The _Investigator_, as Harviss phrased it, "set the pace," and the other journals followed, finding it easier to let their critical man-of-all-work play a variation on the first reviewer's theme than to secure an expert to "do" the book afresh. But it was evident that the Professor had captured his public, for all the resources of the profession could not, as Harviss gleefully pointed out, have carried the book so straight to the heart of the nation. There was something noble in the way in which Harviss belittled his own share in the achievement, and insisted on the inutility of shoving a book which had started with such headway on. "All I ask you is to admit that I saw what would happen," he said with a touch of professional pride. "I knew you'd struck the right note--I knew they'd be quoting you from Maine to San Francisco. Good as fiction? It's better--it'll keep going longer." "Will it?" said the Professor with a slight shudder. He was resigned to an ephemeral triumph, but the thought of the book's persistency frightened him. "I should say so! Why, you fit in everywhere--science, theology, natural history--and then the all-for-the-best element which is so popular just now. Why, you come right in with the How-to-Relax series, and they sell way up in the millions. And then the book's so full of tenderness--there are such lovely things in it about flowers and children. I didn't know an old Dryasdust like you could have such a lot of sentiment in him. Why, I actually caught myself snivelling over that passage about the snowdrops piercing the frozen earth; and my wife was saying the other day that, since she's read 'The Vital Thing,' she begins to think you must write the 'What-Cheer Column,' in the _Inglenook."_ He threw back his head with a laugh which ended in the inspired cry: "And, by George, sir, when the thing begins to slow off we'll start somebody writing against it, and that will run us straight into another hundred thousand." And as earnest of this belief he drew the Professor a supplementary cheque. V Mrs. Linyard's knock cut short the importunities of the lady who had been trying to persuade the Professor to be taken by flashlight at his study table for the Christmas number of the _Inglenook_. On this point the Professor had fancied himself impregnable; but the unwonted smile with which he welcomed his wife's intrusion showed that his defences were weakening. The lady from the _Inglenook_ took the hint with professional promptness, but said brightly, as she snapped the elastic around her note-book: "I shan't let you forget me, Professor." The groan with which he followed her retreat was interrupted by his wife's question: "Do they pay you for these interviews, Samuel?" The Professor looked at her with sudden attention. "Not directly," he said, wondering at her expression. She sank down with a sigh. "Indirectly, then?" "What is the matter, my dear? I gave you Harviss's second cheque the other day--"