Part 8 (2/2)

But there was only fourpence.

”The Head preached a capital sermon last night on the text, 'Of such is the Kingdom of Heaven.' The instant he gave out the words I thought of you, old Phip. And I went on thinking of you till he had done. That's how I know the sermon was a good one, though I didn't listen to another word. Anything that makes me think of you _must_ be good. Phip, _you are a dead cert. for heaven when you die_. But don't die yet, there's a good chap.

For if you go, I shall go too.--Ever yours, JIM.

”_P.S._--Don't forget to give notice that I am leaving this term.”

When Dr Piecraft laid down the letter his eyes were full of tears. ”The only bit of heaven that's left me,” he said aloud, ”is going to be taken away. There's one person in the world, anyhow, who doesn't think me a failure. If you go to the Colonies, Jim, I shall take the pill, come what may. You're a warm-hearted boy, Jim, but cruel too. I'd rather spend a hundred a year on you and go threadbare in consequence, than earn ten thousand a year and not have you to spend it on. At the same time, my only chance of making you relent is to earn some money.--What the deuce is all this about novel-writing?”

He took up the advertis.e.m.e.nt which had fallen in his lap, and read as follows: ”How to Write Novels--a Guide to Fortune in Literature.

Containing Practical Instructions for Amateurs, whereby Success is a.s.sured. By an Old Hand.”

Next morning Piecraft bought the book. As no patients came that day he had ample leisure to read it. ”Easy as lying,” he said to himself when he had finished. ”I see the trick of it. And, by George, I'll make the first attempt this very night. I have half a dozen ideas already.

Cerebral pathology is no bad training for a novelist.”

So he sat down to work, and by two in the morning had written the first chapter of a very promising novel. In ten days more the novel was complete.

Reading over his ma.n.u.script, and severely criticising himself by the rules of his Manual, he found that he had put in too much scenery, had undercoloured the beauty of the heroine, had forgotten to describe her dress, and had introduced no action to break the tedious sentiment of the love-dialogues. These errors he at once set himself to correct, pruning down the excesses and making good the defects. Then, reviewing the whole, he satisfied himself that he had done well. The plot turned on a love affair, and was easily intelligible. The s.e.xes were evenly balanced, and every character had its foil. There was plenty of incident and continuous action. And the whole was unified by a single purpose or controlling idea.

This last gave Piecraft peculiar satisfaction. He had feared when he began that unity of purpose would be of all the rules the most difficult to satisfy. In the purpose of his life he had failed; was it likely, he asked himself, that he would do any better in romance? Judge, then, of his pleasure on discovering that a clear thread of intention ran through the novel from the first sentence to the last, and came to adequate fulfilment in the final catastrophe. ”Purpose,” he reflected, ”is going to be my strongest point. I shall score heavily on that.”

He sent his ma.n.u.script to a publisher, and was rejoiced to hear of its acceptance within a week. In the six months that followed, having little else to do, he produced two more novels. Each of them had a Purpose. The publisher bought the ma.n.u.scripts outright for fifty pounds apiece.

”It's the Purpose that pays,” thought Piecraft. ”It's the Purpose that works the oracle. It's the Purpose the public like. Next time I'll introduce more Purpose and stand out for better terms with the publisher.”

Meanwhile he had been compelled, much against his will, to give notice of Jim's withdrawal from school. In spite of the brightening of his prospects the half-brother had proved inexorable. ”I will borrow from you,” wrote Jim, ”enough to pay my third-cla.s.s fare across the ocean and leave me with a pound or two on landing. After that, not another penny.”

”All right, Jim; have it your own way,” was Phippeny's answer. ”I shall work away until I have saved 500, and then, my boy, _I'll join you on the other side and life will begin again for both of us_. Meanwhile, I'm growing uncommonly prolific in the way of pot-boilers. But I'm not exactly in love with it, and shall abandon my new profession without a sigh. I wish I could produce something really good. Perhaps when I join you I shall get a new inspiration. I believe one can find a pen and ink in the Colonies.”--Thus the matter was arranged.

Dr Phippeny Piecraft was not in the habit of going to church, but one Sunday evening, shortly after these events, he found himself there by accident and heard a sermon, some sentences of which caught his attention. It happened that just then he was gravelled for lack of matter; and he was busy during the service in vainly attempting to construct a plot in which a gamekeeper's daughter was to be betrayed by a young lord under circ.u.mstances of excruciating novelty. In spite of the novelty of the circ.u.mstances he could not help recognising that the main theme was a trifle stale; and as they were singing the hymn before the sermon he confessed to himself that the plot was not worth elaboration, and began to think about other things.

Piecraft's mind, indeed, was just then in a state of extreme confusion.

Now he would be listening to the words of the preacher, now giving way to anxieties about Jim, now returning to the plot of his novel like a moth to a candle-light, and now reflecting, with the acute discomfort of a double consciousness, on his inability to concentrate his thoughts.

”There is nothing,” he mused, ”which sooner demoralises a man's intelligence than the discovery that he can make money by following the demand of a degenerate public taste. It leads to mental incoherence and to the most extraordinary self-deception. I am afraid that that cursed Manual has undone me. It seems to have resurrected another personality who belongs to a lower order of being than my true and proper self.

Having failed to earn my living by being the man I am, I am now in a way to make money by being the man I am not. What business have I to be constructing these ridiculous plots? And how is it that, once started on that line, I am unable to prevent myself going further? I had thought that a scientific training was the best safeguard against obsession. But I perceive it is no such thing. Is it possible that I am so far like Frate Alberigo--my proper soul expelled to another world, and perhaps practising medicine there, while a demon holds possession of my body and writes third-rate novels in this?”

A moment later he was thinking about Jim.

”I hope the boy won't forget to send me a cable when he reaches the port; somehow I feel unaccountably anxious about him.” Then he turned to wondering how much he would be able to screw out of the publishers for the next novel, and how everything would depend on the breadth of the Purpose.

Suddenly a sentence of the sermon caught his ear: ”_Illusion is an integral part of Reality_.”

”Tip-top,” thought Piecraft. ”So it is.” And in a moment his imagination began to cast about for a reality of which three parts should be illusion. But he could think of nothing that answered the description, and again he said to himself, ”I am not in a normal condition to-day.

One should never force a reluctant brain. And I can't help being anxious about Jim. I had better turn my attention to the sermon.”

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