 deliberation and in the earnest
belief that ironic treatment alone would enable me to say all I felt I would
have to say in scorn as well as in pity. It is one of the minor satisfactions of
my writing life that having taken that resolve I did manage, it seems to me, to
carry it right through to the end. As to the personages whom the absolute
necessity of the case - Mrs. Verloc's case - brings out in front of the London
background, from them, too, I obtained those little satisfactions which really
count for so much against the mass of oppressive doubts that haunt so
persistently every attempt at creative work. For instance, of Mr. Vladimir
himself (who was fair game for a caricatural presentation) I was gratified to
hear that an experienced man of the world had said »that Conrad must have been
in touch with that sphere or else has an excellent intuition of things,« because
Mr. Vladimir was »not only possible in detail but quite right in essentials.«
Then a visitor from America informed me that all sorts of revolutionary refugees
in New York would have it that the book was written by somebody who knew a lot
about them. This seemed to me a very high compliment, considering that, as a
matter of hard fact, I had seen even less of their kind than the omniscient
friend who gave me the first suggestion for the novel. I have no doubt, however,
that there had been moments during the writing of the book when I was an extreme
revolutionist, I won't say more convinced than they but certainly cherishing a
more concentrated purpose than any of them had ever done in the whole course of
his life. I don't say this to boast. I was simply attending to my business. In
the matter of all my books I have always attended to my business. I have
attended to it with complete self-surrender. And this statement, too, is not a
boast. I could not have done otherwise. It would have bored me too much to
make-believe.
    The suggestions for certain personages of the tale, both law-abiding and
lawless, came from various sources which, perhaps, here and there, some reader
may have recognized. They are not very recondite. But I am not concerned here to
legitimize any of those people, and even as to my general view of the moral
reactions as between the criminal and the police all I will venture to say is
that it seems to me to be at least arguable.
    The twelve years that have elapsed since the publication of the book
