'There's one thing, perhaps, I'd better mention,' said Mark suddenly; after he had turned to go a new danger had occurred to him, 'the handwriting of the manuscript is not mine. I—I thought it as well to tell you that beforehand; it might lead to mistakes. I had it copied out for me by—by a friend.'
Mr. Fladgate burst out laughing. 'Pardon me,' he said, when he had finished, 'but really I couldn't help it, you do seem to have been so bent on hoodwinking us.'
'And yet you have found me out, you see,' said Mark, with a very unmirthful smile.
Mr. Fladgate smiled, too, making a little gesture of his hand, thinking very possibly that few precautions could be proof against his sagacity, and they parted.
Mark went down the stairs and through the clerks' room into the street, with a dazed and rather awestruck feeling upon him. He hardly realised the treachery he had been guilty of, the temptation had burst upon him so suddenly, his fall had been made so easy for him, that he scarcely felt his dishonour, nor was he likely to feel it very keenly so long as only good results should flow from it. But he was vaguely conscious that he was not the same Mark Ashburn who had parted from old Shelford not an hour ago in the street there; he was a man with a new hope in his breast, and it might be a new fear, but the hope was near and bright, the fear shadowy and remote as yet: he had only to keep his own counsel and be patient for a while, and the course of events would assuredly bring him the stake he had played so high for.
At home that evening he took down his manuscript novels (which of course he had not burnt) and read them again carefully. Yes; there was power in them, he felt it, a copious flow of words, sparkling wit, and melting pathos. The white heat at which the lines were written surprised even himself. It was humiliating to think that without the subterfuge that had been forced upon him he might have found it impossible to find publishers who would appreciate these merits, for after Messrs. Leadbitter & Gandy's refusal he had recognised this to the full; but now, at least, they were insured against any such fate. A careful reading was absolutely necessary to a proper estimation of them, and a careful reading they had never had as yet, and would receive at last, or, if they did not, it would only be because the reputation he had appropriated would procure them a ready acceptance without any such preliminary ordeal. The great point gained was that they would be published, and after that he feared nothing.
If anything whispered to him that he might have accomplished even this by honourable means; that in time and with economy he could have produced them at his own expense; that perhaps a little more perseverance might even have discovered a firm with sufficient faith to take the risk upon themselves; if these doubts suggested themselves to him he had little difficulty in arguing them down. They might have had some weight once, but they came too late; the thing was done now and could never be recalled; his whole interest lay in persuading himself that what he had done was the only thing that could be done, unless he was content to resign his ambition for ever, and Mark succeeded in persuading himself of this.
Very soon his chief feeling was one of impatience for Holroyd's book to come out and make way for his own: then any self-reproach he might still feel would be drowned in a sense of triumph which would justify the means he had taken; so he waited eagerly for the arrival of the first proofs.
They arrived at last. As he came back one evening to Malakoff Terrace, Trixie ran to meet him, holding up two tightly rolled parcels, with a great curiosity in her eyes. 'They came this afternoon,' she whispered, 'and oh, Mark, I couldn't help it; I tore one end a little and peeped; are they really part of a book—is it yours?'
Mark thought he had better accustom himself to this kind of thing as early as possible. 'Yes, Trixie,' he said, 'they're the first proofs of my book.'