Part 43 (1/2)

But then, what hope is there now? I ask. Why, he was going to urge it upon them! And now, of course, he's simply sent it in there without a word!

Don't you see what it was--it was that letter of inquiry they wrote him! He paid no more attention to me than if I were a hound; but he had to send it when they wrote! And perhaps they said something about carelessness and that made him wild.

Oh, the thing is an endless spring of gall to me! I am all raw with it--I have to rush out on the street and walk away my pa.s.sion. I never saw my situation so plainly--the horrible impotence of it! Just see what I struggle against, the utter insane futility of everything I do! Why, I beat my wings in a void, I hammer my head against a wall!

--And now I must wait for that thing to come back--don't I know that it will come back? And don't I know that that will be the end of me?

A black, horrible gloom has settled down upon me. I am utterly lost in despair.

April 21st.

I will write no more about that man--my whole being is turned to bitterness. I wonder at myself--I have no longer one feeling left in this world except a black brooding hatred of him!

--And all the time the thing haunts me like a detective story--I can't find the solution! What does it mean? Why did he do it? It is so irrational--so impossible--so utterly incomprehensible! And shall I _never_ know the truth about it?

April 24th.

”We regret that we are not advised to undertake the publication of The Captive. We return the ma.n.u.script by express.”

There it is! I read that thing, and I felt my whole being sinking down as if into h.e.l.l. There it is! And that is the end of it all! Oh, merciful Providence, is it not simply too cruel to be believed! Eleven weeks!

_Eleven weeks_!

--I can do no more--I do not know where to turn. I believe I shall go mad with my misery.

April 25th.

To-day I thought I would go up and see him--I thought I could not live until I knew what this thing meant. I heard myself saying, ”I _demand_ to know why you treated me thus? I say I demand it! Before G.o.d, how _dared_ you--or don't you believe in a G.o.d?”

--Then again I thought, I will plead with him. It must be some mistake--I can't believe that it is all over. Why, he liked it! And now perhaps it was only looked over by some careless reader and flung aside!

But no--I could not go near the place! I could not face that man again. The memory of his look as he stood there in his insolence is so hateful to me that it makes me tremble.

April 26th.