The Call of the Town Part 17

She was still the bright, attractive young woman he had grown suddenly conscious of a few years ago. Nothing had been whispered of "engagement," but she had indicated in many unmistakable little ways that she regarded Henry's future as bound up with her own. Yet he now began to wonder if he were wise to let things drift on as they were shaping. He wondered, and let things drift. Flo was quite clear in her mind that they were "as good as engaged." She understood that the woman who hesitates is lost.

Mr. P. was away from Laysford for the winter, the second he had spent in London and on the Continent since Henry and he became acquainted, when the journalist had the first real glimpse into the mysteriousness of his friend.

While compiling his weekly column of literary gossip for the _Leader_--a feature which more than one director had stigmatised as shameful waste of good s.p.a.ce that might have been filled with real news or market reports--Henry found a short paragraph in the personal column of a London weekly which made him stare at the print:

"I understand that Adrian Grant, whose book 'Ashes' was so widely discussed last autumn, is the pen-name of a Mr. Phineas Pudifant, a country gentleman who is well known in certain select circles of London's literary and musical world. His previous novel, 'The Corrupter,' published two years before 'Ashes,' had a distinct artistic success; but the great popularity of his later book was as remarkable as it was unexpected and unsought. Adrian Grant is essentially a writer for art's sake, and not for so much per thousand words."

Henry doubted the evidence of his eyes as he read the startling news.

The journal in which the paragraph appeared, and the _chroniqueur_ responsible for it, were noted for the authoritative character of their information, and he knew that such a statement could not have been made so deliberately unless it were true to the facts. The very misspelling of the name was in its favour. There were queer names in England, but Mr. P.'s was especially odd, and even wrongly spelt it retained its peculiarity. Still, it was a tremendous strain on his mind to accept the statement as accurate. Never, so far as he could remember, had Mr. P.

given him cause to couple his name with that of the author of "Ashes,"

but after the first shock of surprise, he began to recall how warmly his reticent friend had defended the book on the evening when they first met. It must be true, and now his wonder was that "Adrian Grant"--he began to think of him under the more euphonious name--could have suppressed "the natural man," which is in every author and prides him on the work of his pen. The mysterious Mr. P. had deepened in mystery; the more Henry's acquaintance with him progressed, the less he knew him.

Henry was tempted to make a paragraph out of this newly acquired information, and to add thereto some references of a local nature which would have been widely quoted from the _Leader_. But he had second thoughts that the subject of the paragraph would not be pleased, and heroically he restrained himself, avoiding all mention of the matter.

The ordinary person who has no means other than word of mouth for advertising abroad some choice bit of gossip that has come his way, can but vaguely estimate the personal restraint which the journalist possessed of a t.i.t-bit of news must exercise in keeping the information to himself. It is the journalist's business to blab, and he is as fidgety as a woman with a secret. Henry, however, had the consolation that perhaps after all the statement might not be correct. There were frequent cases of coincidence in the most absurd cognomens.

He had to nurse his mystery for the remainder of that winter and into the early summer, as Mr. P. remained away from Laysford, and his movements for a time were quite unknown even to Mrs. Arkwright, who usually received periodical cheques for reserving his rooms while he was absent. A brief note to that lady early in the year had explained that her well-paying guest would be longer in returning than he had intended, as he was making a stay of some months in Sardinia. Another paragraph with the name properly spelt had found its way into the newspaper where Henry saw the first. The second was even briefer, and merely mentioned that Mr. P. was at present staying in the Mediterranean island, "where probably some scenes in his next novel would be laid."

Doubt as to the ident.i.ty of Adrian Grant had finally left Henry's mind, and he had even persuaded himself that there were many pa.s.sages both in "The Corrupter" and "Ashes" which revealed the man behind the book. It is surprisingly easy to find the man in his style when you start by knowing him.

And now the man himself was back in Laysford once more. Henry heard the strains of his 'cello before he met the player again. It was a Sat.u.r.day night, and Mr. P. had come downstairs for a chat with him.

"You must have thought that I had gone away for good," he said, after warmly greeting his young friend. "I had it often on my mind to write, but I am a bad correspondent. The most of my time away I spent in Sardinia. My mother was a native of that country, and I find it most interesting."

"I had heard you were making a prolonged stay there. Indeed, I saw some mention of your movements in the _Weekly Review_."

Henry thought this an adroit remark, and fancied it must lead to a confession, but his companion merely inclined his head as if he had not quite caught the words, and went on:

"Ah, but Browning has expressed with grand simplicity the impulse that sends the wanderer back--'Oh, to be in England now that April's there!'"

The chance had gone, "conversational openings" were valueless to one pitted against Adrian Grant. Henry fumbled nervously among the commonplaces of speech, and his friend, with scarcely another reference to himself, was presently making the young journalist talk of--Henry Charles.

"You seem to have been burning the midnight oil too a.s.siduously, I think. A trifle paler than when I saw you last. Still grinding away, I suppose."

"Yes; it is grinding. I have moments when I think journalism sheer hack-work. The glamour of the thing is as delusive as the _ignis fatuus_."

"And there you have life itself. _Ergo_, to journalise is to live."

"I begin to believe you are right, but I could have wished to make the discovery later."

"It's never too early to know the truth. But come, you are surely thriving professionally, for I heard your study of the Bronte's which you wrote for the _Lyceum_ highly praised by the editor when I was in London last week."

"That is indeed welcome news. You know Swainton, then?"

"A little. You see, I have done some work for him myself. The fact is--"

"Are you Adrian Grant?"

Henry blurted out the question and eyed his friend eagerly, nervously, ashamed of his clumsiness and desperate to have done with it. Without a tremor of his eyelids the other replied:

"Since you put it so bluntly--I am. But I have peculiar ideas of authorship, and you will search my rooms in vain for any book or article I have written. My conception of literature is an artistic expression of what life has told me. I say my say and have done with that work. I say it as it pleases my artistic sense, and I pa.s.s to some other phase of life that attracts me and asks me to express it. To the profession of letters I have no strong attachment. To live is better than to write. I know some Sardinian peasants who are kings compared with Tennyson--yes, I will say Tennyson."

Henry was dumb at the vagaries of the man.

"The craft of letters," he went on, "I know only as a branch of life, and far from the n.o.blest."

Adrian Grant could make a thousand pounds, perhaps two, out of any novel he now cared to write. The thought flashed through Henry's mind and left confusion in its tract. What were fame, success, fortune, if one who had won them set such small store thereby?

"I have no wish to be a.s.sociated with my books," he continued. "The reverse. All great art should be anonymous. Think of the precious sculptures of Greece, the work of unknown men who knew that the joy of expressing truth was immortal fame. It is a stupid convention of a stupid age that a book should bear an author's name. My own name is scarcely pleasant to eye or ear; but I do not quarrel with a scurvy trick of Fate. It tickets the man, and that is enough. My pen-name has served its purpose in securing a sort of impersonal appeal for my books, which cease to be mine once the printer has done his work. You will never, I hope, identify me with my works in anything you may write. I am taking steps to prevent such senseless twaddle about Adrian Grant as appeared in the _Weekly Review_ from becoming general. Who betrayed my secret I know not."

"You will find it difficult to contradict."

"No doubt, but once contradicted by my solicitors, who shall be able to swear to its truth?"

"But why suppress truth, since your aim is to express it?" asked Henry laughingly.

"Ah, there we have to use the word in its common commercial sense. The truth that my name is what it is, and the truth that life is an Armageddon, a phantasmagoria, have no relationship."

Mr. P. had risen to the pa.s.sionate height of his unforgotten first meeting with Henry, whose mind was now swaying in a chaos of wild and whirling thought at the touch of this strange creature.

"But there," exclaimed the novelist savagely, "let us talk of simpler things," and he threw himself into the chair he had vacated to pace the room. "You say you are less enamoured of your work than you used to be.

I can understand it, and I should like to help you. From what I have seen of you, the more literary work of a high-cla.s.s journal would suit you better; give you the chance to express yourself--if you have anything to express--and I think you have some sense of style, though your ideas are deplorably British--that is to say, Philistine."

"Do you really think I might succeed in London?" Henry asked, ignoring the sneer at his ideas.

"Succeed as the world accounts success, most probably. You have the dogged British quality of sticking to a thing, or you'd never have been where you are so soon. But it's soulless work churning out this political twaddle."

"I realise that, and I'm no politician; only one by force, so to speak.

You see, I write for a living."

"A terrible condition, but there is worse. Well, there is some zest, at least, in getting into handgrips with London. If you've a stomach for the fray, I could help. The whole scheme of life there is different. The provinces have nothing to compare with it, as you would soon discover."

"But I believe it would be best to try my fortune as soon as I could."

"Yes, it's well to know the worst early," and Mr. P. gave a melancholy smile. "If you care, I shall mention you to Swainton of the _Lyceum_. I have some influence with him, I fancy; and he knows you already as a promising contributor."

"I should be most grateful," said Henry, not without misgivings.

But his mind was now trained direct on London, his earliest ambition. He had made his way with surprising quickness in the provinces, and still he was not happy.

"Who is happy?" asked his friend. "Call no man happy until he is dead!--Solon was at his wisest there."

"Happiness is worth pursuing, all the same," Henry returned, lamely enough, since he allowed the pagan fallacy to pa.s.s unquestioned. "I shan't be happy till I try my luck in London; and if not then--well, we'll see."

Truly, his mind was seriously unsettled by the spell of this man's strange personality.

Henry's eyes were turned to London, but he was soon to find that there was one person who did not relish the prospect, for reasons of her own.