. He could send for bread and beer. No! That would
not do; it was _infra dig._ Go to a dairy? No! Borrow? Impossible! He
knew nobody who would lend. No sooner had he realized this than hunger
began to rage in him like a wild beast let loose, biting him, tearing
him and chasing him round the room. He smoked pipe after pipe to
stupefy the monster; in vain.
A rolling of drums from the barracks yard told him that the guardsmen
were lining up with their copper vessels to receive their dinner; every
chimney was smoking; the dinner bell went in the dockyard; a hissing
sound came from his neighbour's, the policemen's kitchen; the smell of
roast meat penetrated through the chinks of the door; he heard the
rattling of knives and plates in the adjacent room, and the children
saying grace. The paviours in the street below were taking their
after-dinner nap with their heads on their empty food baskets. The
whole town was dining; everybody, except he. He raged against God. But
all at once a clear thought shot through his brain. He seized Ulrica
Eleonora and the guardian angel, wrapped them in paper, wrote Smith's
name and address on the parcel, and handed the messenger his threepence
halfpenny. And with a sigh of relief he threw himself on his sofa and
starved, with a heart bursting with pride.