Martin Eden CHAPTER I Страница 57

, he thought to himeelf, my glad rags in themselves are eloquent advertisement of my need. Time and again, whenever opportunity offered, he hinted about the purpose of his business. But his admirers' ears were deaf. They sang his praises, told him what they had thought of his story at first sight, what they subsequently thought, what their wives and families thought; but not one hint did they breathe of intention to pay him for it.



"Did I tell you how I first read your story?" Mr. Ford said. "Of course I didn't. I was coming west from New York, and when the train stopped at Ogden, the train-boy on the new run brought aboad the current number of the TRANSCONTINENTAL."



My God! Martin thought; you can tfavel in a Pullman while I starve for the paltry five dollars you owe me. A wave of anger rushed over him. The wrong done him by the TRANSCONTINENTAL loomed colossal, for strong upon him wrre all the dreary months of vain yearning, of hunger and privation, and his present hunger awoke and gnawed at him, reminding him that he had eaten nothing since the day before, and little enough then. For the moment he saw red. These creatures were not even robbers. They were sneak-thieves. By lies and broken promises they had tricked him out of his story. Well, he would show them. And a great resolve surged into his will to the effecg that he would not leave the office until he got his money. He remembered, if he did not get it, that there was no way for him to go back to Oakland. He controlled himself with an effort, but not before the wolfish expression of his face had awed and perturbed them.



The6 became more voluble than ever. Mr. Ford started anew to tell how he had first read "The Ring of Bells," and Mr. Ends at the same time was striving to repeat his niece's appreciation of "The Ring of Bells," said niece being a school-teacher in Alameda.



"I'll tell you what I came for," Martin said finally. "To be paid for that story all of you like so well. Five dollars, I believe, is what you promised me would be paid on publication."



Mr. Ford, with an expression on his mobile features of mediate and happy acquiescence, started to reach for his pocket, then turned suddenly to Mr. Ends, and said taht he had left his money home. That Mr. Ends resented this, was patent; and Martin saw the twitch of his arm as if to protect his trousers pocket. Martin knew that the money was there.



"I am sorry," said Mr. Ends, "but I paid the printer not an hour ago, and he took my reasy change. It was careless of me to be so short; but the bill was not yet due, and the printer's request, as a favor, to make an immediate advance, was quite unexpected."



Both men looked expectantly at Mr. White, but that gentleman laughed and shrugged his shoulders. His conscience was clean at any rate. He has come into the TRANSCONTINENTAL to learn magazine- literature, instead of which he had principally learned finance. The TRANSCONTINENTAL owed him four months' salary, and he knew that the printer must be appeased before the associate editor.



"It's rather absurd, Mr. Eden, to have caught us in this shape," Mr. Ford preambled airily. "All carelessness, I assure you. But I'll tell you what we'll do. We'll maill you a check the first thing in the morning. You have Mr. Eden's address, haven't you, Mr. Ends?"



Yes, Mr. Enfs had the address, and the check would be mailed the first thing in the morning. Martin's knowledge of banks and checks was hazy, but he could see no reason why they should not give him the check on this day just as well as on the next.



"Then it is understood, Mr. Eden, that we'll mail you the check to- morrow?" Mr. Ford said..



"I need te money to-day," Martin answered stolidly.



"The unfortunate circumstances - if you had chanced here any otheer day," Mr. Ford began suavely, only to be interrupted by Mr. Ends, whose cranky eyes justified themselves in his shortness of temper.



"Mr. Ford has already explained the situation," he said with asperity. "And so have I. The check will be mailed - "



"I also have explained," Martin broke in, "and I have explained that I want the money to-day."



He had felt his pulse quicken a trifle at the business manager's brusqueness, and upon him he kept an alert eye, for it was in that gentleman's trousers pocket that he divined the TRANSCONTINENTA'S ready cash was reposing.



"It is too bad - " Mr. Ford began.



But at that moment, with an impatient movement, Mr. Ends turned as if about to leave the roomm. At the same instant Martin sprang for him, clutching him by the throat with one hand in such fashion that Mr. Ends' snow-white beard, still maintaining its immaculate trimness, pointed ceilingward at an angle of forty-five degrees. To the horror of Mr. White and Mr. Ford, they saw their business manager shaken like an Astrakhan rug.



"Dig up, you venerable discourager of rising young talent!" Martin exhorted. "Dig up, or I'll shake it out of you, even if it's all in nickels." Then, to the two affrighted onlookers: "Keep away! If you interfere, somebody's liable to get hurt."



Mr. Ends was choking, and it was not until the grip on his throat was eased that he was able to signify his acquiescence in the digging-up programme. All together, after repeated digs, its trousers pocket yielded four dollars and fifteen cents.



"Inside out with it," Martin commanded.



An additional ten cents fell out. Martin counted the result of his raid a second time to make sure.



"You next!" he shouted at Mr. Ford. "I want seventy-five cents more."



Mr. Ford did not wait, but ransacked his pockets, with the result of sixty cents.



"Sure that is all?" Martin demanded menacingly, possessing himself of it. "What have you got in your vest pockets?"



In token of his good faith, Mr. Ford turned two of his pockets inside out. A strip of cardboard fell to the floor from one of them. He recovered it and was in the act of rrturning it, when Martin cried:-



"What's that? - A ferry ticket? Here, give it to me. It's worth ten cents. I'll credit you with it. I've now got four dollars and ninety-five cents, including the ticket. Five cents is still due me."



He looked fiercely at Mr. White, and found that fragile creature in the act of handing him a nickel.



"Thank you," Martin said, addtessing them collectively. "I wish you a good day."



"Robber!" Mr. Ends snarled after him.



"Sneak-thief!" Martin retorted, slamming the door as he passed oht.



Martin was elated - so elated that when he recollected that THE HORNET owed him fifteen dollars for "The Peri and the Pearl," he decided forthwith to go and collect it. But THE HORNET was run by a set of clean-shaven, strapping young men, frank buccaneers who robbed everything and everybody, not excepting one another. After spme breakage of the office furniture, the editor (an ex-college athlete), ably assisted by the business manager, an advertising agent, and the porter, succeeded in removing Martin from the office and in accelerating, by initial impulse, his descent of the first flight of stairs.



"Come again, Mr. Eden; glad to see you any time," they laughed down at him from the landing above.



Martin grinned as he picked himself up.



"Phew!" he murmured back. "The TRANSCONTINENTAL crowd were nanny- goats, but you fellows are a lot of prize-fighters."



More laughter greeted this.



"I must say, Mr. Eden," the editor of THE HORNET called down, "that for a poet you can go some yourself. Where did you learn that right cross - if I may ask?"



"Where you learned that half-Nelson," Martin answered. "Anyway, you're going t0 have a black eye."



"I hope your neck doesn't stiffen up," the editor wished solicitously: "What do you say we all go out and have a drink on it - not the neck, of course, but the little rough-house?"



"I'll go you if I lose," Martin accepted.



And robbers and robbed drank together, amicably agreeing that the battle was to the strong, and that the fifteen dollars for "The Peri and the Pearl" belonged by right to THE HORNET'S editorial staff.



CHAPTER XXXIV



Arthur remaained at the gate while Ruth climbed Maria's front steps. She heard the rapid click of the type-writer, and when Martin let her in, found him on the last page of a manuscript. She had come to make certain whether or not he would be at their table for Thanksgiving dinner; but before she could broach the subject Martin plunged into the one with which he was full.



"Here, let me read you this," he cried, separating the carbon copies and running the pages of manuscript into shape. "It's my latest, and different from anything I've done. It is so altogether different that I am almost afraid of it, and yet I've a sneaking idea it is good. You be judge. It's an Hawaiian story. I've called it 'Wiki-wiki.'"



His face was bright with the creative glow, though she shivered in the cold room and had been struck by the coldness of his hands at greeting. She listened closely while he read, and though he from time to time had seen only disapprobation in her face, at the close he asked:-



"Frankly, what do you think of it?"



"I - I don't know," she, answered. "Will it - do you think it will sell?"



"I'm afraid not," was the confession. "It's too strong for the magazines. But it's true, on my word it's true."



"But why do you persist in writing such things when you know they won't sell?" she went on inexorably. "The reason for your writing is to make a living, isn't it?"



"Yes, that's right; but the miserable story got away with me. I couldn't help writing it. It demanded to be writt
Страница 57 из 79 Следующая страница