Kitabı oku: «The Bread Line: A Story of a Paper», sayfa 2
III
A LETTER FROM THE "DEAREST GIRL IN THE WORLD," OTHERWISE MISS DOROTHY CASTLE OF CLEVELAND, TO MR. TRUMAN LIVINGSTONE OF NEW YORK
"My dear old True: I have both laughed and cried over your letter, and I have thought, too, a great deal. It was awfully jolly to think of you and those good friends of yours dining together on New Year's eve, and there is only one way I would have had it different, and that way would have seemed selfish on my part, and unfair to the others, too.
"I do wish I might have been near by, though, unknown to you, and heard all that passed, for I know you only told me the good things the others said, and not all the best things – those you said yourself. Or, if you did not say them, you thought them, and were only restrained by modesty.
"I suppose you will get over that by and by, when you are as old as Perny and Barry and Van (you see, I am beginning to feel that I know your friends, and call them as you do); only I hope you won't get entirely over it, either, for do you know, True, that is just one reason why I love you – I mean because you are fine and manly and modest – just old True, that's all. And when I came to where you gave the money to the shivering men waiting for bread, I knew just how you felt, and I couldn't keep back the tears to save my life.
"And I know it was you, True, who proposed it, though you didn't say so, for it is exactly what you would do; and when you told how they put out their hands for the money, and some of them said 'God bless you,' and how we would go there together in a year, and with Perny and Van, too, and give them all something again, and perhaps more, – a great deal more, – I wanted to put my arms about you, True, and give you a good hug, and tell you how noble and generous you are, and how I wish I were more like you, for your sake.
"What a wonderful plan that is of Mr. Barrifield's! Do you know, it quite startles me; it seems like some fairy tale. And as for the figures, they fairly make me dizzy. Mr. Barrifield must be a very remarkable man to conceive such an extraordinary idea; and how fortunate for him that he has such men as you and Van and Perny to help him! Between Barry and Perny with their business and literary ability, and you and Van to look after the pictures, I am sure you will get out a beautiful paper, and one that ought to succeed. It seems like magic that it could be made to do so without great capital at the start, but, of course, Mr. Frisby did it 'without a dollar,' so it is possible, and Barry's plan certainly is plausible and fascinating. Then, too, if it should not turn out exactly as planned, he can always get those capitalists to come in, you know; and while I suppose you would be obliged to take a very small share then, it would be better than failure.
"You see, True, I have been thinking, as I said at the start, and I am with you, of course, heart and soul, in whatever you undertake; only, do you know, True, I can't make myself very enthusiastic about it. I mean I don't feel about it as I do about your work, and as I felt when you wrote me that you had got into the big magazines, and had been given a serial to illustrate by the greatest of them all. I hardly slept a wink that night, I was so happy for you and for myself and for everybody. I am glad of this, too, but it is in a different way.
"I know it is hard to save when money is earned with one's hands, for it comes little at a time, and if the paper prospers it will be easier for you afterward. But, somehow, premiums and showy offers in big type don't seem to fit in with my thought of you, and the Bible premium especially doesn't appeal to me entirely. I suppose it is all right, and perhaps, as you say, a great many people will get Bibles who never had them before; but to me there is something almost sacrilegious in the thought of using the Bible as a means of making the paper sell. You know, True, I am not very strait-laced about such matters, either, and, after all, of course, if Mr. Frisby used it, and with the sanction of the Rev. Montague Banks, it must be all right. But you know also, True, that it isn't for money or luxury that I care, – I have had plenty of such things, – and it is just for your own dear, trusting self, and your aims and triumphs, that I love you.
"Your bohemian life there with Perny and Van has always seemed so delightful to me. You are all such good friends, and it must be beautiful to do your work together, and then go out and see the different phases of living and dying, and the struggle of existence, without the cares and worries of business. I have pictured you so often sitting about the fire at evening, smoking your pipes and dreaming the dreams that are only of your world, and happy in that comradeship which only men ever understand and feel for each other. Then I have tried not to be jealous of the others, and to make myself believe that by and by, when I came, it would not be so hard for you to give them up, and that sometimes I would let you go back to them, and then for the evening you could forget that I had ever come into your life and changed it all.
"You must let me say all this, True, because I feel it, and know, in spite of your noble letters to me, that it will make a difference, and that your life will never be quite the same afterward. And that is why I feel about the paper as I do, too, I suppose, for I feel that it will in some way rob you of the quiet happiness and the serene sweetness of art that you now enjoy, and for which I have been more than once tempted to give you up and go out of your life for your own sake. Only, True, I am weak and human, and can't let you go as long as you, too, are weak and human enough to love me and to make us both believe that I will be a help and an inspiration to you by and by.
"As I read over this letter now, it seems to me neither very cheerful nor encouraging, and not at all the letter I started out to write. But if I should write another I fear I should not improve on it, and anyway, True, you know it is from the heart, and that always and always my heart is with you and for you in whatever you do or undertake. Write to me as often as you can, and tell me the good things that happen, and the funny things, too; for I enjoy them all, and your letters are precious to me beyond anything that the days bring. Go right on, True; don't let anything I say make you hesitate for a moment. I am away off here, dreaming idle dreams, while you are there and see and know. I am sure you will do what is best – you always do; and remember that, whatever comes, I am, now and forever, your
"Dorothy."
IV
SOME PREMIUMS
It was decided to make Perner the editor. This decision was reached during a lunch on Twenty-third Street, where the proprietors of the "Whole Family" met one day some weeks after the initial dinner. A number of brief and informal meetings had been held, and a liberal amount of talk expended, besides the continuous discussion and badinage in the studio where Livingstone, Van Dorn, and Perner still worked, though in a manner disheartening to their publishers. The idea of starting a vast enterprise with little or no capital had in it something very fascinating to the bohemian temperament, while the consideration of its unique phases and the more or less appropriate premiums to be offered, afforded never-ending amusement. Work lagged, while hope tinted the air rose-color, and the god of mirth perched by the side of Venus Milo on the mantelpiece.
Livingstone, it is true, had begun, and with fine enthusiasm at first, a picture of the bread line as they had seen it on New Year's eve. The sketch was on canvas, and strong in composition and feeling. The others came over and stood one on either side of him and said so. They said so more than once, and with various degrees of emphasis. Perhaps this satisfied Livingstone, for after that his interest in the undertaking became that of a spectator also. The canvas stood on an easel in one corner, and served as a diversion when the "Whole Family" topic was for the moment exhausted.
But one day Barrifield came over just before noon, and announced that they should organize forthwith. He had been investigating certain premium articles, a number of which he had in his pockets. He said it was necessary to have some definite address, and whoever was to be editor should be chosen, that he might begin to cast about for desirable features. So they drifted over to the Twenty-third Street place to "eat things and talk," as Livingstone said. They had done a good deal of this lately.
While they were waiting for the dishes, Barrifield began emptying his pockets. He produced first from his vest an article that caused Livingstone to whisper:
"I say, old man, put that clock out of sight. You can hear it all over the place."
Barrifield stared at him reproachfully.
"That," he said, with great deliberation, "is a watch."
"I wouldn't have believed it," said Van Dorn, taking it in his hand. "I thought it was a water-meter."
Perner held it to his ear. In his youth he had lived on a farm.
"Twenty-horse-power vibrator," he announced, after listening.
"Stem-winder and – setter," continued Barrifield, undisturbed. "Perfect time."
The article was passed around.
"Didn't they have any thicker ones?" asked Livingstone.
"Well, of course," assented Barrifield, "it is a trifle thicker than a fine gold watch, but it's a perfect gem in other respects. The manufacturer of it told me he had carried one of them a year, and that it hadn't varied a second in that time."
"Maybe it was stopped," suggested Van Dorn, but Barrifield ignored this libel.
"Every boy will want one of the 'Whole Family' watches," he went on. "We can sell a barrel of them in every town."
"How many of them come in a barrel?" interrupted Livingstone.
Barrifield leaned across the table.
"And I can buy them," he said eagerly, "I can buy them for seventy-five cents! Think of it! Seventy-five cents! A five-dollar watch, given with the finest weekly paper ever offered, for only one dollar a year!"
"How will you do that?" asked Perner.
"That leaves us twenty-five cents for the paper."
"Why, you know, we'll add something for postage and packing, as I said before."
"Yes, and it will take something. By the time you get a box on that thrashing-machine, properly nailed and mailed, it will cost twenty-five cents." Perner's business experience was manifesting itself.
"Oh, pshaw, Perny!" protested Barrifield, "it won't cost half so much. We can get boys and girls for three dollars or so a week to attend to all that."
Perner closed his eyes for an instant and saw in fancy an army of youthful clerks packing various premiums for mailing. Then, remembering the difficulty with which he had managed even a small business with less than a dozen assistants, he sighed. He knew that big businesses really were conducted, and with a science and precision that was a constant source of wonder to him. Perhaps Barrifield knew the secret of their management.
"Even if it did cost that," proceeded Barrifield, "think of the quantity of them we will sell, and the immense circulation it will give us. We could afford to lose a little on each and make it back on the advertising."
Perner knew nothing of advertising, except that a certain paper received five thousand dollars a page for each issue, and Barrifield had assured them that the circulation of the "Whole Family" would be more than twice as great. He subsided, therefore, while Barrifield drew from his overcoat pocket a flat package of considerable size and weight. He undid the strings carefully, and a leather-bound, limp-covered book lay before them.
"That," he said triumphantly, "is the Bible!"
Van Dorn reached for it and turned some of the leaves curiously.
"First one Van ever saw," said Perner.
Livingstone took up the book with thoughtful regard.
"Do you really think we'd better use this as a premium?" he said hesitatingly. "It seems to me that it – that it's too – that it's overdoing it." Livingstone's smooth face flushed a little. "I mean that it's been overdone already," he added hastily and with confusion.
"Oh, my dear boy," said Barrifield, "the Bible is never overdone. This is a finer one than Frisby used, and I can get it for just what the watch costs. The' Whole Family' and the great Instructor's Bible, worth both together five dollars, all for one dollar!"
"You don't mean to say that this won't cost postage!" said Perner.
"Not a great deal. Book postage is cheap, – very cheap, – and think how many of them we will sell and how much good they will do! One half-million Bibles and the 'Whole Family' – "
"You didn't bring the gun along, did you?" interrupted Van Dorn.
Just then the dishes were served, and the premiums were for the moment put aside. The talk, however, continued. Barrifield spoke of other premiums he had been considering and upon which he had secured "special inside figures" on large quantity. He no longer mentioned hundreds and thousands in relation to the new paper. He was reveling in millions that were as real to him as if they were already to his credit at the banker's. Presently he reviewed once more the story of Frisby and the "Voice of Light," whose cry in the wilderness had brought fortune so promptly to his aid.
He added fresh details recently obtained, and told how during the first month, when he had been waiting for his advertising to appear, he had been obliged to mortgage his household effects at five per cent. a week in order to live. He had received one thousand dollars in the first mail after the advertising appeared. And when that mail was brought in and laid on his desk he didn't have a dollar in his pocket – not a dollar. As Barrifield proceeded, any vague doubts of success that had crept into the minds of his listeners disappeared. They began the work of organization forthwith, and Van Dorn, who had faith in Perner's literary judgment, proposed that he be the editor. Perner, in turn, proposed Van Dorn as art editor, with Livingstone as his assistant. Barrifield was to be nominally business manager, though, for the reason that his present position consumed most of his time, and as the business offices for convenience were to be in the studios occupied by the other three, the management, such as it was, would for a while fall mostly upon Perner, who referred once more to his ten years' successful experience, and assumed his double responsibility with some dignity.
A consideration of the first number's contents was then taken up, with the result that they were to prepare it mostly themselves. They were on familiar ground now, and Perner and Van Dorn each displayed some evidence of fitness for their respective positions. There must be two stirring serials, one of which they would buy. Barrifield knew where one could be had. Livingstone could do the pictures for this story. The other would be more in Van's line.
Then they lighted cigars and went back to the premiums, and Barrifield launched into the details of his recent explorations and discoveries in the vast jungles of Premium Land. He had examined and priced everything, from a nut-cracker to a trip abroad. Presently he began to spread a number of these things on the table, which the waiter had once more cleared. Besides the watch and Bible, there was a fishing-kit, all but the rod, which was described fully in a leaflet, a bicycle lamp, a pamphlet outlining a tour through the Holy Land, sample pages of a cook-book, and a pair of ear-muffs.
Barrifield arranged these on the cloth, explaining as he did so that a beautiful box kite had been too large to bring, as was also a gun of which he could get a limited quantity – a hundred thousand or so – at a ridiculously low figure. Van Dorn picked up the ear-muffs curiously.
"What do these cost?" he asked.
"Forty-eight cents a pair by the gross. Special inside figure because I told him we would want a quarter of a million pairs."
Van Dorn looked at them a little closer.
"The fellow I saw must have stolen his," he said, "for he was selling them yesterday on Broadway for twenty-five cents a pair."
"Impossible, Van! They couldn't be the same, you know," protested Barrifield, earnestly. "There are many qualities of ear-muffs. These are the very best-double-elastic, wire-set and-bound, storm-proof muffs. They cost forty-six cents to make – the manufacturer told me so. What you saw was a cheap imitation."
Barrifield put an end to further discussion on this point by calling attention to the bicycle lamp – something new and superior to any in use. He had been attracted by it in a sporting-goods window on Nassau Street. The price had been steep, – too steep for a premium, of course, – but he had made up his mind that if he could get on the "inside" he would find a price there within their reach. He had got on the inside. He had pursued the elusive "inside" even to Hoboken, and captured it there in the very sanctity of the factory – the president's private office.
"The president was a fine, big, smooth-faced man with one of these rich, hearty laughs," he explained, "and we had a long talk together. I told him we had a new scheme that would put us in a position to use a quarter of a million of these lamps the first year, and that we had been considering another make – which was true."
"It was," said Van Dorn, "and it would have been equally true to have said that we've been considering every known article of commerce, from a mouse-trap with two holes to a four-masted schooner."
"That caught him right away," continued Barrifield, regardless of this interruption. "He said he wanted to get started with a new thing like ours, and that he was going to let us on the inside. He had a talk with the manager, and came back and made me a net cash price of eighty-seven cents! Think of it! Eighty-seven cents for a two-dollar lamp! Given with the 'Whole Family' one year – fifty-two weeks – for one dollar and one new subscriber!"
Perner the businesslike was calculating.
"That would be two dollars we would get in all," he said, "for two subscriptions, two premiums, postage, and handling. Counting, say, seventy-five cents for the other premium, and twenty-five cents for postage and handling, we would have just thirteen cents left for our two subscriptions."
"By gad!" said Livingstone, weakly.
"But the advertising is where we come in," insisted Barrifield, eagerly. "And besides, everybody won't take lamps, either."
Van Dorn was smiling queerly.
"No," he said; "and if they did we can get them over at Cutten & Downum's for sixty-seven cents apiece. I saw them there yesterday."
"Not this lamp!" protested Barrifield. "I'll bet ten dollars it was a cheap imitation. I'll write to President Bright to-night about it. He's a fine man. He'd take some stock in the 'Whole Family' in a minute, if we'd let him. It couldn't have been this lamp!"
"Maybe not," assented Van Dorn; "but they had a big card up, saying 'Bright & Sons' Stellar, sixty-seven cents,' and the lamps looked just like this."
The others said nothing, but their confidence in Barrifield's purchasing ability had received a distinct jar. Presently Perner noticed the head waiter watching them intently. He was about to mention this when the minion walked over and spoke to Barrifield in a whisper. Barrifield grew red and began to drag the things together as the waiter moved away.
"What's the matter? What did he say, Barry?" asked Van Dorn.
At first Barrifield did not answer. Then the humor of it seized him, and he chuckled all over, growing even redder as he hid away the things.
"Come, old man, what did he say?" urged Livingstone.
Barrifield could hardly steady his voice for laughter.
"It's too good to keep," he admitted.
"Out with it, then," said Perner.
"Why," said Barrifield, "he said that they had sample-rooms up-stairs, and that it was against the rules to show samples here in the dining-room."
"Hoo-ee!" shouted Van Dorn. "That calls for something."
"By gad! yes," said Livingstone, "it does!"
It was well along in the afternoon when the friends left the place, and Perner, Van Dorn, and Livingstone returned to their apartments. They went over at first and stood for some moments before the picture of the bread line.
"Why don't you finish it, Stony?" asked Perner. "Finish it up and sell it for enough to pay your part in the 'Whole Family.'"
"Good scheme – I've thought of it," confessed Livingstone.
"Do you suppose there are any publishers in that line?" mused Van Dorn.
Livingstone laughed.
"I say, fellows, let's take a walk up Fifth Avenue and pick out the houses we're going to buy next year!"
As they turned to go, Van Dorn took up a blank piece of drawing-paper and a brush. He worked away a few moments, the others looking on. As they passed out he tacked it to the outer door with pins. Then they all faced about, and, standing abreast, read in the fading light of the hall-way:
