"You see, Frank, I am breaking with the past altogether. I am going to
write the history of it. I am going to tell how I was tempted and fell,
how I was pushed by the man I loved into that dreadful quarrel of his,
driven forward to the fight with his father and then left to suffer
alone....

"That is the story I am now going to tell. That is the book[6] of pity
and of love which I am writing now--a terrible book....

"I wonder would you publish it, Frank? I should like it to appear in
_The Saturday_."

"I'd be delighted to publish anything of yours," I replied, "and happier
still to publish something to show that you have at length chosen the
better part and are beginning a new life. I'd pay you, too, whatever the
work turns out to be worth to me; in any case much more than I pay
Bernard Shaw or anyone else." I said this to encourage him.

"I'm sure of that," he answered. "I'll send you the book as soon as I've
finished it. I think you'll like it"--and there for the moment the
matter ended.

At length I felt sure that all would be well with him. How could I help
feeling sure? His mind was richer and stronger than it had ever been;
and he had broken with all the dark past. I was overjoyed to believe
that he would yet do greater things than he had ever done, and this
belief and determination were in him too, as anyone can see on reading
what he wrote at this time in prison: