New Grub Street

‘Rather more so, you think?’

She hesitated.

‘It depends, of course, on—on several things.’

‘To be sure,’ Jasper agreed. ‘I don’t think they have any marked faculty for such work; but as they certainly haven’t for teaching, that doesn’t matter. It’s a question of learning a business. I am going through my apprenticeship, and find it a long affair. Money would shorten it, and, unfortunately, I have none.’

‘Yes,’ said Marian, turning her eyes upon the stream, ‘money is a help in everything.’

‘Without it, one spends the best part of one’s life in toiling for that first foothold which money could at once purchase. To have money is becoming of more and more importance in a literary career; principally because to have money is to have friends. Year by year, such influence grows of more account. A lucky man will still occasionally succeed by dint of his own honest perseverance, but the chances are dead against anyone who can’t make private interest with influential people; his work is simply overwhelmed by that of the men who have better opportunities.’

‘Don’t you think that, even to-day, really good work will sooner or later be recognised?’

‘Later, rather than sooner; and very likely the man can’t wait; he starves in the meantime. You understand that I am not speaking of genius; I mean marketable literary work. The quantity turned out is so great that there’s no hope for the special attention of the public unless one can afford to advertise hugely. Take the instance of a successful all-round man of letters; take Ralph Warbury, whose name you’ll see in the first magazine you happen to open. But perhaps he is a friend of yours?’

‘Oh no!’

‘Well, I wasn’t going to abuse him. I was only going to ask: Is there any quality which distinguishes his work from that of twenty struggling writers one could name? Of course not. He’s a clever, prolific man; so are they. But he began with money and friends; he came from Oxford into the thick of advertised people; his name was mentioned in print six times a week before he had written a dozen articles. This kind of thing will become the rule. Men won’t succeed in literature that they may get into society, but will get into society that they may succeed in literature.’

‘Yes, I know it is true,’ said Marian, in a low voice.

‘There’s a friend of mine who writes novels,’ Jasper pursued. ‘His books are not works of genius, but they are glaringly distinct from the ordinary circulating novel. Well, after one or two attempts, he made half a success; that is to say, the publishers brought out a second edition of the book in a few months. There was his opportunity. But he couldn’t use it; he had no friends, because he had no money. A book of half that merit, if written by a man in the position of Warbury when he started, would have established the reputation of a lifetime. His influential friends would have referred to it in leaders, in magazine articles, in speeches, in sermons. It would have run through numerous editions, and the author would have had nothing to do but to write another book and demand his price. But the novel I’m speaking of was practically forgotten a year after its appearance; it was whelmed beneath the flood of next season’s literature.’

Marian urged a hesitating objection.

‘But, under the circumstances, wasn’t it in the author’s power to make friends? Was money really indispensable?’

‘Why, yes—because he chose to marry. As a bachelor he might possibly have got into the right circles, though his character would in any case have made it difficult for him to curry favour.

But as a married man, without means, the situation was hopeless. Once married you must live up to the standard of the society you frequent; you can’t be entertained without entertaining in return. Now if his wife had brought him only a couple of thousand pounds all might have been well. I should have advised him, in sober seriousness, to live for two years at the rate of a thousand a year. At the end of that time he would have been earning enough to continue at pretty much the same rate of expenditure.’

‘Perhaps.’

‘Well, I ought rather to say that the average man of letters would be able to do that. As for Reardon—’

He stopped. The name had escaped him unawares.

‘Reardon?’ said Marian, looking up. ‘You are speaking of him?’

‘I have betrayed myself Miss Yule.’

‘But what does it matter? You have only spoken in his favour.’

‘I feared the name might affect you disagreeably.’

Marian delayed her reply.

‘It is true,’ she said, ‘we are not on friendly terms with my cousin’s family. I have never met Mr Reardon. But I shouldn’t like you to think that the mention of his name is disagreeable to me.’

‘It made me slightly uncomfortable yesterday—the fact that I am well acquainted with Mrs Edmund Yule, and that Reardon is my friend. Yet I didn’t see why that should prevent my making your father’s acquaintance.’

‘Surely not. I shall say nothing about it; I mean, as you uttered the name unintentionally.’

There was a pause in the dialogue. They had been speaking almost confidentially, and Marian seemed to become suddenly aware of an oddness in the situation. She turned towards the uphill path, as if thinking of resuming her walk.

‘You are tired of standing still,’ said Jasper. ‘May I walk back a part of the way with you?’

‘Thank you; I shall be glad.’

They went on for a few minutes in silence.

‘Have you published anything with your signature, Miss Yule?’ Jasper at length inquired.

‘Nothing. I only help father a little.’

The silence that again followed was broken this time by Marian.

‘When you chanced to mention Mr Reardon’s name,’ she said, with a diffident smile in which lay that suggestion of humour so delightful upon a woman’s face, ‘you were going to say something more about him?’

‘Only that—’ he broke off and laughed. ‘Now, how boyish it was, wasn’t it? I remember doing just the same thing once when I came home from school and had an exciting story to tell, with preservation of anonymities. Of course I blurted out a name in the first minute or two, to my father’s great amusement. He told me that I hadn’t the diplomatic character. I have been trying to acquire it ever since.

‘But why?’

‘It’s one of the essentials of success in any kind of public life. And I mean to succeed, you know. I feel that I am one of the men who do succeed. But I beg your pardon; you asked me a question. Really, I was only going to say of Reardon what I had said before: that he hasn’t the tact requisite for acquiring popularity.’

‘Then I may hope that it isn’t his marriage with my cousin which has proved a fatal misfortune?’

‘In no case,’ replied Milvain, averting his look, ‘would he have used his advantages.’

‘And now? Do you think he has but poor prospects?’

‘I wish I could see any chance of his being estimated at his right value. It’s very hard to say what is before him.’

‘I knew my cousin Amy when we were children,’ said Marian, presently. ‘She gave promise of beauty.’

‘Yes, she is beautiful.’

‘And—the kind of woman to be of help to such a husband?’

‘I hardly know how to answer, Miss Yule,’ said Jasper, looking frankly at her. ‘Perhaps I had better say that it’s unfortunate they are poor.’

Marian cast down her eyes.

‘To whom isn’t it a misfortune?’ pursued her companion. ‘Poverty is the root of all social ills; its existence accounts even for the ills that arise from wealth. The poor man is a man labouring in fetters. I declare there is no word in our language which sounds so hideous to me as “Poverty.”’

Shortly after this they came to the bridge over the railway line. Jasper looked at his watch.

‘Will you indulge me in a piece of childishness?’ he said. ‘In less than five minutes a London express goes by; I have often watched it here, and it amuses me. Would it weary you to wait?’