With the last word Alice dropped the manuscript on the table, and
hastily left the room. Charley shot forth, with a vigorous puff, a ring
of heroic proportions.
“Upon my word, Jack, I didn’t think it was in the old girl! Capital! It
is, by Jove!”
“Capital,” said I.
“Yes,” said he, “it is. But, I say, Jack—”
“What?” said I, with some expectancy, for he had lowered his voice to a
confidential whisper.
“It is very clever in the old girl, and all that, you know. Jove! didn’t
she hit out on a high line? ‘Incense-breathing mist,’—how does that
strike you, Hein? And ‘tempestuous thud?’—what have you got to say to
that? And ‘bickering eyes?’ But I say, Jack-Whack, old boy—”
“Well?”
“I say, you won’t tell her what I am going to say?”
“Of course not.”
“Well, I won’t deny that it is well written, and in a high, romantic
vein; but—now you won’t tell her?—but before I would have it thought
that _I_ wrote that chapter, you might shoot me with a brass-barrelled
pistol.”
With that he took up the manuscript, and began running his eye over it
and reading aloud passages here and there. We both (I am ashamed to say)
soon got to laughing, and Charley at last went off into an almost
hysterical state, the tears streaming down his cheeks. Just then Alice
suddenly re-appeared, and his features snapped together like a steel
trap. Charley, in point of fact, was not laughing at his wife, but
rather at the inherent absurdity of all love-scenes; but he felt guilty
when she entered the room, and looked preternaturally solemn.
“What is the matter?” asked Alice.
“I thought it was agreed that there were to be no criticisms?”
“Yes; but you and Jack have been criticising my chapter already.”
“In your absence, of course.”
“And I heard you laughing.”
“Laughing? What do you suppose there was to laugh at? In point of fact,
I said it was capital; didn’t I, Jack?”
“Yes; and I agreed with him.”
“Really?” asked she, looking from one to the other of us with keen
suspicion in her eyes.
“Yes; honestly, my dear, it does you credit.”
Alice looked pleased.
“Of course, however, any one could tell, at a glance, that it was from a
woman’s pen.”
“I don’t see why,” said she, bridling. “So far from that being the case,
I’ll bet you a box of gloves that when the book comes out, the critics
will say that not one line of it was written by me, and that I am a
purely mythical personage, invented out of the whole cloth.”
“Done,” said he; “they will say nothing of the kind. By the way, can you
tell me, Alice, why it is that women always put so much hugging and
kissing in their books?”
“I believe they do,” said Alice, laughing.
“Jack would not have dared to make that chapter so—so—warm, in fact.
Why, it took away my breath, the brisk way in which you enveloped Mary
in the Don’s arms. Jack could not have brought about such a consummation
in less than three chapters.”
“So much the worse for Jack. It was human nature,—woman’s nature, at
any rate.”
“Oho! live and learn, Jack!”
“I am taking notes.”
“And _act_ on them,” rejoined Alice, with a rather malicious allusion to
certain recent incidents in my own personal career. “Women like
_aggressive_ lovers; so next time—”
“But really, Alice,” said Charley, coming to my rescue, “that chapter of
yours—such as it is,—now no offence,—I mean giving, as it does, a
love-passage from a woman’s point of view, is very well done. And one
thing, Jack, seems to me especially to be commended. It is positively
artistic, the way in which she contrives to cast a shadow upon the pair,
as they sit basking in the sunshine of—ah—in fact—sunshine of young
love—ahem—match, Jack—thank you—ahem.” Charley reddened a little,
conscious of having been betrayed into an unwonted burst of eloquence.
“And very cleverly indeed,” added he, “that shadow is wrought by the
very flash of light which will give our readers a momentary glimpse of
certain lines in the nature of poor Dory, which you had not previously
brought out.”
“_Inexorabilis acer_,” said I, musing.
“Oh, yes,” said Alice, turning to her husband; “how often have I heard
you apply those words to your poor friend. They are not to be
found—in—Virgil? At any rate, I cannot recall such a passage.”
“No; they are part of a verse in which Horace gives a characterization
of Achilles.”