But it was charming to both that Bessie let them look at the
proofs of the story she was publishing in a magazine; and allowed them
as well as mamma, to read the manuscript of the tale, romance, or
novel, whichever it was to be called, on which she wished for her
aunt's opinion.
Bessie took care, when complying with the girls' entreaty, that she
would tell them all she had written; to observe that, she thought
'Clare' a very foolish book indeed, and that she wished heartily she
had never written it. Gillian asked why she had done it?
'Oh,' said Dolores, 'things aren't interesting unless something horrid
happens, or some one is frightened, or very miserable.'
'I like things best just and exactly as they really are--or were,' said
Gillian.
'The question between sensation and character,' said Bessie to her
aunt. 'I suppose that, on the whole, it is the few who are palpably
affected by the mass of fiction in the world; but that it is needful to
take good care that those few gather at least no harm from one's work--
to be faithful in it, in fact, like other things.'
And there was no doubt that Bessie had been faithful in her work ever
since she had realized her vocation. Her lending library books,
written with a purpose, were excellent, and were already so much valued
by Miss Hacket, that Gillian thought how once she should have felt it a
privation not to be allowed to tell her whence they came; but to her
surprise on the Sunday, instead of the constraint with which of late
she had been treated at tea-time, the eager inquiry was made whether
this was really the authoress, Miss Merrifield?
Secrets are not kept as well as people think.
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