Rivers had a home, of course, and a wife and a family. He was domesticated somewhere out in Herne Hill, from the hours of eight until ten-thirty in the morning; and except once a week no more was seen of him at home. O'Brien generally took the desk on Sundays. But for the rest of his life Rivers lived and breathed with The Day more than any one else. From the time the door closed on him after breakfast, to the time when it closed on him late at night, when he went home, worn-out and tired, he worked for The Day. He was bought as surely as any slave was bought in the days of bondage. And his price was a magnificent one of four figures.
He expected his men to do as he did, in the service of the paper. For his goodwill, nothing sufficed but the complete subservience of all other interests to the work of The Day. Not until you did that, were you worthy to be on the paper and serve him.... And many hearts were broken in that room, with its hopeless gospel of materialism, where ideals were withered and nothing spiritual could survive.
Rivers was one of the young men who had won himself to power by the brute force of his intellect. He knew his own business to the tips of his fingers, and, beyond that, nothing mattered. Art and literature and the finer qualities of life could not enter into the practical range of his vision. They were not news. The great halfpenny public cared for nothing but news—a murder mystery, for choice; and the only chance art or literature had of awaking his interest was for the artist to commit suicide in extraordinary circumstances, or for the novelist to murder his publisher. ("By George!" I can hear Rivers saying, "here's a ripping story.... Here's an author murdered his publisher ... 'm ... 'm ... I suppose it's justifiable homicide.")
But on news—red-hot news—he was splendid. He might be sitting in his chair, joking idly with anybody who happened to be in the room, and suddenly the boy would bring in a slip from the tape machine: a submarine wreck! Immediately, the listless, joking man would become swiftly serious and grim. He would decide instantly on the choice of reporters—two should be sent to the scene. "Boy, bring the A.B.C. No train. Damn it, why didn't that kid bring the news in at once. He dawdled five minutes. We could have caught the 3.42. Well, look up the trains to Southampton. Four o'clock. O'Brien, telephone up Southampton and tell them to have a car to take The Day reporters on. Boy, ask Mr Wratten and Mr Pride to come up. O'Brien, send a wire to the local chaps—tell 'em to weigh in all they can. Notify the post-office five thousand words from Portsmouth. Too late for photographs to-night—ring through to the artists, we'll have a diagram and a map. Off Southsea, eh? Shove in a picture of Southsea...." And in an hour it would all be over, and Rivers, a new man with news stirring in the world, would playfully punch O'Brien in the chest, and gather about him a reporter or two for company, and bestow wonderful largesse in the shape of steaks and champagne. That was the human thing about Rivers. He was master absolute, and yet there was no sharp dividing line between him and the men under him. The discipline was there, but it was never obtruded. They drank, and joked, and scored off each other, and Rivers, when things were slack, would tell them some of his early adventures, but whenever it came to the test, his authority in his sphere was supreme. He knew how to get the best work out of his men; and, I think, sometimes, he was sorry for the men who had not, and never would get, a salary of four figures.
Humphrey could not understand him. At times he would be brutally cruel, and morose, scarcely speaking a word to anybody except Wratten, who was generally in his good books; at other times he would come to the office as light-hearted as a child, and urge them all into good-humour, and make them feel that there was no life in the world equal to theirs. Since that day when Humphrey had first met him in Ferrol's room, and he had laughed and said, "You're not a genius, are you?" Rivers had not taken any particular notice of him. When he came into Rivers' room, halting and nervous, he envied the easy freedom of the other reporters who chanced to be there. Wratten sitting on a table, dangling his legs, and Tommy Pride, with his hat on the back of his head, and a pipe in his mouth, while a third man might be looking over the diary of the day's events.
"Hullo, Quain...."
"Good-morning, Mr Rivers."
"O'Brien, what have you got for Quain. Eh? Nothing yet. Go downstairs and wait."
Or else: "Nothing doing this morning. You'd better do this lecture at seven o'clock. Give him the ticket, O'Brien."
And, as Humphrey left the room, he heard Wratten say casually, "I'll do that Guildhall luncheon to-day, Rivers, eh?" And Rivers replied, "Right-O. We shall want a column."