A Great Success

Great Success, A

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Title: A Great Success
Author: Mrs Humphry Ward
Release Date: August 25, 2004 [EBook #13288]
Language: English
Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
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[Illustration: "Look there, Doris--you see that path? Let's go on to the
moor a little."]
A Great Success
By
Mrs. Humphry Ward Author of "Eltham House," "Delia Blanchflower,"
etc.
New York Hearst's International Library Co. 1916

CHAPTER I

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PART I


CHAPTER I
"Arthur,--what did you give the man?"
"Half a crown, my dear! Now don't make a fuss. I know exactly what
you're going to say!"
"_Half a crown!_" said Doris Meadows, in consternation. "The fare
was one and twopence. Of course he thought you mad. But I'll get it
back!"
And she ran to the open window, crying "Hi!" to the driver of a
taxi-cab, who, having put down his fares, was just on the point of
starting from the door of the small semi-detached house in a South
Kensington street, which owned Arthur and Doris Meadows for its
master and mistress.
The driver turned at her call.
"Hi!--Stop! You've been over-paid!"
The man grinned all over, made her a low bow, and made off as fast as
he could.
Arthur Meadows, behind her, went into a fit of laughter, and as his wife,
discomfited, turned back into the room he threw a triumphant arm
around her.
"I had to give him half a crown, dear, or burst. Just look at these
letters--and you know what a post we had this morning! Now don't
bother about the taxi! What does it matter? Come and open the post."

Whereupon Doris Meadows felt herself forcibly drawn down to a seat
on the sofa beside her husband, who threw a bundle of letters upon his
wife's lap, and then turned eagerly to open others with which his own
hands were full.
"H'm!--Two more publishers' letters, asking for the book--don't they
wish they may get it! But I could have made a far better bargain if I'd
only waited a fortnight. Just my luck! One--two--four--autograph fiends!
The last--a lady, of course!--wants a page of the first lecture. Calm!
Invitations from the Scottish Athenaeum--the Newcastle Academy--the
Birmingham Literary Guild--the Glasgow Poetic Society--the 'British
Philosophers'--the Dublin Dilettanti!--Heavens!--how many more!
None of them offering cash, as far as I can see--only fame--pure and
undefiled! Hullo!--that's a compliment!--the Parnassians have put me
on their Council. And last year, I was told, I couldn't even get in as an
ordinary member. Dash their impudence!... This is really astounding!
What are yours, darling?"
And tumbling all his opened letters on the sofa, Arthur Meadows
rose--in sheer excitement--and confronted his wife, with a flushed
countenance. He was a tall, broadly built, loose-limbed fellow, with a
fine shaggy head, whereof various black locks were apt to fall forward
over his eyes, needing to be constantly thrown back by a picturesque
action of the hand. The features were large and regular, the complexion
dark, the eyes a pale blue, under bushy brows. The whole aspect of the
man, indeed, was not unworthy of the adjective "Olympian," already
freely applied to it by some of the enthusiastic women students
attending his now famous lectures. One girl artist learned in classical
archaeology, and a haunter of the British Museum, had made a charcoal
study of a well-known archaistic "Diespiter" of the Augustan period, on
the same sheet with a rapid sketch of Meadows when lecturing; a
performance which had been much handed about in the lecture-room,
though always just avoiding--strangely enough--the eyes of the
lecturer.... The expression of slumbrous power, the mingling of dream
and energy in the Olympian countenance, had been, in the opinion of
the majority, extremely well caught. Only Doris Meadows, the
lecturer's wife, herself an artist, and a much better one than the author

of the drawing, had smiled a little queerly on being allowed a sight of
it.
However, she was no less excited by the batch of letters her husband
had allowed her to open than he by his. Her bundle included, so it
appeared, letters from several leading politicians: one, discussing in a
most animated and friendly tone the lecture of the week before, on
"Lord George Bentinck"; and two others dealing with the first lecture
of the series, the brilliant pen-portrait of Disraeli, which--partly owing
to feminine influence behind