I BEGAN the New Year with my first and only regular job on a London daily. Cust had promised that I should have the next vacancy, whatever it was, on the Pall Mall, and the lot fell upon the dramatic criticism. I was summoned by telegram. 'Here,' said Cust and thrust two small pieces of coloured paper into my hand.
'What are these?' I asked.
'Theatres. Go and do 'em.'
'Yes,' I said and reflected. 'I'm willing to have a shot at it, but I ought to warn you that so far, not counting the Crystal Palace Pantomime and Gilbert and Sullivan, I've been only twice to a theatre.'
'Exactly what I want,' said Cust. 'You won't be in the gang. You'll make a break.'
'One wears evening dress?'
It was not in Cust's code of manners to betray astonishment. 'Oh yes. Tomorrow night especially. The Haymarket.'
We regarded each other thoughtfully for a moment. 'Right oh,' said I and hurried round to a tailor named Millar in Charles Street who knew me to be solvent. 'Can you make me evening clothes by tomorrow night?' I asked, 'or must I hire them?'
The clothes were made in time, but in the foyer I met Cust and George Steevens ready to supply a criticism if I failed them and nothing came to hand from me. But I did the job in a fashion and posted my copy fairly written out in its bright red envelope before two o'clock in the morning in the Mornington Road pillar box. The play was 'An Ideal Husband', a new and original play of modern life by Oscar Wilde. That was on the third of January 1895, and all went well. On the fifth I had to do Guy Domville, a play by Henry James at the St. James's Theatre.
From From H. G. Wells, Experiment in Autobiography (1934), ii. 534-535.