The Descent of Man and Other Stories

Within a fortnight, a line from Harviss recalled the Professor to town. He had been looking forward with immense zest to this second meeting; Harviss’s college roar was in his tympanum, and he pictured himself following up the protracted chuckle which would follow his friend’s progress through the manuscript. He was proud of the adroitness with which he had kept his secret from Harviss, had maintained to the last the pretense of a serious work, in order to give the keener edge to his reader’s enjoyment. Not since under-graduate days had the Professor tasted such a draught of pure fun as his anticipations now poured for him.

This time his card brought instant admission. He was bowed into the office like a successful novelist, and Harviss grasped him with both hands.

“Well—do you mean to take it?” he asked, with a lingering coquetry.

“Take it? Take it, my dear fellow? It’s in press already—you’ll excuse my not waiting to consult you? There will be no difficulty about terms, I assure you, and we had barely time to catch the autumn market. My dear Linyard, why didn’t you tell me?” His voice sank to a reproachful solemnity, and he pushed forward his own armchair.

The Professor dropped into it with a chuckle. “And miss the joy of letting you find out?”

“Well—it was a joy.” Harviss held out a box of his best cigars. “I don’t know when I’ve had a bigger sensation. It was so deucedly unexpected—and, my dear fellow, you’ve brought it so exactly to the right shop.”

“I’m glad to hear you say so,” said the Professor modestly.

Harviss laughed in rich appreciation. “I don’t suppose you had a doubt of it; but of course I was quite unprepared. And it’s so extraordinarily out of your line—”

The Professor took off his glasses and rubbed them with a slow smile.

“Would you have thought it so—at college?”

Harviss stared. “At college?—Why, you were the most iconoclastic devil—”

There was a perceptible pause. The Professor restored his glasses and looked at his friend. “Well—?” he said simply.

“Well—?” echoed the other, still staring. “Ah—I see; you mean that that’s what explains it. The swing of the pendulum, and so forth. Well, I admit it’s not an uncommon phenomenon. I’ve conformed myself, for example; most of our crowd have, I believe; but somehow I hadn’t expected it of you.”

The close observer might have detected a faint sadness under the official congratulation of his tone; but the Professor was too amazed to have an ear for such fine shades.

“Expected it of me? Expected what of me?” he gasped. “What in heaven do you think this thing is?” And he struck his fist on the manuscript which lay between them.

Harviss had recovered his optimistic creases. He rested a benevolent eye on the document.

“Why, your apologia—your confession of faith, I should call it. You surely must have seen which way you were going? You can’t have written it in your sleep?”

“Oh, no, I was wide awake enough,” said the Professor faintly.

“Well, then, why are you staring at me as if I were not?” Harviss leaned forward to lay a reassuring hand on his visitor’s worn coat-sleeve. “Don’t mistake me, my dear Linyard. Don’t fancy there was the least unkindness in my allusion to your change of front. What is growth but the shifting of the standpoint? Why should a man be expected to look at life with the same eyes at twenty and at—our age? It never occurred to me that you could feel the least delicacy in admitting that you have come round a little—have fallen into line, so to speak.”

But the Professor had sprung up as if to give his lungs more room to expand; and from them there issued a laugh which shook the editorial rafters.

“Oh, Lord, oh Lord—is it really as good as that?” he gasped.

Harviss had glanced instinctively toward the electric bell on his desk; it was evident that he was prepared for an emergency.

“My dear fellow—” he began in a soothing tone.

“Oh, let me have my laugh out, do,” implored the Professor. “I’ll—I’ll quiet down in a minute; you needn’t ring for the young man.” He dropped into his chair again, and grasped its arms to steady his shaking. “This is the best laugh I’ve had since college,” he brought out between his paroxysms. And then, suddenly, he sat up with a groan. “But if it’s as good as that it’s a failure!” he exclaimed.

Harviss, stiffening a little, examined the tip of his cigar. “My dear Linyard,” he said at length, “I don’t understand a word you’re saying.”

The Professor succumbed to a fresh access, from the vortex of which he managed to fling out—“But that’s the very core of the joke!”

Harviss looked at him resignedly. “What is?”

“Why, your not seeing—your not understanding—”

“Not understanding what?”

“Why, what the book is meant to be.” His laughter subsided again and he sat gazing thoughtfully at the publisher. “Unless it means,” he wound up, “that I’ve over-shot the mark.”

“If I am the mark, you certainly have,” said Harviss, with a glance at the clock.

The Professor caught the glance and interpreted it. “The book is a skit,” he said, rising.

The other stared. “A skit? It’s not serious, you mean?”

“Not to me—but it seems you’ve taken it so.”