From the beginning of the year Edwards had been doing a large amount of five-cent library work for Harte & Perkins. A new weekly had been started, the writer who furnished the copy failed to get his manuscript in on time, and Edwards was given a story to finish and, a few days afterward, the entire series to take care of.
At the time he sold the serial to Mr. White, he was supplying weekly copy for two libraries—the old Five-Cent Library and the new weekly, which shall here be referred to as the Circus Series.
On the proceeds from the sale of "He Was A Stranger" Edwards and his wife had a little outing at Atlantic City. They returned to New York for a few days, and then went on to Boston. Here, comfortably quartered in a hotel, Edwards devoted his mornings to work and his afternoons to seeing the "sights" with Mrs. Edwards. They haunted Old Cambridge, they made pilgrimages to Salem, to Plymouth and to other places, and they enjoyed themselves as they had never done before on an eastern trip. Later they finished out the summer near Monterey, in the Berkshire Hills.
During all these travels the Fiction Factory was regularly grinding out its grist of copy—so many pages a day, so many stories a week. Two libraries, together with a sketch each month for a trade paper published by Harte & Perkins, kept Edwards too busy to prepare any manuscripts for The Argosy. Much of his work, while in the Berkshires, was done in longhand. On this point Mr. Perkins wrote, July 25:
"I should think you would miss your typewriter. I fear that I shall miss it, too, when I read your manuscript, although I find your writing easier to read than that of any of our other writers."
In August the Edwards went West, visited for a time in Michigan and then in Wisconsin, finally returned to the former state and, in the little country town where Edwards was born, bought an old place and settled down.
As with the Golden Star Library, misfortune finally overtook the Circus Series. A telegram was received telling Edwards to hold No. 47 of the Circus Series pending instructions by letter. The letter instructed him to close up finally the adventures of the hero and his friends and bring their various activities to an appropriate end. The series was continued, for a while longer, with a brand-new hero in each story; but Edwards was requested to write but three of the stories in the new form.
The year, which opened auspiciously and proved a banner year financially, closed with a discontinuance of all orders from Harte & Perkins. Re-prints were being used in the old Five-Cent Library—stories that had been issued years before and could now be republished for another generation of boy readers. Under date of Dec. 1, 1911, Mr. Perkins wrote:
"I know of nothing, just at present, which you can do for us, but should anything develop I shall be very glad to inform you."
This left Edwards with a sketch a month for the trade paper, for which he was paid $10 each. That "misfortunes never come singly" is an old saying, and one which Edwards has found particularly true in the writing profession. A letter of Dec. 27, informed him: