Who Wins?; or, The Secret of Monksworth Waste
May Agnes Fleming
New York: New York Book Company, 1910
180 pages
A woman trudges by night, babe at breast, though England's bleak marshes and ghastly commons. She begs for rest at Leamington, the nearest town, but her brute of a husband is insistent on making a ship that is scheduled to depart from Plymouth the next day. Yet, upon reaching Leamington, he's drawn to the warm lights of the Vine Inn. He does decide stop – but not before blackening his wife's one unblackened eye. "I'm going in for a pot o' porter, mistress," says he; "wait you here till I come back. The poor woman does just that. Upon her husband's return, she takes up a long, heavy, sharp-pointed stone, "deadly as a dagger," and brings it down on his head:
There was one convulsive bound, one gurgling cry, a spout of hot, red blood, and then—
The woman turned away with sickening horror from what lay before her. It was very still, too; there was no need to repeat the blow. She flung the stone away, took one last glance at the sleeping child, one last, shuddering gaze at that other still form, then turned swiftly and flitted away into the night.
Very harmless young heroes, their maiden swords still unfleshed — their maiden pistols preserving their pristine glitter — dainty carpet knights, great in the dance, and mighty at the mess-table. They lounged about the boxes, amusing themselves with sarcastic criticisms on their neighbors, while waiting for the curtain to rise.
"A man can not marry his grandmother — no more can he marry a little danseuse, particularly at the innocent age of nineteen. Not but that Miss Rose Adair is pretty enough and sparkling enough to almost warrant such folly. Trevanion’s deucedly spooney about her, but there’ll be no marrying, take my word for it. He comes of a race as proud as the devil.”
And then there's the title. Who Wins? Against whom? What's the prize?
Hermit or hag? There's always one.
Much as I'm loath to use the term, I can't help but describe Who Wins? as the most meta of the Flemings I've read to date. This has much to do with the mysterious character Angus Macgregor's occupation as a writer of popular fiction. In this scene, acquaintance Charley Chudleigh stops by for a tongue-wag:
"Busy, as usual?" he remarked, lounging in, looking inexpressibly handsome and cool in his summer suit of spotless linen. "If I disturb the exercises, I'll go." (Macgregor, in the deep, rose-shaded window-seat, was writing.) "Whereabouts are you? Is Lord Charlemagne Charlemount on his knees to the lovely Lady Sleepshanks? Or is the Black Bandit in the act of leaping from the top of the Martello Tower with the shrieking Aureola Pasdebasque in his arms, or has Rinaldo Binaldi, the magnificent hero of the tale, the dazzling son of 'poor but honest parents,' just been consigned to the deepest dungeon beneath the castle moat by that black-hearted scoundrel, the gouty old Marquis of Carabas? Egad! Macgregor, you sensation novelists are tremendous fellows, and play the very mischief with the women's noddles. Say the word, and I'll go; I've the greatest awe of the profession, and wouldn't interrupt a thrilling chapter for countless worlds."
Object: My copy was purchased last year from a bookseller in upstate New York. Price: US$12.00. It was once owned by a man named Gerald E. Rule ("from Mother"). The title on its cover and spine drop the question mark, but the title page (above) gets things right. Likely the most recent edition, it was published as part of the New York Book Company's Famous Fiction Library. Amongst the other Canadian titles in the Famous Fiction Library, we find only Mrs Fleming's The Baronet's Bride.
Access: Lauren McMullen's invaluable "Checklist of Works by May Agnes Fleming" suggests that Who Wins? made its print debut serialized in Philadelphia Saturday Night (16 April and 23 July 1870). She records a second serialization under the title The Mystery of Mordaunt Hall, which ran anonymously from 16 July 1870 to 1 November 1870 in the London Journal. Prof McMullen notes that the names of settings and characters are altered in the latter serial.*
Prof McMullen's research suggests that Who Wins? may have first appeared as a book published by New York's Surprise Library. No date is given. The earliest edition that can be read online – New York: Munro, 1895 – is here at the Internet Archive. Those looking to purchase a copy online have two choices: a 110-year-old or so New York Book Company bind-up of The Baronet's Bride and Who Wins? (price: US$15.93) or a nearly-equally-as-old paper-covered Street & Smith edition (price: US$25.00).
I'd be torn.
No pun intended.
* The Mystery of Mordaunt Hall is not to be confused with another novel of the same title serialized in New Zealand's Thames Star (4 February-14 April 1896). It too was published anonymously.
