“I know
How far high failure overtops the bounds
Of low successes. Only suffering draws
The inner heart of song, and can elicit
The perfumes of the soul.”
Epic of Hades.
Next week, Lawrence went off like a hero to the war; and my friend--also
I think like a hero--stayed on at Bath, enduring as best he could the
worst form of loneliness; for undoubtedly there is no loneliness so
frightful as constant companionship with an uncongenial person. He had,
however, one consolation: the Major’s health steadily improved, under
the joint influence of total abstinence and Bath water, and, with the
improvement, his temper became a little better.
But one Saturday, when I had run down to Bath without writing
beforehand, I suddenly found a different state of things. In Orange
Grove I met Dr. Mackrill, the Major’s medical man; he used now and then
to play whist with us on Saturday nights, and I stopped to speak to him.
“Oh! you’ve come down again. That’s all right!” he said. “Your friend
wants someone to cheer him up. He’s got his arm broken.”
“How on earth did he manage that?” I asked.
“Well, that’s more than I can tell you,” said the Doctor, with an odd
look in his eyes, as if he guessed more than he would put into words.
“All that I could get out of him was that it was done accidentally. The
Major is not so well--no whist for us to-night, I’m afraid.”
He passed on, and I made my way to Gay Street. There was an air of
mystery about the quaint old landlady; she looked brimful of news when
she opened the door to me, but she managed to ‘keep herself to herself,’
and showed me in upon the Major and Derrick, rather triumphantly I
thought. The Major looked terribly ill--worse than I had ever seen
him, and as for Derrick, he had the strangest look of shrinking and
shame-facedness you ever saw. He said he was glad to see me, but I knew
that he lied. He would have given anything to have kept me away.
“Broken your arm?” I exclaimed, feeling bound to take some notice of the
sling.
“Yes,” he replied; “met with an accident to it. But luckily it’s only
the left one, so it doesn’t hinder me much! I have finished seven
chapters of the last volume of ‘Lynwood,’ and was just wanting to ask
you a legal question.”
All this time his eyes bore my scrutiny defiantly; they seemed to dare
me to say one other word about the broken arm. I didn’t dare--indeed to
this day I have never mentioned the subject to him.
But that evening, while he was helping the Major to bed, the old
landlady made some pretext for toiling up to the top of the house, where
I sat smoking in Derrick’s room.
“You’ll excuse my making bold to speak to you, sir,” she said. I threw
down my newspaper, and, looking up, saw that she was bubbling over with
some story.
“Well?” I said, encouragingly.
“It’s about Mr. Vaughan, sir, I wanted to speak to you. I really do
think, sir, it’s not safe he should be left alone with his father, sir,
any longer. Such doings as we had here the other day, sir! Somehow or
other--and none of us can’t think how--the Major had managed to get hold
of a bottle of brandy. How he had it I don’t know; but we none of us
suspected him, and in the afternoon he says he was too poorly to go for
a drive or to go out in his chair, and settles off on the parlour sofa
for a nap while Mr. Vaughan goes out for a walk. Mr. Vaughan was out a
couple of hours. I heard him come in and go into the sitting-room;
then there came sounds of voices, and a scuffling of feet and moving of
chairs, and I knew something was wrong and hurried up to the door--and
just then came a crash like fire-irons, and I could hear the Major
a-swearing fearful. Not hearing a sound from Mr. Vaughan, I got scared,
sir, and opened the door, and there I saw the Major a leaning up against
the mantelpiece as drunk as a lord, and his son seemed to have got the
bottle from him; it was half empty, and when he saw me he just handed it
to me and ordered me to take it away. Then between us we got the Major
to lie down on the sofa and left him there. When we got out into the
passage Mr. Vaughan he leant against the wall for a minute, looking as
white as a sheet, and then I noticed for the first time that his left
arm was hanging down at his side. ‘Lord! sir,’ I cried, ‘your arm’s
broken.’ And he went all at once as red as he had been pale just before,
and said he had got it done accidentally, and bade me say nothing about
it, and walked off there and then to the doctor’s, and had it set. But
sir, given a man drunk as the Major was, and given a scuffle to get away
the drink that was poisoning him, and given a crash such as I heard,
and given a poker a-lying in the middle of the room where it stands to
reason no poker could get unless it was thrown--why, sir, no sensible
woman who can put two and two together can doubt that it was all the
Major’s doing.”
“Yes,” I said, “that is clear enough; but for Mr. Vaughan’s sake we must
hush it up; and, as for safety, why, the Major is hardly strong enough
to do him any worse damage than that.”
The good old thing wiped away a tear from her eyes. She was very fond of
Derrick, and it went to her heart that he should lead such a dog’s life.
I said what I could to comfort her, and she went down again, fearful
lest he should discover her upstairs and guess that she had opened her
heart to me.
Poor Derrick! That he of all people on earth should be mixed up with
such a police court story--with drunkard, and violence, and pokers
figuring in it! I lay back in the camp chair and looked at Hoffman’s
‘Christ,’ and thought of all the extraordinary problems that one is for
ever coming across in life. And I wondered whether the people of Bath
who saw the tall, impassive-looking, hazel-eyed son and the invalid
father in their daily pilgrimages to the Pump Room, or in church on
Sunday, or in the Park on sunny afternoons had the least notion of
the tragedy that was going on. My reflections were interrupted by his
entrance. He had forced up a cheerfulness that I am sure he didn’t
really feel, and seemed afraid of letting our talk flag for a moment. I
remember, too, that for the first time he offered to read me his novel,
instead of as usual waiting for me to ask to hear it. I can see him
now, fetching the untidy portfolio and turning over the pages, adroitly
enough, as though anxious to show how immaterial was the loss of a left
arm. That night I listened to the first half of the third volume of
‘Lynwood’s Heritage,’ and couldn’t help reflecting that its author
seemed to thrive on misery; and yet how I grudged him to this
deadly-lively place, and this monotonous, cooped-up life.
“How do you manage to write one-handed?” I asked.
And he sat down to his desk, put a letter-weight on the left-hand corner
of the sheet of foolscap, and wrote that comical first paragraph of the
eighth chapter over which we have all laughed. I suppose few readers
guessed the author’s state of mind when he wrote it. I looked over his
shoulder to see what he had written, and couldn’t help laughing aloud--I
verily believe that it was his way of turning off attention from his
arm, and leading me safely from the region of awkward questions.
“By-the-by,” I exclaimed, “your writing of garden-parties reminds me. I
went to one at Campden Hill the other day, and had the good fortune to
meet Miss Freda Merrifield.”
How his face lighted up, poor fellow, and what a flood of questions he
poured out. “She looked very well and very pretty,” I replied. “I played
two sets of tennis with her. She asked after you directly she saw me,
seeming to think that we always hunted in couples. I told her you were
living here, taking care of an invalid father; but just then up came
the others to arrange the game. She and I got the best courts, and as we
crossed over to them she told me she had met your brother several times
last autumn, when she had been staying near Aldershot. Odd that he never
mentioned her here; but I don’t suppose she made much impression on him.
She is not at all his style.”
“Did you have much more talk with her?” he asked.
“No, nothing to be called talk. She told me they were leaving London
next week, and she was longing to get back to the country to her beloved
animals--rabbits, poultry, an aviary, and all that kind of thing. I
should gather that they had kept her rather in the background this
season, but I understand that the eldest sister is to be married in the
winter, and then no doubt Miss Freda will be brought forward.”
He seemed wonderfully cheered by this opportune meeting, and though
there was so little to tell he appeared to be quite content. I left him
on Monday in fairly good spirits, and did not come across him again till
September, when his arm was well, and his novel finished and revised. He
never made two copies of his work, and I fancy this was perhaps because
he spent so short a time each day in actual writing, and lived so
continually in his work; moreover, as I said before, he detested
penmanship.
The last part of ‘Lynwood’ far exceeded my expectations; perhaps--yet I
don’t really think so--I viewed it too favourably. But I owed the book
a debt of gratitude, since it certainly helped me through the worst part
of my life.
“Don’t you feel flat now it is finished?” I asked.
“I felt so miserable that I had to plunge into another story three days
after,” he replied; and then and there he gave me the sketch of his
second novel, ‘At Strife,’ and told me how he meant to weave in his
childish fancies about the defence of the bridge in the Civil Wars.
“And about ‘Lynwood?’ Are you coming up to town to hawk him round?” I
asked.
“I can’t do that,” he said; “you see I am tied here. No, I must send him
off by rail, and let him take his chance.”
“No such thing!” I cried. “If you can’t leave Bath I will take him round
for you.”
And Derrick, who with the oddest inconsistency would let his MS. lie
about anyhow at home, but hated the thought of sending it out alone on
its travels, gladly accepted my offer. So next week I set off with the
huge brown paper parcel; few, however, will appreciate my good nature,
for no one but an author or a publisher knows the fearful weight of a
three volume novel in MS.! To my intense satisfaction I soon got rid of
it, for the first good firm to which I took it received it with great
politeness, to be handed over to their ‘reader’ for an opinion; and
apparently the ‘reader’s’ opinion coincided with mine, for a month
later Derrick received an offer for it with which he at once closed--not
because it was a good one, but because the firm was well thought of,
and because he wished to lose no time, but to have the book published at
once. I happened to be there when his first ‘proofs’ arrived. The Major
had had an attack of jaundice, and was in a fiendish humour. We had
a miserable time of it at dinner, for he badgered Derrick almost past
bearing, and I think the poor old fellow minded it more when there was
a third person present. Somehow through all he managed to keep his
extraordinary capacity for reverencing mere age--even this degraded and
detestable old age of the Major’s. I often thought that in this he
was like my own ancestor, Hugo Wharncliffe, whose deference and
respectfulness and patience had not descended to me, while unfortunately
the effects of his physical infirmities had. I sometimes used to
reflect bitterly enough on the truth of Herbert Spencer’s teaching as to
heredity, so clearly shown in my own case. In the year 1683, through
the abominable cruelty and harshness of his brother Randolph, this Hugo
Wharncliffe, my great-great-great-great-great grandfather, was immured
in Newgate, and his constitution was thereby so much impaired and
enfeebled that, two hundred years after, my constitution is paying the
penalty, and my whole life is thereby changed and thwarted. Hence this
childless Randolph is affecting the course of several lives in the 19th
century to their grievous hurt.
But revenons a nos moutons--that is to say, to our lion and lamb--the
old brute of a Major and his long-suffering son.
While the table was being cleared, the Major took forty winks on the
sofa, and we two beat a retreat, lit up our pipes in the passage, and
were just turning out when the postman’s double knock came, but no
showers of letters in the box. Derrick threw open the door, and the man
handed him a fat, stumpy-looking roll in a pink wrapper.
“I say!” he exclaimed, “PROOFS!”
And, in hot haste, he began tearing away the pink paper, till out came
the clean, folded bits of printing and the dirty and dishevelled blue
foolscap, the look of which I knew so well. It is an odd feeling, that
first seeing one’s self in print, and I could guess, even then, what a
thrill shot through Derrick as he turned over the pages. But he would
not take them into the sitting-room, no doubt dreading another diatribe
against his profession; and we solemnly played euchre, and patiently
endured the Major’s withering sarcasms till ten o’clock sounded our
happy release.
However, to make a long story short, a month later--that is, at the end
of November--‘Lynwood’s Heritage’ was published in three volumes with
maroon cloth and gilt lettering. Derrick had distributed among his
friends the publishers’ announcement of the day of publication; and when
it was out I besieged the libraries for it, always expressing surprise
if I did not find it in their lists. Then began the time of reviews. As
I had expected, they were extremely favourable, with the exception of
the Herald, the Stroller, and the Hour, which made it rather hot for
him, the latter in particular pitching into his views and assuring
its readers that the book was ‘dangerous,’ and its author a believer
in--various thing especially repugnant to Derrick, at it happened.
I was with him when he read these reviews. Over the cleverness of the
satirical attack in the Weekly Herald he laughed heartily, though
the laugh was against himself; and as to the critic who wrote in the
Stroller it was apparent to all who knew ‘Lynwood’ that he had not read
much of the book; but over this review in the Hour he was genuinely
angry--it hurt him personally, and, as it afterwards turned out, played
no small part in the story of his life. The good reviews, however, were
many, and their recommendation of the book hearty; they all prophesied
that it would be a great success. Yet, spite of this, ‘Lynwood’s
Heritage’ didn’t sell. Was it, as I had feared, that Derrick was too
devoid of the pushing faculty ever to make a successful writer? Or was
it that he was handicapped by being down in the provinces playing keeper
to that abominable old bear? Anyhow, the book was well received, read
with enthusiasm by an extremely small circle, and then it dropped down
to the bottom among the mass of overlooked literature, and its career
seemed to be over. I can recall the look in Derrick’s face when one day
he glanced through the new Mudie and Smith lists and found ‘Lynwood’s
Heritage’ no longer down. I had been trying to cheer him up about the
book and quoting all the favourable remarks I had heard about it. But
unluckily this was damning evidence against my optimist view.
He sighed heavily and put down the lists.
“It’s no use to deceive one’s self,” he said, drearily, “‘Lynwood’ has
failed.”
Something in the deep depression of look and tone gave me a momentary
insight into the author’s heart. He thought, I know, of the agony of
mind this book had cost him; of those long months of waiting and their
deadly struggle, of the hopes which had made all he passed through seem
so well worth while; and the bitterness of the disappointment was no
doubt intensified by the knowledge that the Major would rejoice over it.
We walked that afternoon along the Bradford Valley, a road which Derrick
was specially fond of. He loved the thickly-wooded hills, and the
glimpses of the Avon, which, flanked by the canal and the railway, runs
parallel with the high road; he always admired, too, a certain little
village with grey stone cottages which lay in this direction, and liked
to look at the site of the old hall near the road: nothing remained of
it but the tall gate posts and rusty iron gates looking strangely dreary
and deserted, and within one could see, between some dark yew trees,
an old terrace walk with stone steps and balustrades--the most
ghostly-looking place you can conceive.
“I know you’ll put this into a book some day,” I said, laughing.
“Yes,” he said, “it is already beginning to simmer in my brain.”
Apparently his deep disappointment as to his first venture had in no way
affected his perfectly clear consciousness that, come what would, he had
to write.
As we walked back to Bath he told me his ‘Ruined Hall’ story as far as
it had yet evolved itself in his brain, and we were still discussing it
when in Milsom Street we met a boy crying evening papers, and details of
the last great battle at Saspataras Hill.
Derrick broke off hastily, everything but anxiety for Lawrence driven
from his mind.