"I am reluctant," he said, "to decline a manu from you;but you know very well that if you sent me anything like `His Wife's Deceased Sister' it would be most promptly accepted."I now felt obliged to speak of the affair to my wife, who was quite as much surprised, though, perhaps, not quite as much shocked, as I had been.
"Let us read the story again," she said, "and see what is the matter with it." When we had finished its perusal, Hypatia remarked: "It is quite as good as many of the stories you have had printed, and I think it very interesting, although, of course, it is not equal to `His Wife's Deceased Sister.'""Of course not," said I; "that was an inspiration that Icannot expect every day. But there must be something wrong about this last story which we do not perceive. Perhaps my recent success may have made me a little careless in writing it.""I don't believe that," said Hypatia.
"At any rate," I continued, "I will lay it aside, and will go to work on a new one."In due course of time I had another manu finished, and I sent it to my favorite periodical. It was retained some weeks, and then came back to me.
"It will never do," the editor wrote, quite warmly, "for you to go backward. The demand for the number containing `His Wife's Deceased Sister' still continues, and we do not intend to let you disappoint that great body of readers who would be so eager to see another number containing one of your stories."I sent this manu to four other periodicals, and from each of them it was returned with remarks to the effect that, although it was not a bad story in itself, it was not what they would expect from the author of "His Wife's Deceased Sister."The editor of a Western magazine wrote to me for a story to be published in a special number which he would issue for the holidays. I wrote him one of the character and length he desired, and sent it to him. By return mail it came back to me.
"I had hoped," the editor wrote, "when I asked for a story from your pen, to receive something like `His Wife's Deceased Sister,' and I must own that I am very much disappointed."I was so filled with anger when I read this note that Iopenly objurgated "His Wife's Deceased Sister." "You must excuse me," I said to my astonished wife, "for expressing myself thus in your presence, but that confounded story will be the ruin of me yet. Until it is forgotten nobody will ever take anything Iwrite."
"And you cannot expect it ever to be forgotten," said Hypatia, with tears in her eyes.
It is needless for me to detail my literary efforts in the course of the next few months. The ideas of the editors with whom my principal business had been done, in regard to my literary ability, had been so raised by my unfortunate story of "His Wife's Deceased Sister" that I found it was of no use to send them anything of lesser merit. And as to the other journals which I tried, they evidently considered it an insult for me to send them matter inferior to that by which my reputation had lately risen. The fact was that my successful story had ruined me. My income was at an end, and want actually stared me in the face; and I must admit that I did not like the expression of its countenance. It was of no use for me to try to write another story like "His Wife's Deceased Sister." I could not get married every time I began a new manu, and it was the exaltation of mind caused by my wedded felicity which produced that story.
"It's perfectly dreadful!" said my wife. "If I had had a sister, and she had died, I would have thought it was my fault.""It could not be your fault," I answered, "and I do not think it was mine. I had no intention of deceiving anybody into the belief that I could do that sort of thing every time, and it ought not to be expected of me. Suppose Raphael's patrons had tried to keep him screwed up to the pitch of the Sistine Madonna, and had refused to buy anything which was not as good as that.
In that case I think he would have occupied a much earlier and narrower grave than the one on which Mr. Morris Moore hangs his funeral decorations.""But, my dear," said Hypatia, who was posted on such subjects, "the Sistine Madonna was one of his latest paintings.""Very true," said I. "But if he had married as I did, he would have painted it earlier."I was walking homeward one afternoon about this time, when Imet Barbel, a man I had known well in my early literary career.
He was now about fifty years of age, but looked older. His hair and beard were quite gray, and his clothes, which were of the same general hue, gave me the idea that they, like his hair, had originally been black. Age is very hard on a man's external appointments. Barbel had an air of having been to let for a long time, and quite out of repair. But there was a kindly gleam in his eye, and he welcomed me cordially.
"Why, what is the matter, old fellow?" said he. "I never saw you look so woe-begone."I had no reason to conceal anything from Barbel. In my younger days he had been of great use to me, and he had a right to know the state of my affairs. I laid the whole case plainly before him.
"Look here," he said, when I had finished; "come with me to my room; I have something I would like to say to you there."I followed Barbel to his room. It was at the top of a very dirty and well-worn house, which stood in a narrow and lumpy street, into which few vehicles ever penetrated, except the ash and garbage-carts, and the rickety wagons of the venders of stale vegetables.
