“I didn’t know myself until Harry Thurston Peck told me. It’s the wisdom that comes to you going down the stairs, or the elevator, after making a fool of yourself higher up—an afterthought, as it were.”
“And what’s the afterthought now?”
“See that book?” (pointing), “no, not that, the yellowback, by Prof. Borkowsky—one more guy trying to explain Jonathan Swift. I forgot when his Deanship lived and died, but they must have been at it for centuries. And without examining the new volume, I bet I can tell its contents: more highfalutin’ tommyrot about the Dean’s vagaries in erotics and small beer politics. There must be a considerable library on the subject, every new author threshing the old straw a tenth time, and adding mystery trimmings of his own. I always promised myself to submit my theories on Swift and his harem at a first-class insanity shop, but I forgot to ask Krafft-Ebing in Vienna, and now I let Virchow pass.”
I was going to say something obvious, but Mark stopped me. “I know Virchow’s special line, but that man is wise on every conceivable subject, and I am quite sure he would have borne me out, namely, that Swift’s character can be explained on the theory that he was a Sadist and a Masochist in one. If Swift, as he wrote to an acquaintance, ‘died of rage like a poisoned rat in a hole,’ I am sure he enjoyed it. God knows that man gave more pain to his lady loves, Stella, Vanessa and the rest, than all the Romeos in Shakespeare. They say that he killed Vanessa by frightening her to death; he certainly murdered Stella morally by letting her pass for his mistress. Still these two women and others, whose names I forget, were proud of the torments inflicted upon them. I wish I had asked Virchow, when he invited the audience to put questions to him at the end of the lecture.”
MARK IN TRAGEDY AND COMEDY
We had lunch with some of the Herald boys at Cafe des Ambassadeurs, Champs-Elysees, when Dick Benet, editor of “Dalziel’s News,” joined us. Dick, “contrary to his usual morosity, acted the gay and debonair,” to quote Clemens, who suggested that “he must have given the boss the toothache by managing to get his salary raised a hundred francs per annum.”
There was much hilarity about that, for we all knew “the boss” for a skinflint, and Mark told a succession of funny stories about his own salary grabs on the “Virginia Enterprise” and other impecunious sheets. All were keenly alive to the treat, only Dick seemed absent-minded, pulling out his watch every little while and keeping an eye on the door.
“You are not afraid of a bum-bailiff now,” suggested Mark.
“Neither now, nor at any future time,” replied Dick. “Fact is, the wife promised to meet me here and I have an engagement at two o’clock which I mustn’t miss under any circumstances whatever.” Our friend seemed to be lying under some pressure or excitement.
At one-fifteen a tall, stylish Frenchwoman entered, and Dick rushed up to her with outstretched hands. “So glad you came in time,” he murmured. He slurred over the introductions, drew his wife on to the seat next to him, and whispered to her.