“I never was more serious in my life, good folkses all. I’ve got to be. This butterfly existence has gone on long enough. Norah, and Max, and Mr. Doctor Man, I am going away.”
Norah’s hands crashed down on the piano keys with a jangling discord. She swung about to face me.
“Not New York again, Dawn! Not New York!”
“I am afraid so,” I answered.
Max—bless his great, brotherly heart—rose and came over to me and put a hand on my shoulder.
“Don’t you like it here, girlie? Want to be hauled home on a shutter again, do you? You know that as long as we have a home, you have one. We need you here.”
But I shook my head. From his chair at the other side of the room I could feel Von Gerhard’s gaze fixed upon us. He had said nothing.
“Need me! No one needs me. Don’t worry; I’m not going to become maudlin about it. But I don’t belong here, and you know, it. I have my work to do. Norah is the best sister that a woman ever had. And Max, you’re an angel brother-in-law. But how can I stay on here and keep my self-respect?” I took Max’s big hand in mine and gathered courage from it.
“But you have been working,” wailed Norah, “every morning. And I thought the book was coming on beautifully. And I’m sure it will be a wonderful book, Dawn dear. You are so clever.”
“Oh, the book—it is too uncertain. Perhaps it will go, but perhaps it won’t. And then—what? It will be months before the book is properly polished off. And then I may peddle it around for more months. No; I can’t afford to trifle with uncertainties. Every newspaper man or woman writes a book. It’s like having the measles. There is not a newspaper man living who does not believe, in his heart, that if he could only take a month or two away from the telegraph desk or the police run, he could write the book of the year, not to speak of the great American Play. Why, just look at me! I’ve only been writing seriously for a few weeks, and already the best magazines in the country are refusing my manuscripts daily.”