The Mystery of Murray Davenport | Page 7

"I don't think I should be
here now with that accepted manuscript for you to illustrate, if I hadn't
taken a good deal of pains to press my work on the attention of
editors."
"Oh, I don't mean to say that your prosperity, and other men's, is due to
having good things thrust upon you in this way. But if you do owe all
to your own work, at least your work does bring a fair amount of
reward, your efforts are in a fair measure successful. But not so with
me. The greatest fortune I could ever have asked would have been that
my pains should bring their reasonable price, as other men's have done.
Therefore, this extreme case of good luck, small as it is, is the more to
be wondered at. The best a man has a right to ask is freedom from what
people call habitual bad luck. That's an immunity I've never had. My
labors have been always banned--except when the work has
masqueraded as some other man's. In that case they have been blessed.
It will seem strange to you, Mr. Larcher, but whatever I've done in my
own name has met with wretched pay and no recognition, while work
of mine, no better, when passed off as another man's, has won golden
rewards--for him--in money and reputation."
"It does seem strange," admitted Larcher.
"What can account for it?"
"Do you know what a 'Jonah' is, in the speech of the vulgar?"
"Yes; certainly."
"Well, people have got me tagged with that name. I bring ill luck to
enterprises I'm concerned in, they say. That's a fatal reputation, Mr.
Larcher. It wasn't deserved in the beginning, but now that I have it, see
how the reputation itself is the cause of the apparent ill luck. Take this
thing, for instance." He held up a sheet of music paper, whereon he had
evidently been writing before Larcher's arrival. "A song, supposed to
be sentimental. As the idea is somewhat novel, the words happy, and
the tune rather quaint, I shall probably get a publisher for it, who will
offer me the lowest royalty. What then? Its fame and sale--or whether it
shall have any--will depend entirely on what advertising it gets from
being sung by professional singers. I have taken the precaution to
submit the idea and the air to a favorite of the music halls, and he has
promised to sing it. Now, if he sang it on the most auspicious occasion,

making it the second or third song of his turn, having it announced with
a flourish on the programme, and putting his best voice and style into it,
it would have a chance of popularity. Other singers would want it, it
would be whistled around, and thousands of copies sold. But will he do
that?"
"I don't see why he shouldn't," said Larcher.
"Oh, but he knows why. He remembers I am a Jonah. What comes from
me carries ill luck. He'll sing the song, yes, but he won't hazard any
auspicious occasion on it. He'll use it as a means of stopping encores
when he's tired of them; he'll sing it hurriedly and mechanically; he'll
make nothing of it on the programme; he'll hide the name of the author,
for fear by the association of the names some of my Jonahship might
extend to him. So, you see, bad luck will attend my song; so, you see,
the name of bad luck brings bad luck. Not that there is really such a
thing as luck. Everything that occurs has a cause, an infinite line of
causes. But a man's success or failure is due partly to causes outside of
his control, often outside of his ken. As, for instance, a sudden change
of weather may defeat a clever general, and thrust victory upon his
incompetent adversary. Now when these outside causes are adverse,
and prevail, we say a man has bad luck. When they favor, and prevail,
he has good luck. It was a rapid succession of failures, due partly to
folly and carelessness of my own, I admit, but partly to a run of adverse
conjunctures far outside my sphere of influence, that got me my
unlucky name in the circles where I hunt a living. And now you are
warned, Mr. Larcher. Do you think you are safe in having my work
associated with yours, as Mr. Rogers proposes? It isn't too late to draw
back."
Whether the man still spoke seriously, Larcher could not exactly tell.
Certainly the man's eyes were fixed on Larcher's face in a manner that
made Larcher color as one detected. But his weakness had been for an
instant only, and he rallied laughingly.
"Many thanks, but I'm not superstitious, Mr. Davenport. Anyhow, my
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