Fanny's First Novel

by Frank Frankfort Moore

In an instant Susy had whirled round on her seat and flung her arms round her sister's neck, laying her head on her shoulder.

“Oh, Fanny, Fanny, 'tis too cruel!” she sobbed. “We were sure that so much would come of it—it seemed so splendid to read, even before it was printed—so much better than any other story that ever came into our hands—and you worked so hard at it—every spare moment when you might have been enjoying yourself—in the cold of last winter up in that room—and at Lynn too—and Chessington—and now, when we think that your cleverness, your patience, your genius, is to be rewarded, nothing comes of it—all your trouble has gone for nothing—all our secrecy! Oh, it is too cruel!”

“You dear child,” said Fanny. “It is only cruel if it sets you crying in this way. What does it matter to anyone if the book has gone and nothing has come of it? I have been thinking that writing a book and publishing it is like throwing a stone into the sea. It may fall so that it sinks down plumb, or it may fall so that it makes a splash for a while, but it sinks to the bottom all the same. Success or failure is only the difference between a splash and a ripple. We were fools to fancy that our little stone would float.”

“But it was not a stone, it was full of life and it should have—it should have—swum! Oh, the people who buy books are so stupid!”

“They are—that was the hope that I builded on. They are stupid, but not stupid enough to buy my book.”

“Oh, Fanny!”

“That is really the frame of mind that I find myself in to-day. I tell you truly, Susy, that after the first week, I schooled myself to think of the business in this way; and I am certain that in another month I shall even feel delighted that my little pebble made no splash. Look at the matter philosophically, Susy.”

“Oh, philosophically!”

“Well, reasonably. Are we in a different position to-day from that we were in before the book was published? We are not. We are just the same as we were before. It has not injured us in any way. Nay, if you think of it, we are—I, at least, am—all the better for having failed, for I have learned my lesson. I was beginning to feel cleverer than I had any right to think myself, and this has come as a chastening—to make me know my right place. These rebukes do not come by chance, Susy. I know now that I was inclined to hold my head too high. I don't think that I will do so again.”

“You never held your head too high—just the opposite. And I think it very cruel that you should be rebuked for nothing. But I do not blame anyone except the wretched people who refused to buy your nice book, but spent their seven and sixpence at Vauxhall or Ranelagh—perhaps watching Mr. Foote and his puppets at the Haymarket. Oh, I have no patience with them! Why, it only needed a thousand people to buy the book and it would have been accounted a success!”