"How many Society friends have you, Miss Browneyes?" I asked.
"Oh, heaps of them—scores—dead oodles and scads of 'em, as we girls say."
"But really, how many?" I persisted. "Suppose your book were published, how many of your Society friends could you confidently reckon upon as probable purchasers? Here's paper and a pencil. Suppose you set down their names and tot them up."
She eagerly undertook the task, and after half an hour she had a list of forty-odd persons who would pretty surely buy the book—"if they couldn't borrow it," she added.
I explained the matter to her somewhat—dwelling upon the fact that a sale of two thousand copies would barely reimburse the publisher's outlay.
She said I had been "very nice" to her, but on the whole she decided to accept my advice and not pay me fifty dollars for a futile reading of the manuscript. I was glad of that. For it seemed like breaking a butterfly to disappoint so charming a young girl.
The letters Lily Browneyes brought me had at least the merit of sincerity. They were meant to help her accomplish her purpose, and not as so many letters of the kind are, to get rid of importunity by shifting it to the shoulders of some one else. I remember something that illustrates my meaning.
I presided, many years ago, at a banquet given by the Authors Club to Mr. William Dean Howells. Nothing was prearranged. There was no schedule of toasts in my hand, no list of speakers primed to respond to them. With so brilliant a company to draw upon I had no fear as to the results of calling up the man I wanted, without warning.
In the course of the haphazard performance, it occurred to me that we ought to have a speech from some publisher, and accordingly I called upon Mr. J. Henry Harper—"Harry Harper," we who knew and loved him called him.
His embarrassment was positively painful to behold. He made no attempt whatever to respond but appealed to me to excuse him.