"I don't know anything about greatness. All I know is that I like some things and that I don't like others. I don't know why a book is great or why it isn't. You can't judge things by what I say. It's quite possible that you are a great writer, and that's why I want you to let me get a job, so that you can go on with your work and be able to show the world what you can do. I'd hate to think you'd been prevented from doing your best work because you'd had to use up your energy doing other things. It won't take long to finish this book, will it?"
"No."
"Well, then, I shan't have to work for very long. By the time it's finished, The Enchanted Lover may have earned a lot of money for us ... and the play, too ... and then we can just laugh at our troubles now!..."
III
He remained obdurate for a while, but in the end she wore his opposition down. Mr. Crawford gladly welcomed her back to her old job, and even offered her a larger salary than she had been receiving before her marriage. "I've learned your value since you went away," he said. "I'm a fool to tell you that, perhaps, but I can't help it. Half the young women who go out to offices nowadays would be dear at ninepence a week. The last girl we had here caused me to imperil my immortal soul twice a day through her incompetence. I've sworn more in a week since you left us, than I ever swore in my life before!..."
Eleanor insisted that John should not inform his mother of her return to work. Intuitively she knew that Mrs. MacDermott's pride would be outraged by this knowledge, and that she would make bitter complaint to John of his failure to maintain his wife in a way worthy of his family; and so she urged John to say nothing at all of the matter either to Mrs. MacDermott or to Uncle William. He had made no comment on the matter, but she knew that he had been relieved by her request.
Hinde had fulfilled his promise to boom The Enchanted Lover in the Evening Herald, and Mr. Jannissary reluctantly admitted that the book was selling. "Slowly, of course, but still ... selling! I think I shall get my money back," he said.
"Do you think I'll get any money out of it?" John asked.
"Ah, these things are on the knees of the gods, my dear fellow! It is impossible to say!"
The second book moved in a leisurely manner to its close, and Mr. Jannissary declared that he was delighted to hear that The Enchanted Lover would shortly have a successor. He thought that perhaps he could promise to pay royalties from the first copy of the new novel!...