In a tone of easy indifference Jasper explained how he came to be accompanying Miss Yule.
Shall I walk on with you, father? Marian asked, scrutinising his rugged features.
Just as you please; I dont know that I should have gone much further. But we might take another way back.
Jasper readily adapted himself to the wish he discerned in Mr Yule; at once he offered leave-taking in the most natural way. Nothing was said on either side about another meeting.
The young man proceeded homewards, but, on arriving, did not at once enter the house. Behind the garden was a field used for the grazing of horses; he entered it by the unfastened gate, and strolled idly hither and thither, now and then standing to observe a poor worn-out beast, all skin and bone, which had presumably been sent here in the hope that a little more labour might still be exacted from it if it were suffered to repose for a few weeks. There were sores upon its back and legs; it stood in a fixed attitude of despondency, just flicking away troublesome flies with its grizzled tail.
It was tea-time when he went in. Maud was not at home, and Mrs Milvain, tormented by a familiar headache, kept her room; so Jasper and Dora sat down together. Each had an open book on the table; throughout the meal they exchanged only a few words.
Going to play a little? Jasper suggested when they had gone into the sitting-room.
If you like.
She sat down at the piano, whilst her brother lay on the sofa, his hands clasped beneath his head. Dora did not play badly, but an absentmindedness which was commonly observable in her had its effect upon the music. She at length broke off idly in the middle of a passage, and began to linger on careless chords. Then, without turning her head, she asked:
Were you serious in what you said about writing storybooks?
Quite. I see no reason why you shouldnt do something in that way. But I tell you what; when I get back, Ill inquire into the state of the market. I know a man who was once engaged at Jolly & Monksthe chief publishers of that kind of thing, you know; I must look him upwhat a mistake it is to neglect any acquaintance!and get some information out of him. But its obvious what an immense field there is for anyone who can just hit the taste of the new generation of Board school children. Mustnt be too goody-goody; that kind of thing is falling out of date. But youd have to cultivate a particular kind of vulgarity.
Theres an idea, by-the-bye. Ill write a paper on the characteristics of that new generation; it may bring me a few guineas, and it would be a help to you.
But what do you know about the subject? asked Dora doubtfully.
What a comical question! It is my business to know something about every subjector to know where to get the knowledge.
Well, said Dora, after a pause, theres no doubt Maud and I ought to think very seriously about the future. You are aware, Jasper, that mother has not been able to save a penny of her income.
I dont see how she could have done. Of course I know what youre thinking; but for me, it would have been possible. I dont mind confessing to you that the thought troubles me a little now and then; I shouldnt like to see you two going off governessing in strangers houses. All I can say is, that I am very honestly working for the end which I am convinced will be most profitable.
I shall not desert you; you neednt fear that. But just put your heads together, and cultivate your writing faculty. Suppose you could both together earn about a hundred a year in Grub Street, it would be better than governessing; wouldnt it?
You say you dont know what Miss Yule writes?
Well, I know a little more about her than I did yesterday. Ive had an hours talk with her this afternoon.
Indeed?
Met her down in the Leggatt fields. I find she doesnt write independently; just helps her father. What the help amounts to I cant say. Theres something very attractive about her. She quoted a line or two of Tennyson; the first time I ever heard a woman speak blank verse with any kind of decency.
She was walking alone?
Yes. On the way back we met old Yule; he seemed rather grumpy, I thought. I dont think shes the kind of girl to make a paying business of literature. Her qualities are personal. And its pretty clear to me that the valley of the shadow of books by no means agrees with her disposition. Possibly old Yule is something of a tyrant.
He doesnt impress me very favourably. Do you think you will keep up their acquaintance in London?
Cant say. I wonder what sort of a woman that mother really is? Cant be so very gross, I should think.
Miss Harrow knows nothing about her, except that she was a quite uneducated girl.
But, dash it! by this time she must have got decent manners. Of course there may be other objections. Mrs Reardon knows nothing against her.
Midway in the following morning, as Jasper sat with a book in the garden, he was surprised to see Alfred Yule enter by the gate.
I thought, began the visitor, who seemed in high spirits, that you might like to see something I received this morning.
He unfolded a London evening paper, and indicated a long letter from a casual correspondent. It was written by the authoress of On the Boards, and drew attention, with much expenditure of witticism, to the conflicting notices of that book which had appeared in The Study. Jasper read the thing with laughing appreciation.
Just what one expected!
And I have private letters on the subject, added Mr Yule.
There has been something like a personal conflict between Fadge and the man who looks after the minor notices. Fadge, more so, charged the other man with a design to damage him and the paper. Theres talk of legal proceedings. An immense joke!
He laughed in his peculiar croaking way.
Do you feel disposed for a turn along the lanes, Mr Milvain?
By all means.Theres my mother at the window; will you come in for a moment?
With a step of quite unusual sprightliness Mr Yule entered the house. He could talk of but one subject, and Mrs Milvain had to listen to a laboured account of the blunder just committed by The Study. It was Alfreds Yules characteristic that he could do nothing lighthandedly. He seemed always to converse with effort; he took a seat with stiff ungainliness; he walked with a stumbling or sprawling gait.
When he and Jasper set out for their ramble, his loquacity was in strong contrast with the taciturn mood he had exhibited yesterday and the day before. He fell upon the general aspects of contemporary literature.
... The evil of the time is the multiplication of ephemerides. Hence a demand for essays, descriptive articles, fragments of criticism, out of all proportion to the supply of even tolerable work. The men who have an aptitude for turning out this kind of thing in vast quantities are enlisted by every new periodical, with the result that their productions are ultimately watered down into worthlessness.... Well now, theres Fadge. Years ago some of Fadges work was not without a certaina certain conditional promise ofof comparative merit; but now his writing, in my opinion, is altogether beneath consideration; how Rackett could be so benighted as to give him The Studyespecially after a man like Henry Hawkridgepasses my comprehension. Did you read a paper of his, a few months back, in The Wayside, a preposterous rehabilitation of Elkanah Settle? Ha! Ha! Thats what such men are driven to. Elkanah Settle! And he hadnt even a competent acquaintance with his paltry subject. Will you credit that he twice or thrice referred to Settles reply to Absalom and Achitophel by the title of Absalom Transposed, when every schoolgirl knows that the thing was called Achitophel Transposed! This was monstrous enough, but there was something still more contemptible. He positively, I assure you, attributed the play of Epsom Wells to Crowne! I should have presumed that every student of even the most trivial primer of literature was aware that Epsom Wells was written by Shadwell.... Now, if one were to take Shadwell for the subject of a paper, one might very well show how unjustly his name has fallen into contempt. It has often occurred to me to do this. But Shadwell never deviates into sense. The sneer, in my opinion, is entirely unmerited. For my own part, I put Shadwell very high among the dramatists of his time, and I think I could show that his absolute worth is by no means inconsiderable. Shadwell has distinct vigour of dramatic conception; his dialogue....