that you should have the temperament of the writer without the talent," she said to me once.
"What makes you say I write badly? I sell well! " I told her what I got for my books, and about my dear American public.
"Sell! sell! " She was quite contemptuous. "Hall Caine sells better than you do, and Marie Corelli, and Mrs. Barclay."
"Would you rather I gave one of them your MS.? " I asked pettishly. I was vexed with her now, but I did not want her to go. She used to vanish suddenly like a light blown out. I think that was when I fell asleep, but I did not want to keep awake always, or hear her talking. She was inclined to be melancholy, or cynical, and so jarred my mood, my sense of well-being.
Night and morning they gave me my injections of morphia, until the morning when I refused it, to Dr. Kennedy's surprise and against Benham's remonstrance.
"It is good for you, you are not going to set yourself against it?"
"I can have it again tonight. I don't need it in the daytime. The hæmorrhage has left off." Dr. Kennedy supported me in my refusal. I will admit the next few days were dreadful. I found myself utterly ill and helpless, and horribly conscious of all that was going on. The detail of desperate
