LAUNCHED.
Mark had now cut himself adrift and established himself in rooms in
one of the small streets about Connaught Square, where he waited for
his schemes to accomplish themselves. He still retained his mastership
at St. Peter's, although he hoped to be able to throw that up as soon
as he could do so with any prudence, and the time that was not
occupied by his school duties he devoted to the perfecting of his
friend's work. It was hardly a labour of love, and he came to it with
an ever-increasing weariness; all the tedious toiling through piles of
proofs and revised proofs, the weeding out of ingenious perversions
which seemed to possess a hydra-like power of multiplication after the
first eradication, began to inspire him with an infinite loathing of
this book which was his and not his own.
It had never interested him; he had never been able to feel the
slightest admiration for any part of it, and at times he ceased to
believe in it altogether, and think that, after all, he had
transgressed to no purpose, and that his own book would have been a
stronger staff to lean upon than this reed he had borrowed. But he had
to go on with it now, and trust to his good-luck for the consequences;
but still there were moments when he trembled at what he had done, and
could not bear to be so constantly reminded of it.
There was a little story in the book which one of the subordinate
characters told to a child, the distressing history of a small sugar
prince on a Twelfth-cake, who believed himself to be a fairy and was
taken tenderly away from a children's party by a little girl who, as
the prince supposed, would restore him somehow to his proper position
in Fairyland; instead of which, however, she took him home to an
ordinary nursery and ate him.
Mark was doubtful of the wisdom of retaining this story in the book at
all--it seemed to him out of place there--but as he had some scruples
about cutting it out, he allowed it to remain, a decision which was
not without after-effect upon his fortunes.
The title of the book underwent one more change, for Mr. Fladgate's
mind misgave him at the last moment as to his own first suggestion,
and it was finally settled that the book should be called 'Illusion,'
which suited Mark quite as well as anything else.
And so in due time Mark read, with a certain curious thrill, the
announcement that 'Illusion,' a romance by Cyril Ernstone, was 'now
ready at all libraries;' he sent no presentation copies, not even to
Trixie--he had thought of doing so, but when it came to the point he
could not.
It was early one Saturday afternoon in March, Mark had walked back by
a long round from the school to his lodgings through the parks, and
the flower-beds were gay with the lilac, yellow and white of crocus
and snowdrop, the smoke-blackened twigs were studded with tiny spikes
of tender green, and the air was warm and subtly aromatic with the
promise of spring--even in the muddy tainted streets the Lent-lilies
and narcissus flowers in the street-sellers' baskets gave touches of
passing sweetness to the breeze.
Mark felt a longing to get further away from the town and enjoy what
remained of the afternoon on higher ground and in purer air; he would
go up to Hampstead, he thought, and see the lights sweeping over the
rusty bracken on the heath, or walk down over Highgate Hill, and past
the quaint old brick houses with their high-trim laurel hedges and
their last century wrought-iron gateways and lamps in which the light
of other days no longer burns.
But he did not go to either place that afternoon, for when he ran up
to his rooms to change his hat and coat, he saw that on his table
which made him forget his purpose altogether. It was a packet inclosed
in a wrapper which bore the name of his publishers on the outside, and
he knew at once before opening it that it contained reviews. He tore
off the wrapper eagerly, for now at last he would learn whether he had
made a bold and successful stroke, or only a frightful mistake.
Beginners have taken up reviews before now, cowering in anticipation
before the curse of Balaam, to receive an unexpected benediction; but
perhaps no one could be quite so unprepared for this pleasant form of
surprise as Mark, for others have written the works that are
criticised, and though they may have worked themselves up into a
surface ferment of doubt and humility, deep down in their hearts there
is a wonderfully calm acceptance, after the first shock, of the most
extravagant eulogy.
The opening paragraphs of the first critique were enough to relieve
Mark's main anxiety; Holroyd's book was not a failure--there could be
no doubt of that--it was treated with respectful consideration as the
work of a man who was entitled to be taken seriously; if reviews had
any influence (and it can scarcely be questioned that a favourable
review has much) this one alone could not fail to bring 'Illusion' its
fair share of attention.
Mark laid down the first paper with a sense of triumph. If a very
ordinary book like poor Holroyd's was received in this way, what
might he not expect when he produced his own!
Then he took up the next. Here the critic was more measured in his
praise. The book he pronounced to be on the whole a good and very
nearly a great one, a fine conception fairly worked out, but there was
too strong a tendency in parts to a certain dreamy mysticism (here
Mark began to regret that he had not been more careful over the
proofs), while the general tone was a little too metaphysical, and the
whole marred by even more serious blemishes.
'The author,' continued the reviewer, 'whose style is for the most
part easy and dignified, with a praiseworthy absence of all inflation
or bombast, seems at times to have been smitten by a fatal desire to
"split the ears of the groundlings" and produce an impression by showy
parades of a not overwhelmingly profound scholarship; and the effect
of these contrasts would be grotesque in the extreme, were it not
absolutely painful in a work of such high average merit. What, for
instance, will be thought of the taste of a writer who could close a
really pathetic scene of estrangement between the lovers by such a
sentence as the following?...'
The sentence which followed was one of those which Mark had felt it
due to himself to interpolate. This was but one example, said the
inexorable critic, there were other instances more flagrant still--and
in all of these the astonished Mark recognised his own improvements!
To say that this was for the moment an exceedingly unpleasant shock to
his self-satisfaction is to state a sufficiently obvious fact; but
Mark's character must have been very imperfectly indicated if it
surprises anyone to hear that it did not take him long to recover from
the blow.
Perhaps he had been wrong in grafting his own strong individuality on
an entirely foreign trunk--he had not been careful enough to harmonise
the two styles--it was merely an odd coincidence that the reviewer,
struck naturally enough by the disparity, should have pitched upon
_him_ as the offender. By-and-by he grew to believe it a positive
compliment that the reviewer (no doubt a dull person) had simply
singled out for disapproval all the passages which were out of his
depth--if there had been nothing remarkable about them, they would not
have been noticed at all.
And so, as it is a remarkable peculiarity in the mind of man, that it
can frequently be set at ease by some self-constructed theory which
would not bear its own examination for a minute--as if a quack were to
treat himself with his own bread-pills and feel better--Mark, having
convinced himself that the reviewer was a crass fool whose praise and
blame were to be read conversely, found the wound to his self-love
begin to heal from that moment.
That same Saturday afternoon Mabel was sitting in the little room at
the back of the house, in which she received her own particular
friends, wrote her letters, and read; just then she was engaged in the
latter occupation, for the books had come in from the library that
day, and she had sat down after luncheon to skim them through before
selecting any which seemed worth more careful reading.
* * * * *
Mabel had grown to be fastidious in the matter of fiction, the natural
result of a sense of humour combined with an instinctive appreciation
of style. There had been a time of course, when, released from the
strict censorship of a boarding-school under which all novels on the
very lengthy _index expurgatorius_ had to be read in delicious
stealth, she had devoured eagerly any literature which was in bright
covers and three volumes--but that time was past now.
She could not cry over cheap pathos, or laugh at secondhand humour, or
shudder at sham cynicism any longer--desperate escapes and rescues
moved her not, and she had wearied of beautiful wicked fiends and
effeminate golden-haired guardsmen, who hold a Titanic strength in
reserve as their one practical joke, but the liberty she had enjoyed
had done her no particular harm, even if many mothers might have
thought it their duty to restrict it, which Mrs. Langton was too
languid or had too much confidence in her daughter to think of
attempting.
Mabel had only returned to the works of the great masters of this
century with an appreciation heightened by contrast, and though her
new delight in them did not blind her--as why should it?--to the
lesser lights in whom something may be found to learn or enjoy, she
now had standards by which she could form her opinions of them.
Amongst the books sent in that week was 'Illusion,' a romance by Cyril
Ernstone, and Mabel had looked at its neat grey-green covers and red
lettering with a little curiosity, for somebody had spoken of it to
her the day before, and she took it up with the intention of reading a
chapter or two before going out with her racket into the square, where
the tennis season had already set in on the level corner of the lawn.
But the afternoon wore on, and she remained by the window in a low
wicker chair, indifferent to the spring sunshine outside, to the
attractions of lawn tennis, or the occasional sounds of callers,
reading on with parted lips and an occasional little musical laugh or
involuntary sigh, as Holroyd had once dreamed of seeing his book read
by her.
His strong and self-contained nature had unfolded all its deepest
tenderness and most cherished fancies in that his first book, and the
pages had the interest of a confession. Mabel felt that personal
affection for the unknown writer which to have aroused must be the
crown of crowns to those who love their art.
The faults of style and errors of taste here and there which jarred
upon her were still too rare or too foreign to the general tone of the
book to prejudice her seriously, and she put down the book half
finished, not from weariness but with an unusual desire to economise
the pleasure it gave her.
'I wonder what "Cyril Ernstone" is like,' she thought, half
unconsciously.
Perhaps, by the way, a popular but plain author who finds it
necessary to cultivate society, would discover, if he would go about
veiled or engage a better-looking man to personate him, a speedy
increase in the circulation of his next work, and, if at all sensitive
as to his own shortcomings, he would certainly be spared a
considerable amount of pain, for it is trying for a man who rather
enjoys being idolised to be compelled to act as his own iconoclast.
While Mabel was speculating on the personal appearance of the author
of 'Illusion,' Dolly darted in suddenly. 'Oh, there you are, Mabel,'
she said, 'how lazy of you! Mother thought you were playing tennis,
and some people have called, and she and I had to do all the talking
to them!'
'Come and rest then, Dolly,' said Mabel, putting an arm up and drawing
her down to a low stool by her chair.
'I've got my new sash on,' said Dolly warningly.
'I'll be careful,' said Mabel, 'and I've found a little story in this
book I am going to read to you, Dolly, if you care about it.'
'Not a long story, is it, Mab?' inquired Dolly rather dubiously. But
she finally settled herself comfortably down to listen, with her
bright little face laid against Mabel's side, while she read the
melancholy fate of the sugar fairy prince.
Dolly heard it all out in silence, and with a growing trouble in her
eyes. When it was all over, and the heartless mortal princess had
swallowed the sugar prince, she turned half away and said softly,
'Mabel, that was _me_.'
Mabel laughed. 'What _do_ you mean, Dolly?' she said.
'I thought he was plain sugar,' Dolly protested piteously; 'how was I
to know? I never heard of sugar fairies before. And he did look pretty
at first, but I spilt some tea over him, and the colour got all mixed
up, just as the story says it did, and so I ate him.'
'It's only a story, Dolly, you know; you needn't make yourself unhappy
about it--it isn't true really.'
'But it must be true, it's all put down exactly as it happened.... And
it was me.... I've eaten up a real fairy prince.... Mabel, I'm a
greedy pig. If I hadn't done it, perhaps we could have got him out of
the sugar somehow, and then Colin and I would have had a live fairy to
play with. That's what he expected me to do, and I ate him instead. I
know he was a fairy, Mabel, he tasted so nice.... Poor, poor little
prince!'
Dolly was so evidently distressed that Mabel tried hard to convince
her that the story was about another little girl, the prince was only
a sugar one, and so on; but she did not succeed, until the idea struck
her that a writer whose book seemed to indicate a sympathetic nature
would not object to the trouble of removing the childish fears he had
aroused, and she said: 'Listen, Dolly; suppose you write a letter to
Mr. Ernstone--at his publishers', you know--I'll show you how to
address it, but you must write the rest yourself, and ask him to tell
you if the sugar prince was really a fairy, and then you will know all
about it; but my own belief is, Dolly, that there aren't any
fairies--now, at any rate.'
'If there weren't,' argued Dolly, 'people wouldn't write books about
them. I've seen pictures of them lots of times.'
'And they dance in rows at the pantomime, don't they, Dolly?' said
Mabel.
'Oh, I know _those_ aren't fairies--only thin little girls,' said
Dolly contemptuously. 'I'm not a baby, Mabel, but I _would_ write to
Mr.--what you said just now--only I hate letter-writing so--ink is
such blotty, messy stuff--and I daresay he wouldn't answer after all.'
'Try him, dear,' said Mabel.
Dolly looked obstinate and said nothing just then, and Mabel did not
think it well to refer to the matter again. But the next week, from
certain little affectations of tremendous mystery on Dolly's part, and
the absence of the library copy of 'Illusion' from the morning-room
during one whole afternoon, after which it reappeared in a state of
preternatural inkiness, Mabel had a suspicion that her suggestion was
not so disregarded as it had seemed.
And a few days afterwards Mark found on his breakfast table an
envelope from his publisher, which proved to contain a letter directed
to 'Mr. Ciril Ernstone,' at the office. The letter was written in a
round childish hand, with scrapings here and there to record the fall
of a vanquished blot.
'Dear Mr. Ciril Ernstone,' it ran, 'I want you to tell me
how you knew that I ate that sugar prince in your story,
and if you meant me really. Perhaps you made that part of
it up, or else it was some other girl, but please write
and tell me who it was and all about it, because I do so
hate to think I've eaten up a real fairy without knowing
it.--DOROTHY MARGARET LANGTON.'
This poor little letter made Mark very angry; if he had written the
story he would, of course, have been amused if not pleased by the
naïve testimony to his power; but, as it was, it annoyed him to a
quite unreasonable extent.
He threw Dolly's note pettishly across the table; 'I wish I had cut
that sugar prince story out; _I_ can't tell the child anything about
it. Langton, too--wonder if it's any relation to my Langton--sister of
his, perhaps--_he_ lives at Notting Hill somewhere. Well, I won't
write; if I do I shall put my foot in it somehow.... It's quite likely
that Vincent knew this child. She can't be seriously unhappy about
such a piece of nonsense, and if she is, it's not _my_ fault.'
Mark had never quite lost the memory of that morning in the fog, his
brief meeting with Mabel, and the untimely parting by the hedge.
Subsequent events had naturally done something to efface the
impression which her charm and grace had made upon him then; but even
yet he saw her face at times as clearly as ever, and suffered once
more the dull pain he had felt when he first knew that she had gone
from him without leaving him the faintest hope of being ever
privileged to know her more intimately or even see her again.
Sometimes, when he dreamed most wildly of the brilliant future that
was to come to him, he saw himself, as the author of several famous
and successful works (amongst which 'Illusion' was entirely obscured),
meeting her once more, and marking his sense of her past ingratitude
by a studied coldness. But this was a possibility that never, even in
his most sanguine moments, was other than remote.
If he had but known it, there had long been close at hand--in the
shape of young Langton--a means which, judiciously managed, might have
brought that part of his dream to pass immediately, and now he had
that which would realise it even more surely and effectually.
But he did not know, and let the appeal lie unanswered that was due to
Mabel's suggestion--'the moral of which,' as Alice's Duchess might
say, is that one should never neglect a child's letter.