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Once you're dead, your wife will adore you; once you're dead, your wife and I have before us an open road to connubial felicity, a road which, living, you sadly encumber; and only when he has delivered your funeral oration may Dr. Quarmby be exempt from apprehension lest his part in your marriage ceremony bring about his defrockment.
Presently the conversation turned to periodicals, and the three men were unanimous in an opinion that no existing monthly or quarterly could be considered as representing the best literary opinion. 'We want, remarked Mr Quarmby, 'we want a monthly review which shall deal exclusively with literature.
'Somebody's illegitimate son, I believe, replied the source of trustworthy information, with a laugh. 'Denham says he met him in New York a year or two ago, under another name. 'Excuse me, interposed Mr Quarmby, 'there's some mistake in all that. He went on to state what he knew, from Yule himself, concerning Milvain's history.
'I threw out the idea to Jedwood the other day, said Mr Quarmby, 'and he seemed to nibble at it. 'Yes, yes, came from Yule; 'but Jedwood has so many irons in the fire. I doubt if he has the necessary capital at command just now. No doubt he's the man, if some capitalist would join him. 'No enormous capital needed, opined Mr Quarmby. 'The thing would pay its way almost from the first.
Quarmby has betrayed an unoffending couple into involuntary matrimony, an act of which his Bishop can scarcely fail to take official notice; Captain Audaine and the Marchioness are entrapped into a loveless marriage, than which there mayn't be a greater misery in life; and my own future, I needn't add, is irrevocably blighted by the loss of my respected Dorothy, without whom continued animation must necessarily be a hideous and hollow mockery.
'Well, the original idea of the quarterlies was that there are not enough important books published to occupy solid reviewers more than four times a year. That may be true, but then a literary monthly would include much more than professed reviews. Hinks's essays on the historical drama would have come out in it very well; or your "Spanish Poets," Quarmby.
Poverty will make the best people bad, if it gets hard enough. Why there's so much of it in the world, I'm sure I can't see. 'I suppose father will be back soon? 'He said dinner-time. 'Mr Quarmby has been telling me something which is wonderfully good news if it's really true; but I can't help feeling doubtful.
But when Mr Quarmby approached him with blank face, he spoke certain wrathful words which long rankled in that worthy's mind. At home he kept sullen silence. No, not to such men as he poor, and without social recommendations. Besides, he was growing too old.
'I should think so! Ho, ho! Mr Quarmby laughed in a peculiar way, which was the result of long years of mirth-subdual in the Reading-room. 'But not a breath to anyone but your father. He'll be here to-morrow? Break it gently to him, you know; he's an excitable man; can't take things quietly, like I do. Ho, ho! His suppressed laugh ended in a fit of coughing the Reading-room cough.
This afternoon Marian found her father examining a volume of prints which had been lent him by Mr Quarmby. A whiteness in his eyes showed how the disease was progressing, but his face had a more wholesome colour than a year ago. 'Mr Hinks and Mr Gorbutt inquired very kindly after you to-day, said the girl, as she seated herself. 'Oh, is Hinks out again? 'Yes, but he looks very ill.
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