Chapter II: Part 2

"Oh yes," said Miss Phipps-Phipps. "We are going to supersede Boswell with _Lang's Johnson_. We are preparing a _Lang Shakespeare_; and when the copyrights on Thackeray and Dickens have expired, we'll do them all over again. Then we are experimenting in colors for a new fairy-book; and our chromatic Bibles will be a great thing. We are also contemplating an offer to the French Academy to permit all the works of its members to be issued as ours. I really think that _Daudet_ by Andrew Lang would pay. _Hugo_ by Lang might prove too much for the British public, but we shall do it, because we have confidence in ourselves. We shall issue the _Philosophy of Schopenhauer_ by Andrew Lang next week."

"How about our American authors?" I queried. "Are you going to rewrite any of them?"

"Who are they?" asked Miss Phipps-Phipps, with an admirable expression of ingenuousness.

"Well," said I, "myself, and--ah--Edgar Poe."

"Any poets?" said Miss Phipps-Phipps.

"Some," I answered. "Myself and--ah--Longfellow."

"I don't know," said Miss Phipps-Phipps, becoming somewhat reserved. "Send me your manuscripts. I have heard of you, of course--but--ah--who is Miss Longfellow?"

I contented myself with a reference to the scenery, and then I said: "Miss Double Phipps, I wish you would conduct me into the presence of Mr. Lang. I like him as a manly man, and I love him for the books he has put forth, which not only show his manliness, but his appreciation of everything in letters that is good."

"Well, really, Miss Witherup," said Miss Phipps-Phipps, "we don't know where he is, but we think--it is not my thought, but that of the corporation--we think you will find him playing golf at St. Andrews."

"Thank you," said I. "But, after all," I added, "it is not what the corporation thinks so much as what you as an individual think. Where do you believe I may find Mr. Lang?"

"Among the Immortals," was the answer, spoken with enthusiasm.

And believing that the lady was right, I ceased to look for Mr. Lang, for in the presence of immortals I always feel myself to be foolish.

Nevertheless, I am very glad to have seen the Lang Company at Woking, and I now understand many things that I never understood before.

ZOLA

To visit a series of foreign celebrities at home without including Émile Zola in the list would be very like refusing to listen to the lines of Hamlet in Bacon's immortal tragedy of that name. Furthermore, to call upon the justly famous novelist presupposes a visit to Paris, which is a delightful thing, even for a lady journalist. Hence it was that on leaving Woking, after my charming little glimpse into the home life of the Lang Manuscript-Manufacturing Company, I decided to take a run across the Channel and look up the Frenchman of the hour. The diversion had about it an air of adventure which made it pleasantly exciting. For ten hours after my arrival at Paris I did not dare ask where the novelist lived, for fear that I might be arrested and sent to Devil's Island with Captain Dreyfus, or forced to languish for a year or two at the Château d'If, near Marseilles, until the government could get a chance formally to inquire why I wished to know the abiding-place of M. Zola. There was added to this also some apprehension that even if I escaped the gendarmes the people themselves might rise up and string me to a lamp-post as a suitable answer to so treasonable a question.

To tell the truth, I did not go about my business with my usual nerve and aplomb. Had I represented only myself, I should not have hesitated to expose myself to any or to all danger. Intrusted as I was, however, with a commission of great importance to those whom I serve at home, it was my duty to proceed cautiously and save my life. I therefore went at the matter diplomatically. For fifty centimes I induced a small flower-girl, whom I encountered in front of the Café de la Paix, to inquire of the head waiter of that establishment where M. Zola could be met. The tragedy that ensued was terrible. What became of the child I do not know, but when, three hours later, the troops cleared the square in front of the café, the dead and wounded amounted to between two hundred and fifty and three hundred, and the china, tables, and interior decorations of the café were strewn down the Avenue de l'Opéra as far as the Rue de l'Echelle, and along the boulevard to the Madeleine. The opera-house itself was not appreciably damaged, although I am told that pieces of steak and chops and canned pease have since been found clinging to the third-story windows of its splendid façade.

My next effort was even more cautious. I bought a plain sheet of note-paper, and addressed it anonymously to the editor of _La Patrie_, asking for the desired information. The next morning _La Patrie_ announced that if I would send my name and address to its office the communication would be answered suitably. My caution was still great, however, and the name and address I gave were those of a blanchisseuse who ran a pretty little shop on Rue Rivoli. That night the poor woman was exiled from France, and the block in which she transacted business demolished by a mob of ten thousand.

I was about to give up, when chance favored me. The next evening, while seated in my box at the opera, the door was suddenly opened, and a heavy but rather handsome-eyed brunette of I should say fifty years of age burst in upon me.

"Mon Dieu!" she cried, as I turned. "Save me! Tell them I am your chaperon, your mother, your sister--anything--only save me! You will never regret it."

She had hardly uttered these words when a sharp rap came upon the door. "Entrez," I cried. "Que voulez-vous, messieurs?" I added, with some asperity, as five hussars entered, their swords clanking ominously.

"Your name?" said one, who appeared to be their leader.

"Anne Warrington Witherup, if you refer to me," said I, drawing myself up proudly. "If you refer to this lady," I added, "she is Mrs. Watkins Wilbur Witherup, my--ah--my step-mother. We are Americans, and I am a lady journalist."

Fortunately my remarks were made in French, and my French was of a kind which was convincing proof that I came from Westchester County.

A great change came over the intruders.

"Pardon, mademoiselle," said the leader, with an apologetic bow to myself. "We have made the grand _faux pas_. We have entered the wrong box."

"And may I know the cause of your unwarranted intrusion," I demanded, "without referring the question to the State Department at home?"

"We sought--we sought an enemy to France, mademoiselle," said they. "We thought he entered here."

"I harbor only the friends of France," said I.

"Vive la Witherup!" cried the hussars, taking the observation as a compliment, and then chucking me under the chin and again apologizing, with a sweeping bow to my newly acquired step-mother, they withdrew.

"Well, mamma," said I, turning to the lady at my side, "perhaps you can shed some light on this mystery. Who are you?"

"Softly, if you value your life," came the answer. "_Zola, c'est moi!_"

"Mon Doo!" said I. "Vous? Bien, bien, bien!"

"Speak in English," he whispered. "Then I can understand."

"Oh, I only said well, well, well," I explained. "And you have adopted this disguise?"

"Because I have resolved to live long enough to get into the Academy," he explained. "I cannot tell you how grateful I am for your timely aid. If they had caught me they would have thrown me down into the midst of the claque."

"Come," said I, rising and taking him by the hand. "I have come to Paris to see you at home. It was my only purpose. I will escort you thither."

"Non, non!" he cried. "Never again. I am much more at home here, my dear lady, much more. Pray sit down. Why, when I left home by a subterranean passage, perhaps you are not aware, over a thousand members of the National Guard were singing the 'Marseillaise' on the front piazza. Three thousand were dancing that shocking dance, the cancan, in my back yard, and four regiments of volunteers were looking for something to eat in the kitchen, assisted by one hundred and fifty pétroleuses to do their cooking. All my bedroom furniture was thrown out of the second-story windows, and the manuscripts of my new novel were being cut up into souvenirs."

"Poor old mamma!" said I, taking him by the hand. "You can always find comfort in the thought that you have done a noble action."

"It was a pretty good scheme," replied Zola. "A million pounds sterling paid to your best advertising mediums couldn't have brought in a quarter the same amount of fame or notoriety; and then, you see, it places me on a par with Hugo, who was exiled. That's really what I wanted, Miss Witherup. Hugo was a poseur, however, and if he hadn't had the kick to be born before me--"

"Ah," said I, interrupting, for I have rather liked Hugo. "And where do you wish to go?"

"To America," he replied, dramatically. "To America. It is the only country in the world where realism is not artificial. You are a simple, unaffected, outspoken people, who can hate without hating, can love without marrying, can fight without fighting. I love you."

"Sir--or rather mamma!" said I, somewhat indignantly, for as a married man Zola had no right to make a declaration like that, even if he is a Frenchman.

"Not you as you," he hastened to say, "but you as an American I love. Ah, who is your best publisher, Miss Witherup?"

I shall not tell you what I told Zola, but they may get his next book.

"M. Zola," said I, placing great emphasis on the M, "tell me, what interested you in Dreyfus--humanity--or literature?"

"Both," he replied; "they are the same. Literature that is not humanity is not literature. Humanity that does not provide literary people with opportunity is not broad humanity, but special and selfish, and therefore is not humanity at all."

"Did Dreyfus write to you?" I asked.

"No," said he. "Nor I to him. I have no time to write letters."

"Then how did it all come about?" I demanded.

"He was attracting too much attention!" cried the novelist, passionately. "He was living tragedy while I was only writing it. People said his story was greater than any I, Émile--"

"Witherup!" said I, anxiously, for it seemed to me that the people in the next box were listening.

"Merci!" said he. "Yes, I, Mrs. Watkins Wilbur Witherup, of Westchester City, U. S. A., was told that this man's story was greater and deeper in its tragic significance than any I could conceive. Wherefore I wrote to the War Department and accused it of concealing the truth from France in the mere interests of policy, of diplomacy. _I_ made them tremble. _I_ made the army shiver. _I_ have struck a blow at the republic from which it will not soon recover. And to-day Dreyfus pales beside the significance of Zola. I believe in free institutions, but Heaven help a free institution when it clashes with a paying corporation like Émile--"

"Witherup! Do be cautious," I put in again. "Yet, sir," I added, "they have quashed your sentence, and you need not go to jail."

"No," said he, gloomily. "I need not. Why? Because jail is safer than home. That is why they did it. They dare not exile me. They hope by quashing me to be rid of me. But they will see. I will force them to imprison me yet."

"If you are so anxious to visit America, why don't you?" I suggested. "There is no duty on the kind of thing we do not wish to manufacture ourselves."

"Ah," said he; "if I was exiled, they would send me. If I go as a private citizen, well, I pay my own way."

"Oh," said I. "I see."

And then, as the opera was over, we departed. Zola saw me to my carriage, and just as I entered it he said: "Excuse me, Miss Witherup, but what paper do you write for?"

I told him.

"It is a splendid journal!" he cried. "I take it every day, and especially enjoy its Sunday edition. In fact, it is the only American newspaper I read. Tell your editor this, and here is my photograph and my autograph, and a page of my manuscript for reproduction."

He took all these things out of his basque as he spoke.

"I will send you to-morrow," he added, "an original sketch in black and white of my house, with the receipt of my favorite dish, together with a recommendation of a nerve tonic that I use. With this will go a complete set of my works with a few press notices of the same, and the prices they bring on all book-stands. Good-bye. God bless you!" he concluded, huskily. "I shall miss my step-daughter as I would an only son. Adieu!"

We parted, and I returned, much affected, to my rooms, while he went back, I presume, to his mob-ridden home.

SIR HENRY IRVING

The impression left upon my mind by my curious and intensely dramatic encounter with Zola was of so theatric a nature that I resolved to get back to conventional ground once more through the medium of the stage. I was keyed up to a high pitch of nervous excitement by my unexpected meeting with an unsuspected step-mother, and the easiest return to my norm of equanimity, it seemed to me, lay through the doors of the greenroom. Hence I sought out London's only actor, Sir Henry Irving.

I found him a most agreeable gentleman. He received me cordially on the stage of his famous theatre. There was no setting of any kind. All about us were the bare cold walls of the empty stage and it was difficult to believe that this very same spot, the night before, had been the scene of brilliant revels.

"How do you do, Miss Witherup?" said Sir Henry, as I arrived, advancing with his peculiar stride, which reminds me of dear old Dobbin on my father's farm. "It is a great pleasure to welcome to England so fair a representative of so fine a press."

"I wished to see you, 'at home,' Sir Henry," I replied, not desiring to let him see how completely his cordiality had won me, and so affecting a coldness I was far from feeling.

"That is why I have you _here_, madam," he replied. "The stage is my home. The boards for me; the flare of the lime-lights; the pit; the sweet family circle; the auditorium in the dim distance; the foot-lights--ah, these are the inspiring influences of _my_ life! The old song 'Home Is Where the Heart Is' must, in my case, be revised to favor the box-office, and instead of the 'Old Oaken Bucket,' the song I sing is the song of the 'Old Trap Door.' Did you ever hear that beautiful poem, 'The Song of the Old Trap Door'?"

"No, Sir Henry, I never did," said I. "I hope to, however."

"I will do it now for you," he said; and assisting me over the foot-lights into a box, he took the centre of the stage, ordered the calcium turned upon him, and began:

"How dear to my heart are the scenes of my triumphs,
In Hamlet, Othello, and Shylock as well!
Completely confounding the critics who cry 'Humphs!'
And casting o'er others a magical spell!
How dear to my soul are the fond recollections
Of thunderous clappings and stampings and roars
As, bowing and scraping in many directions,
I sink out of sight through the old trap doors!
The old trap doors, the bold trap doors,
That creaking and squeaking sink down thro' the floors!"

I could not restrain my enthusiasm when he had finished.

"Bravo!" I cried, clapping my hands together until my palms ached. "More!"

"There is no more," said Sir Henry, with a gratified smile. "You see, recited before ten or twenty thousand people with the same verve that I put into 'Eugene Aram,' or 'Ten Little Nigger Boys,' so much enthusiasm is aroused that I cannot go on. The applause never stops, so of course a second verse would be a mere waste of material."

"Quite so," I observed. Then a thought came to me which I resolved to turn to my profit. "Sir Henry," I said, "I'll bet a box of cigars against a box for your performance to-night that I can guess who wrote that poem for you in one guess."

"Done!" he replied, eagerly.

"Austin," said I.

"Make Miss Witherup out a ticket for Box A for the 'Merchant of Venice' to-night," cried the famous actor to his secretary. "How the deuce did you know?"

"Oh, that was easy," I replied, much gratified at having won my wager. "I don't believe any one else could have thought of a rhyme to triumphs like 'cry Humphs'!"

"You have wonderful insight," remarked Sir Henry. "But come, Miss Witherup, I did not mean to receive you in a box, or on a bare stage. What is your favorite style of interior decoration?"

His question puzzled me. I did not know but that possibly Sir Henry's words were a delicate method of suggesting luncheon, and then it occurred to me that this could not possibly be so at that hour, one o'clock. Actors never eat at hours which seem regular to others. I hazarded an answer, however, and all was made clear at once.

"I have a leaning towards the Empire style," said I.

Sir Henry turned immediately and roared upward into the drops: "Hi, Billie, set the third act of 'Sans Gene,' and tell my valet to get out my Bonapartes. The lady has a leaning towards the Empire. Excuse me for one moment, Miss Witherup," he added, turning to me. "If you will remain where you are until I have the room ready for you, I will join you there in five minutes."

The curtain was immediately lowered, and I sat quietly in the box, as requested, wondering greatly what was going to happen. Five minutes later the curtain rose again, and there, where all had been bare and cheerless, I saw the brilliantly lit room wherein Bonaparte as Emperor has his interview with his ex-laundress. It was cosey, comfortable, and perfect in every detail, and while I was admiring, who should appear at the rear entrance but Bonaparte himself--or, rather, Sir Henry made up as Bonaparte.

"Dear me, Sir Henry!" I cried, delightedly. "You do me too much honor."

"That were impossible," he replied, gallantly. "Still, lest you be embarrassed by such preparations to receive you, let me say that this is my invariable custom, and when I know in advance of the tastes of my callers, all is ready when they arrive. Unfortunately, I have had to keep you waiting because I did not know your tastes."

"Do you mean to say that you adapt your scenery and personal make-up to the likings of the individual who calls?" I cried, amazed.

"Always," said he. "It is easy, and I think courteous. For instance, when the Archbishop of Canterbury calls upon me I have Canterbury Cathedral set here, and wear vestments, and receive him in truly ecclesiastical style. The organ is kept going, and lines of choir-boys, suitably garbed, pass constantly in and out.

"When the King of Denmark called I had the throne-room scene of 'Hamlet' set, and we talked, with his Majesty sitting on the throne, and myself, clad as the melancholy Prince, reclining on a rug before him. He expressed himself as being vastly entertained. It gave him pleasure, and was no trouble to me beyond giving orders to the stage-manager. Then when an old boyhood friend of mine who had gone wrong came to see me, hearing that he was an inebriate, as well as a thief, I received him in the character of Dubose, in the attic scene of the 'Lyons Mail.'"

"A very interesting plan," said I, "and one which I should think would be much appreciated by all."

"True," replied Sir Henry. And then he laughed. "It never failed but once," said he. "And then it wasn't my fault. Old Beerbohm Tree came to visit me one morning, and I had the graveyard scene of 'Hamlet' set, and myself appeared as the crushed tragedian. I thought Tree had some sense of humor and could appreciate the joke, but I was mistaken. He got as mad as a hatter, and started away in a rage. If he hadn't fallen into the grave on the way out, I'd never have had a chance to explain that I didn't mean anything by it."

By this time I had clambered back to the stage again, and was about to sit down on one of the very handsome Empire sofas in the room, when Sir Henry gave a leap of at least two feet in the air, and roared with rage.

"Send the property-man here!" he cried, trembling all over and turning white in the face. "Send him here; bring him in chains. If he's up-stairs, throw him down; if he's down-stairs, put him in a catapult and throw him up. It matters not how he comes, as long as he comes."

I shrank back in terror. The man's rage seemed almost ungovernable, and I observed that he held a poker in his hand. Up and down the room he strode, muttering imprecations upon the property-man, until I felt that if I did not wish to see murder done I would better withdraw.

"Excuse me, Sir Henry," said I, rising, and speaking timidly, "I think perhaps I'd better go."

"Sit down!" he retorted, imperiously, pointing at the sofa with the poker. I sat down, and just then the property-man arrived.

"Want me, S'rennery?" he said.

Irving gazed at him, with a terrible frown wrinkling his forehead, for a full minute, during which it seemed to me that the whole building trembled, and I could almost hear the seats in the top gallery creak with nervousness.

"Want you?" he retorted, witheringly. "Yes, I want you--as an usher, perhaps; as a flunky to announce that a carriage waits; as a Roman citizen to say Hi-hi! but as a property-man, never!"

There was another ominous pause, and I could see that the sarcasm of the master sank deeply into the soul of the hireling.

"Wha--what 'ave I done, S'rennery?" asked the trembling property-man.

"WHAT HAVE YOU DONE?" roared Sir Henry. "Look upon that poker and see!"

The man looked, and sank sobbing to the floor.

"Heaven help me!" he moaned. "I have a sick grandfather, S'rennery," he added. "I was up with him all night."

The great man immediately became all tenderness. Throwing the poker to one side, he sprang to where his unfortunate property-man lay, and raised him up.

"Why the devil didn't you say so?" he said, sympathetically. "I didn't know it, Henderson, my dear old boy. Never mind the poker. Let it go. I forgive you that. Here, take this £20 note, and don't come back until your grandfather is well again."

It was a beautiful scene, and so pathetic that I almost wept. The property-man rose to his feet, and putting the £20 note in his pocket, walked dejectedly away.

Sir Henry turned to me, and said, his voice husky with emotion: "Pardon me, Miss Witherup! I was provoked."

"It was a magnificent scene, Sir Henry," said I. "But what was the matter with the poker? I thought it rather a good one."

"It is," said he, sitting down on a small chair and twiddling his thumbs. "But, you see, this is an Empire scene, and that confounded thing is a Marie Antoinette poker. Why, if that had happened at a public performance, I should have been ruined."

"Might not Bonaparte have used a Marie Antoinette poker?" I asked, to draw him out.

"Bonaparte, Miss Witherup," he answered, "might have done anything but that. You see, by the time he became Emperor every bit of household stuff in the palace had been stolen by the French mobs. Therefore it is fair to assume that the palace was entirely refurnished when Bonaparte came in, and as at that time there was no craze for Louis Quinze, or Louis Seize, or Louis number this, that, and the other, it is not at all probable that Napoleon would have taken the trouble to snoop around the second-hand shops for a poker of that kind. Indeed, it is more than probable that everything he had in the palace was absolutely new."

"What a wonderful mind you must have, Sir Henry, to think of these things!" I said, enthusiastically.

"Miss Witherup," said the actor-knight, impressively, "this is an age of wonderful minds, and there are so many of them that he who wishes to rise above his fellows must be careful of every detail. Would I have been a knight to-day had it not been for my care of details? Never. It would have gone to Willie Edouin, or to my friend Tree, or to some other actor of the same grade. My principle, Miss Witherup, is not original. I look after the details, and the results take care of themselves. It is the old proverb of the pennies and the pounds all over again."

"It is wisdom," I said, oracularly. "But it must be wearing."

"Oh no," said Sir Henry, with a gesture of self-deprecation. "There are so many details that I have had to make up a staff of advisers. As a matter of fact, I am not a man. I am a combination of men. In the popular mind I embody the wisdom, the taste, the culture, the learning of many. In fact, Miss Witherup, while I am not London, London finds artistic expression in me."

"And you are coming to America again?" I asked, rising, for I felt I ought to go, I was so awed by the humble confession of my host.

"Some day," said he. "When times are better."

"Why, Sir Henry," I cried, "you who have just given £20 to your property-man can surely afford to cross--"

"I referred, madam," he interrupted, "to times in America, for I contemplate charging $5 a stall when next I visit you. You see, my next visit will be the first of a series of twenty farewell seasons which I propose to make in the States, which I love dearly. Don't forget that, please--_which I love dearly_. I want your people to know."

"I shall not, Sir Henry," said I, holding out my hand. "Good-bye."

"Say _au revoir_," he replied. "I shall surely see you at to-night's performance."

And so we parted.

On the way down the Strand, back to my rooms, I met the property-man, who was evidently waiting for me.

"Excuse me, miss," said he, "but you saw?"

"Saw what?" said I.

"How he called me down about the Marie Antoinette poker?" he replied, nervously.

"Yes," said I, "I did."

"Well, it was all arranged beforehand, miss, so that you would be impressed by his love for and careful attention to details. That's all," said he. "We other fellers at the Lyceum has some pride, miss, and we wants you to understand that S'rennery isn't the only genius on the programme, by good long odds. It's not knowin' that that made her Majesty the Queen make her mistake."

"I didn't know, Mr. Henderson, that her Majesty had made a mistake," said I, coldly.

"Well, she did, miss. She knighted S'rennery as a individual, when she'd ought to have knighted the whole bloomin' theaytre. There's others than him as does it!" he observed, proudly. "King Somebody knighted a piece of steak. Why couldn't the Queen knight the theaytre?"

Which struck me as an idea of some force, although I am a great admirer of a man who, like Sir Henry, can dominate an institution of such manifest excellence.

IAN MACLAREN

So pleased was I with my experience at the Lyceum Theatre that, fearing to offset the effects upon my nerves of Sir Henry Irving's wonderful cordiality, I made no more visits to the homes of celebrities for two weeks, unless a short call on Li Hung-Chang can be considered such. Mr. Chang was so dispirited over the loss of his yellow jacket and the partition of the Chinese Empire that I could not get a word out of him except that he was not feeling "welly well," and that is hardly sufficient to base an interview on for a practically inexperienced lady journalist like myself.

I therefore returned to English fields again for my next interview, and having heard that the Rev. Ian Maclaren was engaged on a translation into English of his Scottish stories, I took train to Liverpool, first having wired the famous object of my visit of my intention. He replied instantly by telegraph that he was too busy to receive me, but I started along just the same. There is nothing in the world that so upsets me as having one of my plans go awry, and I certainly do not intend to have my equanimity disturbed for the insufficient reason that somebody else is busy. So I wired back to Liverpool as follows:

"Very sorry, but did not receive your telegram until too late to
change my plans. My trunks were all packed and my Scotch lassie
costume finished. Expect me on the eleven sixty-seven. Will not
stay more than a week.

"(Signed)

"ANNE WARRINGTON WITHERUP."

Dr. Maclaren being a courteous man, and I being a lady, I felt confident that this would fetch him; and it apparently did, for two hours later I received this message:

"_Witherup, London:_

"Am not here. Have gone to Edinburgh. Do not know when I shall
return.

"(Signed)

"MACLAREN."

To this I immediately replied:

"_Maclaren, Liverpool:_

"All right. Will meet you at Edinburgh, as requested.

"(Signed)

"WITHERUP."

The reader will observe that it takes a smart British author to escape from an American lady journalist once she has set her heart on interviewing him. But I did not go to Edinburgh. I am young, and have not celebrated my thirtieth birthday more than five times, but I am not a gudgeon; so I refused to be caught by the Edinburgh subterfuge, and stuck to my original proposition of going to Liverpool on the eleven sixty-seven; and, what is more, I wore my Highland costume, and all the way down studied a Scotch glossary, until I knew the difference between such words as dour and hoots as well as if I had been born and bred at Loch Macglasgie.

As I had expected, Dr. Maclaren was there, anxiously awaiting developments, and as I stepped out of my carriage he jumped from behind a huge trunk by which he thought he was concealed, and fled through the Northwestern Hotel out into the street, and thence off in the direction of the Alexandra Docks. I followed in hot pursuit, and, by the aid of a handy hansom, was not long in overtaking the unwilling author. It may be said by some that I was rather too persistent, and, knowing that the good Doctor did not wish to be interviewed, should have relinquished my quest. It was just that quality in Dr. Maclaren's make-up that made me persist. There are so few successful authors who may be said to possess the virtue of modesty in the presence of an interviewer that I determined to catch one who was indeed the only one of that rare class I had ever met.

"Dr. Maclaren?" I cried, as I leaped out of the hansom, and landed, fortunately, on my feet--a lady journalist is a good deal of a feline in certain respects--directly in his path.

"The same," he replied, pantingly. "And you are Miss Witherup?"

"The very same," I retorted, coldly.

"I am perfectly delighted to see you," he said, removing his hat and mopping his brow, which the unwonted exercise he was taking had caused to drip profusely. "Perfectly charmed, Miss Witherup."

I eyed him narrowly. "One wouldn't have thought so," I said, with a suspicious emphasis, "from the way you were running away from me."

"Running away, my dear Miss Witherup?" he gasped, with an admirable affectation of innocence. "Why, not at all."

"Then why, Dr. Maclaren," I asked, "were you running towards the docks within ten seconds of the arrival of my train?"

To the gentleman's credit be it said that he never hesitated for a moment.

"Why?" he cried, in the manner of one cut to the heart by an unjust suspicion. "Why? Because, madam, when you got out of that railway carriage I did not see you, and fearing that I had mistaken your message, and that instead of coming from London by rail you were coming from America by steamer, I hastened off down towards the docks in the hope of welcoming you to England, and helping you through the custom-house. You wrong me, madam, by thinking otherwise."

The gentleman's tact was so overwhelmingly fine that I forgave him his fiction, which was not quite convincing, and took him by the hand.

"And now," said I, "may I see you at home?"

A gloomy cloud settled over the Doctor's fine features.

"That is my embarrassment," he said, with a deep sigh. "I haven't any."

"What?" I cried.

"I have been evicted," he said, sadly.

"You? For non-payment of rent?" I asked, astonished.

"Not at all," said the Doctor, taking a five-pound note from his pocket and throwing it into the street. "I have more money than I know what to do with. For _heresy_. My house belongs to a man who does not like the doctrines of my books, and he put us out last Monday. That is why--"

"I understand," I said, pressing his hand sympathetically. "I am so sorry! But cheer up, Doctor," I added. "I have been sent here by an American newspaper that never does anything by halves. I have been told to interview you at _home_. It must be done. My paper spares no expense. Therefore, when I find you without a home to be interviewed in, I am authorized to provide you with one. Come, let us go and purchase a furnished house somewhere."

He looked at me, astonished.

"Well," he gasped out at length, "I've seen something of American enterprise, but this beats everything."

"I suppose we can get a furnished house for $10,000?" I said.

"You can rent all Liverpool for that," he said. "Suppose, instead of going to that expense, we run over to the Golf Links? I'm very much at home there, though I don't play much of a game."

"Its atmosphere is very Scottish," said I.

"It is indeed," he replied. "Indeed, it's too Scotch for me. I can hold my own with the great bulk of Scotch dialect with ease, but when it comes to golf terms I'm a duffer from Dumfries. There are words like 'foozle' and 'tee-off' and 'schlaff' and 'baffy-iron' and 'Glenlivet.' I've had 'em explained to me many a time and oft, but they go out of one ear just as fast as they go in at the other. That's one reason why I've never written a golf story. The game ought to appeal strongly to me for two reasons--the self-restraint it imposes upon one's vocabulary of profane terms, and the large body of clerical persons who have found it adapted to their requirements. But the idiom of it floors me; and after several ineffectual efforts to master the mysteries of its glossary, I gave it up. I can drive like a professional, and my putting is a dream, but I can't converse intelligently about it, and as I have discovered that half the pleasure of the game lies in talking of it afterwards, I have given it up."

By this time we had reached the railway station again, and a great light as of an inspiration lit up the Doctor's features.

"Splendid idea!" he cried. "Let us go into the waiting-room of the station, Miss Witherup. You can interview me there. I have just remembered that when I was lecturing in America the greater part of my time was passed waiting in railway stations for trains that varied in lateness between two and eight hours, and I got to feel quite at home in them. I doubt not that in a few moments I shall feel at home in this one--and then, you know, you need not bother about your train back to London, for it leaves from this very spot in twenty minutes."

He looked at me anxiously, but he need not have. When I discovered that he could not master the art of golfing sufficiently to be able to talk about it at least, he suddenly lost all interest to me. I have known so many persons who were actually only half baked who could talk intelligently about golf, whether they played well or not--the tea-table golfers, we call them at my home near Weehawken--that it seemed to be nothing short of sheer imbecility for a person to confess to an absolute inability to brag about "driving like a professional" and "putting like a dream."

"Very well, Doctor," said I. "This will do me quite as well. I'm tired, and willing to go back, anyhow. Don't bother to wait for my departure."

"Oh, indeed!" he cried, his face suffusing with pleasure. "I shall be delighted to stay. Nothing would so charm me as to see you safely off."

I suppose it was well meant, but I couldn't compliment him on his "putting."

"Are you coming to America again?" I asked.

"I hope to some day," he replied. "But not to read or to lecture. I am coming to see something of your country. I wish to write some recollections of it, and just now my recollections are confused. I know of course that New York City is the heart of the orange district of Florida, and that Albany is the capital of Saratoga. I am aware that Niagara Falls is at the junction of the Hudson and the Missouri, and that the Great Lakes are in the Adirondacks, and are well stocked with shad, trout, and terrapin, but of your people I know nothing, save that they gather in large audiences and pay large sums for the pleasure of seeing how an author endures reading his own stuff. I know that you all dine publicly always, and that your men live at clubs while the ladies are off bicycling and voting, but what becomes of the babies I don't know, and I don't wish to be told. I leave them to the consideration of my friend Caine. When I write my book, _Scooting through Schoharis; or, Long Pulls on a Pullman_, I wish it to be the result of personal observation and not of hearsay."

"A very good idea," said I. "And will this be published over your own name?"

"No, madam," he replied. "That is where we British authors who write about America make a mistake. We ruin ourselves if we tell the truth. My book will ostensibly be the work of 'Sandy Scootmon.'"

"Good name," said I. "And a good rhyme as well."

"To what?" he asked.

"Hoot mon!" said I, with a certain dryness of manner.

Just then the train-bell rang, and the London Express was ready.

"Here, Doctor," said I, handing him the usual check as I rose to depart. "Here is a draft on London for $5000. Our thanks to go with it for your courtesy."

He looked annoyed.

"I told you I didn't wish any money," said he, with some asperity. "I have more American fifty-cent dollars now than I can get rid of. They annoy me."

And he tore the check up. We then parted, and the train drew out of the station. Opposite me in the carriage was a young woman who I thought might be interested in knowing with whom I had been talking.

"Do you know who that was?" I asked.

"Very well indeed," she replied.

"Ian Maclaren," I said.

"Not a bit of it," said she. "That's one of our head detectives. We know him well in Liverpool. Dr. Maclaren employs him to stave off American interviewers."

I stared at the woman, aghast.

"I don't believe it," I said. "If he'd been a detective, he wouldn't have torn up my check."

"Quite so," retorted the young woman, and there the conversation stopped.

I wonder if she was right? If I thought she was, I'd devote the rest of my life to seeing Ian Maclaren at home; but I can't help feeling that she was wrong. The man was so entirely courteous, after I finally cornered him, that I don't see how it could have been any one else than the one I sought; for, however much one may object to this popular author's dialect, England has sent us nothing finer in the way of a courteous gentleman than he.

RUDYARD KIPLING

An endeavor to find Rudyard Kipling at home is very much like trying to discover the North Pole. Most people have an idea that there is a North Pole somewhere, but up to the hour of going to press few have managed to locate it definitely. The same is true of Mr. Kipling's home. He has one, no doubt, somewhere, but exactly where that favored spot is, is as yet undetermined. My first effort to find him was at his residence in Vermont, but upon my arrival I learned that he had fled from the Green Mountain State in order to escape from the autograph-hunters who were continually lurking about his estate. Next I sought him at his lodgings in London, but the fog was so thick that if so be he was within I could not find him. Then taking a P. & O. steamer, I went out to Calcutta, and thence to Simla. In neither place was he to be found, and I sailed to Egypt, hired a camel, and upon this ship of the desert cruised down the easterly coast of Africa to the Transvaal, where I was informed that, while he had been there recently, Mr. Kipling had returned to London. I immediately turned about, and upon my faithful and wobbly steed took a short-cut catacornerwise across to Algiers, where I was fortunate enough to intercept the steamer upon which the object of my quest was sailing back to Britain.

He was travelling _incog._ as Mr. Peters, but I recognized him in a moment, not only by his vocabulary, but by his close resemblance to a wood-cut I had once seen in the advertisement of a famous dermatologist, which I had been told was a better portrait of Kipling than of Dr. Skinberry himself, whose skill in making people look unlike themselves was celebrated by the publication of the wood-cut in question.

He was leaning gracefully over the starboard galley as I walked up the gang-plank. I did not speak to him, however, until after the vessel had sailed. I am too old a hand at interviewing modest people to be precipitate, and knew that if I began to talk to Mr. Kipling about my mission before we started, he would in all probability sneak ashore and wait over a steamer to escape me. Once started, he was doomed, unless he should choose to jump overboard. So I waited, and finally, as Gibraltar gradually sank below the horizon, I tackled him.

"Mr. Kipling?" said I, as we met on the lanyard deck.

"Peters," said he, nervously, lighting a jinrikisha.

"All the same," I retorted, taking out my note-book, "I've come to interview you at home. Are you a good sailor?"

"I'm good at whatever I try," said he. "Therefore you can wager a spring bonnet against a Kohat that I am a good sailor."

"Excuse me for asking," said I. "It was necessary to ascertain. My instructions are to interview you at home. If you are a good sailor, then you are at home on the sea, so we may begin. What work are you engaged on now?"

"The hardest of my life," he replied. "I am now trying to avoid an American lady journalist. I know you are an American by the Cuban flag you are wearing in your button-hole. I know that you are a lady, because you wear a bonnet, which a gentleman would not do if he could. And I know you are a journalist, because you have confessed it. But for goodness' sake, madam, address me as Peters, and I will talk on forever. If it were known on this boat that I am Kipling, I should be compelled to write autographs for the balance of the voyage, and I have come away for a rest."

"Very well, Mr. Peters," said I. "I will respect your wishes. Why did you go to South Africa?"

"After color. I am writing a new book, and I needed color. There are more colored people in Africa than anywhere else. Wherefore--"

"I see," said I. "And did you get it?"

"Humph!" he sneered. "Did I get it? It is evident, madam, that you have not closely studied the career of Rudyard--er--Peters. Did he ever fail to get anything he wanted?"

"I don't know," I replied. "That's what I wanted to find out."

"Well, you may draw your own conclusions," he retorted, "when I speak that beautiful and expressive American word 'Nit.'"

I put the word down for future use. It is always well for an American to make use of her own language as far as is possible, and nowhere can one gain a better idea of what is distinctively American than from a study of English authors who use Americanisms with an apology--paid for, no doubt, at space rates.

"Have you been at work on the ocean?" I inquired.

"No," said he. "Why should I work on the ocean? I can't improve the ocean."

"Excuse me," said I. "I didn't know that you were a purist."

"I'm not," said he. "I'm a Peters."

There was a pause, and I began to suspect that beneath his suave exterior Mr. Kipling concealed a certain capacity for being disagreeable.

"I didn't know," I said, "but that you had spent some of your time interviewing the boilers or the engines of the ship. A man who can make a locomotive over into an attractive conversationalist ought to be able to make a donkey-engine, for instance, on shipboard, seem less like a noisy jackass than it is."

"Good!" he cried, his face lighting up. "There's an idea there. Gad! I'll write a poem on the donkey-engine as a sort of companion to my McAndrews Hymn, and, what is more, I will acknowledge my debt to you for suggesting the idea."

"I'm much obliged, Mr.--er--Peters," said I, coldly, "but you needn't. You are welcome to the idea, but I prefer to make my own name for myself. If you put me in one of your books, I should become immortal; and while I wish to become immortal, I prefer to do it without outside assistance."

Peters, _né_ Kipling, immediately melted.

"If you were a man," said he, "I'd slap you on the back and call the steward to ask you what you'd have."

"Thank you," said I. "Under the circumstances, I am glad I am not a man. I do not wish to be slapped on the back, even by a British author. But if you really wish to repay me for my suggestion, drop your unnatural modesty and let me interview you frankly. Tell me what you think--if you ever do think. You've been so meteoric that one naturally credits you with more heart and spontaneity than thought and care."

"Very well," said he. "Let the cross-examination begin."

"Do you ride a bicycle?" I asked.

"Not at sea," he replied.

"What is your favorite wheel?" I asked.

"The last that is sent me by the maker," he answered.

"Do you use any tonic--hair, health, or otherwise--which you particularly recommend to authors?" I asked.

"I must refuse to answer that question until I have received the usual check," said Mr.--er--Peters.

"Do you still hold with the Spanish that Americans are pigs, and that New York is a trough?" I asked.

"There are exceptions, and when I last saw New York I was not a conscious witness of any particularly strong devotion to the pen," he answered, uneasily and evasively.

"Do you like the American climate?" I asked.

"Is there such a thing?" he asked, in return. "If there is, I didn't see it. You Americans are in the experimental stage of existence in weather as in government. I don't think you have as yet settled upon any settled climate. My experience has been that during any week in any season of the year you have a different climate for each day. I can say this, however, that your changes are such that the average is uncomfortable. It is hot one day and cold the next; baking the third; wintry the fourth; humid the fifth; dry the sixth; and on the seventh you begin with sunshine before breakfast, follow it up with rain before luncheon, and a sleigh ride after dinner."

It was evident that Mr.--er--Peters had not lost his powers of observation.

"Why have you left Vermont, Mr. Kipling?" I asked.

"Peters!" he remonstrated, in a beseeching whisper.

"Excuse me, Mr. Peters," said I. "Why have you left Vermont, Mr. Peters?"

"That is a delicate question, madam," he replied. "Are you not aware that my house is still in the market?"

"I am instructed," said I, drawing out my check-book, "to get an answer to any question I may choose to ask, at any cost. If you fear to reply because it may prevent a sale of your house, I will buy the house at your own price."

"Forty thousand dollars," said he. "It's worth twenty thousand, but in the hurry of my departure I left fifty thousand dollars' worth of notes stored away in the attic."

I drew and handed him the check.

"Now that your house is sold," said I, "_why_, Mr. Peters, did you leave Vermont?"

"For several reasons," he replied, putting the check in his pocket, and relighting his jinrikisha, which had gone out. "In the first place, it was some distance from town. I thought, when I built the house, that I could go to New York every morning and come back at night. My notion was correct, but I discovered afterwards that while I could go to New York by day and return by night, there was not more than five minutes between the trains I had to take to do it. Then there was a certain amount of human sympathy involved. The postman was fairly bent under the weight of the letters I received asking for autographs. He came twice a day, and each time the poor chap had to carry a ton of requests for autographs."

"Still, you needn't have replied to them," I said.

"Oh, I never tried to," he said. "It was the postman who aroused my sympathy."

"But you didn't give up trying to live in your own house that had cost you $20,000 for that?" I said.

"Well, no," he answered. "Frankly, I didn't. There were other drawbacks. You Americans are too fond of collecting things. For instance, I went to a reception one night in Boston, and I wore a new dress-suit, and, by Jove! when I got home and took my coat off I found that the tails had been cut off--I presume by souvenir-hunters! Every mail brought countless requests for locks of my hair; and every week, when my laundry came back, there were at least a dozen things of one kind or another missing, which I afterwards learned had been stolen off the line by collectors of literary relics. Then the kodak fiends, that continually lurked about behind bushes and up in the trees and under the piazzas, were a most infernal nuisance. I dare say there are 50,000 unauthorized photographs of myself in existence to-day. Even these I might have endured, not to mention visitors who daily came to my home to tell me how much they had enjoyed my books. Ten or a dozen of these people are gratifying, but when you come down to breakfast and find a line stretching all the way from your front door to the railway station, and excursion trains coming in loaded to the full with others every hour, it ceases to be pleasant and interferes seriously with one's work. However, I never murmured until one day I observed a gang of carpenters at work on the other side of the street, putting up a curious-looking structure which resembled nothing I had ever seen before. When I had made inquiries I learned that an enterprising circus-manager had secured a lease of the place for the summer, and was erecting a grand-stand for people who came to catch a glimpse of me to sit on.