The Third Violet | Page 6

the rocky path. Miss Fanhall and Hawker had
remained on top of the ledge. Hollanden showed much zeal in
conducting his contingent to the foot of the falls. Through the trees they
could see the cataract, a great shimmering white thing, booming and
thundering until all the leaves gently shuddered.
"I wonder where Miss Fanhall and Mr. Hawker have gone?" said the
younger Miss Worcester. "I wonder where they've gone?"
"Millicent," said Hollander, looking at her fondly, "you always had

such great thought for others."
"Well, I wonder where they've gone?"
At the foot of the falls, where the mist arose in silver clouds and the
green water swept into the pool, Miss Worcester, the elder, seated on
the moss, exclaimed, "Oh, Mr. Hollanden, what makes all literary men
so peculiar?"
"And all that just because I said that I could have made better digestive
organs than Providence, if it is true that he made mine," replied
Hollanden, with reproach. "Here, Roger," he cried, as he dragged the
child away from the brink, "don't fall in there, or you won't be the
full-back at Yale in 1907, as you have planned. I'm sure I don't know
how to answer you, Miss Worcester. I've inquired of innumerable
literary men, and none of 'em know. I may say I have chased that
problem for years. I might give you my personal history, and see if that
would throw any light on the subject." He looked about him with chin
high until his glance had noted the two vague figures at the top of the
cliff. "I might give you my personal history----"
Mrs. Fanhall looked at him curiously, and the elder Worcester girl cried,
"Oh, do!"
After another scanning of the figures at the top of the cliff, Hollanden
established himself in an oratorical pose on a great weather-beaten
stone. "Well--you must understand--I started my career--my career, you
understand--with a determination to be a prophet, and, although I have
ended in being an acrobat, a trained bear of the magazines, and a
juggler of comic paragraphs, there was once carved upon my lips a
smile which made many people detest me, for it hung before them like
a banshee whenever they tried to be satisfied with themselves. I was
informed from time to time that I was making no great holes in the
universal plan, and I came to know that one person in every two
thousand of the people I saw had heard of me, and that four out of five
of these had forgotten it. And then one in every two of those who
remembered that they had heard of me regarded the fact that I wrote as
a great impertinence. I admitted these things, and in defence merely

builded a maxim that stated that each wise man in this world is
concealed amid some twenty thousand fools. If you have eyes for
mathematics, this conclusion should interest you. Meanwhile I created
a gigantic dignity, and when men saw this dignity and heard that I was
a literary man they respected me. I concluded that the simple campaign
of existence for me was to delude the populace, or as much of it as
would look at me. I did. I do. And now I can make myself quite happy
concocting sneers about it. Others may do as they please, but as for
me," he concluded ferociously, "I shall never disclose to anybody that
an acrobat, a trained bear of the magazines, a juggler of comic
paragraphs, is not a priceless pearl of art and philosophy."
"I don't believe a word of it is true," said Miss Worcester.
"What do you expect of autobiography?" demanded Hollanden, with
asperity.
"Well, anyhow, Hollie," exclaimed the younger sister, "you didn't
explain a thing about how literary men came to be so peculiar, and
that's what you started out to do, you know."
"Well," said Hollanden crossly, "you must never expect a man to do
what he starts to do, Millicent. And besides," he went on, with the
gleam of a sudden idea in his eyes, "literary men are not peculiar,
anyhow."
The elder Worcester girl looked angrily at him. "Indeed? Not you, of
course, but the others."
"They are all asses," said Hollanden genially.
The elder Worcester girl reflected. "I believe you try to make us think
and then just tangle us up purposely!"
The younger Worcester girl reflected. "You are an absurd old thing,
you know, Hollie!"
Hollanden climbed offendedly from the great weather-beaten stone.

"Well, I shall go and see that the men have not spilled the luncheon
while breaking their necks over these rocks. Would you like to have it
spread here, Mrs. Fanhall? Never mind consulting the girls. I assure
you I shall spend a great deal of energy and temper in bullying