Still, it might be as well to hear the opinion of one who had taken the important step, and after breakfast he drew Frank into conversation about Lizzie.

"I am quite happy," he said. "Lizzie is a good wife, and I love her better to-day than the day I married her; but the price I paid for her was too high. Mount Rorke has behaved shamefully, and so has everybody but you. I never see any of the old lot now. Snowdown came once to dine about a year ago, but I never go anywhere where Lizzie is not asked. Mount Rorke has only written once since my marriage, and then it was to say he never wished to see me again. The next I heard was the announcement of his marriage."

"So he has married again," said Mike, looking at Frank, and then he thought--"So you who came from the top shall go to the bottom! Shall he who came from the bottom go to the top?"

"I have not heard yet of a child. I have tried to find out if one is expected; but what does it matter?--Mount Rorke wouldn't give me a penny-piece to save me from starvation, and I should have time to starve a good many times before he goes off the hooks. I don't mind telling you I'm about as hard up as a man possibly can be. I owe three quarters' rent for my rooms in Temple Gardens, nearly two hundred pounds. The Inn is pressing me, and I can't get three hundred for my furniture, and I'm sure I paid more than fifteen hundred for what there is there."

"Why don't you sell a share in the paper?"

"I have sold a small part of it, a very small part of it, a fifth, and there is a fellow called Thigh--you know the fellow, he has edited every stupid weekly that has appeared and disappeared for the last ten years--well, he has got hold of a mug, and by all accounts a real mug, one of the right sort, a Mr. Beacham Brown. Mr. Brown wants a paper, and has commissioned Thigh to buy him one. Thigh wants me to sell a half share in the _Pilgrim_ for a thousand, but I shall have to give Thigh back four hundred; and I shall--that is to say, I shall if I agree to Thigh's terms--become a.s.sistant editor at a salary of six pounds a week; two pounds a week of which I shall have to hand over to Thigh, who comes in as editor at a salary of ten pounds a week. All the staff will be engaged on similar conditions. Thigh is 'working' Beacham Brown beautifully--he won't have a sixpence to bless himself with when Thigh has done with him."

"And are you going to accept Thigh's terms?"

"Not if I can possibly help it. If your articles send up the circulation and my new advertising agent can do the West End tradesmen for a few more advertis.e.m.e.nts, I shall stand off and wait for better terms. My new advertising agent is a wonder, the finest in Christendom. The other day a Bond Street jeweller who advertises with us came into my office. He said, 'Sir, I have come to ask you if you circulate thirty thousand copies a week.' 'Well,' I said, 'perhaps not quite.' 'Then, sir,' he replied, 'you will please return me my money; I gave your agent my advertis.e.m.e.nt upon his implicit a.s.surance that you circulated thirty thousand a week.' I said there must be some mistake; Mr. Tomlinson happens to be in the office, if you'll allow me I'll ask him to step down-stairs. I touched the bell, and told the boy to ask Mr. Tomlinson to step into the office. 'Mr.

Tomlinson,' I said, 'Mr. Page says that he gave you his advertis.e.m.e.nt on our implicit a.s.surance that we circulated thirty thousand copies weekly. Did you tell him that?' Quite unabashed, Tomlinson answered, 'I told Mr. Page that we had more than thirty thousand readers a week. We send to ten line regiments and five cavalry regiments--each regiment consists of, let us say, eight hundred. We send to every club in London, and each club has on an average a thousand members.

Why, sir,' exclaimed Tomlinson, turning angrily on the jeweller, 'I might have said that we had a hundred thousand readers and I should have still been under the mark!' The jeweller paid for his advertis.e.m.e.nt and went away crestfallen. Such a man as Tomlinson is the very bone and muscle of a society journal."

"And the nerves too," said Mike.

"Better than the contributors who want to write about the relation between art and morals."

The young men laughed mightily.

"And what will you do," said Mike, "if you don't settle with Thigh?"

"Perhaps my man will be able to pick up another advertis.e.m.e.nt or two; perhaps your articles may send up the circulation. One thing is certain, things can't go on as they are; at this rate I shall not be able to carry the paper on another six months."

The conversation fell, and Mike remembered the letter in his side pocket; it lay just over his heart. Frank's monetary difficulties had affected his matrimonial aspirations. "For if the paper 'bursts up'

how shall I live, much less support a wife? Live! I shall always be able to live, but to support a wife is quite another matter. Perhaps Lily has some money. If she had five hundred a year I would marry her; but I don't know if she has a penny. She must have some, a few thousands--enough to pay the first expenses. To get a house and get into the house would cost a thousand." A cloud pa.s.sed over his face.

The householder, the payer of rates and taxes which the thought evoked, jarred and caricatured the ideal, the ideal Mike Fletcher, which in more or less consistent form was always present in his mind.

He who had always received, would have to make presents. The engagement ring would cost five-and-twenty pounds, and where was he to get the money? The ring he would have to buy at once; and his entire fortune did not for the moment amount to ten pounds. Her money, if she had any, would pay for the honeymoon; and it was only right that a woman should pay for her honeymoon. They would go to Italy. She was Italy! At least she was his idea of Italy. Italy! he had never been there; he had always intended to keep Italy for his wedding tour. He was virgin of Italy. So much virginity he had at all events kept for his wife. She was the emblem and symbol of Italy.

Venice rose into his eyes. He is in a gondola with her; the water is dark with architrave and pillar; and a half moon floats in a boundless sky But remembering that this is the Venice of a hundred "chromos," his imagination filled the well-known water-way with sunlight and maskers, creating the carnival upon the Grand Ca.n.a.l.

Laughing and mocking Loves; young n.o.bles in blue hose, sword on thigh, as in Shakespeare's plays; young brides in tumultuous satin, with collars of translucent pearls; garlands reflected in the water; scarves thrown about the ample bosoms of patrician matrons. Then the brides, the n.o.bles, the pearls, the loves, and the matrons disappear in a shower of confetti. Wearying of Venice he strove to see Florence, "the city of lilies"; but the phrase only suggested flower-sellers. He intoxicated upon his love, she who to him was now Italy. He imagined confidences, sudden sights of her face more exquisite than the Botticelli women in the echoing picture galleries, more enigmatic than the eyes of a Leonardo; and in these days of desire, he lived through the torment of impersonal love, drawn for the first time out of himself. All beautiful scenes of love from books, pictures, and life floated in his mind. He especially remembered a sight of lovers which he had once caught on an hotel staircase. A young couple, evidently just returned from the theatre, had entered their room; the woman was young, tall, and aristocratic; she was dressed in some soft material, probably a dress of cream-coloured lace in numberless flounces; he remembered that her hair was abundant and shadowed her face. The effect of firelight played over the hangings of the bed; she stood by the bed and raised her fur cloak from her shoulders. The man was tall and thin, and the light caught the points of the short sharp beard. The scene had bitten itself into Mike's mind, and it reappeared at intervals perfect as a print, for he sometimes envied the calm and healthfulness of honourable love.

"Great Scott! twelve o'clock!" Smiling, conscious of the incongruity, he set to work, and in about three hours had finished a long letter, in which he usefully advised "light o' loves" on the advantages of foreign travel.

"I wonder," he thought, "how I can write in such a strain while I'm in love with her. What beastliness! I hate the whole thing. I desire a new life; I have tried vice long enough and am weary of it; I'm not happy, and if I were to gain the whole world it would be dust and ashes without her. Then why not take that step which would bring her to me?" He faced his cowardice angrily, and resolved to post the letter. But he stopped before he had walked fifty yards, for his doubts followed him, buzzing and stinging like bees. Striving to rid himself of them, and weary of considering his own embarra.s.sed condition, he listened gladly to Lizzie, who deplored Mount Rorke's cruelty and her husband's continuous ill luck.

"I told him his family would never receive me; I didn't want to marry him; for days I couldn't make up my mind; he can't say I persuaded him into it."

"But you are happy now; don't you like being married?"

"Oh, yes, I should be happy enough if things only went better with us. He is so terribly unlucky. No one works harder than Frank; he often sits up till three o'clock in the morning writing. He tries everything, but nothing seems to succeed with him. There's this paper. I don't believe he has ever had a penny out of it. Tell me, Mr. Fletcher, do you think it will ever succeed?"

"Newspapers generally fail for want of a concerted plan of appeal to a certain section of society kept steadily in view; they are nearly always vague and undetermined; but I believe when four clever pens are brought together, and write continuously, and with set purpose and idea, that they can, that they must and invariably do create a property worth at least twenty thousand pounds."

"Frank has gone to the station to meet Thigh. I distrust that man dreadfully; I hope he won't rob my poor husband. Frank told me to get a couple of pheasants for dinner. Which way are you going? To the post-office? Do you want a stamp?"

"No, thank you, my letter is stamped." He held the letter in the box unable to loose his fingers, embarra.s.sed in the consideration whether marriage would permit him to develop his artistic nature as he intended. Lizzie was looking at him, and it was with difficulty that he concealed from her the fact that he had not dropped his letter in the box.

When they returned to the cottage they found Thigh and Frank were turning over the pages of the last number of the _Pilgrim_.

"Just let's go through the paper," said Frank. "One, two, three--twelve columns of paragraphs! and I'll bet that in every one of those columns there is a piece of news artistic, political, or social, which no other paper has got. Here are three articles, one written by our friend here, one by me, and one by a man whose name I am not at liberty to mention; but I may tell you he has written some well-known books, and is a constant contributor to the _Fortnightly_; here is a column of gossip from Paris excellently well done; here is a short story ... What do you think the paper wants?"

Thigh was a very small and very neatly-dressed man. His manner was quiet and reserved, and he caressed a large fair moustache with his left hand, on which a diamond ring sparkled.

"I think it wants smartening up all round," he said. "You want to make it smarter; people will have things bright nowadays."

"Bright!" said Frank; "I don't know where you are going for brightness nowadays. Just look at the other papers--here is the _Club_--did you ever see such a rag? Here is the _Spy_--I don't think you could tell if you were reading a number of last year or this week if you didn't look at the date! I've given them up for news. I look to see if they have got a new advertis.e.m.e.nt; if they have, I send Tomlinson and see if I can get one too."

Thigh made some judicious observations, and the conversation was continued during dinner. Frank and Mike vying with each other to show their deference to Thigh's literary opinions--Lizzie eager to know what he thought of her dinner.

Thigh said the turbot was excellent, that the cutlets were very nice, that the birds were splendid; the jam pudding was voted delicious.

And they leaned back in their chairs, their eyes filled with the torpor of digestion. Frank brought out a bottle of old port, the last of a large supply which he had had from Mount Rorke's wine merchant.

The pleasure of the wine was in their stomachs, and under its influence they talked of Tennyson, Leonardo da Vinci, Corot, and the _Ingoldsby Legends_. The servant had brought in the lamp, cigars were lighted, the clock struck nine. As yet not a word had been spoken of the business, and seeing that Mike was deep in conversation with Lizzie, Frank moved his chair towards Thigh, and said--

"Well, what about buying half of the paper?"

"I'm quite ready to buy half the paper on the conditions I've already offered you."

"But they won't do. If I have to go smash, I may as well go smash for a large sum as a small one. To clear myself of debts I must have five hundred pounds."

"Well, you'll get six hundred; you'll receive a thousand and you'll give me back four hundred."

"Yes, but I did not tell you that I have sold a small share in the paper to an old schoolfellow of mine. When I have paid him I shall have only two hundred, and that won't be of the slightest use to me."

"Oh, you have sold part of the paper already, have you? How do you know your friend will consent to be bought out? That complicates matters."

"My friend only did it to oblige me; he is only too anxious to be bought out. He is in a fearful funk lest he should be compromised in a libel action."

"Oh, then I think it can be managed. Were I in your place I should try and get rid of him for nothing. I can't offer you better terms; it wouldn't pay me to do so; I might as well start a new paper."

"Yes, but tell me, how can I get rid of him for nothing?"

Thigh looked at Frank inquiringly, and apparently satisfied he drew his chair nearer, stroked his moustache, and said, speaking under his breath--

"Have you collected what money is owing to the paper lately? Have you many outstanding debts?"

"We have got some."

"Well, don't collect any money that is owing, but make out a long statement of the paper's liabilities; don't say a word about the outstanding debts, and tell your friend that he is responsible as part owner of the paper for this money. When you have sufficiently frightened him, suggest that he should sign over his share to you, you being a man of straw whom it would be useless to proceed against.

Or you might get your printer to press you for money--"

"That won't be difficult."

"Offer him a bill, and then mix the two accounts up together."

At this moment Mike was speaking to Lizzie of love. She told him there was no real happiness except in married life, a.s.sured him that though they might be beggars to-day, she would not give up her husband for all the wealth of the three kingdoms.