The Way We Live Now, Anthony Trollope [good story books to read .txt] 📗

morning she went to her publishers, and was closeted for half an hour with the senior partner, Mr. Leadham. “I’ve got it all in black and white,” she said, full of the wrong which had been done her, “and can prove him to be wrong. It was in 1522 that the man first came to Paris, and he couldn’t have been her lover before that. I got it all out of the Biographie Universelle. I’ll write to Mr. Alf myself⁠—a letter to be published, you know.”

“Pray don’t do anything of the kind, Lady Carbury.”

“I can prove that I’m right.”

“And they can prove that you’re wrong.”

“I’ve got all the facts⁠—and the figures.”

Mr. Leadham did not care a straw for facts or figures⁠—had no opinion of his own whether the lady or the reviewer were right; but he knew very well that the Evening Pulpit would surely get the better of any mere author in such a contention. “Never fight the newspapers, Lady Carbury. Who ever yet got any satisfaction by that kind of thing? It’s their business, and you are not used to it.”

“And Mr. Alf is my particular friend! It does seem so hard,” said Lady Carbury, wiping hot tears from her cheeks.

“It won’t do us the least harm, Lady Carbury.”

“It’ll stop the sale?”

“Not much. A book of that sort couldn’t hope to go on very long, you know. The Breakfast Table gave it an excellent lift, and came just at the right time. I rather like the notice in the Pulpit, myself.”

“Like it!” said Lady Carbury, still suffering in every fibre of her self-love from the soreness produced by those Juggernaut’s car-wheels.

“Anything is better than indifference, Lady Carbury. A great many people remember simply that the book has been noticed, but carry away nothing as to the purport of the review. It’s a very good advertisement.”

“But to be told that I have got to learn the A.B.C. of history⁠—after working as I have worked!”

“That’s a mere form of speech, Lady Carbury.”

“You think the book has done pretty well?”

“Pretty well;⁠—just about what we hoped, you know.”

“There’ll be something coming to me, Mr. Leadham?”

Mr. Leadham sent for a ledger, and turned over a few pages and ran up a few figures, and then scratched his head. There would be something, but Lady Carbury was not to imagine that it could be very much. It did not often happen that a great deal could be made by a first book. Nevertheless, Lady Carbury, when she left the publisher’s shop, did carry a cheque with her. She was smartly dressed and looked very well, and had smiled on Mr. Leadham. Mr. Leadham, too, was no more than man, and had written⁠—a small cheque.

Mr. Alf certainly had behaved badly to her; but both Mr. Broune of the Breakfast Table, and Mr. Booker of the Literary Chronicle, had been true to her interests. Lady Carbury had, as she promised, “done” Mr. Booker’s New Tale of a Tub in the Breakfast Table. That is, she had been allowed, as a reward for looking into Mr. Broune’s eyes, and laying her soft hand on Mr. Broune’s sleeve, and suggesting to Mr. Broune that no one understood her so well as he did, to bedaub Mr. Booker’s very thoughtful book in a very thoughtless fashion⁠—and to be paid for her work. What had been said about his work in the Breakfast Table had been very distasteful to poor Mr. Booker. It grieved his inner contemplative intelligence that such rubbish should be thrown upon him; but in his outside experience of life he knew that even the rubbish was valuable, and that he must pay for it in the manner to which he had unfortunately become accustomed. So Mr. Booker himself wrote the article on the Criminal Queens in the Literary Chronicle, knowing that what he wrote would also be rubbish. “Remarkable vivacity.” “Power of delineating character.” “Excellent choice of subject.” “Considerable intimacy with the historical details of various periods.” “The literary world would be sure to hear of Lady Carbury again.” The composition of the review, together with the reading of the book, consumed altogether perhaps an hour of Mr. Booker’s time. He made no attempt to cut the pages, but here and there read those that were open. He had done this kind of thing so often, that he knew well what he was about. He could have reviewed such a book when he was three parts asleep. When the work was done he threw down his pen and uttered a deep sigh. He felt it to be hard upon him that he should be compelled, by the exigencies of his position, to descend so low in literature; but it did not occur to him to reflect that in fact he was not compelled, and that he was quite at liberty to break stones, or to starve honestly, if no other honest mode of carrying on his career was open to him. “If I didn’t, somebody else would,” he said to himself.

But the review in the Morning Breakfast Table was the making of Lady Carbury’s book, as far as it ever was made. Mr. Broune saw the lady after the receipt of the letter given in the first chapter of this tale, and was induced to make valuable promises which had been fully performed. Two whole columns had been devoted to the work, and the world had been assured that no more delightful mixture of amusement and instruction had ever been concocted than Lady Carbury’s Criminal Queens. It was the very book that had been wanted for years. It was a work of infinite research and brilliant imagination combined. There had been no hesitation in the laying on of the paint. At that last meeting Lady Carbury had been very soft, very handsome, and very winning; Mr. Broune had given the order with good will, and it had been obeyed in the same feeling.

Therefore, though the crushing had been very real, there had also been some elation; and as a net result, Lady