Of the many completely happy periods of Richard's life
there were few more joyous than the first years he spent as a
reporter in New York. For the first time he was completely
his own master and paying his own way — a condition which
afforded him infinite satisfaction. He was greatly attached
to Brisbane and as devoted to the interests of The Evening
Sun as if he had been the editor and publisher. In return
Brisbane gave him a free rein and allowed him to write very
much what and as he chose. The two men were constantly
together, in and out of office hours, and planned many of the
leading features of the paper which on account of the
brilliancy of its news stories and special articles was at
that time attracting an extraordinary amount of attention.
Richard divided his working hours between reporting important
news events, writing specials (principally about theatrical
people), and the Van Bibber stories, nearly all of which were
published for the first time in The Evening Sun. These
short tales of New York life soon made a distinct hit, and,
while they appeared anonymously, it was generally known that
Richard was their author. In addition to his newspaper work
my brother was also working on short stories for the
magazines, and in 1890 scored his first real success in this
field, with "Gallegher," which appeared in Scribner's.
This
was shortly followed by "The Other Woman," "Miss
Catherwaite's Understudy," "A Walk up the Avenue," "My
Disreputable Friend, Mr. Raegen," "An Unfinished Story," and
other stories that soon gave him an established reputation as
a writer of fiction. But while Richard's success was attained
in a remarkably short space of time and at an extremely early
age, it was not accomplished without an enormous amount of
hard work and considerable privation. When he first went to
New York his salary was but thirty dollars a week, and while
he remained on
The Evening Sun never over fifty dollars,
and
the prices he received for his first short stories were
extremely meagre. During the early days on
The Evening
Sun
he had a room in a little house at 108 Waverly Place, and took
his meals in the neighborhood where he happened to find
himself and where they were cheapest. He usually spent his
week-ends in Philadelphia, but his greatest pleasure was when
he could induce some member of his family to visit him in New
York. I fear I was the one who most often accepted his
hospitality, and wonderful visits they were, certainly to me,
and I think to Richard as well. The great event was our
Saturday-night dinner, when we always went to a little
restaurant on Sixth Avenue. I do not imagine the fifty-cent
table d'hote (
vin compris ) the genial Mr. Jauss served us
was any better than most fifty-cent table-d'hote dinners, but
the place was quaint and redolent of strange smells of cooking
as well as of a true bohemian atmosphere. Those were the days
when the Broadway Theatre was given over to the comic operas
in which Francis Wilson and De Wolfe Hopper were the stars,
and as both of the comedians were firm friends of Richard, we
invariably ended our evening at the Broadway. Sometimes we
occupied a
box as the guests of the management, and at other times we
went behind the scenes and sat in the star's dressing-room. I
think I liked it best when Hopper was playing, because during
Wilson's regime the big dressing-room was a rather solemn sort
of place, but when Hopper ruled, the room was filled with
pretty girls and he treated us to fine cigars and champagne.
Halcyon nights those, and then on Sunday morning we always
breakfasted at old Martin's on University Place eggs a la
Martin and that wonderful coffee and pain de menage. And what
a wrench it was when I tore myself away from the delights of
the great city and scurried back to my desk in sleepy
Philadelphia. Had I been a prince royal Richard could not
have planned more carefully than he did for these visits, and
to meet the expense was no easy matter for him. Indeed, I
know that to pay for all our gayeties he usually had to carry
his guitar to a neighboring pawn-broker where the instrument
was always good for an eight — dollar loan. But from the time
Richard first began to make his own living one of the great
pleasures of his life was to celebrate, or as he called it, to
"have a party." Whenever he had finished a short story he had
a party, and when the story had been accepted there was
another party, and, of course, the real party was when he
received the check. And so it was throughout his life, giving
a party to some one whom a party would help, buying a picture
for which he had no use to help a struggling artist, sending a
few tons of coal to an old lady who was not quite warm enough,
always writing a letter or a check for some one of his own
craft who had been less fortunate than he — giving to every
beggar that he met, fearing that among all the thousand fakers
he might refuse one worthy
case. I think this habit of giving Richard must have
inherited from his father, who gave out of all proportion to
his means, and with never too close a scrutiny to the
worthiness of the cause. Both men were too intensely human to
do that, but if this great desire on the part of my father and
brother to help others gave the recipients pleasure I'm sure
that it caused in the hearts of the givers an even greater
happiness. The following letters were chosen from a great
number which Richard wrote to his family, telling of his first
days on
The Evening Sun, and of his life in New York.
