Mr Cohen, who had obtained the situation indirectly for Clara,
thought nothing more about it until, one day, he went to the shop,
and he then recollected his recommendation, which had been given
solely in faith, for he had never seen the young woman, and had
trusted entirely to Marshall. He found her at her dark desk, and as
he approached her, she hastily put a mark in a book and closed it.
'Have you sold a little volume called After Office Hours by a man
named Robinson?' 'I did not know we had it. I have never seen it.'
'I do not wonder, but I saw it here about six months ago; it was up
there,' pointing to a top shelf. Clara was about to mount the
ladder, but he stopped her, and found what he wanted. Some of the
leaves were torn.
'We can repair those for you; in about a couple of days it shall be
ready.' He lingered a little, and at that moment another customer entered.
Clara went forward to speak to him, and Cohen was able to see that it
was the Heroes and Hero Worship she had been studying, a course of
lectures which had been given by a Mr Carlyle, of whom Cohen knew
something. As the customer showed no signs of departing, Cohen left,
saying he would call again.
Before sending Robinson's After Office Hours to the binder, Clara
looked at it. It was made up of short essays, about twenty
altogether, bound in dark-green cloth, lettered at the side, and
published in 1841. They were upon the oddest subjects: such as,
Ought Children to learn Rules before Reasons? The Higher Mathematics
and Materialism. Ought We to tell Those Whom We love what We think
about Them? Deductive Reasoning in Politics. What Troubles ought We
to Make Known and What ought We to Keep Secret: Courage as a Science
and an Art.
Clara did not read any one essay through, she had no time, but she
was somewhat struck with a few sentences which caught her eye; for
example--'A mere dream, a vague hope, ought in some cases to be more
potent than a certainty in regulating our action. The faintest
vision of God should be more determinative than the grossest earthly
assurance.' 'I knew a case in which a man had to encounter three successive
trials of all the courage and inventive faculty in him. Failure in
one would have been ruin. The odds against him in each trial were
desperate, and against ultimate victory were overwhelming.
Nevertheless, he made the attempt, and was triumphant, by the
narrowest margin, in every struggle. That which is of most value to
us is often obtained in defiance of the laws of probability.'