d till the better mood returned. "On
Neutral Ground" took me seven months; now I have to write three volumes
in nine weeks, with the lash stinging on my back if I miss a day.'

He brooded for a little.

'I suppose there must be some rich man somewhere who has read one or two
of my books with a certain interest. If only I could encounter him and
tell him plainly what a cursed state I am in, perhaps he would help me
to some means of earning a couple of pounds a week. One has heard of
such things.'

'In the old days.'

'Yes. I doubt if it ever happens now. Coleridge wouldn't so easily meet
with his Gillman nowadays. Well, I am not a Coleridge, and I don't ask
to be lodged under any man's roof; but if I could earn money enough to
leave me good long evenings unspoilt by fear of the workhouse--'

Amy turned away, and presently went to look after her little boy.

A few days after this they had a visit from Milvain. He came about ten
o'clock in the evening.

'I'm not going to stay,' he announced. 'But where's my copy of "Margaret
Home"? I am to have one, I suppose?'

'I have no particular desire that you should read it,' returned Reardon.

'But I HAVE read it, my dear fellow. Got it from the library on the day
of publication; I had a suspicion that you wouldn't send me a copy. But
I must possess your opera omnia.'

'Here it is. Hide it away somewhere.--You may as well sit down for a few
minutes.'

'I confess I should like to talk about the book, if you don't mind.
It isn't so utterly and damnably bad as you make out, you know. The
misfortune was that you had to make three volumes of it. If I had leave
to cut it down to one, it would do you credit.

The motive is good enough.'

'Yes. Just good enough to show how badly it's managed.'

Milvain began to expatiate on that well-worn topic, the evils of the
three-volume system.

'A triple-headed monster, sucking the blood of English novelists.
One might design an allegorical cartoon for a comic literary paper.
By-the-bye, why doesn't such a thing exist?--a weekly paper treating of
things and people literary in a facetious spirit. It would be caviare
to the general, but might be supported, I should think. The editor would
probably be assassinated, though.'

'For anyone in my position,' said Reardon, 'how is it possible to
abandon the three volumes? It is a question of payment. An author of
moderate repute may live on a yearly three-volume novel--I mean the man
who