They further "retrenched,"
by taking a mean advantage of Carter's having called upon them in
person, by handing him three or four of his stories--but by this he
saved his postage-stamps.
Each day, when he returned to the flat, Dolly, who always expected
each editor would hastily dust off his chair and offer it to her
brilliant husband, would smile excitedly and gasp, "Well?" and
Carter would throw the rejected manuscripts on the table and say:
"At least, I have not returned empty- handed." Then they would
discover a magazine that neither they nor any one else knew
existed, and they would hurriedly readdress the manuscripts to that
periodical, and run to post them at the letter-box on the corner.
"Any one of them, if ACCEPTED," Carter would point out, "might
bring us in twenty-five dollars. A story of mine once sold for
forty; so to-night we can afford to dine at a restaurant where wine
is NOT 'included.'"
Fortunately, they never lost their sense of humor. Otherwise the
narrow confines of the flat, the evil smells that rose from the
baked streets, the greasy food of Italian and Hungarian
restaurants, and the ever-haunting need of money might have crushed
their youthful spirits. But in time even they found that one, still
less two, cannot exist exclusively on love and the power to see the
bright side of things-- especially when there is no bright side.
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