"I am going to finish up about _my_ business now, and then I shall not
ever mention the subject again. But I did want to talk with somebody
about it, having so little reliance on my own judgment. And your letter
came just then, and so I wrote. I have never mentioned it to another
soul. Confucius is a great deal better friend to me than you ever
were or ever will be, but somehow I could not speak to him about it. I
don't want to _speak_ to any one. Besides I was afraid he would take up
against Mr. Hunt.
"I have looked into my papers, but I cannot make much out of them....
I never thought the first thing about it till I saw in the 'S.' what
I told you before--and I hardly thought of it then; but several weeks
after, when I wanted money, and my account for this year was less than
I expected, I hunted up the old 'S.' to see if I had read it right, and
then I wrote to Mr. Hunt without thought of there being anything wrong,
but asking him how it was. I supposed there was some _modus operandi_,
... and wanted to know what. It was nearly three weeks before he wrote
again, and then came a pleasant letter; but all he said about mine
was--[then follows an account of the correspondence.]
"Now I must confess I feel next door to being insulted. I hate to use
the word, but there it is. ---- is as innocent and as good as an angel,
and does not in the least know what she is writing about. But all that
Mr. Hunt ever said to me on the subject, or I to him, did not occupy
five minutes, and he never spoke but once. That was years ago. It must
have been before the second contract was made. He said that owing to
the fluctuations of the market, the uncertainties arising from the
war, or something of that sort, they were going to give their authors
a fixed sum--fifteen cents per volume--instead of a percentage. It was
at a time when prices (of books) were changing from one dollar and a
quarter to two dollars, but I don't know exactly when. I assented of
course; I neither knew nor cared anything about it. I had no interest
in it. And that is all that has ever passed between us. Even now I have
not the least fault to find if I am on the same footing as others.
But why does he not say so? Do you think I am entirely unreasonable
in being dissatisfied? I wish you would tell me if you think so, for
it is like death almost to think it possible that Mr. Hunt should be
in the wrong. I have had the most implicit confidence in him. I like
him so much that I hate to hear a word said against the 'Adriatic,' or
anything that he is concerned in. I would have been delighted to write
for him for nothing if he had needed the money, and asked me.... Mr.
Hunt's last letter to me by ---- was January 18. I did not reply to it,
and so the matter stands. I shall never say or do anything more about
it. You cannot conceive how distasteful it is to me. Nothing in all my
life--literary--ever touched me so nearly. If I had lost every speck
of money that I had--twice over--it would not have so disheartened me.
Confidence must be entire, or it is nothing. Do not you ever speak to
any one of this.... I shall never mention it. A dead friendship is as
sacred as a dead friend.
[But if your dead friend will not rest quietly in his grave, but
persists in stalking up and down the earth, scaring the timid,
oppressing the weak, and boasting all the time his own beneficence, you
may presently learn with Browning, that even
"Serene deadness
Tries a man's temper."]
"Now I hope I have not overwearied you with my tiresome letter. You
need not be afraid of a repetition of it. In fact, there is nothing
more to say,--which you will perhaps think the strongest security of
all. I hope that you are good,--at least that you are content with
nothing less than good,--which is the highest that any of us can go, I
fancy. I think you had better burn this letter too. It will be safest."