CHAPTER X.
A FIRST OFFENCE.
When Harry Ringrose vowed that he would get something into a magazinewithin a week, he simply meant that he would write something and get ittaken by some editor. But even so he had no conception of the oddsagainst him. Few beginners can turn out acceptable matter at a day'snotice, and fewer editors accept within the week. Fortune, however,often favours the fool who rushes in.
Harry began wisely by deciding to make his first offering poetical, forverses of kinds he had written for years, and besides, they would comequicker if they came at all. Undoubted indolence is also discernible inthis choice, but on the whole it was the sound one, and that veryevening saw Harry set to work in a spirit worthy of a much olderliterary hand.
He found among the books the selected poems of Shelley which he hadbrought home some mid-summers before as a prize for his Englishexamination. His own language was indeed the only one for which poorHarry had shown much aptitude, though for a youth who had scribbled forhis school magazine, and formed the habit of shedding verses in histhirteenth year, he was wofully ill-read even in that. Let it beconfessed that he took down his Shelley with the cynical and shamelessintention of seeking what he might imitate in those immortal pages. Theredeeming fact remains that he read in them for hours without oncerecalling his impious and immoral scheme.
It was years since he had dipped into the book, and its contents causedhim naive astonishment. He had read a little poetry in his desultoryway. Tennyson he loved, and Byron he had imitated at school But in allhis adventurings on the AEgean seas of song, he had never chanced uponsuch a cluster of golden islets as the lyrics in this selection. Theepic mainland had always less attraction for him. He found it demand aconcentrative effort, and Harry was very sorry and even ashamed, but heloved least to read that way. So he left "Alastor" and "The Witch ofAtlas" untouched and untried, and spent half the night in ecstasiesover such discoveries as the "Indian Serenade" and "Love's Philosophy."These were the things for him; the things that could be written out onhalf a sheet of notepaper or learnt in five minutes; the things heloved to read, and would have died to write.
He forgot his proposed revenge; he forgot his uttered vow. He forgotthe sinister design with which he had taken up his Shelley, and it waspure love of the lines that left him, when he had blown out his candle,saying his last-learnt over to himself:
"Rarely, rarely, comest thou, Spirit of Delight! Wherefore hast thou left me now Many a day and night? Many a weary night and day 'Tis since thou art fled away.
How shall ever one like me Win thee back again? With the joyous and the free Thou wilt scoff at pain. Spirit false! thou hast forgot All but those who need thee not.
As a lizard with the shade Of a trembling leaf, Thou with sorrow art dismayed----"
Here he stuck fast and presently fell asleep, to think no more of ittill he was getting up next morning. He was invaded with a dimrecollection of this poem while the water was running into his bath. Ashe took his plunge, the lines sprang out clear as sunshine after rain,and the man in the bath made a discovery.
They were not Shelley's lines at all. They were his own.
At breakfast he was distraught. Mrs. Ringrose complained. Harry pulledout an envelope, made a note first, and then his apology. Mrs. Ringrosereturned as usual to her room, but Harry did not follow her with hispipe. He went to his own room instead, and sat down on the unmade bed,with a pencil, a bit of paper, and a frightful furrow between hisdowncast eyes. In less than half-an-hour, however, the thing was done:a highly imitative effort in the manner of those verses which he hadbeen saying to himself last thing the night before.
The matter was slightly different: the subject was dreams, not delight,and instead of "Spirit of Delight," the dreams were apostrophised as"Spirits of the Night." Then the form of the stanza was freshened up alittle: the new poet added a seventh line, rhyming with the second andfourth, while the last word of the fifth was common to all the stanzas,and necessitated a new and original double-rhyme in the sixth line ofeach verse. Harry found a rhyming dictionary (purchased in hisschool-days for the benefit of the school magazine) very handy in thisconnection. It was thus he made such short work of his rough draft. Butthe fair copy was turned out (in the sitting-room) in even quickertime, and a somewhat indiscreet note written to the Editor of _UncleTom's Magazine_, though not on the lines which Mrs. Ringrose had oncesuggested. A "stamped directed envelope" was also prepared, andenclosed in compliance with _Uncle Tom's_ very explicit "Notice toContributors." Then Harry stole down and out, and posted his missivewith a kind of guilty pride: after all, the deed itself had been a gooddeal less cold-blooded than the original intention.
Mrs. Ringrose knew nothing. She had seen Harry scribble on an envelope,and that was all. She knew how the boy blew hot and cold, and she didhim the injustice of concluding he had renounced his vow, but thekindness of never voicing her conclusion. Yet his restless idleness,and a something secretive in his manner, troubled her greatly duringthe next few days, and never more than on the Saturday morning, whenHarry came in late for breakfast and there was a letter lying on hisplate.
"You seem to have been writing to yourself," said Mrs. Ringrose, as shelooked suspiciously from Harry to the letter.
"To myself?" he echoed, and without kissing her he squeezed round thetable to his place.
"Yes; that's your writing, isn't it? And it looks like one of myenvelopes!"
It was both. Harry stood gazing at his own superscription, and weighingthe envelope with his eye. He was afraid to feel it. It looked too thinto contain his verses. It was too thin! Between finger and thumb itfelt absolutely empty. He tore it open, and read on a printed slip thesweetest words his eyes had ever seen.
"The Editor of _Uncle Tom's Magazine_ has great pleasure in acceptingfor publication----"
The title of the verses (a very bad one) was filled in below, the datebelow that, and that was all.
"Oh, mother, they've accepted my verses!"
"Who?"
"_Uncle Tom's Magazine._"
"Did you actually send some verses to _Uncle Tom_?"
"Yes, on Tuesday, the day after Uncle Spencer was here. I've done whatI said I'd do. He'll see I'm not such an utter waster after all."
"And you--never--told--me!"
His mother's eyes were swimming. He kissed them dry, and began to makelight of his achievement.
"Mother, I couldn't. I didn't know what you would think of them. Ididn't think much of them myself, nor do I now. The verses in _UncleTom_ are not much. And then--I thought it would be a surprise."
"Well, it wouldn't have been one if I had known you had sent them,"said Mrs. Ringrose; and now she was herself again. "I only hope, myboy," she added, "that they will pay you something."
"Of course they will. _Uncle Tom_ must have an excellent circulation."
"Then I hope they'll pay you something handsome. Did you tell theEditor how long we have taken him in?"
"Mother!"
"Then I've a great mind to write and tell him myself. I am sure itwould make a difference."
"Yes; it would make the difference of my getting the verses back byreturn of post," said Harry, grimly.
Mrs. Ringrose looked hurt, but gave way on the point, and bade him goon with his breakfast. Harry did so with the _Uncle Tom_ acceptancespread out and stuck up against the marmalade dish, and one eye was onit all the time. Afterwards he went to his room and read over the roughdraft of his verses, which he had not looked at since he sent themaway. He could not help thinking a little more of them than he hadthought then. He wondered how they would look in print, and referred toone of the bound _Uncle Toms_ to see.
"Well, have you brought them?" said Mrs. Ringrose when he could keepaway from her no longer.
"The verses? No, dear, I have only a very rough draft of them, whichyou couldn't possibly read; and I could never read them to you--Ireally couldn't."
"Not to your own
mother?"
He shook his head. He was also blushing; and his diffidence in thematter was not the less genuine because he was swelling all the timewith private pride. Mrs. Ringrose did not press the point. Thepecuniary side of the affair continued to interest her very much.
"Do you think fifty?" she said at length, with considerable obscurity;but her son knew what she was talking about.
"Fifty what?"
"Pounds!"
"For my poor little verses? You little know their length! They are onlyforty-two lines in all."
"Well, what of that? I am sure I have heard of such sums being givenfor a short poem."
"Well, they wouldn't give it for mine. Fifty shillings, more like."
"No, no. Say twenty pounds. They could never give you less."
Harry shook his head and smiled.
"A five-pound note, at the very outside," said he, oracularly. "Butwhatever it is, it'll be one in the eye for the other uncle! Upon myword, I think we must go to his church to-morrow evening."
"It will mean going in to supper afterwards, and you know you didn'tlike it last time."
"I can lump it for the sake of scoring off Uncle Spencer!"
But that was more easily said than done, especially, so to speak, onthe "home ground," where a small but exclusively feminine and entirelyspiritless family sang a chorus of meek approval to the reverendgentleman's every utterance. When, therefore, Mr. Walthew added to hismelancholy congratulations a solemn disparagement of all the lightermagazines (which he boasted were never to be seen in his house), theecho from those timid throats was more galling than the speech itself.But when poor Mrs. Ringrose ventured only to hint at her innocentexpectations as to the honorarium, and her brother actually laughedoutright, and his family made equally merry, then indeed was Harrypunished for the ignoble motives with which he had attended his uncle'schurch.
"My good boy," cried Uncle Spencer, with extraordinary geniality, "youwill be lucky if you get a sixpence! I say again that I congratulateyou on the prospect of getting into print at all. I say again that eventhat is not less a pleasure than a surprise to me. But I would notdelude myself with pecuniary visions until I could write seriousarticles for the high-class magazines!"
Between his mother's presentiments and his uncle's prognostications,the contributor himself endeavoured to strike a happy medium; but evenhe was disappointed when an afternoon post brought a proof of theverses, together with a postal order for ten-and-sixpence. Harry showedit to his mother without a word, and for the moment they both lookedglum. Then the boy burst out laughing, and the lady followed suit.
"And I had visions of a fiver," said Harry.
"Nay, but I was the worst," said his mother, who was laughing andcrying at the same time. "I said twenty!"
"It only shows how much the public know about such things.Ten-and-six!"
"Well, my boy, that's better than what your uncle said. How long did ittake you to write?"
"Oh, not more than half an hour. If it comes to that, the money wasquickly earned."
For a minute and more Mrs. Ringrose gazed steadily at an upper sash,which was one's only chance of seeing the sky through the windows ofthe flat. Her lips were tightly pursed; they always were when she wasin the toils of a calculation.
"A thousand a year!" she exclaimed at length.
"What do you mean, mother?"
"Well, if this poem only took you half an hour, you might easily turnout half a dozen a day. That would be three guineas. Three guineas aday would come to over a thousand a year."
Harry laughed and kissed her.
"I'll see what I can do," he said; "but I'm very much afraid half adozen a week will be more than I can manage. Three guineas a week wouldbe splendid. I shouldn't have to go round begging for work any more;they would never give me half as much in an office. Heigho! Here arethe verses for you to read."
He put on his hat, and went into the High Street to cash his order. Itwas the first money his pen had ever earned him in the open market,and, since the sum seemed to Harry too small to make much difference,he determined to lay out the whole of it in festive and appropriate, ifunjustifiable fashion. The High Street shops met all his wants. At onehe bought a ninepenny tin of mulligatawny, and a five-and-ninepennybottle of Perrier Jouet; at another, some oyster patties and meringuesand half a pound of pressed beef (cut in slices), which came tohalf-a-crown between them. The remaining shilling he spent onstrawberries and the odd sixpence on cream. He would have nothing sent,so we may picture a triumphant, but rather laborious return to theflat.
He found his mother in tears over the proofs of his first verses; sheshed more when he showed her how he had spent his first honorarium. Yetshe was delighted; there had been very little in the house, but nowthey would be able to do without the porter's wife to cook, and wouldbe all by themselves for their little treat. No one enjoyed what sheloved to call a "treat" more than Mrs. Ringrose; and perhaps even inthe best of days she had never had a greater one than that now givenher by her extravagant son. It was unexpected, and, indeed,unpremeditated; it had all the elements of success; and for one shortevening it made Harry's mother almost forget that she was also the wifeof a fraudulent and missing bankrupt.
Harry, too, was happier than he had been for many a day. In the courseof the evening he stole innumerable glances at his proof, wonderingwhat this friend or that would think of the verses when they came outin _Uncle Tom_. Once it was through Lowndes's spectacles that he triedto look at them, more than once from Mr. Innes's point of view, butmost often with the sterling grey eyes of the girl on Richmond Hill,who had so earnestly begged him to write. He had heard nothing of herfrom that evening to this; her father had not mentioned her in the oneletter Harry had received from him, and neither of them had been nearthe flat. But he believed that Fanny Lowndes would like the verses; heknew that she would encourage him to go on.
And go on he did, with feverish energy, for the next few days. But thegood luck did not repeat itself too soon; for though the first taste ofprinter's ink gave the lad energy, so that within a week he hadshowered verses upon half the magazines in London, all those versesreturned like the dove to the ark, because it did not also bring himgood ideas, and his first success had spoilt him a little by costing noeffort. Even _Uncle Tom_ would have no more of him; and the unhappyHarry began to look upon his imitation of Shelley as the mere fluke itseemed to have been.