Adventures and Letters of Richard Harding Davis Part 4

NEW YORK--1890.

DEAR CHAS:

Brisbane has suggested to me that the Bradley story would lead anyone to suppose that my evenings were spent in the boudoirs of the horizontales of 34th Street and has scared me somewhat in consequence.

If it strikes you and Dad the same way don't show it to Mother. Dad made one mistake by thinking I wrote a gambling story which has made me nervous. It is hardly the fair thing to suppose that a man must have an intimate acquaintance with whatever he writes of intimately. A lot of hunting people, for instance, would not believe that I had written the "Traver's Only Ride" story because they knew I did not hunt. Don't either you or Dad make any mistake about this.

d.i.c.k.

As a matter of fact they would not let me in the room, and I don't know whether it abounded in signed etchings or Bougereau's nymphs.

NEW YORK--1890.

DEAR FAMILY:

Today has been more or less feverish. In the morning's mail I received a letter from Berlin asking permission to translate "Gallegher" into German, and a proof of a paragraph from The Critic on my burlesque of Rudyard Kipling, which was meant to please but which bored me. Then the "Raegen" story came in, making nine pages of the Scribner's, which at ten dollars a page ought to be $90. Pretty good pay for three weeks' work, and it is a good story. Then at twelve a young man came bustling into the office, stuck his card down on the desk and said, "I am S. S. McClure. I have sent my London representative to Berlin and my New York man to London. Will you take charge of my New York end?"

If he thought to rattle me he was very much out of it, for I said in his same tone and manner, "Bring your New York representative back and send me to London, and I'll consider it. As long as I am in New York I will not leave The Evening Sun."

"Edmund Gosse is my London representative," he said; "you can have the same work here. Come out and take lunch." I said, "Thank you, I can't; I'll see you on Tuesday."

"All right," he said. "I'll come for you. Think of what I say. I'll make your fortune. Bradford Merrill told me to get you. You won't have anything to do but ask people to write novels and edit them. I'll send you abroad later if you don't like New York. Can you write any children's stories for me?"

"No," I said, "see you Tuesday."

This is a verbal report of all and everything that was said. I consider it a curious interview. It will raise my salary here or I go.

What do YOU think? d.i.c.k.

NEW YORK--1890.

DEAR FAMILY:

The more I thought of the McClure offer the less I thought of it. So I told him last night I was satisfied where I was, and that the $75 he offered me was no inducement. Brisbane says I will get $50 about the first of October, which is plenty and enough for a young man who intends to be good to his folks. I cannot do better than stay where I am, for it is understood between Brisbane and Laffan that in the event of the former's going into politics I shall take his place, which will suit very well until something better turns up. Then there is the chance of White's coming back and my going to Lunnon, which would please me now more for what I think I could make of it than what I think others have made of it. If I had gone to McClure I would have been shelved and side-tracked, and I am still in the running, and learning every day. Brisbane and I have had our first serious difficulty over Mrs. R----, who is staying with Mrs. "Bill." There is at present the most desperate rivalry, and we discuss each other's chances with great anger. He counts on his transcontinental knowledge, but my short stories. .h.i.t very hard, and he is not in it when I sing "Thy Face Will Lead Me On" and "When Kerrigan Struck High C." She has a fatal fondness for Sullivan, which is most unfortunate, as Brisbane can and does tell her about him by the half hour. Yesterday we both tried to impress her by riding down in front of the porch and showing off the horses and ourselves. Brisbane came off best, though I came off quickest, for my horse put his foot in a hole and went down on his knees, while I went over his head like the White Knight in "Alice." I would think nothing of sliding off a roof now. But I made up for this mishap by coming back in my grey suit and having it compared with the picture in The Century. It is a very close fight, and, while Brisbane is chasing over town for photographs of Sullivan, I am buying books of verses of which she seems to be fond. As soon as she gets her divorce one of us is going to marry her. We don't know which. She is about as beautiful a woman as I ever saw, and very witty and well-informed, but it would cost a good deal to keep her in diamonds. She wears some the Queen gave her, but she wants more.

d.i.c.k.

NEW YORK--1890.

DEAR MOTHER (LATE MA):

I am well and with lots to do. I went up to see Hopper the other night, which was the first time in three months that I have been back of a theater, and it was like going home. There is a smell about the painty and ga.s.sy and dusty place that I love as much as fresh earth and newly cut hay, and the girls look so pretty and bold lying around on the sets, and the men so out of focus and with such startling cheeks and lips. They were very glad to see me and made a great fuss. Then I've been to see Carmencita dance, which I enjoyed remarkably, and I have been reading Rudyard Kipling's short stories, and I think it is disgusting that a boy like that should write such stories. He hasn't left himself anything to do when he gets old. He reminds me of Bret Harte and not a bit of Stevenson, to whom some of them compare him.

I am very glad you liked the lady in mid-air story so much, but it wasn't a bit necessary to add the MORAL from a MOTHER. I saw it coming up before I had read two lines; and a very good moral it is, too, with which I agree heartily. But, of course, you know it is not a new idea to me. Anything as good and true as that moral cannot be new at this late date. I went to the Brooklyn Handicap race yesterday. It is one of the three biggest races of the year, and a man stood in front of me in the paddock in a white hat. Another man asked him what he was "playing."

"Well," he said, "I fancy Fides myself."

"Fides!" said his friend, "why, she ain't in it. She won't see home.

Raceland's the horse for your money; she's favorite, and there isn't any second choice. But Fides! Why, she's simply impossible. Raceland beat HER last Suburban."

"Yes, I remember," said the man in the white hat, "but I fancy Fides."

Then another chap said to him, "Fides is all good enough on a dust track on a sunny, pleasant day, but she can't ran in the mud. She hasn't got the staying powers. She's a pretty one to look at, but she's just a 'grandstand' ladies' choice. She ain't in it with Raceland or Erica. The horse YOU want is not a pretty, dainty flyer, but a stayer, that is sure and that brings in good money, not big odds, but good money. Why, I can name you a dozen better'n Fides."

"Still, somehow, I like Fides best," said the obstinate man in the white hat.

"But Fides will take the bit in her mouth and run away, or throw the jock or break into the fence. She isn't steady. She's all right to have a little bet on, just enough for a flyer, but she's not the horse to plunge on. If you're a millionaire with money to throw away, why, you might put some of it up on her, but, as it is, you want to put your money where it will be sure of a 'place,' anyway. Now, let me mark your card for you?"

"No," said the man, "what you all say is reasonable, I see that; but, somehow, I rather fancy Fides best."

I've forgotten now whether Fides won or not, and whether she landed the man who just fancied her without knowing why a winner or sent him home broke. But, in any event, that is quite immaterial, the story simply shows how obstinate some men are as regards horses and--other uncertain critters. I have no doubt but that the Methodist minister's daughter would have made Hiram happy if he had loved her, but he didn't. No doubt Anne ----, Nan ----, Katy ---- and Maude ---- would have made me happy if they would have consented to have me and I had happened to love them, but I fancied Fides.

But now since I have scared you sufficiently, let me add for your peace of mind that I've not enough money to back any horses just at present, and before I put any money up on any one of them for the Matrimonial stakes, I will ask you first to look over the card and give me a few pointers. I mayn't follow them, you know, but I'll give you a fair warning, at any rate.

"You're my sweetheart, I'm your beau."

d.i.c.k.

NEW YORK, May 29, 1890.

This is just a little good night note to say how I wish I was with you down at that dear old place and how much I love you and Nora who is getting lovelier and sweeter and prettier everyday and I know a pretty girl when I see 'em, Fides, for instance. But I won't tease you about that any more.

I finished a short silly story to night which I am in doubt whether to send off or not. I think I will keep it until I read it to you and learn what you think.

Mr. Gilder has asked me to stay with them at Marion, and to go to Cambridge with Mrs. Gilder and dear Mrs. Cleveland and Grover Cleveland, when he reads the poem before D. K. E.

I have bought a book on decorations, colored, and I am choosing what I want, like a boy with a new pair of boots.

Good-night, my dearest Mama.

d.i.c.k.

In addition to his regular work on The Evening Sun, my brother, as I have already said, was devoting a great part, of his leisure moments to the writing of short stories, and had made a tentative agreement with a well-known magazine to do a series of short sketches of New York types.

Evidently fearful that Richard was writing too much and with a view to pecuniary gain, my mother wrote the following note of warning:

PHILADELPHIA, 1890.

DEAR d.i.c.k:

I wouldn't undertake the "types." For one thing, you will lose prestige writing for ----'s paper. For another, I dread beyond everything your beginning to do hack work for money. It is the beginning of decadence both in work and reputation for you. I know by my own and a thousand other people. Begin to write because it "is a lot of money" and you stop doing your best work. You make your work common and your prices will soon go down. George Lewes managed George Eliot wisely.

He stopped her hack work. Kept her at writing novels and soon one each year brought her $40,000. I am taking a purely mercenary view of the thing. There is another which you understand better than I-- Mind your Mother's advice to you--now and all the time is "do only your best work--even if you starve doing it." But you won't starve. You'll get your dinner at Martin's instead of Delmonico's, which won't hurt you in the long run. Anyhow, $1000. for 12,500 words is not a great price.