MARK SNYDER
Three-quarters of an hour later Henry might have been seen--in fact, was
seen by a number of disinterested wayfarers--to enter a magnificent new
block of offices and flats in Charing Cross Road. _Love in Babylon_ was
firmly gripped under his right arm. Partly this strange burden and
partly the brilliant aspect of the building made him feel self-conscious
and humble and rather unlike his usual calm self. For, although Henry
was accustomed to offices, he was not accustomed to magnificent offices.
There are offices in Lincoln's Inn Fields, offices of extreme wealth,
which, were they common lodging-houses, would be instantly condemned by
the County Council. Powells was such a one--and Sir George had a reputed
income of twenty thousand a year. At Powells the old Dickensian
tradition was kept vigorously alive by every possible means. Dirt and
gloom were omnipresent. Cleanliness and ample daylight would have been
deemed unbusinesslike, as revolutionary and dangerous as a typewriter.
One day, in winter, Sir George had taken cold, and he had attributed his
misfortune, in language which he immediately regretted, to the fact that
'that d----d woman had cleaned the windows'--probably with a damp cloth.
'That d----d woman' was the caretaker, a grey-haired person usually
dressed in sackcloth, who washed herself, incidentally, while washing
the stairs. At Powells, nothing but the stairs was ever put to the
indignity of a bath.
That Henry should be somewhat diffident about invading Kenilworth
Mansions was therefore not surprising. He climbed three granite steps,
passed through a pair of swinging doors, traversed eight feet of
tesselated pavement, climbed three more granite steps, passed through
another pair of swinging doors, and discovered himself in a spacious
marble hall, with a lift-cabinet resembling a confessional, and broad
stairs behind curving up to Paradise. On either side of him, in place
of priceless works by old masters, were great tablets inscribed with
many names in gold characters. He scanned these tablets timidly, and at
length found what he wanted, 'Mark Snyder, Literary Agent,' under the
heading 'Third Floor.' At the same moment a flunkey in chocolate and
cream approached him.
'Mr. Snyder?' asked Henry.
'Third-floor, left,' pronounced the flunkey, thus giving the tablets the
force of his authority.
As Henry was wafted aloft in the elevator, with the beautiful and
innocuous flunkey as travelling companion, he could not help contrasting
that official with the terrible Powellian caretaker who haunted the
Powellian stairs.
On the third-floor, which seemed to be quite a world by itself, an arrow
with the legend 'Mark Snyder, Literary Agent,' directed his mazed feet
along a corridor to a corner where another arrow with the legend 'Mark
Snyder, Literary Agent,' pointed along another corridor. And as he
progressed, the merry din of typewriters grew louder and louder. At
length he stood in front of a glassy door, and on the face of the door,
in a graceful curve, was painted the legend, 'Mark Snyder, Literary
Agent.' Shadows of vague moving forms could be discerned on the
opalescent glass, and the chatter of typewriters was almost
disconcerting.
Henry paused.
That morning Mr. Mark Snyder had been to Powells on the business of one
of his clients, a historian of the Middle Ages, and in the absence of
Sir George had had a little talk with Henry. And Henry had learnt for
the first time what a literary agent was, and, struck by the man's
astuteness and geniality, had mentioned the matter of _Love in Babylon_.
Mr. Snyder had kindly promised to look into the matter of _Love in
Babylon_ himself if Henry could call on him instantly with the
manuscript. The reason for haste was that on the morrow Mr. Snyder was
leaving England for New York on a professional tour of the leading
literary centres of the United States. Hence Henry's telegram to Dawes
Road.
Standing there in front of Mr. Snyder's door, Henry wondered whether,
after all, he was not making a fool of himself. But he entered.
Two smart women in tight and elegant bodices, with fluffy bows at the
backs of their necks, looked up from two typewriters, and the one with
golden hair rose smiling and suave.
'Well, you seem a fairly nice sort of boy--I shall be kind to you,' her
eyes appeared to say. Her voice, however, said nothing except, 'Will you
take a seat a moment?' and not even that until Henry had asked if Mr.
Snyder was in.
The prospective client examined the room. It had a carpet, and lovely
almanacs on the walls, and in one corner, on a Japanese table, was a
tea-service in blue and white. Tables more massive bore enormous piles
of all shapes and sizes of manuscripts, scores and hundreds or unprinted
literary works, and they all carried labels, 'Mark Snyder, Literary
Agent.' _Love in Babylon_ shrank so small that Henry could scarcely
detect its presence under his arm.
Then Goldenhair, who had vanished, came back, and, with the most
enchanting smile that Henry had ever seen on the face of a pretty woman,
lured him by delicious gestures into Mr. Mark Snyder's private office.
'Well,' exclaimed Mr. Snyder, full of good-humour, 'here we are again.'
He was a fair, handsome man of about forty, and he sat at a broad table
playing with a revolver. 'What do you think of that, Mr. Knight?' he
asked sharply, holding out the revolver for inspection.
'It seems all right,' said Henry lamely.
Mr. Snyder laughed heartily. 'I'm going to America to-morrow. I told
you, didn't I? Never been there before. So I thought I'd get a revolver.
Never know, you know. Eh?' He laughed again.
Then he suddenly ceased laughing, and sniffed the air.
'Is this a business office?' Henry asked himself. 'Or is it a club?'
His feet were on a Turkey carpet. He was seated in a Chippendale chair.
A glorious fire blazed behind a brass fender, and the receptacle for
coal was of burnished copper. Photogravures in rich oaken frames adorned
the roseate walls. The ceiling was an expanse of ornament, with an
electric chandelier for centre.
'Have a cigarette?' said Mr. Snyder, pushing across towards Henry a tin
of Egyptians.
'Thanks,' said Henry, who did not usually smoke, and he put _Love in
Babylon_ on the table.
Mr. Snyder sniffed the air again.
'Now, what can I do for you?' said he abruptly.
Henry explained the genesis, exodus, and vicissitudes of _Love in
Babylon_, and Mr. Snyder stretched out an arm and idly turned over a few
leaves of the manuscript as it lay before its author.
'Who's your amanuensis?' he demanded, smiling.
'My aunt,' said Henry.
'Ah yes!' said Mr. Snyder, smiling still, 'It's too short, you know,' he
added, grave. 'Too short. What length is it?'
'Nearly three hundred folios.'
'None of your legal jargon here,' Mr. Snyder laughed again. 'What's a
folio?'
'Seventy-two words.'
'About twenty thousand words then, eh? Too short!'
'Does that matter?' Henry demanded. 'I should have thought----'
'Of course it matters,' Mr. Snyder snapped. 'If you went to a concert,
and it began at eight and finished at half-past, would you go out
satisfied with the performers' assurance that quality and not quantity
was the thing? Ha, ha!'
Mr. Snyder sniffed the air yet again, and looked at the fire
inquisitively, still sniffing.
'There's only one price for novels, six-shillings,' Mr. Snyder
proceeded. 'The public likes six shillings' worth of quality. But it
absolutely insists on six shillings' worth of quantity, and doesn't
object to more. What can I do with this?' he went on, picking up _Love
in Babylon_ and weighing it as in a balance. 'What _can_ I do with a
thing like this?'
'If Carlyle came to Kenilworth Mansions!' Henry speculated. At the same
time Mr. Snyder's epigrammatic remarks impressed him. He saw the art of
Richardson and Balzac in an entirely new aspect. It was as though he had
walked round the house of literature, and peeped in at the backdoor.
Mr. Snyder suddenly put _Love in Babylon_ to his nose.
'Oh, it's _that_!' he murmured, enlightened.
Henry had to narrate the disaster of the onion-cart, at which Mr. Snyder
was immensely amused.
'Good!' he ejaculated. 'Good! By the way, might send it to Onions
Winter. Know Onions Winter? No? He's always called Spring Onions in the
trade. Pushing man. What a joke it would be!' Mr. Snyder roared with
laughter. 'But seriously, Winter might----'
Just then Goldenhair entered the room with a slip of paper, and Mr.
Snyder begged to be excused a moment. During his absence Henry reflected
upon the singularly unbusinesslike nature of the conversation, and
decided that it would be well to import a little business into it.
'I'm called away,' said Mr. Snyder, re-entering.
'I must go, too,' said Henry. 'May I ask, Mr. Snyder, what are your
terms for arranging publication?'
'Ten per cent.,' said Mr. Snyder succinctly. 'On gross receipts.
Generally, to unknown men, I charge a preliminary fee, but, of course,
with you----'
'Ten per cent.?' Henry inquired.
'Ten per cent.,' repeated Mr. Snyder.
'Does that mean--ten per cent.?' Henry demanded, dazed.
Mr. Snyder nodded.
'But do you mean to say,' said the author of _Love in Babylon_
impressively, 'that if a book of mine makes a profit of ten thousand
pounds, you'll take a thousand pounds just for getting it published?'
'It comes to that,' Mr. Snyder admitted.
'Oh!' cried Henry, aghast, astounded. 'A thousand pounds!'
And he kept saying: 'A thousand pounds! A thousand pounds!'
He saw now where the Turkey carpets and the photogravures and the
Teofani cigarettes came from.
'A thousand pounds!'
Mr. Snyder stuck the revolver into a drawer.
'I'll think it over,' said Henry discreetly. 'How long shall you be in
America?'
'Oh, about a couple of months!' And Mr. Snyder smiled brightly. Henry
could not find a satisfactory explanation of the man's eternal jollity.
'Well, I'll think it over,' he said once more, very courteously. 'And
I'm much obliged to you for giving me an interview.' And he took up
_Love in Babylon_ and departed.
It appeared to have been a futile and ludicrous encounter.