Brave Slayton! Chateaubriand died in a garret, Byron courted a widow,
Keats starved to death, Poe mixed his drinks, De Quincey hit the pipe,
Ade lived in Chicago, James kept on doing it, Dickens wore white
socks, De Maupassant wore a strait-jacket, Tom Watson became a
Populist, Jeremiah wept, all these authors did these things for the
sake of literature, but thou didst cap them all; thou marriedst a wife
for to carve for thyself a niche in the temple of fame!
On Friday morning Mrs. Slayton said she would go over to the
_Hearthstone_ office, hand in one or two manuscripts that the editor
had given to her to read, and resign her position as stenographer.
"Was there anything--er--that--er--you particularly fancied
in the stories you are going to turn in?" asked Slayton with a
thumping heart.
"There was one--a novelette, that I liked so much," said his wife. "I
haven't read anything in years that I thought was half as nice and
true to life."
That afternoon Slayton hurried down to the _Hearthstone_ office. He
felt that his reward was close at hand. With a novelette in the
_Hearthstone_, literary reputation would soon be his.
The office boy met him at the railing in the outer office. It was not
for unsuccessful authors to hold personal colloquy with the editor
except at rare intervals.
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