'I mean to begin even sooner than I had intended. It is true that when I took your verses I made them my own by those little touches and corrections which, as you know very well, distinguish true poetry from its imitation'—It was not until he was gone that Effie remembered that not a single alteration had ever been made. So great is the power of the human voice that for the moment she listened and acquiesced, subdued and ashamed of herself—'At last, my young friend, the time for alteration and improvement is past. You can now stand alone—your verses signed—if, of course, we remain, as I hope, on the same friendly relations.'
'Oh!' she murmured.
'Enough. We understand each other. Your brother, you told me, is at work on a play—a romantic drama.'
'Yes. He has finished it. He has been at work upon it for two years, thinking of nothing else all day.'
Mr. Feilding nodded approval.
'That is the way,' he said heartily, 'to produce good work. Perfect—absolute—devotion—regardless of any earthly consideration. Art—Art—before all else. And now it is done?'
'Yes; he is copying it out.'
'Effie'—he suddenly changed the subject—'you have never told me of your resources. Tell me! I do not ask out of idle curiosity. That you are not rich I know——'
'No, we are not rich. We have a little—a thousand pounds apiece—and we have resolved to live on that, and on what we can get besides, until we have made our way. We have no rich relations to help us. My father is a country clergyman with a small living. We came to town so that Archie could get treatment for his hip. He is better now, and we shall stay altogether if we can only hold on.'
'A thousand pounds each. That is seventy pounds a year, I suppose?'