Part 5 (2/2)

'This is my brother Noel. He is the poet.' Noel had turned quite pale.

He is disgustingly like a girl in some ways. The Editor told us to sit down, and he took the poems from Noel, and began to read them. Noel got paler and paler; I really thought he was going to faint, like he did when I held his hand under the cold-water tap, after I had accidentally cut him with my chisel. When the Editor had read the first poem--it was the one about the beetle--he got up and stood with his back to us. It was not manners; but Noel thinks he did it 'to conceal his emotion,' as they do in books. He read all the poems, and then he said--

'I like your poetry very much, young man. I'll give you--let me see; how much shall I give you for it?'

'As much as ever you can,' said Noel. 'You see I want a good deal of money to restore the fallen fortunes of the house of Bastable.'

The gentleman put on some eye-gla.s.ses and looked hard at us. Then he sat down.

'That's a good idea,' said he. 'Tell me how you came to think of it.

And, I say, have you had any tea? They've just sent out for mine.'

He rang a tingly bell, and the boy brought in a tray with a teapot and a thick cup and saucer and things, and he had to fetch another tray for us, when he was told to; and we had tea with the Editor of the Daily Recorder. I suppose it was a very proud moment for Noel, though I did not think of that till afterwards. The Editor asked us a lot of questions, and we told him a good deal, though of course I did not tell a stranger all our reasons for thinking that the family fortunes wanted restoring. We stayed about half an hour, and when we were going away he said again--

'I shall print all your poems, my poet; and now what do you think they're worth?'

'I don't know,' Noel said. 'You see I didn't write them to sell.'

'Why did you write them then?' he asked.

Noel said he didn't know; he supposed because he wanted to.

'Art for Art's sake, eh?' said the Editor, and he seemed quite delighted, as though Noel had said something clever.

'Well, would a guinea meet your views?' he asked.

I have read of people being at a loss for words, and dumb with emotion, and I've read of people being turned to stone with astonishment, or joy, or something, but I never knew how silly it looked till I saw Noel standing staring at the Editor with his mouth open. He went red and he went white, and then he got crimson, as if you were rubbing more and more crimson lake on a palette. But he didn't say a word, so Oswald had to say--

'I should jolly well think so.'

So the Editor gave Noel a sovereign and a s.h.i.+lling, and he shook hands with us both, but he thumped Noel on the back and said--

'Buck up, old man! It's your first guinea, but it won't be your last.

Now go along home, and in about ten years you can bring me some more poetry. Not before--see? I'm just taking this poetry of yours because I like it very much; but we don't put poetry in this paper at all. I shall have to put it in another paper I know of.'

'What _do_ you put in your paper?' I asked, for Father always takes the Daily Chronicle, and I didn't know what the Recorder was like. We chose it because it has such a glorious office, and a clock outside lighted up.

'Oh, news,' said he, 'and dull articles, and things about Celebrities.

If you know any Celebrities, now?'

Noel asked him what Celebrities were.

'Oh, the Queen and the Princes, and people with t.i.tles, and people who write, or sing, or act--or do something clever or wicked.'

'I don't know anybody wicked,' said Oswald, wis.h.i.+ng he had known d.i.c.k Turpin, or Claude Duval, so as to be able to tell the Editor things about them. 'But I know some one with a t.i.tle--Lord Tottenham.'

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