Barney abandoned his tandem to the tender care of his man, and went up to London by train. He sat gloomily in a corner of a first-class smoking-compartment, and cursed the world. Nevertheless he was able to consume a great number of cigarettes between the sea and Charing Cross, and, as he smoked, he made stern, heroic resolutions regarding his career. He would now take it seriously in hand. He would business-manage himself. He saw in the clear light of a great disappointment that he had hitherto paid too much attention to the production of masterpieces, and too little to the advertising of them. It was evidently hopeless to expect the appreciation of a stupid and uncritical public to come to his work, and the great critic whom he had confidently looked for had not yet put in an appearance. If, then, the critic would not come to Mahomet, Mahomet would go to the critic. He would purchase the most expensive art-critic there was in the market; then the tardy public would learn that a genius had lived among them unrecognized.

As his comprehensive plans took final shape the train ran into the glass-roofed tunnel at Charing Cross. Barney sprang into a hansom, and drove directly to the works. “Beastly hole!” he said to himself, as he gazed round at the ruin the fire had wrought. The ground was covered with cluttering heaps of burnt and twisted iron, and piles of new building material were scattered everywhere. The apparent confusion and ugliness of it all offended his artistic sense, and he thanked his stars it was not necessary for him to spend his days there. He accosted Sartwell, who had been discussing some question with the architect, and shook the manager’s hand with energy and cordiality.

“Mr. Sartwell,” he cried, “I came the moment I heard of the fire.”

“Ah,” said the manager, dryly. “Have you been in America?”

“No,” laughed Barney, “not quite so far away as that; but, don’t you know, I never read the papers, and so heard of the conflagration purely by accident. Now, I am here entirely at your disposal, and am ready to do anything and everything you want done. I would rather not carry bricks, if there is anything else I can do; but I am ready to help in any way I can. I don’t mind telling you, Mr. Sartwell, that, in placing myself at the disposal of the firm, I do so at considerable sacrifice; for art is long and time is fleeting, and I have work to do in my studio that you, perhaps, might not think worth doing; but I hope posterity will not agree with you, don’t you know. Still, I am here. Command me.”

“Indeed, you do me wrong,” said Sartwell, with a grim smile. “I consider you of much greater value in the studio than here. I have no doubt posterity and I will quite agree in our estimate of your labour. Artists are few and labourers many. It would be a real disaster if our present crisis were to interfere with your artistic work. Therefore, although I am flattered by your generous offer of help, I could not think of availing myself of it. No; the studio is your place, Mr. Hope.”

“It’s uncommonly kind of you, Mr. Sartwell, to say so many nice things about my efforts, and I assure you I appreciate them, for I don’t have too many encouragements—I don’t, I assure you. This is such a beastly materialistic world, don’t you know. Has my father got home yet?”

“Yes; he returned last night.”

“Ah, I didn’t know that. Terribly upset, I suppose?”

“A trifle worried.”

“Naturally he would be. Well, there’s nothing I can do for you then?”

“Nothing, unless you undertake the decoration of the new factory, and thus send it down to posterity with the Vatican frescoes. Still, that question won’t arise for a month or two yet.”

“Quite so. I’ll think about it. Well, if you need me, you know my address. A wire will bring me at any time.”

“It’s generous of you to stand ready to leap into the chasm in this way, but take my advice and stick to the studio. Nevertheless, I’ll remember, and let you know if a crisis arises with which I am unable to deal single-handed.”

“Do,” cried Barney, again shaking hands with good-natured effusion. “Well, good-by!”

He picked his way to the gates, and stepped into his waiting hansom, a well-merited feeling of having answered the stern call of duty cheering his heart as he drove away.

It was a long drive to Haldiman’s studio, and Barney, telling the cabman he might have to wait an hour or two, dashed up the steps and rang the bell. Being admitted, he asked if Haldiman was at home; then sprang up the stairs, struck one startling knock on the studio door with the head of his stick, and entered.

Haldiman stood at his easel, a black pipe in his mouth, an old jacket on his back, and a general air about him of not having brushed his hair for a week. A half-finished drawing in black and white decorated a great sheet of cardboard placed on the easel.

“Hello, Barney!” he cried. “I thought that was your delicate way of announcing yourself. You look as trim and well-groomed as a shop-walker. Haven’t given up painting and taken to that line, have you?”

“No, old man, I haven’t!” shouted Barney, slamming the door behind him and coming into the room like a cyclone. “And I’m not trim, for I have just had a railway journey, and went from Charing Cross to the works, and from the works here. I’ve had no time to go to the club and make myself pretty; I was in too much of a hurry to see you. So don’t be sarcastic, Haldiman.”

“Everything is comparative, Barney, and to me you look like a radiant being from another and a better world, where a man has unlimited credit with his tailor. Sit down, won’t you?”

“That’s what I came for. I say, Haldiman, where do you keep your exhilarating fluid and the syphons? I’m tired out. Be hospitable. You see I’ve a load on my mind these days. The works were partly destroyed by fire, and we’re rebuilding and all that sort of thing, don’t you know, which rather takes it out of a fellow, looking after workmen and seeing that no mistakes are made.”

“Oh, I saw about that in the papers, and was wondering if it was your shop,” said Haldiman, placing a small table beside his friend, and putting a bottle, a syphon, and a glass upon it. “Help yourself, my boy. You don’t mind my going on with my work?”

“But I do!” cried Barney. “Sit down yourself, Haldiman. I want to talk to you seriously.”

“I am behindhand with this picture now, Barney. I can work and listen. Fire away.”

“Look here, Haldiman, how much do you get for a smear like that?”

Haldiman stood back and looked critically at the picture, then said with a drawl:

“Well, I’m in hopes of looting four guineas out of the pirate who edits the magazine this is for. It’s a full page, you know.”

“Great heavens! Imagine a man doing a picture for such a sum as that! I wouldn’t draw a line under a hundred pounds.”

“I’ve often thought of putting my price up to that entrancing figure,” replied Haldiman, reflectively, “but refrained for fear of bankrupting the magazines. One must have some consideration for the sixpenny press.” Barney thrust his hand deep into his trousers pocket, drew out a fist-full of coins, selected four sovereigns and four shillings, and placed them on the table, saying: “There, Haldiman, there’s your guineas. I buy that picture. Now sit down and talk to me. I want your whole attention.”

Haldiman stood for a moment looking alternately at the money and at the man. At last he spoke, slowly and quietly:

“Some day, Barney, you’ll do a thing like that, and get smashed in consequence. I’m unfortunately unable to throw you out of the window myself; but there is a cabman loitering about in front, and I will call him in to assist me if you don’t at once put that money in your pocket. Don’t make me violate the sacred rules of hospitality.”

“You have violated them, Hal, already, by getting angry. I see you’re angry, so don’t deny it. Besides, the cabman wouldn’t come; I own him, and if he did I could put you both out.”

“You can’t hire me, like a cabman, you know, Barney.”

“Of course not, of course not. I’m not trying to, dear boy. Do sit down and be sensible. I’ve come to you as one friend to another, for I’m at a crisis in my career. I need help, so be good to me. I take a serious view of life now, and——”

“Since when?”

“Since this morning, if you like. The ‘when’ doesn’t matter. I’ve come to the conclusion that I’m wasting my existence. You’ll scoff, of course, but I know I have genius—not talent, mind, but genius. There’s no use of making any bones about it, or pretending false modesty: if a man is a genius, he knows it. Very well, then, why not say so?”

“I see no reason against it.”

“Quite so. Now, Haldiman, how much money do you make in a year?”

“You mean, how little?”

“Put it any way you like. Name the figure.”

“What’s that got to do with your genius?”

“Never you mind. What’s the amount?”

“Now, Barney, if you’re cooking up some new kind of financial insult, I give you fair warning I won’t stand it.”

Barney had gulped down his stimulant, and now paced up and down the room, clearing a track for himself by kicking things out of the way. Haldiman sat in a deep armchair, his legs stretched out, and his hands in his pockets, watching his friend’s energetic march to and fro.

“The artistic profession,” cried the pedestrian, “has been held up to the scorn of the world since painting began. Read any novel, and you will see that, if the heroine is to make a doocedly bad marriage, she invariably falls in love with an artist—invariably.”

“Well, she generally marries us.”

“Yes, and lives in misery ever after.”

“Oh, we’re generous, and share it with her.”

“You see what I mean. The artist is held up to contempt, and all respectable people in the book are aghast at the girl’s choice. Now, why is this?”

“Ask me a harder one. It is because fiction is notoriously untrue to life. The wives of the Royal Academy live in a splendour and luxury undreamed of by the ordinary lady of title.”

“Nothing of the sort. It’s because the artists don’t business-manage themselves. They have no commercial sense. Therefore they are poor. Now, if a man invents a soap, what does he do?”

“Washes himself.”

“He advertises it. He becomes rich. Why, then, if a man writes a great book, should he not advertise himself and his book in every way that is open to him?”

“I believe he does, Barney. Where have you been living this while back to be so ignorant of the approved modern methods in art and literature?”

“Isn’t a great picture of more value to the world than a much-advertised soap?”

“Well, if you ask me, I should say, no. I’d back the soap as a civilizer against the Louvre any day.”

Barney stopped in his walk, raised his arms above his head, and let them drop heavily to his sides.

“I haven’t a friend in the world!” he cried, in tragic tones. “Not one—not one!”

“Barney, this conversation is bewildering. What are you driving at, anyhow? Art, soap, literature, advertising, friendship, marriage—what’s wrong? Who is the woman?”

“Don’t talk to me about women! I hate them!”

“I thought you were most successful in that line. I believe I have your own authority for the statement.”

“Success! One is successful up to a point; then there is a disappointment that shows what a sham success has been. I’ll never speak to a woman again.”

“I’ve been there myself—several times. Still we always return—if not to our first love, to our fourth, or fifth. As for friends, I don’t know any man who has more.”

“Not true friends, Haldiman. I haven’t one, I tell you. I did think you were a friend, and you do nothing but sneer at me. You think I don’t see it; I do, all the same. I’m the most sensitive of men, although nobody appears to appreciate it.”

“I don’t sneer at you, Barney. What put that in your head? I think you sometimes fail to appreciate other people’s sensitiveness. You are a trifle prone to flaunt Bank of England notes in the faces of those not so well provided as you are with them. Then the sensitive soul rises in rebellion.”

“That’s my unfortunate manner, Haldiman. I don’t really mean to do so. If I had a game leg, or a club foot, and came thumping in here with it, you wouldn’t make fun of my defect, would you? Of course not. Well, why should you resent a defect of manner when you know my intentions are good?”

“I don’t resent anything about you, Barney—at least only spasmodically.”

“You know I’d go to the end of the world to serve a friend—I would, honest! Yet I’ve no luck. Here is a poor devil of a musician I am trying to befriend. I can see he dislikes me intensely. I got a publisher to bring out some of his music—paid all the expenses—yet it was like pulling teeth to get that organist to allow me to help him, and he’s a genius if ever there was one. I got a select and appreciative audience together to hear him play. He didn’t come, although he promised to do so, and the people thought I was trying to make fools of them. It must be all my accursed manner. Now you always know the right thing to say: I don’t. My genius doesn’t run that way. I’m an artist.”

Haldiman threw back his head and laughed. Barney stared at him, displeasure on his brow.

“What the deuce are you laughing at now?”

“Forgive me, Barney; I’m laughing at the thumping of your club foot, although you did not believe me capable of it.”

“What have I said?”

“Nothing—nothing. Barney, I love you! You are the one and only Barnard Hope; all others are base imitations. Now listen to me. I haven’t the faintest idea what it is you want. This conversation has been simply encyclopaedic in the amount of ground covered; but I’ll do for you what you would do for me, short of abduction or assassination. I’d prefer not to land myself in prison, if you don’t mind, but I’ll even run the risk of that. What do you want? Out with it!”

“But the moment I begin, you’ll say your insulted. You terrorize me, Haldiman,—’pon my soul, you do!”

“Go on. For ten minutes insults are barred. Will you go on?”

“Very well. I asked you how much you made in a year, and you jeered at me.”

“I never keep accounts, and never pay a debt until the brokers come in, so I really haven’t the slightest idea. You can guess at the amount just as well as I can.. Guess and proceed.”

“All right. I want to pay you double your yearly income for your help in this matter.”

“That isn’t friendship, that’s commercialism again. I beg pardon, I forgot. Don’t look daggers, Barney; I accept. Can I have the money in advance?”

“Of course you can,” cried Barney, gleefully, making a dive for his inside pocket; then, as the other went into a fit of laughter, the joyful look faded into an expression of intense indignation, and Barney, with a curse, strode to the door. Haldiman sprang to his feet and grasped the offended man by the shoulders.

“None of that!” he cried. “Come back, you villain! You are not going to offer me a fortune and then sneak off in that fashion. Sit down, Barney; sit down and go on with the pretty talk!”

“Oh, it’s no use!” said the other, in tones of deep dejection. “I said I hadn’t a friend in the world, and I haven’t.”

“Bosh! You’re harder to humour than a baby. If a man may not smile in his own room, where may he? I’m intensely interested, and want to know what crime I’m expected to commit. Never mind the money, but state your case.”

“The money is part of the case. I pay or I don’t play.”

“Certainly. That’s understood. I accept. Fire away!”

“Well, you know all the editors of the illustrated weeklies and magazines.”

“For my sins I do—alas!”

“Then, to come right to the point as between man and man, I want to buy a first-class critic, and the editor of a first-class illustrated periodical.”

“You mean you want to buy a going magazine?”

“I don’t mean anything of the kind. I mean just what I say.”

“Then I don’t quite understand you. Explain.”

“What I want is this: I want a first-class art-critic to write an article in a first-class periodical saying Barnard Hope is the greatest artist the world has ever seen.”

“Oh, is that all?”

“No, that’s not all. I want the article superbly illustrated—in colour if possible—with, reproductions of my chief paintings.”

“Ah! I wouldn’t do that, Barney, if I were you. The pictures would be rather a give-away of the great critic’s eulogy.”

“Yes, I knew you would say that. The obviousness of such a remark would commend itself to you. But you see I’m perfectly frank with you. Now, could you manage this for me? Remember, I don’t care how much money I spend.”

Haldiman removed the black pipe from his mouth, knocked the ashes out of it, and thoughtfully re-filled it.

“Well, for brazen cheek, Barney,” he said at last, “that proposal——”

“Yes, I know, I know, I know. But these things happen every day—or, not to exaggerate, let us say every second day. It is simply doing for me what Ruskin did for Turner. Turner painted away all his life; nobody recognized him, and he died in Chelsea. Now I’m living in Chelsea, and I want recognition during my life. Of course my Ruskin will come along after I’m dead; but, like the fellow who was to be executed, I won’t be there to enjoy it. Things rarely happen at the right moment in this world, and my brazen proposal is merely to take events by the coat collar and hurry them up a bit. You see what I mean? Besides, I’m infinitely greater than Turner, don’t you know.”

Haldiman smoked and meditated for some moments; then he said:

“I’m not sure but the trick may be done, although I doubt if brutal barefaced bribery will do it. How would a magazine like ‘Our National Art’ suit you?”

“Nothing could be better.”

“And would a French art-critic like Viellieme be satisfactory?”

“Perfectly. What he says is taken for gospel all the world over.”

“Well, I happen to know that the editor of ‘Our National Art’ has been trying for a year to get Viellieme to write about English art; but the Frenchman won’t come over to London, even for a day, at any price. Viellieme is great as a writer, but greater still as a money-spender. I’ll run over to Paris and sound him. You couldn’t bribe the editor of ‘Our National Art,’ but he will print anything Viellieme will write for him. Now I know the Frenchman doesn’t care what he writes for England, although he is rather particular about what appears in Paris. He thinks there is no art in England.”

“He’s right, too, as far as his knowledge goes; but he’s never seen anything of mine.”

“Just so. Then, if Viellieme agrees, you would be willing to send some of your immortal works over to Paris for his inspection.”

“All of them, my boy, all of them.”

“Then we’ll look on that as settled. I’ll do my best.”

“God bless you, my dear fellow! God bless you!” cried Barney with deep emotion, crushingly wringing the hand of the wincing man, whom he now declared to be his one friend on earth. He clattered noisily down the stair like a stalwart trooper, sprang into the waiting hansom, and departed.