Abroad with the Jimmies Part 5

"Do American publishers rob all foreign authors as I have been robbed, or am I mistaken in thinking that large numbers of 'Degeneration' have been sold in America?"

Alas, wherever I go in Europe, I am obliged to hear this denunciation of our publishers! I cannot get beyond the sound of it. To hear foreign authors denounce American publishers by every term of opprobrium which could commonly be applied to Barabbas! I was puzzled to know whether they really are the most unscrupulous robbers in creation or if they only have the name of being.

"You are not mistaken in thinking that large numbers of 'Degeneration'

have been sold," I said, "and if your book was properly copyrighted and protected and you did not sign away all your rights to your American publishers for a song, as too many foreign authors do in their scorn of American appreciation of good literature, you should not be obliged to complain, for I distinctly remember that 'Degeneration' often led in the lists of best selling books which our booksellers report at the end of each week."

"Then I will leave you to judge for yourself," said Doctor Nordau. "The entire amount I have received from my American publishers for 'Degeneration' is fifty pounds! That is every sou!"

"Fifty pounds!" cried Jimmie, in consternation. "Why that is only two hundred and fifty dollars of our money!"

"I leave it to you to judge for yourselves," said Doctor Nordau again.

We said nothing, for as Jimmie said after we left, there was really nothing to say.

But evidently our consternation touched him, for he broke out into a big German laugh, saying:

"Don't take it so deeply to heart! You are too sensitive. Do you take the criticisms of your books so deeply to heart as you take a criticism of your countrymen? Don't do it! Remember, there are few critics worth reading."

"I never read them while they are fresh," I admitted. "I keep them until their heat has had time to cool. Then if they are favourable I say, 'This is just so much extra pleasure that, as it is all over. I had no right to expect.' And if they are unfavourable I think, 'What difference does it make? It was published weeks ago and everybody has forgotten it by this time!'"

"You have the right spirit," he said. "Where would I be if I had taken to heart the criticisms of the degenerates on 'Degeneration?' I sit back and laugh at them for holding a hand mirror up to their faces and unconsciously crying out 'I see a fool!' To understand great truths,--and great truths are seldom popular,--one must bring a willing mind. Yet how often it is that the very sick one wishes most to help are the ones who refuse, either from conceit or stupidity, to believe and be healed. Remember this: no one can get out of a book more than he brings to it. Readers of books seldom realise that by their written or spoken criticisms they are displaying themselves in all their weaknesses, all their vanities, all their strength for their hearers to make use of as they will."

"I shouldn't think anything ever would disturb you," said Jimmie, regarding Doctor Nordau's gigantic strength admiringly.

Doctor Nordau laughed.

"It is the little things of this life, my friend, which often disturb a mental balance which is always poised to receive great shocks. The gnat-bites and mosquito buzzings are sometimes harder to bear than an operation with a surgeon's knife."

I looked triumphantly at Jimmie as Doctor Nordau said that, for Jimmie never has got over it that I once dragged the whole party off a train and made them wait until the next one, because the wheels of our railway carriage squeaked. But Jimmie's mind is open to persuasion, especially from one whose opinions he admires as he admires Max Nordau's, for he looked at me with more tolerance, as he said:

"It is the nervous organisation, I suppose. She can bear neuralgia for days at a time which would drive me crazy in an hour, but I've seen her burst into tears because a door slammed."

"Exactly so!" said Doctor Nordau. "I understand perfectly."

"Now, I never hear such noises," pursued Jimmie. "But I suppose there must be _some_ difference between you both, who can write books, and me, who can't even write a letter without dictating it!"

Soon after this we came away, Jimmie beaming with delight over one idol who had not tumbled from his pedestal at a near view.

We were still in the midst of the Paris season. It was very gay and Bee and Mrs. Jimmie had made some amiable friends among the very smartest of the Parisian smart set. When we went to tea or dinner with these people Jimmie and I had to be dragged along like dogs who are muzzled for the first time. Every once in awhile _en route_ we would plant our fore feet and try to rub our muzzles off, but the hands which held our chains were gentle but firm, and we always ended by going.

On one Sunday we were invited to have _dejeuner_ with the Countess S., and as it was her last day to receive she had invited us to remain and meet her friends. At the breakfast there were perhaps sixteen of us and the conversation fell upon palmistry. We had just seen Cheiro in London, and as he had amiably explained a good many of our lines to us, I was speaking of this when the old d.u.c.h.esse de Z. thrust her little wrinkled paw loaded down with jewels across the plate of her neighbour and said:

"Mademoiselle, can you see anything in the lines of my hand?"

I make no pretence of understanding palmistry, but I saw in her hand a queer little mark that Cheiro had explained to us from a chart. I took her hand in mine and all the conversation ceased to hear the pearls of wisdom which were about to drop from my lips. The d.u.c.h.esse was very much interested in the occult and known to be given to table tipping and the invocation of spirits.

"I see something here," I began, hesitatingly, "which looks to me as if you had once been threatened with a great danger, but had been miraculously preserved," I said.

The old woman drew her hand away.

"Humph," she muttered with her mouth full of homard. "I wondered if you would see that. It was a.s.sa.s.sination I escaped. It was enough to leave a mark, eh, mademoiselle?"

"I should think so," I murmured.

The young Count de X. on my right said, in a tone which the d.u.c.h.esse might have heard:

"When she was a young girl, only nineteen, her husband tied her with ropes to her bed and set fire to the bed curtains. Her screams brought the servants and they rescued her."

My fork fell with a clatter.

"What an awful man!" I gasped.

"He was my uncle, mademoiselle!" said the young man, imperturbably, arranging the gardenia in his b.u.t.tonhole, "but as you say, he was a bad lot."

"I beg your pardon!" I exclaimed.

"It is nothing," he answered. "It is no secret. Everybody knows it."

Later in the afternoon I took occasion to apologise to the d.u.c.h.esse for having referred to the subject.

"Why should you be distressed, mademoiselle," said the old woman, peering up into my face from beneath her majenta bonnet with her little watery brown eyes, "such things will go into books and be history a few years hence. We make history, such families as ours," she added, proudly.

I turned away rather bewildered and for an hour or two watched Bee and Mrs. Jimmie being presented to those who called to pay their respects to our hostess. They were of all descriptions and fascinating to a degree.

Finally the d.u.c.h.esse came up to me bringing a lady whom she introduced as the Countess Y.

"She is a compatriot of yours, mademoiselle."

It so happened that Bee and Mrs. Jimmie were standing near me and overheard.

"Ah, you are an American," I said.

"Well," said the countess, moving her shoulders a little uneasily, "I am an American, but my husband does not like to have me admit it."

It was a small thing. She had a right to deny her nationality if she liked, but in some way it shocked the three of us alike and we moved forward as if pulled by one string.

"I think we must be going," said Bee, haughtily.

Jimmie's jaw was so set as we left the house of the countess, and Bee and Mrs. Jimmie looked so disturbed that I suggested that we drive down to the Louvre and take one last look at our treasures. Mine are the Venus de Milo and the Victory, and Jimmie's is the colossal statue of the river Tiber. Jimmie loves that old giant, Father Tiber, lying there with the horn of plenty and dear little Romulus and Remus with their foster mother under his right hand. Jimmie says the _toes_ of the giant fascinate him.

It looked like rain, so we hastily checked our parasols and Jimmie's stick and cut down the left corridor to the stairs, and so on down to the chamber where we left Jimmie and the Tiber to stare each other out of countenance. The rest of us continued our way to the room where the Venus stands enthroned in her silent majesty. We sat down to rest and worship, and then coming up the steps again and mounting another flight, we stood looking across the arcade at the brilliant electric poise of the Victory, and in taking our last look at her, we did not notice that it had gradually grown very dark.

When we came out, rested, uplifted, and calmed as the effect of that glorious Venus always is upon our fretted spirits, we discovered that the most terrific rainstorm was in progress it ever was our luck to behold. The water came down in cataracts and blinding sheets of rain.

Every one except us had been warned by the darkness and had got themselves home. The streets were empty except for the cabs and carriages which skurried by with fares. Our frantic signals and Jimmie's dashes into the street were of no avail.

We would have walked except that Bee and I had colds, and big, beautiful Mrs. Jimmie was subject to croup, which as every one knows is terrible in its attacks upon grown people.

Poor Jimmie ran in every direction in his wild efforts for a carriage, but none was to be had. We waited two hours, then Mrs. Jimmie saw a black covered wagon approaching and she gathered up her skirts and hailed it. The driver obligingly pulled up at the curb.