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THE PLOT THAT FAILED
Among the most promising residents of Dumfries Corners some ten years ago was a certain Mr. Richard Partington Smithers, whose brilliant début and equally sudden extinguishment in the field of literary endeavor have given rise from time to time to no little discussion. He was young, very young, indeed, at the time of his great literary success, and his friends and neighbors prophesied great things for him. Yet nothing has since come from his pen, and many have wondered why.
Thanks to Mr. Smithers himself I am enabled to make public the story of his sudden withdrawal from the ranks of the immortals when on the very threshold of the temple of fame.
Ten years have changed his point of view materially, and an experience that once seemed tragedy to him is now in his eyes sufficiently tinged with comedy, and his own position among us is so secure that he is willing that the story of his failure should go forth.
After trying many professions Smithers had become a man of schemes. He devised plans that should enrich other people. Unfortunately, he sold these to other people on a royalty basis, and so failed to grow rich himself. If he had only sold his plans outright and collected on the spot he might sometime have made something; but this he did not do, and as a consequence he rarely made anything that was at all considerable, and finally, to keep the wolf out of his dining-room, he was forced to take up poetry, that being in his estimation the last as well as the easiest resource of a well-ordered citizen.
"I always threatened to take up poetry when all else had failed me," he said to himself; "therefore I will now proceed to take up poetry. Writing is purely manual labor, anyhow. Given a pad, a pencil, and perseverance—three very important p's—and I can produce a fourth, a poem, in short order. Sorry I didn't get to the end of my other ropes before, now that I think of it."
And so he sat down and took up poetry.
He put it down again, however, very quickly.
"Dear me!" he ejaculated. "Now, who'd have thought that? Here I have the pencil and the pad and the perseverance, but I'm hanged if the poem is quite as easy as I had supposed. These little conceits aren't so easy to write, after all, even when they contain no ideas. Of course, it isn't hard to say:
"'Sweet month of May, time of the violet wild,
The dandelion golden, and the mild
Ethereal sweetness of the blossoming trees,
The soft suggested calor of the breeze,
The ruby-breasted robin on the lawn,
The thrushes piping sweetly at the dawn,
The gently splashing waters by the weir,
The rose- and lilac-laden atmosphere'—
"because, after all, it's nothing but a catalogue of the specialties of May; but how the dickens to wind the thing up is what puzzles me. It's too beautiful and truly poetic to be spoiled by a completing couplet like:
"'And in the distant dam the croaking frog
Completes, O May, thy wondrous catalogue.'
"Nobody would take a thing like that—and pay for it; but what else can be said? What do the violets wild, the dandelion, the ruby-breasted robin, and the lilac-laden atmosphere and other features all do, I'd like to know? What one of many verbs—oh, tut! Poetry very evidently is not in my line, after all. I'll turn the vials of my vocabulary upon essay-writing."
Which Partington, as his friends called him, proceeded at once to do. He applied himself closely to his desk for one whole morning, and wrote a very long paper on "The Tendency of the Middle Ages Towards Artificialism." Hardly one of the fifteen thousand words employed by him in the construction of this paper held fewer than five syllables, and one or two of them got up as high as ten, a fact which led Partington to think that the editor of the South American Quarterly Review ought at least to have the refusal of it. Apparently the editor of the South American Quarterly Review was only too eager to have the refusal of it, because he refused it, or so Partington observed in confidence to an acquaintance, in less time than it could possibly have taken him to read it. After that the essay became emulous of men like Stanley and Joe Cook. It became a great traveller, but never failed to get back in safety to its fond parent, Richard Partington Smithers, as our hero now called himself. Finally, Partington did manage to realize something on his essay—that is to say, indirectly—for after "The Tendency of the Middle Ages Towards Artificialism" had gone the rounds of all the reviews, monthlies, dailies, and weeklies in the country, its author pigeon-holed it, and, stringing together the printed slips it had brought back to him upon the various occasions of its return, he sent these under the head of "How Editors Reject" to an evening journal in Boston, whose readers could know nothing of the subject, for reasons that are familiar to those who are acquainted with American letters. For this he not only received the editor's thanks, but a six months' subscription to the journal in question—the latter of which was useful, since every night, excluding Sundays, its columns contained much valuable information on such subjects as "How to Live on Fifty Dollars a Year," "How to Knit an Afghan with One Needle," and "How Not to Become a Novelist."
Discouraged by the fate of his essay, Partington endeavored to get a position on a railway somewhere as a conductor or brakeman; but failing in this, he returned once more to his writing-table and wrote a novel. This was the hardest work he had ever attempted. It took him quite a week to think his story out and put it together; but when he had it done he was glad he had stuck conscientiously to it, for the results really seemed good to him. The book was charmingly written, he thought; so charming, in fact, that he did not think it necessary to have a type-written copy made of it before sending it out to the publishers. Possibly this was a mistake. For a time Partington really believed it was a mistake, because the publisher who saw it first returned it without comment, prejudiced against it, no doubt, by the fact that it came to him in the author's autograph. The second publisher was not so rude. He said he would print it if Partington would advance one thousand dollars to protect him against loss. The third publisher evidently thought better of the book, for he only demanded protection to the amount of seven hundred and fifty dollars, which, of course, Partington could not pay; and in consequence False but Fair never saw the light of day as a published book.
"Is it rejected because of its length, its breadth, or what?" he had asked the last publisher who had turned his back on the book.
"Well, to tell you the truth, Mr. Smithers," the publisher had answered, "all that our readers had to say about it—and the three who read it agreed unanimously—was that the book is immature. You do not write like an adult."
"Thanks," said Partington, as he bowed himself out. "If that's the truth, I'll try writing for juveniles. I'll sit right down to-night and knock off a short story about 'Tommy and the Huckleberry-tree.' I don't know whether huckleberries grow on trees or on huckles, but that will make the tale all the more interesting. If they don't grow on trees people will regard the story as romance. If they do grow on trees it will be realism."
True to his promise, that night Partington did write a story, and it was, as he had said it should be, about "Tommy and the Huckleberry-tree"; and so amusing did it appear to the editor of that eminent juvenile periodical, Nursery Days, because of what he supposed was the author's studied ignorance on the subject of huckleberries, that it was accepted instanter, and the name of Richard Partington Smithers shortly appeared in all the glory of type.
Partington walked on air for at least a week after his effusion appeared in print. He had visions night and day in which he seemed to see himself the centre of the literary circle, and as he promenaded the avenue in the afternoons he felt almost inclined to stop people who passed him by to tell them who he was, and thus enable them to feast their eyes on one whose name would shortly become a household word. All reasonable young authors feel this way after their first draught at the soul-satisfying spring of publicity. It is only that preposterous young person who was born tired who fails to experience the sensations that were Partington's that week; and at the end of the week, again like the reasonable young author, he began to realize that immortality could not be gained by one story treating of a fictitious Tommy and an imaginary huckleberry-tree, and so he sat himself down at his desk once more, resolved this time to clinch himself, as it were, in the public mind, with a tale of "Jimmie and the Strawberry-mine." This story did not come as easily as the other. In fact, Partington found it impossible to write more than a third of the second tale that night. He couldn't bring his mind down to it exactly, probably because his mind had been soaring so high since the publication of his first effusion. For diversion as much as for anything else during a lull in his flow of language he penned a short letter to the editor of Nursery Days, and announced his intention to send the story of "Jimmie and the Strawberry-mine" to him shortly—which was unfortunate. If he had finished the story first and then sent it, it might have been good enough to convince the editor against his judgment that he ought to have it. A concrete story can often accomplish more than an abstract idea. In this event it could not have accomplished less, anyhow, for the editor promptly replied that he did not care for a second story of that nature. There was no particular evidence in hand, he said, that the children liked stories of that kind particularly, adding that the first was only an experiment that it was not necessary to repeat, and so on; polite, but unmistakably valedictory.
"No evidence in hand that they are liked, eh? Well, how on earth, I wonder," Partington said, angrily, to himself, "do they ever find evidence that things are liked? Do they go about asking subscribers, or what?"
And then he picked up the issue of Nursery Days that had started him along on his way to immortality, to console himself, at all events, with the sight of his published story. In turning over the leaves of the periodical his eye fell upon a page across the top of which ran a highly ornate cut which indicated that there was printed the "Post-office Department of Nursery Days," on perusing which Partington found a number of communications and editorial responses like these:
I
"DEAR POSTMASTER,—I have been taking Nursery Days since Christmas, so I thought I would write you a letter. My birthday came a week ago Thursday. I received a watch and chain, a glove-buttoner, a penknife, and a set of ivory jackstraws. We have a cat at home whose name is Rumpelstiltzken. He is very sleepy, and sleeps all day. He always picks out the most comfortable chair, and then feels very much injured if we turn him out. I like Bolivar Wiggins's story in your last paper very much. Are you going to have any more stories by Bolivar Wiggins?
"Your little friend, "HELEN CHECKERBY, aged seven.
"[We hope soon to have a new story from Mr. Wiggins, Helen. We wish we could see your cat. He seems a very sensible cat.—EDITOR Nursery Days.]"
II
"CANADA.
I am a little girl nearly ten years old, and as I like your paper very much I thought you would like a letter from me. Here is a cow's head I drew. It is not very good, but I wanted to see if I would get a prize or not. I have two little sisters; their names are Jennie and Fanny. I hope I will see my letter in print. The stories I like best are Bolivar Wiggins's story about 'Solemn Sophy' and his other one about 'Bertie's Balloon.' Have you any more stories by him? I must close now, so good-bye.
"LILLIAN JAMES.
"[Several, Lillian. Your cow is beautiful, and perhaps some day it will appear in this column. Watch carefully, and maybe you will see it.—EDITOR Nursery Days.]"
"Ah!" said Partington, softly, as he read these effusions. "That is why Bolivar Wiggins is permitted to cover so much space, eh? The children like his stories well enough to write letters about him—or perhaps Bolivar himself—ah!"
The second "ah" uttered by Partington indicated that a thought had flashed across his mind—a thought not particularly complimentary to Bolivar Wiggins.
"Perhaps," he said, slowly, "Bolivar writes these letters to the editor himself—and if Bolivar, why not I?"
It was a tempting—alas, too tempting—opportunity to supply the editor of Nursery Days with the needed evidence that stories of the "Tommy and the Huckleberry-tree" order were the most popular literary novelty of the day, and to it, in a moment of weakness, Partington succumbed. I regret to have to record the fact that he passed the balance of the night writing letters from fictitious "Sallies, aged six," "Warry and Georgie, twins, aged twelve," and others dwelling in widely separated sections of the country, to the number of at least two dozen, all of which, being an expert penman, Partington wrote in a diversity of juvenile hands that was worthy of a better cause. Here are two samples of the letters he wrote that night:
I
"NORWICH, CONNECTICUT.
"I have taken the Nursery Days for one year, and think it is a very nice paper. For pets I have two cats, named Lady Tompkins and Jimpsey. I have tried to solve the 'Caramel Puzzle,' but think one answer is wrong. I go to school, and there are forty-four scholars in my room. My little kitty Jimpsey sleeps all day long, and at night she is playful. She wakes me up in the morning, and then waits till I get up. Who is Mr. Smithers who wrote that beautiful story about 'Tommy and the Huckleberry-tree'? Everybody of all ages, from baby to my grandmother, likes it and hopes you will print more by that author.
"SARAH WINKLETOP."
II
"YONKERS, N.Y.
"Our Uncle Willie in New York sends us Nursery Days every week. We like it immensely, and every one tries to get the first reading of it. "Tommy and the Huckleberry-tree" is a splendid story. Papa bought six copies of Nursery Days with that in it to send to my little cousins in England.
"JIMMIE CONWAY RHODES."
Others were more laudatory of Partington's story, some less so, but each demanded more of his work.
These written, Partington made arrangements to have them posted from the various towns wherein they were ostensibly written, and then, when they had been posted, he chuckled slightly and sat down to await developments.
It took a trifle over one week for developments to develop, and then they developed rapidly. Just eight days after his conception of this magnificent scheme the postman whistled at Partington's door and left this note:
OFFICE OF NURSERY DAYS,NEW YORK, March 16, 1889.
"Richard Partington Smithers, Esq.:
"DEAR SIR,—Can you call upon me some afternoon this week? Yours truly,
THOMAS JACKSON TORPYHUE,"Editor Nursery Days."
"The bait is good, and I'll land the fish at once," said Partington, his face wreathing with smiles. "I'll call upon Mr. Thomas Jackson Torpyhue."
And call he did. Two hours later he entered the sanctum of the editor of Nursery Days.
"Good-afternoon," he said, as he sat down at the editor's side.
"Good-afternoon, Mr. Smithers," said Mr. Torpyhue. "I'm very glad to see you."
"I thought you'd be," began Partington, forgetting himself for a moment in his triumph. "If that wasn't evidence enough that I—ah– oh—er—ah! Ahem! Why, certainly," he continued, suddenly recalling the fact that as yet he could properly have no knowledge of the evidence in question.
The editor threw his head back and laughed, and Partington forced himself to join him, nervously withal.
"You have heard of the evidence have you?" asked Mr. Torpyhue.
Partington gasped faintly, and said he thought not.
"Well, it's very strange, Mr. Smithers," said Mr. Torpyhue, "but do you know that you have developed into one of our most popular authors?"
"Indeed?" queried Partington, pulling himself together and trying to appear gratified.
"Yes, sir. Here is a bundle of twenty-four letters all received within three days. One of the letters calls you the best writer of short stories of the day. Another, from Canada, written by a parent, says that you have written one of the most delightful bits of juvenile humor that he has seen in forty years."
"How extremely flattering!" said Partington, faintly.
"Yes, extremely," assented the editor, dryly. "And now, Mr. Smithers, I'm going to do for you what this paper has never done even to its most popular author in the past."
"Now, my dear Mr. Torpyhue," began Partington, gaining courage, "I beg you not to feel called upon to discriminate against your old favorites in my favor. Your present rates of payment are entirely satisfac—"
"You misunderstand me, Mr. Smithers," interrupted Mr. Torpyhue. "What I'm going to do to you that I never before have done even to our most popular author is to return to you at once every one of those highly entertaining manuscripts you have favored us with—we receive so many real letters from real children that, of course, we cannot afford to buy from you purely fictitious ones. These of yours are excellently well done, but you see my point. One does not pay for things that can be had gratis. Perhaps later you will try us with something else," he added, with a grin.
Here Mr. Torpyhue paused, and Partington tried to think of something to say. It was all so sudden, however, and, in spite of his misgivings, so extremely unexpected, that his breath was taken away. He had neither breath nor presence of mind enough left even to deny the allegation, and when he did recover his breath he found himself walking dejectedly down the stairs of the Nursery Days building with his bundle of encomia in his hands.
"I wonder how he caught on!" he groaned, as half an hour later he entered his room and threw himself face downward on his couch.
Investigation after dinner gave him a clue.
Not one of the letters had been mailed from the town in which it had been dated. The envelope containing the Washington letter bore the Boston postmark. The Brooklyn missive had been sent from Chicago, that from Norwich had been posted at Yonkers, and vice versa, and so on through the whole list. Each and every one had, through some evil chance, started wrong. In addition to this, Partington found that in a forgetful moment he had appended to two of the communications an editorial response promising more work from Mr. Smithers.
"I must have been muddled by my success with 'Tommy and the Huckleberry-tree,'" he sighed, as he cast the documents into the fire. "If that's the effect literary honors have on me I'd better quit the profession, which leaves only two things to be done. I shall have to commit one of two crimes—suicide or matrimony. The question now is, which?"
He thought deeply for a moment, and then, putting on his hat and overcoat, he turned off the gas and left the room.
"I'll call on Harris, borrow a cent from him, and let the toss decide," he said, as he passed out into the night.
Is it really any wonder that Mr. Smithers has given up literature?
THE BASE INGRATITUDE OF BARKIS, M.D
The time has arrived when it is possibly proper that I should make a note of the base ingratitude of Barkis, M.D. I have hesitated to do this hitherto for several reasons, any one of which would prove a valid excuse for my not doing so. To begin with, I have known Barkis ever since he was a baby. I have tossed him in the air, to his own delight and to the consternation of his mother, who feared lest I should fail to catch him on his way down, or that I should underestimate the distance between the top of his head and the ceiling on his way up. Later I have held him on my knee and told him stories of an elevating nature—mostly of my own composition—and have afterwards put these down upon paper and sold them to syndicates at great profit. So that, in a sense, I am beholden to Barkis for some measure of my prosperity. Then, when Barkis grew older, I taught him the most approved methods of burning his fingers on the Fourth of July, and when he went to college I am convinced that he gained material aid from me in that I loaned him my college scrap-books, which contained, among other things, a large number of examination papers which I marvel greatly to-day that I was ever able successfully to pass, and which gave to him some hint as to the ordeal he was about to go through. In his younger professional days, also, I have been Barkis's friend, and have called him up, to minister to a pain I never had, at four o'clock in the morning, simply because I had reason to believe that he needed four or five dollars to carry him through the ensuing hours of the day.
Quotation books have told us that in love, as well as in war, all is fair, and if this be true Barkis's ingratitude, the narration of which cannot now give pain to any one, becomes, after all, nothing more than a venial offence. I do not place much reliance upon the ethics of quotation books generally, but when I remember my own young days, and the things I did to discredit the other fellow in that little affair which has brought so much happiness into my own life, I am inclined to nail my flag to the masthead in defence of the principle that lovers can do no wrong. It is no ordinary stake that a lover plays for, and if he stacks the cards, and in other ways turns his back upon the guiding principles of his life, blameworthy as he may be, I shall not blame him, but shall incline rather towards applause.
On the other hand, something is due to the young ladies in the case, and as much for their sake as for any other reason have I set upon paper this narrative of the man's ingratitude, simply telling the story and drawing no conclusions whatever.
Barkis was not endowed with much in the way of worldly possessions. His father had died when the lad was very young, and had left the boy and his mother to struggle on alone. But there was that in both of them which enabled the mother to feel that the boy was worth struggling for, and the boy at a very early age to realize the difficulties of the struggle, and to like the difficulties because they afforded him an opportunity to help his mother either by not giving her unnecessary trouble or in bringing to her efforts in their mutual behalf aid of a very positive kind.
Boys of this kind—and in saying this I cast no reflections whatsoever upon that edifying race of living creatures whom I admire and respect more than any other—are so rare that it did not take the neighbors of the Barkis family many days to discover that the little chap was worth watching, and if need be caring for in a way which should prove substantial. There are so many ways, too, in which one may help a boy without impairing his self-reliance that on the whole it was not very difficult to assist Barkis. So when one of his neighbors employed him in his office at a salary of eight dollars a week, when other boys received only four for similar service, the lad, instead of feeling himself favored, assumed an obligation and made himself worth five times as much as the other boys, so that really his employer, and not he, belonged to the debtor class.
Some said it was a pity that little Barkis wasted his talents in a real estate office, but they were the people who didn't know him. He expended his nervous energy in the real estate office, but his mind he managed to keep free for the night school, and when it came to the ultimate it was found that little Barkis had wasted nothing. He entered college when several other boys—who had not served in a real estate office, who had received diplomas from the high-school, and who had played while he had studied—failed.
That his college days were a trial to his mother every one knew. She wished him to keep his end up, and he did—and without spending all that his mother sent him, either. The great trouble was that at the end of his college course it was understood that Barkis intended studying medicine. When that crept out the neighbors sighed. They deprecated the resolve among themselves, but applauded the boy's intention to his face.
"Good for you, Jack!" said one. "You are just the man for a doctor, and I'll give you all my business."
This man, of course, was a humorist.
Another said: "Jack, you are perfectly right. Real estate and coal are not for you. Go in for medicine; when my leg is cut off you shall do the cutting."
To avoid details, however, some of which would make a story in themselves, Jack Barkis went through college, studied medicine, received his diploma as a full-fledged M.D., and settled down at Dumfries Corners for practice. And practice did not come! And income was not.
It was plainly visible to the community that Barkis was hard up, as the saying is, and daily growing more so. To make matters worse, it was now impossible to help him as the boy had been helped. He was no longer a child, but a man; and the pleasing little subterfuges, which we had employed to induce the boy to think he was making his way on his own sturdy little legs, with the man were out of the question. His clothing grew threadbare, and there were stories of insufficient nourishment. As time went on the outward and visible signs of his poverty increased, yet no one could devise any plan to help him.
And then came a solution, and inasmuch as it was brought about by the S.F.M.E., an association of a dozen charming young women in the city forming the Society for Mutual Encouragement, or Enjoyment, or Endorsement, or something else beginning with E—I never could ascertain definitely what the E stood for—it would seem as if the young ladies should have received greater consideration than they did when prosperity knocked at the Doctor's door.
It seems that the Doctor attended a dance one evening in a dress coat, the quality and lack of quantity of which were a flagrant indication of a sparse, not to say extremely needy, wardrobe. All his charm of manner, his grace in the dance, his popularity, could not blind others to the fact that he was ill-dressed, and the girls decided that something must be done, and at once.
"We might give a lawn fete for his benefit," one of them suggested.
"He isn't a church or a Sunday-school," Miss Daisy Peters retorted. "Besides, I know Jack Barkis well enough to know that he would never accept charity from any one. We've got to help him professionally."
"We might boycott all the fellows at dances," suggested Miss Wilbur, "unless they will patronize the Doctor. Decline to dance with them unless they present a certificate from Jack proving that they are his patients."
"Humph!" said Miss Peters. "That wouldn't do any good. They are all healthy, and even if they did go to Jack for a prescription the chances are they wouldn't pay him. They haven't much more money than he has."
"I am afraid that is true," assented Miss Wilbur. "Indeed, if they have any at all, I can't say that they have given much sign of it this winter. The Bachelors' Cotillon fell through for lack of interest, they said, but I have my doubts on that score. It's my private opinion they weren't willing or able to pay for it."
"Well, I'm sure I don't know what we can do to help Jack. If he had our combined pocket-money he'd still be poor," sighed Miss Peters.
"He couldn't be induced to take it unless he earned it," said little Betsy Barbett. "You all know that."
"Hurrah!" cried Miss Peters, clapping her hands ecstatically; "I have it! I have it! I have it! We'll put him in the way of earning it."
And they all put their heads together, and the following was the result:
The next day Jack Barkis's telephone rang more often in an hour than it had ever done before in a month, and every ring meant a call.
The first call was from Miss Daisy Peters, and he responded.
"I'm so sorry to send for you—er—Doctor," she said—she had always called him Jack before, but now he had come professionally—"for—for—Rover, but the poor dog is awfully sick to-day, and Doctor Pruyn was out of town. Do you mind?"
"Certainly not, Daisy," he replied, a shade of disappointment on his face. I am inclined to believe he had hoped to find old Mr. Peters at death's door. "If the dog is sick I can help him. What are his symptoms?"
And Miss Peters went on to say that her cherished Rover, she thought, had malaria. He was tired and lazy, when usually he rivalled the cow that jumped over the moon in activity. She neglected to say that she had with her own fair hands given the poor beast a dose of sulphonal the night before—not enough to hurt him, but sufficient to make him appear tired and sleepy.
"I must see my patient," said the Doctor, cheerfully. "Will he come if I whistle?"
Miss Peters was disinclined to accede to this demand. She was beginning to grow fearful that Jack would see through her little subterfuge, and that the efforts of the S.F.M.E. would prove fruitless.
"Oh," she demurred, "is that—er—necessary? Rover isn't a child, you know. He won't stick out his tongue if you tell him to—and, er—I don't think you could tell much from his pulse—and—"
"I'd better see him, though," observed Jack, quietly. "I certainly can't prescribe unless I do."
So Rover was brought out, and it was indeed true that his old-time activity had been superseded by a lethargy which made the wagging of his tail a positive effort. Still, Doctor Barkis was equal to the occasion, prescribed for the dog, and on his books that night wrote down a modest item as against Mr. Billington Peters and to his own financial credit. Furthermore, he had promised to call again the next day, which meant more practice.
On his return home he found a hurry call awaiting him. Miss Betsy Barbett had dislocated her wrist. So to the Barbett mansion sped Doctor Barkis, and there, sure enough, was Miss Barbett apparently suffering greatly.
"Oh, I am so glad you have come," she moaned. "It hurts dreadfully, Jack—I mean Doctor."
