Lafcadio Hearn - "Japan: An Attempt at Interpretation"

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T.S. Arthur - "The Lights and Shadows of Real Life"

New Philadelphia Book Publisher Highlights Local Talent
Book and Publishing News from Publishers Newswire(tm)

Looking for Child to be on Cover of a New Book, 'The Model Child'
PHILADELPHIA, Pa. -- The Philadelphia literary world will celebrate the launch of two new players today, April 10th: Kay Square Press, a new publishing company focused on Philadelphia-area artists, their stories, and their art; and Kay Square's first release, 'With the Rich and Mighty: Emlen Etting of Philadelphia' (ISBN: 978-0-9815129-0-7), a critical biography by Kenneth C. Kaleta.

FlatSigned Press Alleges Don Imus Remarks Damage Legacy of President Gerald R. Ford
NEW YORK, N.Y. -- Nathan Yungerberg, an accomplished model scout and professional child photographer is launching a nation-wide casting call to find the cover model for his highly anticipated book release, 'The Model Child: A Parents Guide to the Child Modeling Industry' (ISBN: 978-0-9817018-0-6).

Books: The Fallen Leaves

W >> Wilkie Collins >> The Fallen Leaves




"Do you believe in that?" he said, pointing to the illustration.

Regina declined to understand him. "In what?" she asked.

"In love at first sight."

It would be speaking with inexcusable rudeness to say plainly that she
told him a lie. Let the milder form of expression be, that she modestly
concealed the truth. "I don't know anything about it," she said.

_"I_ do," Amelius remarked smartly.

She persisted in looking at the illustration. Was there an infection of
imbecility in that fatal work? She was too simple to understand him,
even yet! "You do--what?" she inquired innocently.

"I know what love at first sight is," Amelius burst out.

Regina turned over the leaves of the magazine. "Ah," she said, "you
have read the story."

"I haven't read the story," Amelius answered. "I know what I felt
myself--on being introduced to a young lady."

She looked up at him with a sly smile. "A young lady in America?" she
asked.

"In England, Miss Regina." He tried to take her hand--but she kept it
out of his reach. "In London," he went on, drifting back into his
customary plainness of speech. "In this very street," he resumed,
seizing her hand before she was aware of him. Too much bewildered to
know what else to do, Regina took refuge desperately in shaking hands
with him. "Goodbye, Mr. Goldenheart," she said--and gave him his
dismissal for the second time.

Amelius submitted to his fate; there was something in her eyes which
warned him that he had ventured far enough for that day.

"May I call again, soon?" he asked piteously.

"No!" answered a voice at the door which they both recognized--the
voice of Mrs. Farnaby.

"Yes!" Regina whispered to him, as her aunt entered the room. Mrs.
Farnaby's interference, following on the earlier events of the day, had
touched the young lady's usually placable temper in a tender place--and
Amelius reaped the benefit of it.

Mrs. Farnaby walked straight up to him, put her hand in his arm, and
led him out into the hall.

"I had my suspicions," she said; "and I find they have not misled me.
Twice already, I have warned you to let my niece alone. For the third,
and last time, I tell you that she is as cold as ice. She will trifle
with you as long as it flatters her vanity; and she will throw you
over, as she has thrown other men over. Have your fling, you foolish
fellow, before you marry anybody. Pay no more visits to this house,
unless they are visits to me. I shall expect to hear from you." She
paused, and pointed to a statue which was one of the ornaments in the
hall. "Look at that bronze woman with the clock in her hand. That's
Regina. Be off with you--goodbye!"

Amelius found himself in the street. Regina was looking out at the
dining-room window. He kissed his hand to her: she smiled and bowed.
"Damn the other men!" Amelius said to himself. "I'll call on her
tomorrow."



CHAPTER 4

Returning to his hotel, he found three letters waiting for him on the
sitting-room table.

The first letter that he opened was from his landlord, and contained
his bill for the past week. As he looked at the sum total, Amelius
presented to perfection the aspect of a serious young man. He took pen,
ink, and paper, and made some elaborate calculations. Money that he had
too generously lent, or too freely given away, appeared in his
statement of expenses, as well as money that he had spent on himself.
The result may be plainly stated in his own words: "Goodbye to the
hotel; I must go into lodgings."

Having arrived at this wise decision, he opened the second letter. It
proved to be written by the lawyers who had already communicated with
him at Tadmor, on the subject of his inheritance.


"DEAR SIR,

"The enclosed, insufficiently addressed as you will perceive, only
reached us this day. We beg to remain, etc."


Amelius opened the letter enclosed, and turned to the signature for
information. The name instantly took him back to the Community: the
writer was Mellicent.

Her letter began abruptly, in these terms:

"Do you remember what I said to you when we parted at Tadmor? I said,
'Be comforted, Amelius, the end is not yet.' And I said again, 'You
will come back to me.'

"I remind you of this, my friend--directing to your lawyers, whose
names I remember when their letter to you was publicly read in the
Common Room. Once or twice a year I shall continue to remind you of
those parting words of mine: there will be a time perhaps when you will
thank me for doing so.

"In the mean while, light your pipe with my letters; my letters don't
matter. If I can comfort you, and reconcile you to your life--years
hence, when you, too, my Amelius, may be one of the Fallen Leaves like
me--then I shall not have lived and suffered in vain; my last days on
earth will be the happiest days that I have ever seen.

"Be pleased not to answer these lines, or any other written words of
mine that may follow, so long as you are prosperous and happy. With
_that_ part of your life I have nothing to do. You will find friends
wherever you go--among the women especially. Your generous nature shows
itself frankly in your face; your manly gentleness and sweetness speak
in every tone of your voice; we poor women feel drawn towards you by an
attraction which we are not able to resist. Have you fallen in love
already with some beautiful English girl? Oh, be careful and prudent!
Be sure, before you set your heart on her, that she is worthy of you!
So many women are cruel and deceitful. Some of them will make you
believe you have won their love, when you have only flattered their
vanity; and some are poor weak creatures whose minds are set on their
own interests, and who may let bad advisers guide them, when you are
not by. For your own sake, take care!

"I am living with my sister, at New York. The days and weeks glide by
me quietly; you are in my thoughts and my prayers; I have nothing to
complain of; I wait and hope. When the time of my banishment from the
Community has expired, I shall go back to Tadmor; and there you will
find me, Amelius, the first to welcome you when your spirits are
sinking under the burden of life, and your heart turns again to the
friends of your early days.

"Goodbye, my dear--goodbye!"


Amelius laid the letter aside, touched and saddened by the artless
devotion to him which it expressed. He was conscious also of a feeling
of uneasy surprise, when he read the lines which referred to his
possible entanglement with some beautiful English girl. Here, with
widely different motives, was Mrs. Farnaby's warning repeated, by a
stranger writing from another quarter of the globe! It was an odd
coincidence, to say the least of it. After thinking for a while, he
turned abruptly to the third letter that was waiting for him. He was
not at ease; his mind felt the need of relief.

The third letter was from Rufus Dingwell; announcing the close of his
tour in Ireland, and his intention of shortly joining Amelius in
London. The excellent American expressed, with his customary absence of
reserve, his fervent admiration of Irish hospitality, Irish beauty, and
Irish whisky. "Green Erin wants but one thing more," Rufus predicted,
"to be a Paradise on earth--it wants the day to come when we shall send
an American minister to the Irish Republic." Laughing over this quaint
outbreak, Amelius turned from the first page to the second. As his eyes
fell on the next paragraph, a sudden change passed over him; he let the
letter drop on the floor.

"One last word," the American wrote, "about that nice long bright
letter of yours. I have read it with strict attention, and thought over
it considerably afterwards. Don't be riled, friend Amelius, if I tell
you in plain words, that your account of the Farnabys doesn't make me
happy--quite the contrary, I do assure you. My back is set up, sir,
against that family. You will do well to drop them; and, above all
things, mind what you are about with the brown miss, who has found her
way to your favourable opinion in such an almighty hurry. Do me a
favour, my good boy. Just wait till I have seen her, will you?"

Mrs. Farnaby, Mellicent, Rufus--all three strangers to each other; and
all three agreed nevertheless in trying to part him from the beautiful
young Englishwoman! "I don't care," Amelius thought to himself "They
may say what they please--I'll marry Regina, if she will have me!"



BOOK THE FOURTH

LOVE AND MONEY

CHAPTER 1

In an interval of no more than three weeks what events may not present
themselves? what changes may not take place? Behold Amelius, on the
first drizzling day of November, established in respectable lodgings,
at a moderate weekly rent. He stands before his small fireside, and
warms his back with an Englishman's severe sense of enjoyment. The
cheap looking-glass on the mantelpiece reflects the head and shoulders
of a new Amelius. His habits are changed; his social position is in
course of development. Already, he is a strict economist. Before long,
he expects to become a married man.

It is good to be economical: it is, perhaps, better still to be the
accepted husband of a handsome young woman. But, for all that, a man in
a state of moral improvement, with prospects which his less favoured
fellow creatures may reasonably envy, is still a man subject to the
mischievous mercy of circumstances, and capable of feeling it keenly.
The face of the new Amelius wore an expression of anxiety, and, more
remarkable yet, the temper of the new Amelius was out of order.

For the first time in his life he found himself considering trivial
questions of sixpences, and small favours of discount for cash
payments--an irritating state of things in itself. There were more
serious anxieties, however, to trouble him than these. He had no reason
to complain of the beloved object herself. Not twelve hours since he
had said to Regina, with a voice that faltered, and a heart that beat
wildly, "Are you fond enough of me to let me marry you?" And she had
answered placidly, with a heart that would have satisfied the most
exacting stethoscope in the medical profession, "Yes, if you like."
There was a moment of rapture, when she submitted for the first time to
be kissed, and when she consented, on being gently reminded that it was
expected of her, to return the kiss--once, and no more. But there was
also an attendant train of serious considerations which followed on the
heels of Amelius when the kissing was over, and when he had said
goodbye for the day.

He had two women for enemies, both resolutely against him in the matter
of his marriage.

Regina's correspondent and bosom friend, Cecilia, who had begun by
disliking him, without knowing why, persisted in maintaining her
unfavourable opinion of the new friend of the Farnabys. She was a young
married woman; and she had an influence over Regina which promised,
when the fit opportunity came, to make itself felt. The second, and by
far the more powerful hostile influence, was the influence of Mrs.
Farnaby. Nothing could exceed the half sisterly, half motherly,
goodwill with which she received Amelius on those rare occasions when
they happened to meet, unembarrassed by the presence of a third person
in the room. Without actually reverting to what had passed between them
during their memorable interview, Mrs. Farnaby asked questions, plainly
showing that the forlorn hope which she associated with Amelius was a
hope still firmly rooted in her mind. "Have you been much about London
lately?" "Have you met with any girls who have taken your fancy?" "Are
you getting tired of staying in the same place, and are you going to
travel soon?" Inquiries such as these she was, sooner or later, sure to
make when they were alone. But if Regina happened to enter the room, or
if Amelius contrived to find his way to her in some other part of the
house, Mrs. Farnaby deliberately shortened the interview and silenced
the lovers--still as resolute as ever to keep Amelius exposed to the
adventurous freedom of a bachelor's life. For the last week, his only
opportunities of speaking to Regina had been obtained for him secretly
by the well-rewarded devotion of her maid. And he had now the prospect
before him of asking Mr. Farnaby for the hand of his adopted daughter,
with the certainty of the influence of two women being used against
him--even if he succeeded in obtaining a favourable reception for his
proposal from the master of the house.

Under such circumstances as these--alone, on a rainy November day, in a
lodging on the dreary eastward side of the Tottenham Court Road--even
Amelius bore the aspect of a melancholy man. He was angry with his
cigar because it refused to light freely. He was angry with the poor
deaf servant-of-all-work, who entered the room, after one thumping
knock at the door, and made, in muffled tones, the barbarous
announcement, "Here's somebody a-wantin' to see yer."

"Who the devil is Somebody?" Amelius shouted.

"Somebody is a citizen of the United States," answered Rufus, quietly
entering the room. "And he's sorry to find Claude A. Goldenheart's
temperature at boiling-point already!"

He had not altered in the slightest degree since he had left the
steamship at Queenstown. Irish hospitality had not fattened him; the
change from sea to land had not suggested to him the slightest
alteration in his dress. He still wore the huge felt hat in which he
had first presented himself to notice on the deck of the vessel. The
maid-of-all-work raised her eyes to the face of the long lean stranger,
overshadowed by the broadbrimmed hat, in reverent amazement. "My love
to you, miss," said Rufus, with his customary grave cordiality; _"I'll_
shut the door." Having dismissed the maid with that gentle hint, he
shook hands heartily with Amelius. "Well, I call this a juicy morning,"
he said, just as if they had met at the cabin breakfast-table as usual.

For the moment, at least, Amelius brightened at the sight of his
fellow-traveller. "I am really glad to see you," he said. "It's lonely
in these new quarters, before one gets used to them."

Rufus relieved himself of his hat and great coat, and silently looked
about the room. "I'm big in the bones," he remarked, surveying the
rickety lodging-house furniture with some suspicion; "and I'm a trifle
heavier than I look. I shan't break one of these chairs if I sit down
on it, shall I?" Passing round the table (littered with books and
letters) in search of the nearest chair, he accidentally brushed
against a sheet of paper with writing on it. "Memorandum of friends in
London, to be informed of my change of address," he read, looking at
the paper, as he picked it up, with the friendly freedom that
characterized him. "You have made pretty good use of your time, my son,
since I took my leave of you in Queenstown harbour. I call this a
reasonable long list of acquaintances made by a young stranger in
London."

"I met with an old friend of my family at the hotel," Amelius
explained. "He was a great loss to my poor father, when he got an
appointment in India; and, now he has returned, he has been equally
kind to me. I am indebted to his introduction for most of the names on
that list."

"Yes?" said Rufus, in the interrogative tone of a man who was waiting
to hear more. "I'm listening, though I may not look like it. Git
along."

Amelius looked at his visitor, wondering in what precise direction he
was to "git along."

"I'm no friend to partial information," Rufus proceeded; "I like to
round it off complete, as it were, in my own mind. There are names on
this list that you haven't accounted for yet. Who provided you, sir,
with the balance of your new friends?"

Amelius answered, not very willingly, "I met them at Mr. Farnaby's
house."

Rufus looked up from the list with the air of a man surprised by
disagreeable information, and unwilling to receive it too readily.
"How?" he exclaimed, using the old English equivalent (often heard in
America) for the modern "What?"

"I met them at Mr. Farnaby's," Amelius repeated.

"Did you happen to receive a letter of my writing, dated Dublin?" Rufus
asked.

"Yes."

"Do you set any particular value on my advice?"

"Certainly!"

"And you cultivate social relations with Farnaby and family,
notwithstanding?"

"I have motives for being friendly with them, which--which I haven't
had time to explain to you yet."

Rufus stretched out his long legs on the floor, and fixed his shrewd
grave eyes steadily on Amelius.

"My friend," he said, quietly, "in respect of personal appearance and
pleasing elasticity of spirits, I find you altered for the worse, I do.
It may be Liver, or it may be Love. I reckon, now I think of it, you're
too young yet for Liver. It's the brown miss--that's what 'tis. I hate
that girl, sir, by instinct."

"A nice way of talking of a young lady you never saw!" Amelius broke
out.

Rufus smiled grimly. "Go ahead!" he said. "If you can get vent in
quarrelling with me, go ahead, my son."

He looked round the room again, with his hands in his pockets,
whistling. Descending to the table in due course of time, his quick eye
detected a photograph placed on the open writing desk which Amelius had
been using earlier in the day. Before it was possible to stop him, the
photograph was in his hand. "I believe I've got her likeness," he
announced. "I do assure you I take pleasure in making her acquaintance
in this sort of way. Well, now, I declare she's a columnar creature!
Yes, sir; I do justice to your native produce--your fine fleshy
beef-fed English girl. But I tell you this: after a child or two, that
sort runs to fat, and you find you have married more of her than you
bargained for. To what lengths may you have proceeded, Amelius, with
this splendid and spanking person?"

Amelius was just on the verge of taking offence. "Speak of her
respectfully," he said, "if you expect me to answer you."

Rufus stared in astonishment. "I'm paying her all manner of
compliments," he protested, "and you're not satisfied yet. My friend, I
still find something about you, on this occasion, which reminds me of
meat cut against the grain. You're almost nasty--you are! The air of
London, I reckon, isn't at all the thing for you. Well, it don't matter
to me; I like you. Afloat or ashore, I like you. Do you want to know
what I should do, in your place, if I found myself steering a little
too nigh to the brown miss? I should--well, to put it in one word, I
should scatter. Where's the harm, I'll ask you, if you try another girl
or two, before you make your mind up. I shall be proud to introduce you
to our slim and snaky sort at Coolspring. Yes. I mean what I say; and
I'll go back with you across the pond." Referring in this disrespectful
manner to the Atlantic Ocean, Rufus offered his hand in token of
unalterable devotion and goodwill.

Who could resist such a man as this? Amelius, always in extremes, wrung
his hand, with an impetuous sense of shame. "I've been sulky," he said,
"I've been rude, I ought to be ashamed of myself--and I am. There's
only one excuse for me, Rufus. I love her with all my heart and soul;
and I'm engaged to be married to her. And yet, if you understand my way
of putting it, I'm--in short, I'm in a mess."

With this characteristic preface, he described his position as exactly
as he could; having due regard to the necessary reserve on the subject
of Mrs. Farnaby. Rufus listened, with the closest attention, from
beginning to end; making no attempt to disguise the unfavourable
impression which the announcement of the marriage-engagement had made
on him. When he spoke next, instead of looking at Amelius as usual, he
held his head down, and looked gloomily at his boots.

"Well," he said, "you've gone ahead this time, and that's a fact. She
didn't raise any difficulties that a man could ride off on--did she?"

"She was all that was sweet and kind!" Amelius answered, with
enthusiasm.

"She was all that was sweet and kind," Rufus absently repeated, still
intent on the solid spectacle of his own boots. "And how about uncle
Farnaby? Perhaps he's sweet and kind likewise, or perhaps he cuts up
rough? Possible--is it not, sir?"

"I don't know; I haven't spoken to him yet."

Rufus suddenly looked up. A faint gleam of hope irradiated his long
lank face. "Mercy be praised! there's a last chance for you," he
remarked. "Uncle Farnaby may say No."

"It doesn't matter what he says," Amelius rejoined. "She's old enough
to choose for herself, he can't stop the marriage."

Rufus lifted one wiry yellow forefinger, in a state of perpendicular
protest. "He cannot stop the marriage," the sagacious New Englander
admitted; "but he can stop the money, my son. Find out how you stand
with him before another day is over your head."

"I can't go to him this evening." said Amelius; "he dines out."

"Where is he now?"

"At his place of business."

"Fix him at his place of business. Right away!" cried Rufus, springing
with sudden energy to his feet.

"I don't think he would like it," Amelius objected. "He's not a very
pleasant fellow, anywhere; but he's particularly disagreeable at his
place of business."

Rufus walked to the window, and looked out. The objections to Mr.
Farnaby appeared to fail, so far, in interesting him.

"To put it plainly," Amelius went on, "there's something about him that
I can't endure. And--though he's very civil to me, in his way--I don't
think he has ever got over the discovery that I am a Christian
Socialist."

Rufus abruptly turned round from the window, and became attentive
again. "So you told him that--did you?" he said.

"Of course!" Amelius rejoined, sharply. "Do you suppose I am ashamed of
the principles in which I have been brought up?"

"You don't care, I reckon, if all the world knows your principles,
persisted Rufus, deliberately leading him on.

"Care?" Amelius reiterated. "I only wish I had all the world to listen
to me. They should hear of my principles, with no bated breath, I
promise you!"

There was a pause. Rufus turned back again to the window. "When
Farnaby's at home, where does he live?" he asked suddenly--still
keeping his face towards the street.

Amelius mentioned the address. "You don't mean that you are going to
call there?" he inquired, with some anxiety.

"Well, I reckoned I might catch him before dinner-time. You seem to be
sort of feared to speak to him yourself. I'm your friend, Amelius--and
I'll speak for you."

The bare idea of the interview struck Amelius with terror. "No, no!" he
said. "I'm much obliged to you, Rufus. But in a matter of this sort, I
shouldn't like to transfer the responsibility to my friend. I'll speak
to Mr. Farnaby in a day or two."

Rufus was evidently not satisfied with this. "I do suppose, now," he
suggested, "you're not the only man moving in this metropolis who
fancies Miss Regina. Query, my son: if you put off Farnaby much
longer--" He paused and looked at Amelius. "Ah," he said, "I reckon I
needn't enlarge further: there _is_ another man. Well, it's the same in
my country; I don't know what he does, with You: he always turns up,
with Us, just at the time when you least want to see him."

There _was_ another man--an older and a richer man than Amelius;
equally assiduous in his attentions to the aunt and to the niece;
submissively polite to his favoured young rival. He was the sort of
person, in age and in temperament, who would be perfectly capable of
advancing his own interests by means of the hostile influence of Mrs.
Farnaby. Who could say what the result might be if, by some unlucky
accident, he made the attempt before Amelius had secured for himself
the support of the master of the house? In his present condition of
nervous irritability, he was ready to believe in any coincidence of the
disastrous sort. The wealthy rival was a man of business, a near city
neighbour of Mr. Farnaby. They might be together at that moment; and
Regina's fidelity to her lover might be put to a harder test than she
was prepared to endure. Amelius remembered the gentle conciliatory
smile (too gentle by half) with which his placid mistress had received
his first kisses--and, without stopping to weigh conclusions, snatched
up his hat. "Wait here for me, Rufus, like a good fellow. I'm off to
the stationer's shop." With those parting words, he hurried out of the
room.

Left by himself, Rufus began to rummage the pockets of his frockcoat--a
long, loose, and dingy garment which had become friendly and
comfortable to him by dint of ancient use. Producing a handful of
correspondence, he selected the largest envelope of all; shook out on
the table several smaller letters enclosed; picked one out of the
number; and read the concluding paragraph only, with the closest
attention.

"I enclose letters of introduction to the secretaries of literary
institutions in London, and in some of the principal cities of England.
If you feel disposed to lecture yourself, or if you can persuade
friends and citizens known to you to do so, I believe it may be in your
power to advance in this way the interests of our Bureau. Please take
notice that the more advanced institutions, which are ready to
countenance and welcome free thought in religion, politics, and morals,
are marked on the envelopes with a cross in red ink. The envelopes
without a mark are addressed to platforms on which the customary
British prejudices remain rampant, and in which the charge for places
reaches a higher figure than can be as yet obtained in the sanctuaries
of free thought."