XIV
Henry Harper did not go to tea at King John's Mansions on the next Sunday afternoon. And on the following Sunday he stayed away too. Moreover, during the whole of that fortnight Miss Cora Dobbs did not call once at No. 249, Charing Cross Road.
This was a relief to the young man. He would not have known how to meet her had she come to the shop as usual. He was so shattered by the bolt from the blue that he didn't know in the least what to do.
Happily there was his work to distract him. Mr. Ambrose had suggested that he should write another tale for Brown's Magazine. He was to take his own time over the new story, bearing ever in mind the advice given him formerly, which he had turned to very good account; and in the meantime, his fancy could expand in the happy knowledge that the "Adventures of Dick Smith" were attracting attention in the magazine. Mr. Ambrose had already arranged for the story to appear as a book when its course had run in Brown's, and he was convinced—if prophecy was ever safe in literary matters—that real success awaited it.
Could Henry Harper have put Miss Cora Dobbs out of his thoughts, he might have been almost completely happy in planning and writing the "Further Adventures of Dick Smith." Aladdin's wonderful lamp was making his life a fairy tale. An incredible vista of fame and fortune was spreading before his eyes. Even Mr. Rudge had been stricken with awe by the check for three hundred pounds.
Yet, at the back of everything just now was a terrible feeling of indecision. There could be no doubt that the great world of which he knew so little, clearly looked to him "to act the gentleman." The phrase was that of the elegant and refined Miss Bonser and the dashing Miss Press, who mixed habitually with gentlemen, and therefore were in a position to speak with authority on such a delicate matter. And so plain was his duty that it had even percolated to Mrs. Greaves, who, in ways subtle and mysterious, seemed to be continually unbosoming herself to a similar tenor.
In the course of the third week of crisis, Mr. Harper's perplexities were greatly increased by a brief but emotional note, written on elegantly art-shaded notepaper, which had the name "Cora" with a ring round it engraved in the left-hand corner. It said:
DEAR HARRY,
Why haven't you been or written? I am feeling so low and miserable that unless you come to see me Sunday, the doctor says I shall have a bad breakdown.