“And two years ago I was–––You know what, Jim!”
“And two years ago I was Captain Mayne Plunkett of dime novel repute––or disrepute––with glazed pants and a celluloid collar.”
“And Aunt Christina of ‘Love Notes’ fame,” Phil reminded.
Jim put up his hand. “Hush! Let the dead bury their dead.
“But it beats the Dutch all the same how offers keep coming in on a man when he doesn’t require them; yet, when he’s nearly down and out, he can’t even get a political speech to report.”
“That’s simple enough too, Jim. You know the reason; you have preached it in this business long enough.
“Think failure and you bring every brooding failure carrion-crow in the Universe to roost on the top rail of your iron bedstead. Think success, look success, live success,––and success walks in at your front door, while everyone helps you along the same way with each thought he gives your apparent success, even if his thought be simply one of envy.”
“Yes!––and as you are aware, my one object in life when I was slightly younger was to be a successful novelist. But no publisher would look at me. Then I got my nose in on this penny-a-line Deadwood Dick stuff––which I shall never despise, for many a square meal I have had to fill a round hole off the fifty dollars a book they netted me.
“To-day I have a letter from the publishers of these same paper ‘Horribles,’ enclosing six of my poor, starved, mental offsprings. They are the pick of fifty which they say I have written.”