Not George Washington — an Autobiographical Novel

  Chapter 5

  THE COLUMN_(James Orlebar Cloyster's narrative continued)_

  After the first week "On Your Way," on the _Orb_, offered hardlyany difficulty. The source of material was the morning papers, whichwere placed in a pile on our table at nine o'clock. The halfpennypapers were our principal support. Gresham and I each took one, andpicked it clean. We attended first to the Subject of the Day. This wasgenerally good for two or three paragraphs of verbal fooling. There wasa sort of tradition that the first half-dozen paragraphs should betopical. The rest might be topical or not, as occasion served.

  The column usually opened with a one-line pun--Gresham's invention.

  Gresham was a man of unparalleled energy and ingenuity. He had createdseveral of the typical characters who appeared from time to time in "OnYour Way," as, for instance, Mrs. Jenkinson, our Mrs. Malaprop, andJones junior, our "howler" manufacturing schoolboy. He was also a stoutapostle of a mode of expression which he called "funny language." Thus,instead of writing boldly: "There is a rumour that----," I was taught tosay, "It has got about that----." This sounds funnier in print, soGresham said. I could never see it myself.

  Gresham had a way of seizing on any bizarre incident reported in themorning papers, enfolding it in "funny language," adding a pun, andthus making it his own. He had a cunning mastery of periphrasis, and atelling command of adverbs.

  Here is an illustration. An account was given one morning by theCentral news of the breaking into of a house at Johnsonville (Mich.) bya negro, who had stolen a quantity of greenbacks. The thief, escapingacross some fields, was attacked by a cow, which, after severelyinjuring the negro, ate the greenbacks.

  Gresham's unacknowledged version of the episode ran as follows:

  "The sleepy god had got the stranglehold on John Denville when CaesarBones, a coloured gentleman, entered John's house at Johnsonville(Mich.) about midnight. Did the nocturnal caller disturb his slumberinghost? No. Caesar Bones has the finer feelings. But as he wasnoiselessly retiring, what did he see? Why, a pile of greenbacks whichJohn had thoughtlessly put away in a fire-proof safe."

  To prevent the story being cut out by the editor, who revised all theproofs of the column, with the words "too long" scribbled against it,Gresham continued his tale in another paragraph.

  "'Dis am berry insecure,' murmured the visitor to himself,transplanting the notes in a neighbourly way into his pocket. Mark thesequel. The noble Caesar met, on his homeward path, an irritablecudster. The encounter was brief. Caesar went weak in the second round,and took the count in the third. Elated by her triumph, and hungry fromher exertions, the horned quadruped nosed the wad of paper money anddaringly devoured it. Caesar has told the court that if he is convictedof felony, he will arraign the owner of the ostrich-like bovine on acharge of receiving stolen goods. The owner merely ejaculates 'Blackmale!'"

  On his day Gresham could write the column and have a hundred lines overby ten o'clock. I, too, found plenty of copy as a rule, though Icontinued my practice of doing a few paragraphs overnight. But everynow and then fearful days would come, when the papers were empty ofmaterial for our purposes, and when two out of every half-dozenparagraphs which we did succeed in hammering out were returned deletedon the editor's proof.

  The tension at these times used to be acute. The head printer wouldsend up a relay of small and grubby boys to remind us that "On YourWay" was fifty lines short. At ten o'clock he would come in person, andbe plaintive.

  Gresham, the old hand, applied to such occasions desperate remedies. Hewould manufacture out of even the most pointless item of news twoparagraphs by adding to his first the words, "This reminds us ofMr. Punch's famous story." He would then go through the bound volumesof _Punch_--we had about a dozen in the room--with lightning speeduntil he chanced upon a more or less appropriate tag.

  Those were mornings when verses would be padded out from three stanzasto five, Gresham turning them out under fifteen minutes. He had awonderful facility for verse.

  As a last expedient one fell back upon a standing column, a moth-eatencollection of alleged jests which had been set up years ago to meet theworst emergencies. It was, however, considered a confession of weaknessand a degradation to use this column.

  We had also in our drawer a book of American witticisms, published inNew York. To cut one out, preface it with "A good American story comesto hand," and pin it on a slip was a pleasing variation of the usualmode of constructing a paragraph. Gresham and I each had our favouritemethod. Personally, I had always a partiality for dealing with"buffers." "The brakes refused to act, and the train struck the buffersat the end of the platform" invariably suggested that if elderlygentlemen would abstain from loitering on railway platforms, they wouldnot get hurt in this way.

  Gresham had a similar liking for "turns." "The performance at theFrivoli Music Hall was in full swing when the scenery was noticed to beon fire. The audience got a turn. An extra turn."

  Julian Eversleigh, to whom I told my experiences on the _Orb_,said he admired the spirit with which I entered into my duties. Hesaid, moreover, that I had a future before me, not only as ajournalist, but as a writer.

  Nor, indeed, could I help seeing for myself that I was getting on. Iwas making a fair income now, and had every prospect of making a muchbetter one. My market was not restricted. Verses, articles, and fictionfrom my pen were being accepted with moderate regularity by many of theminor periodicals. My scope was growing distinctly wider. I found, too,that my work seemed to meet with a good deal more success when I sentit in from the _Orb_, with a letter to the editor on _Orb_ notepaper.

  Altogether, my five weeks on the _Orb_ were invaluable to me. Iought to have paid rather than have taken payment for working on thecolumn. By the time Fermin came back from Scotland to turn me out, Iwas a professional. I had learned the art of writing against time. Ihad learned to ignore noise, which, for a writer in London, is the mostvaluable quality of all. Every day at the _Orb_ I had had to turnout my stuff with the hum of the Strand traffic in my ears, varied byan occasional barrel-organ, the whistling of popular songs by theprinters, whose window faced ours, and the clatter of a typewriter inthe next room. Often I had to turn out a paragraph or a verse whilelistening and making appropriate replies to some other member of thestaff, who had wandered into our room to pass the time of day or readout a bit of his own stuff which had happened to please himparticularly. All this gave me a power of concentration, without whichwriting is difficult in this city of noises.

  The friendship I formed with Gresham too, besides being pleasant, wasof infinite service to me. He knew all about the game. I followed hisadvice, and prospered. His encouragement was as valuable as his advice.He was my pilot, and saw me, at great trouble to himself, through thedangerous waters.

  I foresaw that the future held out positive hope that my marriage withMargaret would become possible. And yet----

  Pausing in the midst of my castle-building, I suffered a sense ofrevulsion. I had been brought up to believe that the only adjectivethat could be coupled with the noun "journalism" was "precarious." WasI not, as Gresham would have said, solving an addition sum in infantilepoultry before their mother, the feathered denizen of the farmyard, hadlured them from their shell? Was I not mistaking a flash in the pan fora genuine success?

  These thoughts numbed my fingers in the act of writing to Margaret.

  Instead, therefore, of the jubilant letter I had intended to send her,I wrote one of quite a different tone. I mentioned the arduous natureof my work. I referred to the struggle in which I was engaged. Iindicated cleverly that I was a man of extraordinary courage battlingwith fate. I implied that I made just enough to live on.

  It would have been cruel to arouse expectations which might never befulfilled. In this letter, accordingly, and in subsequent letters, Irather went to the opposite extreme. Out of pure regard for Margaret, Ipainted my case unnecessarily black. Considerations of a similar natureprompted me to keep on my lodging in Walpole Street. I had two roomsin
stead of one, but they were furnished severely and with nothing butthe barest necessaries.

  I told myself through it all that I loved Margaret as dearly as ever.Yet there were moments, and they seemed to come more frequently as thedays went on, when I found myself wondering. Did I really want to giveup all this? The untidiness, the scratch meals, the nights with Julian?And, when I was honest, I answered, No.

  Somehow Margaret seemed out of place in this new world of mine.