‘To-morrow I finish the second volume.’
‘And in a week,’ she replied, ‘we shan’t have a shilling left.’
He had refrained from making inquiries, and Amy had forborne to tell him the state of things, lest it should bring him to a dead stop in his writing. But now they must needs discuss their position.
‘In three weeks I can get to the end,’ said Reardon, with unnatural calmness. ‘Then I will go personally to the publishers, and beg them to advance me something on the manuscript before they have read it.’
‘Couldn’t you do that with the first two volumes?’
‘No, I can’t; indeed I can’t. The other thing will be bad enough; but to beg on an incomplete book, and such a book—I can’t!’
There were drops on his forehead.
‘They would help you if they knew,’ said Amy in a low voice.
‘Perhaps; I can’t say. They can’t help every poor devil. No; I will sell some books. I can pick out fifty or sixty that I shan’t much miss.’
Amy knew what a wrench this would be. The imminence of distress seemed to have softened her.