"I'm afraid I see a lot of yellow-backs!" he said, lifting a playful finger.
A novel, by a woman, of which The Speaker had written that "it's dialogue would move every literary artist to enthusiasm," lay on the window-sill—Kent had already observed it with gratification—and Cæsar acknowledged that he had read it. He conceded that it possessed a "superficial smartness." "Superficial" was his latest word, and when his discourse took a literary turn, his authoritative opinions were peppered with it.
Kent's bedroom was furnished very plainly, but it was exquisitely neat. His gaze rested with thankfulness on a large table, of a solidity that seemed to promise that it would not wobble. Beside the blotting-pad was an inkstand, of whose construction the primary object had been that it should hold ink; a handful of early flowers was arranged in a china bowl. There was a knot in his throat as he contemplated these preparations—the more touching for their simplicity—and when he sat down, the table confirmed its promise, and he found that the position afforded him a view of a corner of the garden.
It was here that he worked.
By degrees the frankness of her manner became more spontaneous in Cynthia, and his embarrassment in her society was sometimes forgotten. They were, as she had promised, the best of friends. Their rambles together had a charm which one associates with a honeymoon, but in which their own honeymoon had been lacking. In these rambles Kent was never bored; it appeared to him delightful to place himself in her hands and be taken where she listed in the April twilight. To seek shelter from showers in strange quarters was adventurous; and milk had a piquancy drunk with Cynthia in farmyards. He signed the extension of the Streatham agreement with gladness.
The alteration in her impressed him still more strongly now that he had opportunities for studying it; and the gradual result of three years, presenting itself to him as the fruit of ten months, was startling. His wife had become a woman—in her tone, in her bearing, in her comments, which often had a pungency, though they might not be brilliant. She was a woman in the composure with which she ignored their anomalous relations—a very fascinating woman withal, whose composure, while it won his admiration, disturbed him too, as the weeks went by. It was in moments difficult to identify her new personality with the girl's whose love for him had been so constantly evident. Among her other changes, had she grown to care less for him? He could not be surprised if she had.
Shortly after his arrival, Messrs. Kynaston had begun to send his proof-sheets, and in May The Eye of the Beholder was published. In the walk that they took after Cynthia had read it, she and Kent spoke of little else. It had amazed him to perceive how eager he was to hear her verdict, and at her first words, "I'm proud of you," the colour rushed to his face. He would never have supposed that her approval could excite him so much, or that her views would have such interest for him. When the criticisms began to come in, it was delicious, as they sat at breakfast, to open the yellow envelopes and devour the long slips with their heads bent together; and then, after he had paid a visit to the child, he would go up to his room and wish that the corner of the garden that he overlooked contained the bench.
Despite the seven rejections, and the opinion of Messrs. Cousins' reader that the construction rendered the novel hopeless, the criticisms were magnificent. The more important the paper, the less qualified was the praise. The lighter periodicals were sometimes a little "superior," but the authoritative organs were earnest and cordial, and in no less powerful a pronouncement than The Spectator's the construction was called "masterly." The Saturday Review repeated that Mr. Kent's style was admirable; and The Athenæum, and The Daily Chronicle, and The Times, and every paper to which a novelist looks, described him as a realist of a high order.