Beaton lit a cigarette which he pinched nervously between his lips before he spoke."You've come for that letter,I suppose,Fulkerson?It isn't done."Fulkerson turned from staring at the bust to which he had mounted."What you fretting about that letter for?I don't want your letter."Beaton stopped biting his cigarette and looked at him."Don't want my letter?Oh,very good!"he bristled up.He took his cigarette from his lips,and blew the smoke through his nostrils,and then looked at Fulkerson.
"No;I don't want your letter;I want you."Beacon disdained to ask an explanation,but he internally lowered his crest,while he continued to look at Fulkerson without changing his defiant countenance.This suited Fulkerson well enough,and he went on with relish,"I'm going out of the syndicate business,old man,and I'm on a new thing."He put his leg over the back of a chair and rested his foot on its seat,and,with one hand in his pocket,he laid the scheme of 'Every Other Week'before Beaton with the help of the other.The artist went about the room,meanwhile,with an effect of indifference which by no means offended Fulkerson.He took some water into his mouth from a tumbler,which he blew in a fine mist over the head of Judas before swathing it in a dirty cotton cloth;he washed his brushes and set his palette;he put up on his easel the picture he had blocked on the day before,and stared at it with a gloomy face;then he gathered the sheets of his unfinished letter together and slid them into a drawer of his writing-desk.By the time he had finished and turned again to Fulkerson,Fulkerson was saying:"I did think we could have the first number out by New-Year's;but it will take longer than that--a month longer;but I'm not sorry,for the holidays kill everything;and by February,or the middle of February,people will get their breath again and begin to look round and ask what's new.Then we'll reply in the language of Shakespeare and Milton,'Every Other Week;and don't you forget it.'"He took down his leg and asked,"Got a pipe of 'baccy anywhere?"Beaton nodded at a clay stem sticking out of a Japanese vase of bronze on his mantel."There's yours,"he said;and Fulkerson said,"Thanks,"and filled the pipe and sat down and began to smoke tranquilly.
Beaton saw that he would have to speak now."And what do you want with me?""You?Oh yes,"Fulkerson humorously dramatized a return to himself from a pensive absence."Want you for the art department."Beaton shook his head."I'm not your man,Fulkerson,"he said,compassionately."You want a more practical hand,one that's in touch with what's going.I'm getting further and further away from this century and its claptrap.I don't believe in your enterprise;I don't respect it,and I won't have anything to do with it.It would-choke me,that kind of thing.""That's all right,"said Fulkerson.He esteemed a man who was not going to let himself go cheap."Or if it isn't,we can make it.You and March will pull together first-rate.I don't care how much ideal you put into the thing;the more the better.I can look after the other end of the schooner myself.""You don't understand me,"said Beaton."I'm not trying to get a rise out of you.I'm in earnest.What you want is some man who can have patience with mediocrity putting on the style of genius,and with genius turning mediocrity on his hands.I haven't any luck with men;I don't get on with them;I'm not popular."Beaton recognized the fact with the satisfaction which it somehow always brings to human pride.
"So much the better!"Fulkerson was ready for him at this point.
"I don't want you to work the old-established racket the reputations.
When I want them I'll go to them with a pocketful of rocks--knock-down argument.But my idea is to deal with the volunteer material.Look at the way the periodicals are carried on now!Names!names!names!In a country that's just boiling over with literary and artistic ability of every kind the new fellows have no chance.The editors all engage their material.I don't believe there are fifty volunteer contributions printed in a year in all the New York magazines.It's all wrong;it's suicidal.'Every Other Week'is going back to the good old anonymous system,the only fair system.It's worked well in literature,and it will work well in art.""It won't work well in art,"said Beaton."There you have a totally different set of conditions.What you'll get by inviting volunteer illustrations will be a lot of amateur trash.And how are you going to submit your literature for illustration?It can't be done.At any rate,I won't undertake to do it.""We'll get up a School of Illustration,"said Fulkerson,with cynical security."You can read the things and explain 'em,and your pupils can make their sketches under your eye.They wouldn't be much further out than most illustrations are if they never knew what they were illustrating.You might select from what comes in and make up a sort of pictorial variations to the literature without any particular reference to it.Well,I understand you to accept?""No,you don't."
"That is,to consent to help us with your advice and criticism.That's all I want.It won't commit you to anything;and you can be as anonymous as anybody."At the door Fulkerson added:"By-the-way,the new man--the fellow that's taken my old syndicate business--will want you to keep on;but I guess he's going to try to beat you down on the price of the letters.He's going in for retrenchment.I brought along a check for this one;I'm to pay for that."He offered Beaton an envelope.
"I can't take it,Fulkerson.The letter's paid for already."Fulkerson stepped forward and laid the envelope on the table among the tubes of paint.
