The Descent of Man and Other Stories. Edith Wharton

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СКАЧАТЬ to wage their final battle; and for the moment he had no doubt of the outcome. The next day he went to town to see Harviss. He wanted to ask for an advance on the new popular edition of "The Vital Thing." He had determined to drop a course of supplementary lectures at the University, and to give himself up for a year to his book. To do this, additional funds were necessary; but thanks to "The Vital Thing" they would be forthcoming.

      The publisher received him as cordially as usual; but the response to his demand was not as prompt as his previous experience had entitled him to expect.

      "Of course we'll be glad to do what we can for you, Linyard; but the fact is, we've decided to give up the idea of the new edition for the present."

      "You've given up the new edition?"

      "Why, yes—we've done pretty well by 'The Vital Thing,' and we're inclined to think it's your turn to do something for it now."

      The Professor looked at him blankly. "What can I do for it?" he asked—"what more" his accent added.

      "Why, put a little new life in it by writing something else. The secret of perpetual motion hasn't yet been discovered, you know, and it's one of the laws of literature that books which start with a rush are apt to slow down sooner than the crawlers. We've kept 'The Vital Thing' going for eighteen months—but, hang it, it ain't so vital any more. We simply couldn't see our way to a new edition. Oh, I don't say it's dead yet—but it's moribund, and you're the only man who can resuscitate it."

      The Professor continued to stare. "I—what can I do about it?" he stammered.

      "Do? Why write another like it—go it one better: you know the trick. The public isn't tired of you by any means; but you want to make yourself heard again before anybody else cuts in. Write another book—write two, and we'll sell them in sets in a box: The Vital Thing Series. That will take tremendously in the holidays. Try and let us have a new volume by October—I'll be glad to give you a big advance if you'll sign a contract on that."

      The Professor sat silent: there was too cruel an irony in the coincidence.

      Harviss looked up at him in surprise.

      "Well, what's the matter with taking my advice—you're not going out of literature, are you?"

      The Professor rose from his chair. "No—I'm going into it," he said simply.

      "Going into it?"

      "I'm going to write a real book—a serious one."

      "Good Lord! Most people think 'The Vital Thing' 's serious."

      "Yes—but I mean something different."

      "In your old line—beetles and so forth?"

      "Yes," said the Professor solemnly.

      Harviss looked at him with equal gravity. "Well, I'm sorry for that," he said, "because it takes you out of our bailiwick. But I suppose you've made enough money out of 'The Vital Thing' to permit yourself a little harmless amusement. When you want more cash come back to us—only don't put it off too long, or some other fellow will have stepped into your shoes. Popularity don't keep, you know; and the hotter the success the quicker the commodity perishes."

      He leaned back, cheerful and sententious, delivering his axioms with conscious kindliness.

      The Professor, who had risen and moved to the door, turned back with a wavering step.

      "When did you say another volume would have to be ready?" he faltered.

      "I said October—but call it a month later. You don't need any pushing nowadays."

      "And—you'd have no objection to letting me have a little advance now? I need some new instruments for my real work."

      Harviss extended a cordial hand. "My dear fellow, that's talking—I'll write the cheque while you wait; and I daresay we can start up the cheap edition of 'The Vital Thing' at the same time, if you'll pledge yourself to give us the book by November.—How much?" he asked, poised above his cheque-book.

      In the street, the Professor stood staring about him, uncertain and a little dazed.

      "After all, it's only putting it off for six months," he said to himself; "and I can do better work when I get my new instruments."

      He smiled and raised his hat to the passing victoria of a lady in whose copy of "The Vital Thing" he had recently written:

      Labor est etiam ipsa voluptas.

THE OTHER TWO

       Table of Contents

      I

      WAYTHORN, on the drawing-room hearth, waited for his wife to come down to dinner.

      It was their first night under his own roof, and he was surprised at his thrill of boyish agitation. He was not so old, to be sure—his glass gave him little more than the five-and-thirty years to which his wife confessed—but he had fancied himself already in the temperate zone; yet here he was listening for her step with a tender sense of all it symbolized, with some old trail of verse about the garlanded nuptial door-posts floating through his enjoyment of the pleasant room and the good dinner just beyond it.

      They had been hastily recalled from their honeymoon by the illness of Lily Haskett, the child of Mrs. Waythorn's first marriage. The little girl, at Waythorn's desire, had been transferred to his house on the day of her mother's wedding, and the doctor, on their arrival, broke the news that she was ill with typhoid, but declared that all the symptoms were favorable. Lily could show twelve years of unblemished health, and the case promised to be a light one. The nurse spoke as reassuringly, and after a moment of alarm Mrs. Waythorn had adjusted herself to the situation. She was very fond of Lily—her affection for the child had perhaps been her decisive charm in Waythorn's eyes—but she had the perfectly balanced nerves which her little girl had inherited, and no woman ever wasted less tissue in unproductive worry. Waythorn was therefore quite prepared to see her come in presently, a little late because of a last look at Lily, but as serene and well-appointed as if her good-night kiss had been laid on the brow of health. Her composure was restful to him; it acted as ballast to his somewhat unstable sensibilities. As he pictured her bending over the child's bed he thought how soothing her presence must be in illness: her very step would prognosticate recovery.

      His own life had been a gray one, from temperament rather than circumstance, and he had been drawn to her by the unperturbed gayety which kept her fresh and elastic at an age when most women's activities are growing either slack or febrile. He knew what was said about her; for, popular as she was, there had always been a faint undercurrent of detraction. When she had appeared in New York, nine or ten years earlier, as the pretty Mrs. Haskett whom Gus Varick had unearthed somewhere—was it in Pittsburgh or Utica?—society, while promptly accepting her, had reserved the right to cast a doubt on its own discrimination. Inquiry, however, established her undoubted connection with a socially reigning family, and explained her recent divorce as the natural result of a runaway match at seventeen; and as nothing was known of Mr. Haskett it was easy to believe the worst of him.

      Alice Haskett's remarriage with Gus Varick was a СКАЧАТЬ