yet no whit
more tuneful or interesting, was making its authors rich. We couldn't
understand it, we had to conclude it was a fluke, a question of
chance, of accident. Pair was still a very young man; he must go on
knocking, and some day--to-morrow, next week, next year, but some day
certainly--the door of public favour would be opened to him. Meanwhile
his position was by no means an unenviable one, goodness knows. To
have your orbit in the art world of Paris, and to be recognised there
as a star; to be written about in the _Revue des Deux-Mondes_; to
possess the friendship of the masters, to know that they believe in
you, to hear them prophesy, 'He will do great things'--all that is
something, even if your wares don't 'take on' in the market-place.

'It's a good job, though, that I haven't got to live by them,' Pair
said; and there indeed he touched a salient point. His people were
dead; his father had been a younger son; he had no money of his own.
But his father's elder brother, a squire in Hampshire, made him rather
a liberal allowance,--something like six hundred a year, I believe,
which was opulence in the Latin Quarter. Now, the squire had been
aware of Pair's relation with Godelinette from its inception, and had
not disapproved. On his visits to Paris he had dined with them, given
them dinners, and treated her with the utmost complaisance. But when,
one fine morning, her tailor died, and my quixotic friend announced
his intention of marrying her, _dans les delais legaux_, the squire
protested. I think I read the whole correspondence, and I remember
that in the beginning the elder man took the tone of paradox and
banter. 'Behave dishonourably, my dear fellow. I have winked at your
mistress heretofore, because boys will be boys; but it is the _man_
who marries. And, anyhow, a woman is so much more interesting in a
false position.' But he soon became serious, presently furious, and,
when the marriage was an accomplished fact, cut off the funds.

'Never mind, my dear,' said Pair. 'We will go to London and seek our
fortune. We will write the songs of the people, and let who will make
the laws. We will grow rich and famous, and

"When I am king, diddle-diddle,
You shall be queen!"'

* * * * *

So they went to London to seek their fortune, and--that was the last
I ever saw of them, nearly the last I heard. I had two letters from
Pair, written within a month of their hegi