putterings 441 < 442 > 443 index
I’d do better to let it alone a bit. Another time.
“But you are busy,” he objected, with a look at her easel.
“Only puttering. And I’d do better to let it alone a bit. . . . Will you take this chair? It’s really man-size and comfy.”
She spoke rapidly, intent upon pleasant hospitality. There was something about this gruff young man, with all his surliness, that stirred both feminine curiosity and a motherly impulse to soften his aloofness.
“No, no — I only came for a minute.”
p 74
He gave her a long look, then walked away with a glance at his great covered marble, standing where last summer the marble for his unfinished “Fountain of Life” had stood, and began puttering with his tools.
“You said you — wanted to see me,” she reminded him.
“You’re too tired. Another time.”
“No. I couldn’t sleep. . . . I’d rather hear what it was.”
p 317
both from Mary Hastings Bradley, The Splendid Chance (1915)
illustrated by Edmund Frederick (1870-1949)
links to NYPL copy/scan (via hathitrust)
same (via google books) : link
—
Excerpts from / links to contemporary reviews will be added in due course.
Publication was not preceded by serialization in magazines, but was anticipated by a think-piece on background to (and inevitability of) the war —
Mary Hastings Bradley. “Behind the Frontiers.” McCall’s Magazine 42:5 (January 1915) : 19-21, 80
archive.org : link
(same number contained Sarah Comstock, “The Nurse at the Front” 14-15, 52)
and — with regard to American girls in France — by this —
Mary Hastings Bradley, “The Girl from Home,” in Good Housekeeping Magazine (December 1911) : 763-769
google books : link
introduced by this “Editor’s Note —
The author of this charming tale of Parisian life — one of the cleverest and most successful of the younger short story writers — is eager to have the situation herein truthfully portrayed brought before the many American girls who, ignorant of the pitfalls of that foreign city, are lured thither by rosy dreams of success in their chosen art.
—
am reminded of W. B. Trites his story “The Slacker” (The Saturday Evening Post, December 11, 1915), described at asfaltics 2630
and also of his future wife Estelle Klauder (Trites) her “The First Trip to European Countries” in The Bureau Country Tribune (Friday, May 13, 1910; and presumably elsewhere), listed and linked at asfaltics 2630a
Mary Hastings Bradley (1882-1976)
- “traveler and author,” known for detective fiction and travel books, some on big game hunting
wikipedia : link
a rather longer entry at fr.wikipedia : link - Mary Hastings Bradley papers, 1903-1976. Coll MS Brad76 : (111 linear ft.) : permalink
finding aid (with thorough biographical history) : link - Mary Wilhelmina Hastings, Smith College ’05 (English, where she would have encountered and even studied under Jennette Lee),
Class of 1905 Classbook, Smith College (1905) : portrait : link
senior member of the Philosophical Society (p53)
two addresses in that volume :
“Ivy Oration” (pp 115-117) and “Junior Class History” (pp 125-127). - Fiction Mags Index : Bradley, Mary (Wilhelmina) Hastings
by title : link
chronological : link
author index (links sometimes change, so this overview can be useful) : link
—
Edmund Frederick, illustrator (1870-1949) : see profile at Allen Holtz’s Stripper’s Guide : link
contemporary notices/reviews (that together sketch the story)
- An impression of the time alread compassed by the great war comes with something of a shock upon reading The Splendid Chance, by Mary Hastings Bradley (Appleton, $1.30 net). Its heroine, a young American artist in Paris, is bereft of one lover and comes to the point of surrender to another in the months which followed the threatened advance on the French capital. The first fiancé was an Enlish officer, a steamer acquaintance. Until each family could be suitably notified the engagement was kept secret. The girl cannot and then will not go home, for her life becomes bound up in the sorrows of her French friends and the tragic fate of her English lover. It as if she were marooned, so cut off is she from all that life had meant to her hitherto. The situation is presented with power and the scenes of war with almost too trenchant realism. The characters are varied and it is interesting to see how they meet the terrible test, peasant, shopkeeper and aristocrat. The book quickens sympathy with our old-time allies.
“Recent Fiction” in The Congregationalist and Christian World 100:33 (August 19, 1915) : 259 (?)
google books : link - A Clever Romance.
The Splendid Chance, by Mary Hastings Bradley. (Appleton.)
“The Splendid Chance” is a novel which shows clever workman ship in dealing with material by no means unusual. The heroine. Katherine King, is a familiar type — the lovely girl putting her beauty in the discard and resolving to play life’s game with her intellect. Her adventures are predictable from the first, for obviously her renunciation of feminine charm does not mean its destruction, and she leaves several broken hearts by the wayside. The first part of the book, dealing with Miss King’s adventures on board ship and as an art student in Paris, are deftly done, and the latter half depicts her war loss as authentic tragedy.
The Rocky Mountain News (Daily), 56:255 (September 12, 1915)
via Colorado Historic Newspapers : link - “The Splendid Chance” (Appleton, $1.30) by Mary Hastings Bradley, is a well-told story. It derives more than usual interest from its atmosphere and surroundings, for it is set in the streets and environs of Paris during the early days of the present war when the Boches came too near to the gates. Just what is the splendid chance, whether that of the volunteer nurse, an American girl and student in Paris, who appropriated the cap of the dead Sister of Charity and in this garb hurried out to the battlefield, there happily to find among the wounded her own fallen betrothed, whose last moments she was able to solace; or whether there were more splendid chances related earlier or later in the story, the authoress leaves to the interested reader to decide. The style is markedly better than some of the latter-day “best sellers,” yet the authoress has not profited by her familiarity with the French genius fully to appreciate the force of compression and the worth of economy of words, nor has she seen deeply enough into the French people to realize how sincerely their religious feelings have been aroused during this war.
America (“A Catholic Review of the Week”) 13:24 (September 25, 1915) : 596
google books : link