Martin Eden

Maria didn’t have any money, and so I had to recover her cows for her. That’s where the Transcontinental fiver went—‘The Ring of Bells’ went into the poundman’s pocket.”
    “Then you won’t come?”
    He looked down at his clothing.
    “I can’t.”
    Tears of disappointment and reproach glistened in her blue eyes, but she said nothing.
    “Next Thanksgiving you’ll have dinner with me in Delmonico’s,” he said cheerily; “or in London, or Paris, or anywhere you wish. I know it.”
    “I saw in the paper a few days ago,” she announced abruptly, “that there had been several local appointments to the Railway Mail. You passed first, didn’t you?”
    He was compelled to admit that the call had come for him, but that he had declined it. “I was so sure—I am so sure—of myself,” he concluded. “A year from now I’ll be earning more than a dozen men in the Railway Mail. You wait and see.”
    “Oh,” was all she said, when he finished. She stood up, pulling at her gloves. “I must go, Martin. Arthur is waiting for me.”
    He took her in his arms and kissed her, but she proved a passive sweetheart. There was no tenseness in her body, her arms did not go around him, and her lips met his without their wonted pressure.
    She was angry with him, he concluded, as he returned from the gate. But why? It was unfortunate that the poundman had gobbled Maria’s cows. But it was only a stroke of fate. Nobody could be blamed for it. Nor did it enter his head that he could have done aught otherwise than what he had done. Well, yes, he was to blame a little, was his next thought, for having refused the call to the Railway Mail. And she had not liked “Wiki-Wiki.”
    He turned at the head of the steps to meet the letter-carrier on his afternoon round. The ever recurrent fever of expectancy assailed Martin as he took the bundle of long envelopes. One was not long. It was short and thin, and outside was printed the address of The New York Outview . He paused in the act of tearing the envelope open. It could not be an acceptance. He had no manuscripts with that publication. Perhaps—his heart almost stood still at the—wild thought—perhaps they were ordering an article from him; but the next instant he dismissed the surmise as hopelessly impossible.
    It was a short, formal letter, signed by the office editor, merely informing him that an anonymous letter which they had received was enclosed, and that he could rest assured the Outview’s staff never under any circumstances gave consideration to anonymous correspondence.
    The enclosed letter Martin found to be crudely printed by hand. It was a hotchpotch of illiterate abuse of Martin, and of assertion that the “so-called Martin Eden” who was selling stories to magazines was no writer at all, and that in reality he was stealing stories from old magazines, typing them, and sending them out as his own. The envelope was postmarked “San Leandro.” Martin did not require a second thought to discover the author. Higginbotham’s grammar, Higginbotham’s colloquialisms, Higginbotham’s mental quirks and processes, were apparent throughout. Martin saw in every line, not the fine Italian hand, but the coarse grocer’s fist, of his brother-in-law.
    But why? he vainly questioned. What injury had he done Bernard Higginbotham? The thing was so unreasonable, so wanton. There was no explaining it. In the course of the week a dozen similar letters were forwarded to Martin by the editors of various Eastern magazines. The editors were behaving handsomely, Martin concluded. He was wholly unknown to them, yet some of them had even been sympathetic. It was evident that they detested anonymity. He saw that the malicious attempt to hurt him had failed. In fact, if anything came of it, it was bound to be good, for at least his name had been called to the attention of a number of editors. Sometime, perhaps, reading a submitted manuscript of his, they might remember him as the fellow about whom they had received an anonymous letter. And who was to say that such a remembrance might not sway the balance of their judgment just a trifle in his favor?
    It was about this time that Martin took a great slump in Maria’s estimation. He found her in the kitchen one morning groaning with pain, tears of weakness running down her cheeks, vainly endeavoring to put through a large ironing. He promptly diagnosed her affliction as La Grippe, dosed her with hot whiskey (the remnants in the