‘But, you see, we haven’t money, and there’s little chance of our getting any. That scrubby old uncle won’t leave anything to us; I feel too sure of it. I often feel disposed to go and beg him on my knees to think of us in his will.’ She laughed. ‘I suppose it’s impossible, and would be useless; but I should be capable of it if I knew it would bring money.’
Reardon said nothing.
‘I didn’t think so much of money when we were married,’ Amy continued. ‘I had never seriously felt the want of it, you know. I did think—there’s no harm in confessing it—that you were sure to be rich some day; but I should have married you all the same if I had known that you would win only reputation.’
‘You are sure of that?’
‘Well, I think so. But I know the value of money better now. I know it is the most powerful thing in the world. If I had to choose between a glorious reputation with poverty and a contemptible popularity with wealth, I should choose the latter.’
‘No!’
‘I should.’
‘Perhaps you are right.’
He turned away with a sigh.
‘Yes, you are right. What is reputation? If it is deserved, it originates with a few score of people among the many millions who would never have recognised the merit they at last applaud. That’s the lot of a great genius. As for a mediocrity like me—what ludicrous absurdity to fret myself in the hope that half-a-dozen folks will say I am “above the average!” After all, is there sillier vanity than this? A year after I have published my last book, I shall be practically forgotten; ten years later, I shall be as absolutely forgotten as one of those novelists of the early part of this century, whose names one doesn’t even recognise. What fatuous posing!’