Love's Pilgrimage: A Novel

by Upton Sinclair

Then Thyrsis, in his desperation, joined the ranks of the begging letter-writers. He would send long accounts of his plight to eminent philanthropists—having no idea that the secretaries of eminent philanthropists throw out basketsful of such letters every day. He would read in the papers of some public-spirited enterprise—he would hear of this man or that woman who was famous for his or her interest in helpful things—and he would sit down and write these people that he was starving, and implore them to read his book. In later years, when he came to know of some of these newspaper idols, it was a comfort to him to feel certain that his letters had been thrown away unread.

Also he begged from everybody he met, under whatever circumstances he met them. If by any chance the person might be imagined to possess money, sooner or later would come some hour of distress, when Thyrsis would be driven to try to borrow. On one occasion he counted it up, and there were forty-three individuals to whom he had made himself a nuisance. With half a dozen of them he had actually succeeded; but always promising to return the money when his next check came in—and always scrupulously doing this. There was never anyone who rose to the understanding of what he really wanted—a free gift, for the sake of his art. There was never anyone who could understand his utter shamelessness about it; that fervor of consecration which made it impossible for a man to humiliate him, or to insult him—to do anything save to write himself down a dead soul.

People were quite clear in their views upon this question; a man must earn his own way in the world. And that was all right, if a man were in the world for himself. But what if he were working for humanity, and had no time to think about himself? Was that truly a disgraceful thing? Take Jesus, for instance; ought he to have kept at his carpenter’s trade, instead of preaching the Sermon on the Mount? Or was it that his right to preach the Sermon was determined by the size of the collection he could take among the audience?

And then, while he pondered this problem of “earning one’s own way,” Thyrsis was noting the lives of the people who were preaching it. What were they doing to earn the luxuries they enjoyed? Even granting that one recognized their futile benevolence as justifying them personally—what about the tens of thousands of others who lived in utter idleness, squandering in self-indulgence and ostentation huge fortunes of which they had never earned a penny? The boy could not go upon the streets of the city without having this monstrous fact flaunted in his face in a thousand forms. So many millions for folly and vice, and not one cent for his art! This was the thing upon which he was brooding day and night—and filling his soul with an awful bitterness which was to horrify the world in later years.

Section 4. He might not come to see Corydon in her home; but she would meet him in the street, and they would walk in the park, a pitiful and mournful pair. They had to walk slowly, and often he would have to help her, for her burden had now become great. She had altered all her dresses, and she wore a long cape, and even then was not able to hide the disfigurement of her person. They would sit upon a bench in the cold, and talk about the latest aspects of his struggle, what he was doing and what he hoped to do. Corydon would bring him the opinions of a few more members of the bourgeois world, and they would curse this world and these people together. For there was no more thought of giving up on Corydon’s side than there was on his; it was not for nothing that he had talked to her upon the hill-top in the moonlight.

Meanwhile, however, time was passing, and the prospect of her approaching confinement hung over them like a black thunder-cloud. It came on remorselessly, menacingly. The event was due about Christmas time, and there must be some money then—there must be some money then! But where was it to be found?

Thyrsis had tried another story for the “Treasure Chest,” but the editor had not liked his plot. Also he was taking “The Hearer of Truth” from one place to another; but with less and less hope, as he learned from various editors and publishers how radical and subversive they considered it. He took it now mechanically, as a matter of form—making it his rule always to count upon rejection, so that he might never be disappointed.

One of Corydon’s rich friends had told her of a certain famous surgeon, and Corydon had gone to see him. He had a beautiful private hospital, and his prices were unthinkable; but he had seemed to be interested in her, and when she told him her circumstances, he had said that he would try to “meet her halfway.” But even with the reductions he quoted, it would cost them nearly a hundred and fifty dollars; and how could Thyrsis get such a sum? Even if the surgeon were willing to wait—what prospect was there that he could ever get it?

This again was the curse of their leisure-class upbringing. They did not know how poor women had their babies, and they shrunk from the thought of finding it out. Corydon had met this man, and had been impressed by him; and Thyrsis realized, even if she did not, that she had got her heart set upon the plan. And if he did not make it possible, and then anything were to go wrong with her, how would he ever be able to forgive himself? This event would come but once, and might mean so much to them.

So he said to himself that he would “raise the money”. But the days passed and became weeks, and the weeks became months, and there was no sign of the raising. And then suddenly came one of those shafts of sunlight through the clouds—one of those will-o’-the-wisps that were forever luring Thyrsis into the swamps. Another editor liked “The Hearer of Truth”; another editor said that it was a great piece of literature, and that he would surely use it! So Thyrsis went to the great surgeon and told him that he would be able to pay him in a little while; and the arrangement was made for Corydon to come. And then the editor put the “great piece of literature” away in his desk, and forgot all about it for a month—while Thyrsis waited, day by day, in an agony of suspense.