The Way We Live Now | Page 3

as you do. Think of
my name, that has been so often slandered but never disgraced! Say
that you are sorry, and it shall be forgotten.'
When a man has kissed a woman it goes against the grain with him to
say the very next moment that he is sorry for what he has done. It is as
much as to declare that the kiss had not answered his expectation. Mr
Broune could not do this, and perhaps Lady Carbury did not quite
expect it. 'You know that for world I would not offend you,' he said.
This sufficed. Lady Carbury again looked into his eyes, and a promise
was given that the articles should be printed and with generous
remuneration.
When the interview was over Lady Carbury regarded it as having been
quite successful. Of course when struggles have to be made and hard
work done, there will be little accidents. The lady who uses a street cab
must encounter mud and dust which her richer neighbour, who has a
private carriage, will escape. She would have preferred not to have
been kissed but what did it matter? With Mr Broune the affair was
more serious. 'Confound them all' he said to himself as he left the house;
'no amount of experience enables a man to know them.' As he went

away he almost thought that Lady Carbury had intended him to kiss her
again, and he was almost angry with himself in that he had not done so.
He had seen her three or four times since, but had not repeated the
offence.
We will now go on to the other letters, both of which were addressed to
the editors of other newspapers. The second was written to Mr Booker,
of the 'Literary Chronicle.' Mr Booker was a hard-working professor of
literature, by no means without talent, by no means without influence,
and by no means without a conscience. But, from the nature of the
struggles in which he had been engaged, by compromises which had
gradually been driven upon him by the encroachment of brother authors
on the one side and by the demands on the other of employers who
looked only to their profits, he had fallen into a routine of work in
which it was very difficult to be scrupulous, and almost impossible to
maintain the delicacies of a literary conscience. He was now a
bald-headed old man of sixty, with a large family of daughters, one of
whom was a widow dependent on him with two little children. He had
five hundred a year for editing the 'Literary Chronicle,' which, through
his energy, had become a valuable property. He wrote for magazines,
and brought out some book of his own almost annually. He kept his
head above water, and was regarded by those who knew about him, but
did not know him, as a successful man. He always kept up his spirits,
and was able in literary circles to show that he could hold his own. But
he was driven by the stress of circumstances to take such good things
as came in his way, and could hardly afford to be independent. It must
be confessed that literary scruple had long departed from his mind.
Letter No. 2 was as follows:

'Welbeck Street, 25th February, 187-.
'DEAR MR BOOKER,
'I have told Mr Leadham' Mr Leadham was senior partner in the
enterprising firm of publishers known as Messrs. Leadham and Loiter
to send you an early copy of my "Criminal Queens." I have already
settled with my friend Mr Broune that I am to do your "New Tale of a
Tub" in the "Breakfast Table." Indeed, I am about it now, and am
taking great pains with it. If there is anything you wish to have
specially said as to your view of the Protestantism of the time, let me

know. I should like you to say a word as to the accuracy of my
historical details, which I know you can safely do. Don't put it off, as
the sale does so much depend on early notices. I am only getting a
royalty, which does not commence till the first four hundred are sold.
Yours sincerely,
MATILDA CARBURY.
ALFRED BOOKER, ESQ.,
"Literary Chronicle" Office, Strand.'

There was nothing in this which shocked Mr Booker. He laughed
inwardly, with a pleasantly reticent chuckle, as he thought of Lady
Carbury dealing with his views of Protestantism as he thought also of
the numerous historical errors into which that clever lady must
inevitably fall in writing about matters of which he believed her to
know nothing. But he was quite alive to the fact that a favourable
notice in the 'Breakfast Table' of his very thoughtful work, called the
'New Tale of a Tub,' would serve