It's little
enough, to be sure; but you know what I am. Do you only love the
author in me? Don't you think of me apart from all that I may do
or not do? If I had to earn my living as a clerk, would that make
me a clerk in soul?'
'You shall not fall to that! It would be too bitter a shame to
lose all you have gained in these long years of work. Let me plan
for you; do as I wish. You are to be what we hoped from the
first. Take all the summer months. How long will it be before you
can finish this short book?'
'A week or two.'
'Then finish it, and see what you can get for it. And try at once
to find a tenant to take this place off our hands; that would be
twenty-five pounds saved for the rest of the year. You could live
on so little by yourself, couldn't you?'
'Oh, on ten shillings a week, if need be.'
'But not to starve yourself, you know. Don't you feel that my
plan is a good one? When I came to you to-night I meant to speak
of this, but you were so cruel--'
'Forgive me, dearest love! I was half a madman. You have been so
cold to me for a long time.
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