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diff --git a/1306-h/1306-h.htm b/1306-h/1306-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..11d2d21 --- /dev/null +++ b/1306-h/1306-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,4115 @@ +<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?> + +<!DOCTYPE html + PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" + "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd" > + +<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" lang="en"> + <head> + <title> + Seven Men, by Max Beerbohm + </title> + <style type="text/css" xml:space="preserve"> + + body { margin:5%; background:#faebd0; text-align:justify} + P { text-indent: 1em; margin-top: .25em; margin-bottom: .25em; } + H1,H2,H3,H4,H5,H6 { text-align: center; margin-left: 15%; margin-right: 15%; } + hr { width: 50%; text-align: center;} + .foot { margin-left: 20%; margin-right: 20%; text-align: justify; text-indent: -3em; font-size: 90%; } + blockquote {font-size: 97%; font-style: italic; margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%;} + .mynote {background-color: #DDE; color: #000; padding: .5em; margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 95%;} + .toc { margin-left: 10%; margin-bottom: .75em;} + .toc2 { margin-left: 20%;} + div.fig { display:block; margin:0 auto; text-align:center; } + div.middle { margin-left: 20%; margin-right: 20%; text-align: justify; } + .figleft {float: left; margin-left: 0%; margin-right: 1%;} + .figright {float: right; margin-right: 0%; margin-left: 1%;} + .pagenum {display:inline; font-size: 70%; font-style:normal; + margin: 0; padding: 0; position: absolute; right: 1%; + text-align: right;} + pre { font-style: italic; font-size: 90%; margin-left: 10%;} + +</style> + </head> + <body> +<div>*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 1306 ***</div> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <h1> + SEVEN MEN + </h1> + <p> + <br /> + </p> + <h2> + by Max Beerbohm + </h2> + <p> + <br /><br /> <br /> <br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /> <br /> + </p> + <div class="mynote"> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + Transcriber’s Note: + From the version of “Seven Men” published in 1919 by William + Heinemann (London). Two of the stories have been omitted + (“James Pethel” and “A.V. Laider”) since they are available + separately from Project Gutenberg. + + In this plain ASCII version, emphasis and syllable + stress italics have been converted to capitals; foreign italics and accents + have been removed + + In “Enoch Soames:” + I added a missing closing quotation mark in the following + phrase: ‘Ten past two,’ he said. + + In “Hilary Maltby and Stephen Braxton:” + I changed the opening double quote to a single quote in: + ‘I wondered what old Mr. Abraham Hayward... + and + ‘I knew that if I leaned forward... +</pre> + <br /> + </div> + <p> + <br /> <br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /> <br /> + </p> + <h2> + Contents + </h2> + <table summary="" style="margin-right: auto; margin-left: auto"> + <tr> + <td> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0001"> ENOCH SOAMES </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0003"> HILARY MALTBY AND STEPHEN BRAXTON </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0004"> ‘SAVONAROLA’ BROWN </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0005"> SAVONAROLA </a> + </p> + </td> + </tr> + </table> + <p> + <br /> <br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /> <br /> <a name="link2H_4_0001" id="link2H_4_0001"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + ENOCH SOAMES + </h2> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0002" id="link2H_4_0002"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <p> + When a book about the literature of the eighteen-nineties was given by Mr. + Holbrook Jackson to the world, I looked eagerly in the index for SOAMES, + ENOCH. I had feared he would not be there. He was not there. But everybody + else was. Many writers whom I had quite forgotten, or remembered but + faintly, lived again for me, they and their work, in Mr. Holbrook + Jackson’s pages. The book was as thorough as it was brilliantly written. + And thus the omission found by me was an all the deadlier record of poor + Soames’ failure to impress himself on his decade. + </p> + <p> + I daresay I am the only person who noticed the omission. Soames had failed + so piteously as all that! Nor is there a counterpoise in the thought that + if he had had some measure of success he might have passed, like those + others, out of my mind, to return only at the historian’s beck. It is true + that had his gifts, such as they were, been acknowledged in his life-time, + he would never have made the bargain I saw him make—that strange + bargain whose results have kept him always in the foreground of my memory. + But it is from those very results that the full piteousness of him glares + out. + </p> + <p> + Not my compassion, however, impels me to write of him. For his sake, poor + fellow, I should be inclined to keep my pen out of the ink. It is ill to + deride the dead. And how can I write about Enoch Soames without making him + ridiculous? Or rather, how am I to hush up the horrid fact that he WAS + ridiculous? I shall not be able to do that. Yet, sooner or later, write + about him I must. You will see, in due course, that I have no option. And + I may as well get the thing done now. + </p> + <p> + In the Summer Term of ‘93 a bolt from the blue flashed down on Oxford. It + drove deep, it hurtlingly embedded itself in the soil. Dons and + undergraduates stood around, rather pale, discussing nothing but it. + Whence came it, this meteorite? From Paris. Its name? Will Rothenstein. + Its aim? To do a series of twenty-four portraits in lithograph. These were + to be published from the Bodley Head, London. The matter was urgent. + Already the Warden of A, and the Master of B, and the Regius Professor of + C, had meekly ‘sat.’ Dignified and doddering old men, who had never + consented to sit to any one, could not withstand this dynamic little + stranger. He did not sue: he invited; he did not invite: he commanded. He + was twenty-one years old. He wore spectacles that flashed more than any + other pair ever seen. He was a wit. He was brimful of ideas. He knew + Whistler. He knew Edmond de Goncourt. He knew every one in Paris. He knew + them all by heart. He was Paris in Oxford. It was whispered that, so soon + as he had polished off his selection of dons, he was going to include a + few undergraduates. It was a proud day for me when I—I—was + included. I liked Rothenstein not less than I feared him; and there arose + between us a friendship that has grown ever warmer, and been more and more + valued by me, with every passing year. + </p> + <p> + At the end of Term he settled in—or rather, meteoritically into—London. + It was to him I owed my first knowledge of that forever enchanting little + world-in-itself, Chelsea, and my first acquaintance with Walter Sickert + and other august elders who dwelt there. It was Rothenstein that took me + to see, in Cambridge Street, Pimlico, a young man whose drawings were + already famous among the few—Aubrey Beardsley, by name. With + Rothenstein I paid my first visit to the Bodley Head. By him I was + inducted into another haunt of intellect and daring, the domino room of + the Cafe Royal. + </p> + <p> + There, on that October evening—there, in that exuberant vista of + gilding and crimson velvet set amidst all those opposing mirrors and + upholding caryatids, with fumes of tobacco ever rising to the painted and + pagan ceiling, and with the hum of presumably cynical conversation broken + into so sharply now and again by the clatter of dominoes shuffled on + marble tables, I drew a deep breath, and ‘This indeed,’ said I to myself, + ‘is life!’ + </p> + <p> + It was the hour before dinner. We drank vermouth. Those who knew + Rothenstein were pointing him out to those who knew him only by name. Men + were constantly coming in through the swing-doors and wandering slowly up + and down in search of vacant tables, or of tables occupied by friends. One + of these rovers interested me because I was sure he wanted to catch + Rothenstein’s eye. He had twice passed our table, with a hesitating look; + but Rothenstein, in the thick of a disquisition on Puvis de Chavannes, had + not seen him. He was a stooping, shambling person, rather tall, very pale, + with longish and brownish hair. He had a thin vague beard—or rather, + he had a chin on which a large number of hairs weakly curled and clustered + to cover its retreat. He was an odd-looking person; but in the ‘nineties + odd apparitions were more frequent, I think, than they are now. The young + writers of that era—and I was sure this man was a writer—strove + earnestly to be distinct in aspect. This man had striven unsuccessfully. + He wore a soft black hat of clerical kind but of Bohemian intention, and a + grey waterproof cape which, perhaps because it was waterproof, failed to + be romantic. I decided that ‘dim’ was the mot juste for him. I had already + essayed to write, and was immensely keen on the mot juste, that Holy Grail + of the period. + </p> + <p> + The dim man was now again approaching our table, and this time he made up + his mind to pause in front of it. ‘You don’t remember me,’ he said in a + toneless voice. + </p> + <p> + Rothenstein brightly focussed him. ‘Yes, I do,’ he replied after a moment, + with pride rather than effusion—pride in a retentive memory. ‘Edwin + Soames.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Enoch Soames,’ said Enoch. + </p> + <p> + ‘Enoch Soames,’ repeated Rothenstein in a tone implying that it was enough + to have hit on the surname. ‘We met in Paris two or three times when you + were living there. We met at the Cafe Groche.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘And I came to your studio once.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Oh yes; I was sorry I was out.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘But you were in. You showed me some of your paintings, you know.... I + hear you’re in Chelsea now.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Yes.’ + </p> + <p> + I almost wondered that Mr. Soames did not, after this monosyllable, pass + along. He stood patiently there, rather like a dumb animal, rather like a + donkey looking over a gate. A sad figure, his. It occurred to me that + ‘hungry’ was perhaps the mot juste for him; but—hungry for what? He + looked as if he had little appetite for anything. I was sorry for him; and + Rothenstein, though he had not invited him to Chelsea, did ask him to sit + down and have something to drink. + </p> + <p> + Seated, he was more self-assertive. He flung back the wings of his cape + with a gesture which—had not those wings been waterproof—might + have seemed to hurl defiance at things in general. And he ordered an + absinthe. ‘Je me tiens toujours fidele,’ he told Rothenstein, ‘a la + sorciere glauque.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘It is bad for you,’ said Rothenstein dryly. + </p> + <p> + ‘Nothing is bad for one,’ answered Soames. ‘Dans ce monde il n’y a ni de + bien ni de mal.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Nothing good and nothing bad? How do you mean?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I explained it all in the preface to “Negations.”’ + </p> + <p> + ‘“Negations”?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Yes; I gave you a copy of it.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Oh yes, of course. But did you explain—for instance—that + there was no such thing as bad or good grammar?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘N-no,’ said Soames. ‘Of course in Art there is the good and the evil. But + in Life—no.’ He was rolling a cigarette. He had weak white hands, + not well washed, and with finger-tips much stained by nicotine. ‘In Life + there are illusions of good and evil, but’—his voice trailed away to + a murmur in which the words ‘vieux jeu’ and ‘rococo’ were faintly audible. + I think he felt he was not doing himself justice, and feared that + Rothenstein was going to point out fallacies. Anyhow, he cleared his + throat and said ‘Parlons d’autre chose.’ + </p> + <p> + It occurs to you that he was a fool? It didn’t to me. I was young, and had + not the clarity of judgment that Rothenstein already had. Soames was quite + five or six years older than either of us. Also, he had written a book. + </p> + <p> + It was wonderful to have written a book. + </p> + <p> + If Rothenstein had not been there, I should have revered Soames. Even as + it was, I respected him. And I was very near indeed to reverence when he + said he had another book coming out soon. I asked if I might ask what kind + of book it was to be. + </p> + <p> + ‘My poems,’ he answered. Rothenstein asked if this was to be the title of + the book. The poet meditated on this suggestion, but said he rather + thought of giving the book no title at all. ‘If a book is good in itself—’ + he murmured, waving his cigarette. + </p> + <p> + Rothenstein objected that absence of title might be bad for the sale of a + book. ‘If,’ he urged, ‘I went into a bookseller’s and said simply “Have + you got?” or “Have you a copy of?” how would they know what I wanted?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Oh, of course I should have my name on the cover,’ Soames answered + earnestly. ‘And I rather want,’ he added, looking hard at Rothenstein, ‘to + have a drawing of myself as frontispiece.’ Rothenstein admitted that this + was a capital idea, and mentioned that he was going into the country and + would be there for some time. He then looked at his watch, exclaimed at + the hour, paid the waiter, and went away with me to dinner. Soames + remained at his post of fidelity to the glaucous witch. + </p> + <p> + ‘Why were you so determined not to draw him?’ I asked. + </p> + <p> + ‘Draw him? Him? How can one draw a man who doesn’t exist?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘He is dim,’ I admitted. But my mot juste fell flat. Rothenstein repeated + that Soames was non-existent. + </p> + <p> + Still, Soames had written a book. I asked if Rothenstein had read + ‘Negations.’ He said he had looked into it, ‘but,’ he added crisply, ‘I + don’t profess to know anything about writing.’ A reservation very + characteristic of the period! Painters would not then allow that any one + outside their own order had a right to any opinion about painting. This + law (graven on the tablets brought down by Whistler from the summit of + Fujiyama) imposed certain limitations. If other arts than painting were + not utterly unintelligible to all but the men who practised them, the law + tottered—the Monroe Doctrine, as it were, did not hold good. + Therefore no painter would offer an opinion of a book without warning you + at any rate that his opinion was worthless. No one is a better judge of + literature than Rothenstein; but it wouldn’t have done to tell him so in + those days; and I knew that I must form an unaided judgment on + ‘Negations.’ + </p> + <p> + Not to buy a book of which I had met the author face to face would have + been for me in those days an impossible act of self-denial. When I + returned to Oxford for the Christmas Term I had duly secured ‘Negations.’ + I used to keep it lying carelessly on the table in my room, and whenever a + friend took it up and asked what it was about I would say ‘Oh, it’s rather + a remarkable book. It’s by a man whom I know.’ Just ‘what it was about’ I + never was able to say. Head or tail was just what I hadn’t made of that + slim green volume. I found in the preface no clue to the exiguous + labyrinth of contents, and in that labyrinth nothing to explain the + preface. + </p> + <p> + ‘Lean near to life. Lean very near—nearer. + </p> + <p> + ‘Life is web, and therein nor warp nor woof is, but web only. + </p> + <p> + ‘It is for this I am Catholick in church and in thought, yet do let swift + Mood weave there what the shuttle of Mood wills.’ + </p> + <p> + These were the opening phrases of the preface, but those which followed + were less easy to understand. Then came ‘Stark: A Conte,’ about a + midinette who, so far as I could gather, murdered, or was about to murder, + a mannequin. It was rather like a story by Catulle Mendes in which the + translator had either skipped or cut out every alternate sentence. Next, a + dialogue between Pan and St. Ursula—lacking, I felt, in ‘snap.’ + Next, some aphorisms (entitled ‘Aphorismata’ [spelled in Greek]). + Throughout, in fact, there was a great variety of form; and the forms had + evidently been wrought with much care. It was rather the substance that + eluded me. Was there, I wondered, any substance at all? It did now occur + to me: suppose Enoch Soames was a fool! Up cropped a rival hypothesis: + suppose <i>I</i> was! I inclined to give Soames the benefit of the doubt. + I had read ‘L’Apres-midi d’un Faune’ without extracting a glimmer of + meaning. Yet Mallarme—of course—was a Master. How was I to + know that Soames wasn’t another? There was a sort of music in his prose, + not indeed arresting, but perhaps, I thought, haunting, and laden perhaps + with meanings as deep as Mallarme’s own. I awaited his poems with an open + mind. + </p> + <p> + And I looked forward to them with positive impatience after I had had a + second meeting with him. This was on an evening in January. Going into the + aforesaid domino room, I passed a table at which sat a pale man with an + open book before him. He looked from his book to me, and I looked back + over my shoulder with a vague sense that I ought to have recognised him. I + returned to pay my respects. After exchanging a few words, I said with a + glance to the open book, ‘I see I am interrupting you,’ and was about to + pass on, but ‘I prefer,’ Soames replied in his toneless voice, ‘to be + interrupted,’ and I obeyed his gesture that I should sit down. + </p> + <p> + I asked him if he often read here. ‘Yes; things of this kind I read here,’ + he answered, indicating the title of his book—‘The Poems of + Shelley.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Anything that you really’—and I was going to say ‘admire?’ But I + cautiously left my sentence unfinished, and was glad that I had done so, + for he said, with unwonted emphasis, ‘Anything second-rate.’ + </p> + <p> + I had read little of Shelley, but ‘Of course,’ I murmured, ‘he’s very + uneven.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I should have thought evenness was just what was wrong with him. A deadly + evenness. That’s why I read him here. The noise of this place breaks the + rhythm. He’s tolerable here.’ Soames took up the book and glanced through + the pages. He laughed. Soames’ laugh was a short, single and mirthless + sound from the throat, unaccompanied by any movement of the face or + brightening of the eyes. ‘What a period!’ he uttered, laying the book + down. And ‘What a country!’ he added. + </p> + <p> + I asked rather nervously if he didn’t think Keats had more or less held + his own against the drawbacks of time and place. He admitted that there + were ‘passages in Keats,’ but did not specify them. Of ‘the older men,’ as + he called them, he seemed to like only Milton. ‘Milton,’ he said, ‘wasn’t + sentimental.’ Also, ‘Milton had a dark insight.’ And again, ‘I can always + read Milton in the reading-room.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘The reading-room?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Of the British Museum. I go there every day.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘You do? I’ve only been there once. I’m afraid I found it rather a + depressing place. It—it seemed to sap one’s vitality.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘It does. That’s why I go there. The lower one’s vitality, the more + sensitive one is to great art. I live near the Museum. I have rooms in + Dyott Street.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘And you go round to the reading-room to read Milton?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Usually Milton.’ He looked at me. ‘It was Milton,’ he certificatively + added, ‘who converted me to Diabolism.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Diabolism? Oh yes? Really?’ said I, with that vague discomfort and that + intense desire to be polite which one feels when a man speaks of his own + religion. ‘You—worship the Devil?’ + </p> + <p> + Soames shook his head. ‘It’s not exactly worship,’ he qualified, sipping + his absinthe. ‘It’s more a matter of trusting and encouraging.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Ah, yes.... But I had rather gathered from the preface to “Negations” + that you were a—a Catholic.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Je l’etais a cette epoque. Perhaps I still am. Yes, I’m a Catholic + Diabolist.’ + </p> + <p> + This profession he made in an almost cursory tone. I could see that what + was upmost in his mind was the fact that I had read ‘Negations.’ His pale + eyes had for the first time gleamed. I felt as one who is about to be + examined, viva voce, on the very subject in which he is shakiest. I + hastily asked him how soon his poems were to be published. ‘Next week,’ he + told me. + </p> + <p> + ‘And are they to be published without a title?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘No. I found a title, at last. But I shan’t tell you what it is,’ as + though I had been so impertinent as to inquire. ‘I am not sure that it + wholly satisfies me. But it is the best I can find. It suggests something + of the quality of the poems.... Strange growths, natural and wild, yet + exquisite,’ he added, ‘and many-hued, and full of poisons.’ + </p> + <p> + I asked him what he thought of Baudelaire. He uttered the snort that was + his laugh, and ‘Baudelaire,’ he said, ‘was a bourgeois malgre lui.’ France + had had only one poet: Villon; ‘and two-thirds of Villon were sheer + journalism.’ Verlaine was ‘an epicier malgre lui.’ Altogether, rather to + my surprise, he rated French literature lower than English. There were + ‘passages’ in Villiers de l’Isle-Adam. But ‘I,’ he summed up, ‘owe nothing + to France.’ He nodded at me. ‘You’ll see,’ he predicted. + </p> + <p> + I did not, when the time came, quite see that. I thought the author of + ‘Fungoids’ did—unconsciously, of course—owe something to the + young Parisian decadents, or to the young English ones who owed something + to THEM. I still think so. The little book—bought by me in Oxford—lies + before me as I write. Its pale grey buckram cover and silver lettering + have not worn well. Nor have its contents. Through these, with a + melancholy interest, I have again been looking. They are not much. But at + the time of their publication I had a vague suspicion that they MIGHT be. + I suppose it is my capacity for faith, not poor Soames’ work, that is + weaker than it once was.... + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + TO A YOUNG WOMAN. + + Thou art, who hast not been! + Pale tunes irresolute + And traceries of old sounds + Blown from a rotted flute + Mingle with noise of cymbals rouged with rust, + Nor not strange forms and epicene + Lie bleeding in the dust, + Being wounded with wounds. + + For this it is + That in thy counterpart + Of age-long mockeries + Thou hast not been nor art! +</pre> + <p> + There seemed to me a certain inconsistency as between the first and last + lines of this. I tried, with bent brows, to resolve the discord. But I did + not take my failure as wholly incompatible with a meaning in Soames’ mind. + Might it not rather indicate the depth of his meaning? As for the + craftsmanship, ‘rouged with rust’ seemed to me a fine stroke, and ‘nor + not’ instead of ‘and’ had a curious felicity. I wondered who the Young + Woman was, and what she had made of it all. I sadly suspect that Soames + could not have made more of it than she. Yet, even now, if one doesn’t try + to make any sense at all of the poem, and reads it just for the sound, + there is a certain grace of cadence. Soames was an artist—in so far + as he was anything, poor fellow! + </p> + <p> + It seemed to me, when first I read ‘Fungoids,’ that, oddly enough, the + Diabolistic side of him was the best. Diabolism seemed to be a cheerful, + even a wholesome, influence in his life. + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + NOCTURNE. + + Round and round the shutter’d Square + I stroll’d with the Devil’s arm in mine. + No sound but the scrape of his hoofs was there + And the ring of his laughter and mine. + We had drunk black wine. + + I scream’d, ‘I will race you, Master!’ + ‘What matter,’ he shriek’d, ‘to-night + Which of us runs the faster? + There is nothing to fear to-night + In the foul moon’s light!’ + + Then I look’d him in the eyes, + And I laugh’d full shrill at the lie he told + And the gnawing fear he would fain disguise. + It was true, what I’d time and again been told: + He was old—old. +</pre> + <p> + There was, I felt, quite a swing about that first stanza—a joyous + and rollicking note of comradeship. The second was slightly hysterical + perhaps. But I liked the third: it was so bracingly unorthodox, even + according to the tenets of Soames’ peculiar sect in the faith. Not much + ‘trusting and encouraging’ here! Soames triumphantly exposing the Devil as + a liar, and laughing ‘full shrill,’ cut a quite heartening figure, I + thought—then! Now, in the light of what befell, none of his poems + depresses me so much as ‘Nocturne.’ + </p> + <p> + I looked out for what the metropolitan reviewers would have to say. They + seemed to fall into two classes: those who had little to say and those who + had nothing. The second class was the larger, and the words of the first + were cold; insomuch that + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + Strikes a note of modernity throughout.... These tripping + numbers.—Preston Telegraph +</pre> + <p> + was the only lure offered in advertisements by Soames’ publisher. I had + hopes that when next I met the poet I could congratulate him on having + made a stir; for I fancied he was not so sure of his intrinsic greatness + as he seemed. I was but able to say, rather coarsely, when next I did see + him, that I hoped ‘Fungoids’ was ‘selling splendidly.’ He looked at me + across his glass of absinthe and asked if I had bought a copy. His + publisher had told him that three had been sold. I laughed, as at a jest. + </p> + <p> + ‘You don’t suppose I CARE, do you?’ he said, with something like a snarl. + I disclaimed the notion. He added that he was not a tradesman. I said + mildly that I wasn’t, either, and murmured that an artist who gave truly + new and great things to the world had always to wait long for recognition. + He said he cared not a sou for recognition. I agreed that the act of + creation was its own reward. + </p> + <p> + His moroseness might have alienated me if I had regarded myself as a + nobody. But ah! hadn’t both John Lane and Aubrey Beardsley suggested that + I should write an essay for the great new venture that was afoot—‘The + Yellow Book’? And hadn’t Henry Harland, as editor, accepted my essay? And + wasn’t it to be in the very first number? At Oxford I was still in statu + pupillari. In London I regarded myself as very much indeed a graduate now—one + whom no Soames could ruffle. Partly to show off, partly in sheer + good-will, I told Soames he ought to contribute to ‘The Yellow Book.’ He + uttered from the throat a sound of scorn for that publication. + </p> + <p> + Nevertheless, I did, a day or two later, tentatively ask Harland if he + knew anything of the work of a man called Enoch Soames. Harland paused in + the midst of his characteristic stride around the room, threw up his hands + towards the ceiling, and groaned aloud: he had often met ‘that absurd + creature’ in Paris, and this very morning had received some poems in + manuscript from him. + </p> + <p> + ‘Has he NO talent?’ I asked. + </p> + <p> + ‘He has an income. He’s all right.’ Harland was the most joyous of men and + most generous of critics, and he hated to talk of anything about which he + couldn’t be enthusiastic. So I dropped the subject of Soames. The news + that Soames had an income did take the edge off solicitude. I learned + afterwards that he was the son of an unsuccessful and deceased bookseller + in Preston, but had inherited an annuity of 300 pounds from a married + aunt, and had no surviving relatives of any kind. Materially, then, he was + ‘all right.’ But there was still a spiritual pathos about him, sharpened + for me now by the possibility that even the praises of The Preston + Telegraph might not have been forthcoming had he not been the son of a + Preston man. He had a sort of weak doggedness which I could not but + admire. Neither he nor his work received the slightest encouragement; but + he persisted in behaving as a personage: always he kept his dingy little + flag flying. Wherever congregated the jeunes feroces of the arts, in + whatever Soho restaurant they had just discovered, in whatever music-hall + they were most frequenting, there was Soames in the midst of them, or + rather on the fringe of them, a dim but inevitable figure. He never sought + to propitiate his fellow-writers, never bated a jot of his arrogance about + his own work or of his contempt for theirs. To the painters he was + respectful, even humble; but for the poets and prosaists of ‘The Yellow + Book,’ and later of ‘The Savoy,’ he had never a word but of scorn. He + wasn’t resented. It didn’t occur to anybody that he or his Catholic + Diabolism mattered. When, in the autumn of ‘96, he brought out (at his own + expense, this time) a third book, his last book, nobody said a word for or + against it. I meant, but forgot, to buy it. I never saw it, and am ashamed + to say I don’t even remember what it was called. But I did, at the time of + its publication, say to Rothenstein that I thought poor old Soames was + really a rather tragic figure, and that I believed he would literally die + for want of recognition. Rothenstein scoffed. He said I was trying to get + credit for a kind heart which I didn’t possess; and perhaps this was so. + But at the private view of the New English Art Club, a few weeks later, I + beheld a pastel portrait of ‘Enoch Soames, Esq.’ It was very like him, and + very like Rothenstein to have done it. Soames was standing near it, in his + soft hat and his waterproof cape, all through the afternoon. Anybody who + knew him would have recognised the portrait at a glance, but nobody who + didn’t know him would have recognised the portrait from its bystander: it + ‘existed’ so much more than he; it was bound to. Also, it had not that + expression of faint happiness which on this day was discernible, yes, in + Soames’ countenance. Fame had breathed on him. Twice again in the course + of the month I went to the New English, and on both occasions Soames + himself was on view there. Looking back, I regard the close of that + exhibition as having been virtually the close of his career. He had felt + the breath of Fame against his cheek—so late, for such a little + while; and at its withdrawal he gave in, gave up, gave out. He, who had + never looked strong or well, looked ghastly now—a shadow of the + shade he had once been. He still frequented the domino room, but, having + lost all wish to excite curiosity, he no longer read books there. ‘You + read only at the Museum now?’ asked I, with attempted cheerfulness. He + said he never went there now. ‘No absinthe there,’ he muttered. It was the + sort of thing that in the old days he would have said for effect; but it + carried conviction now. Absinthe, erst but a point in the ‘personality’ he + had striven so hard to build up, was solace and necessity now. He no + longer called it ‘la sorciere glauque.’ He had shed away all his French + phrases. He had become a plain, unvarnished, Preston man. + </p> + <p> + Failure, if it be a plain, unvarnished, complete failure, and even though + it be a squalid failure, has always a certain dignity. I avoided Soames + because he made me feel rather vulgar. John Lane had published, by this + time, two little books of mine, and they had had a pleasant little success + of esteem. I was a—slight but definite—‘personality.’ Frank + Harris had engaged me to kick up my heels in The Saturday Review, Alfred + Harmsworth was letting me do likewise in The Daily Mail. I was just what + Soames wasn’t. And he shamed my gloss. Had I known that he really and + firmly believed in the greatness of what he as an artist had achieved, I + might not have shunned him. No man who hasn’t lost his vanity can be held + to have altogether failed. Soames’ dignity was an illusion of mine. One + day in the first week of June, 1897, that illusion went. But on the + evening of that day Soames went too. + </p> + <p> + I had been out most of the morning, and, as it was too late to reach home + in time for luncheon, I sought ‘the Vingtieme.’ This little place—Restaurant + du Vingtieme Siecle, to give it its full title—had been discovered + in ‘96 by the poets and prosaists, but had now been more or less abandoned + in favour of some later find. I don’t think it lived long enough to + justify its name; but at that time there it still was, in Greek Street, a + few doors from Soho Square, and almost opposite to that house where, in + the first years of the century, a little girl, and with her a boy named De + Quincey, made nightly encampment in darkness and hunger among dust and + rats and old legal parchments. The Vingtieme was but a small whitewashed + room, leading out into the street at one end and into a kitchen at the + other. The proprietor and cook was a Frenchman, known to us as Monsieur + Vingtieme; the waiters were his two daughters, Rose and Berthe; and the + food, according to faith, was good. The tables were so narrow, and were + set so close together, that there was space for twelve of them, six + jutting from either wall. + </p> + <p> + Only the two nearest to the door, as I went in, were occupied. On one side + sat a tall, flashy, rather Mephistophelian man whom I had seen from time + to time in the domino room and elsewhere. On the other side sat Soames. + They made a queer contrast in that sunlit room—Soames sitting + haggard in that hat and cape which nowhere at any season had I seen him + doff, and this other, this keenly vital man, at sight of whom I more than + ever wondered whether he were a diamond merchant, a conjurer, or the head + of a private detective agency. I was sure Soames didn’t want my company; + but I asked, as it would have seemed brutal not to, whether I might join + him, and took the chair opposite to his. He was smoking a cigarette, with + an untasted salmi of something on his plate and a half-empty bottle of + Sauterne before him; and he was quite silent. I said that the preparations + for the Jubilee made London impossible. (I rather liked them, really.) I + professed a wish to go right away till the whole thing was over. In vain + did I attune myself to his gloom. He seemed not to hear me nor even to see + me. I felt that his behaviour made me ridiculous in the eyes of the other + man. The gangway between the two rows of tables at the Vingtieme was + hardly more than two feet wide (Rose and Berthe, in their ministrations, + had always to edge past each other, quarrelling in whispers as they did + so), and any one at the table abreast of yours was practically at yours. I + thought our neighbour was amused at my failure to interest Soames, and so, + as I could not explain to him that my insistence was merely charitable, I + became silent. Without turning my head, I had him well within my range of + vision. I hoped I looked less vulgar than he in contrast with Soames. I + was sure he was not an Englishman, but what WAS his nationality? Though + his jet-black hair was en brosse, I did not think he was French. To + Berthe, who waited on him, he spoke French fluently, but with a hardly + native idiom and accent. I gathered that this was his first visit to the + Vingtieme; but Berthe was off-hand in her manner to him: he had not made a + good impression. His eyes were handsome, but—like the Vingtieme’s + tables—too narrow and set too close together. His nose was + predatory, and the points of his moustache, waxed up beyond his nostrils, + gave a fixity to his smile. Decidedly, he was sinister. And my sense of + discomfort in his presence was intensified by the scarlet waistcoat which + tightly, and so unseasonably in June, sheathed his ample chest. This + waistcoat wasn’t wrong merely because of the heat, either. It was somehow + all wrong in itself. It wouldn’t have done on Christmas morning. It would + have struck a jarring note at the first night of ‘Hernani.’ I was trying + to account for its wrongness when Soames suddenly and strangely broke + silence. ‘A hundred years hence!’ he murmured, as in a trance. + </p> + <p> + ‘We shall not be here!’ I briskly but fatuously added. + </p> + <p> + ‘We shall not be here. No,’ he droned, ‘but the Museum will still be just + where it is. And the reading-room, just where it is. And people will be + able to go and read there.’ He inhaled sharply, and a spasm as of actual + pain contorted his features. + </p> + <p> + I wondered what train of thought poor Soames had been following. He did + not enlighten me when he said, after a long pause, ‘You think I haven’t + minded.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Minded what, Soames?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Neglect. Failure.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘FAILURE?’ I said heartily. ‘Failure?’ I repeated vaguely. ‘Neglect—yes, + perhaps; but that’s quite another matter. Of course you haven’t been—appreciated. + But what then? Any artist who—who gives—’ What I wanted to say + was, ‘Any artist who gives truly new and great things to the world has + always to wait long for recognition’; but the flattery would not out: in + the face of his misery, a misery so genuine and so unmasked, my lips would + not say the words. + </p> + <p> + And then—he said them for me. I flushed. ‘That’s what you were going + to say, isn’t it?’ he asked. + </p> + <p> + ‘How did you know?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘It’s what you said to me three years ago, when “Fungoids” was published.’ + I flushed the more. I need not have done so at all, for ‘It’s the only + important thing I ever heard you say,’ he continued. ‘And I’ve never + forgotten it. It’s a true thing. It’s a horrible truth. But—d’you + remember what I answered? I said “I don’t care a sou for recognition.” And + you believed me. You’ve gone on believing I’m above that sort of thing. + You’re shallow. What should YOU know of the feelings of a man like me? You + imagine that a great artist’s faith in himself and in the verdict of + posterity is enough to keep him happy.... You’ve never guessed at the + bitterness and loneliness, the’—his voice broke; but presently he + resumed, speaking with a force that I had never known in him. ‘Posterity! + What use is it to ME? A dead man doesn’t know that people are visiting his + grave—visiting his birthplace—putting up tablets to him—unveiling + statues of him. A dead man can’t read the books that are written about + him. A hundred years hence! Think of it! If I could come back to life then—just + for a few hours—and go to the reading-room, and READ! Or better + still: if I could be projected, now, at this moment, into that future, + into that reading-room, just for this one afternoon! I’d sell myself body + and soul to the devil, for that! Think of the pages and pages in the + catalogue: “SOAMES, ENOCH” endlessly—endless editions, commentaries, + prolegomena, biographies’—but here he was interrupted by a sudden + loud creak of the chair at the next table. Our neighbour had half risen + from his place. He was leaning towards us, apologetically intrusive. + </p> + <p> + ‘Excuse—permit me,’ he said softly. ‘I have been unable not to hear. + Might I take a liberty? In this little restaurant-sans-facon’—he + spread wide his hands—‘might I, as the phrase is, “cut in”?’ + </p> + <p> + I could but signify our acquiescence. Berthe had appeared at the kitchen + door, thinking the stranger wanted his bill. He waved her away with his + cigar, and in another moment had seated himself beside me, commanding a + full view of Soames. + </p> + <p> + ‘Though not an Englishman,’ he explained, ‘I know my London well, Mr. + Soames. Your name and fame—Mr. Beerbohm’s too—very known to + me. Your point is: who am <i>I</i>?’ He glanced quickly over his shoulder, + and in a lowered voice said ‘I am the Devil.’ + </p> + <p> + I couldn’t help it: I laughed. I tried not to, I knew there was nothing to + laugh at, my rudeness shamed me, but—I laughed with increasing + volume. The Devil’s quiet dignity, the surprise and disgust of his raised + eyebrows, did but the more dissolve me. I rocked to and fro, I lay back + aching. I behaved deplorably. + </p> + <p> + ‘I am a gentleman, and,’ he said with intense emphasis, ‘I thought I was + in the company of GENTLEMEN.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Don’t!’ I gasped faintly. ‘Oh, don’t!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Curious, nicht wahr?’ I heard him say to Soames. ‘There is a type of + person to whom the very mention of my name is—oh-so-awfully-funny! + In your theatres the dullest comedian needs only to say “The Devil!” and + right away they give him “the loud laugh that speaks the vacant mind.” Is + it not so?’ + </p> + <p> + I had now just breath enough to offer my apologies. He accepted them, but + coldly, and re-addressed himself to Soames. + </p> + <p> + ‘I am a man of business,’ he said, ‘and always I would put things through + “right now,” as they say in the States. You are a poet. Les affaires—you + detest them. So be it. But with me you will deal, eh? What you have said + just now gives me furiously to hope.’ + </p> + <p> + Soames had not moved, except to light a fresh cigarette. He sat crouched + forward, with his elbows squared on the table, and his head just above the + level of his hands, staring up at the Devil. ‘Go on,’ he nodded. I had no + remnant of laughter in me now. + </p> + <p> + ‘It will be the more pleasant, our little deal,’ the Devil went on, + ‘because you are—I mistake not?—a Diabolist.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘A Catholic Diabolist,’ said Soames. + </p> + <p> + The Devil accepted the reservation genially. ‘You wish,’ he resumed, ‘to + visit now—this afternoon as-ever-is—the reading-room of the + British Museum, yes? but of a hundred years hence, yes? Parfaitement. Time—an + illusion. Past and future—they are as ever-present as the present, + or at any rate only what you call “just-round-the-corner.” I switch you on + to any date. I project you—pouf! You wish to be in the reading-room + just as it will be on the afternoon of June 3, 1997? You wish to find + yourself standing in that room, just past the swing-doors, this very + minute, yes? and to stay there till closing time? Am I right?’ + </p> + <p> + Soames nodded. + </p> + <p> + The Devil looked at his watch. ‘Ten past two,’ he said. ‘Closing time in + summer same then as now: seven o’clock. That will give you almost five + hours. At seven o’clock—pouf!—you find yourself again here, + sitting at this table. I am dining to-night dans le monde—dans le + higlif. That concludes my present visit to your great city. I come and + fetch you here, Mr. Soames, on my way home.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Home?’ I echoed. + </p> + <p> + ‘Be it never so humble!’ said the Devil lightly. + </p> + <p> + ‘All right,’ said Soames. + </p> + <p> + ‘Soames!’ I entreated. But my friend moved not a muscle. + </p> + <p> + The Devil had made as though to stretch forth his hand across the table + and touch Soames’ forearm; but he paused in his gesture. + </p> + <p> + ‘A hundred years hence, as now,’ he smiled, ‘no smoking allowed in the + reading-room. You would better therefore——’ + </p> + <p> + Soames removed the cigarette from his mouth and dropped it into his glass + of Sauterne. + </p> + <p> + ‘Soames!’ again I cried. ‘Can’t you’—but the Devil had now stretched + forth his hand across the table. He brought it slowly down on—the + tablecloth. Soames’ chair was empty. His cigarette floated sodden in his + wine-glass. There was no other trace of him. + </p> + <p> + For a few moments the Devil let his hand rest where it lay, gazing at me + out of the corners of his eyes, vulgarly triumphant. + </p> + <p> + A shudder shook me. With an effort I controlled myself and rose from my + chair. ‘Very clever,’ I said condescendingly. ‘But—“The Time + Machine” is a delightful book, don’t you think? So entirely original!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘You are pleased to sneer,’ said the Devil, who had also risen, ‘but it is + one thing to write about an impossible machine; it is a quite other thing + to be a Supernatural Power.’ All the same, I had scored. + </p> + <p> + Berthe had come forth at the sound of our rising. I explained to her that + Mr. Soames had been called away, and that both he and I would be dining + here. It was not until I was out in the open air that I began to feel + giddy. I have but the haziest recollection of what I did, where I + wandered, in the glaring sunshine of that endless afternoon. I remember + the sound of carpenters’ hammers all along Piccadilly, and the bare + chaotic look of the half-erected ‘stands.’ Was it in the Green Park, or in + Kensington Gardens, or WHERE was it that I sat on a chair beneath a tree, + trying to read an evening paper? There was a phrase in the leading article + that went on repeating itself in my fagged mind—‘Little is hidden + from this august Lady full of the garnered wisdom of sixty years of + Sovereignty.’ I remember wildly conceiving a letter (to reach Windsor by + express messenger told to await answer): + </p> + <p> + ‘MADAM,—Well knowing that your Majesty is full of the garnered + wisdom of sixty years of Sovereignty, I venture to ask your advice in the + following delicate matter. Mr. Enoch Soames, whose poems you may or may + not know,’.... + </p> + <p> + Was there NO way of helping him—saving him? A bargain was a bargain, + and I was the last man to aid or abet any one in wriggling out of a + reasonable obligation. I wouldn’t have lifted a little finger to save + Faust. But poor Soames!—doomed to pay without respite an eternal + price for nothing but a fruitless search and a bitter disillusioning.... + </p> + <p> + Odd and uncanny it seemed to me that he, Soames, in the flesh, in the + waterproof cape, was at this moment living in the last decade of the next + century, poring over books not yet written, and seeing and seen by men not + yet born. Uncannier and odder still, that to-night and evermore he would + be in Hell. Assuredly, truth was stranger than fiction. + </p> + <p> + Endless that afternoon was. Almost I wished I had gone with Soames—not + indeed to stay in the reading-room, but to sally forth for a brisk + sight-seeing walk around a new London. I wandered restlessly out of the + Park I had sat in. Vainly I tried to imagine myself an ardent tourist from + the eighteenth century. Intolerable was the strain of the slow-passing and + empty minutes. Long before seven o’clock I was back at the Vingtieme. + </p> + <p> + I sat there just where I had sat for luncheon. Air came in listlessly + through the open door behind me. Now and again Rose or Berthe appeared for + a moment. I had told them I would not order any dinner till Mr. Soames + came. A hurdy-gurdy began to play, abruptly drowning the noise of a + quarrel between some Frenchmen further up the street. Whenever the tune + was changed I heard the quarrel still raging. I had bought another evening + paper on my way. I unfolded it. My eyes gazed ever away from it to the + clock over the kitchen door.... + </p> + <p> + Five minutes, now, to the hour! I remembered that clocks in restaurants + are kept five minutes fast. I concentrated my eyes on the paper. I vowed I + would not look away from it again. I held it upright, at its full width, + close to my face, so that I had no view of anything but it.... Rather a + tremulous sheet? Only because of the draught, I told myself. + </p> + <p> + My arms gradually became stiff; they ached; but I could not drop them—now. + I had a suspicion, I had a certainty. Well, what then?... What else had I + come for? Yet I held tight that barrier of newspaper. Only the sound of + Berthe’s brisk footstep from the kitchen enabled me, forced me, to drop + it, and to utter: + </p> + <p> + ‘What shall we have to eat, Soames?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Il est souffrant, ce pauvre Monsieur Soames?’ asked Berthe. + </p> + <p> + ‘He’s only—tired.’ I asked her to get some wine—Burgundy—and + whatever food might be ready. Soames sat crouched forward against the + table, exactly as when last I had seen him. It was as though he had never + moved—he who had moved so unimaginably far. Once or twice in the + afternoon it had for an instant occurred to me that perhaps his journey + was not to be fruitless—that perhaps we had all been wrong in our + estimate of the works of Enoch Soames. That we had been horribly right was + horribly clear from the look of him. But ‘Don’t be discouraged,’ I + falteringly said. ‘Perhaps it’s only that you—didn’t leave enough + time. Two, three centuries hence, perhaps—’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Yes,’ his voice came. ‘I’ve thought of that.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘And now—now for the more immediate future! Where are you going to + hide? How would it be if you caught the Paris express from Charing Cross? + Almost an hour to spare. Don’t go on to Paris. Stop at Calais. Live in + Calais. He’d never think of looking for you in Calais.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘It’s like my luck,’ he said, ‘to spend my last hours on earth with an + ass.’ But I was not offended. ‘And a treacherous ass,’ he strangely added, + tossing across to me a crumpled bit of paper which he had been holding in + his hand. I glanced at the writing on it—some sort of gibberish, + apparently. I laid it impatiently aside. + </p> + <p> + ‘Come, Soames! pull yourself together! This isn’t a mere matter of life + and death. It’s a question of eternal torment, mind you! You don’t mean to + say you’re going to wait limply here till the Devil comes to fetch you?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I can’t do anything else. I’ve no choice.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Come! This is “trusting and encouraging” with a vengeance! This is + Diabolism run mad!’ I filled his glass with wine. ‘Surely, now that you’ve + SEEN the brute—’ + </p> + <p> + ‘It’s no good abusing him.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘You must admit there’s nothing Miltonic about him, Soames.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I don’t say he’s not rather different from what I expected.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘He’s a vulgarian, he’s a swell-mobsman, he’s the sort of man who hangs + about the corridors of trains going to the Riviera and steals ladies’ + jewel-cases. Imagine eternal torment presided over by HIM!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘You don’t suppose I look forward to it, do you?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Then why not slip quietly out of the way?’ + </p> + <p> + Again and again I filled his glass, and always, mechanically, he emptied + it; but the wine kindled no spark of enterprise in him. He did not eat, + and I myself ate hardly at all. I did not in my heart believe that any + dash for freedom could save him. The chase would be swift, the capture + certain. But better anything than this passive, meek, miserable waiting. I + told Soames that for the honour of the human race he ought to make some + show of resistance. He asked what the human race had ever done for him. + ‘Besides,’ he said, ‘can’t you understand that I’m in his power? You saw + him touch me, didn’t you? There’s an end of it. I’ve no will. I’m sealed.’ + </p> + <p> + I made a gesture of despair. He went on repeating the word ‘sealed.’ I + began to realise that the wine had clouded his brain. No wonder! Foodless + he had gone into futurity, foodless he still was. I urged him to eat at + any rate some bread. It was maddening to think that he, who had so much to + tell, might tell nothing. ‘How was it all,’ I asked, ‘yonder? Come! Tell + me your adventures.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘They’d make first-rate “copy,” wouldn’t they?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I’m awfully sorry for you, Soames, and I make all possible allowances; + but what earthly right have you to insinuate that I should make “copy,” as + you call it, out of you?’ + </p> + <p> + The poor fellow pressed his hands to his forehead. ‘I don’t know,’ he + said. ‘I had some reason, I know.... I’ll try to remember.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘That’s right. Try to remember everything. Eat a little more bread. What + did the reading-room look like?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Much as usual,’ he at length muttered. + </p> + <p> + ‘Many people there?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Usual sort of number.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘What did they look like?’ + </p> + <p> + Soames tried to visualise them. ‘They all,’ he presently remembered, + ‘looked very like one another.’ + </p> + <p> + My mind took a fearsome leap. ‘All dressed in Jaeger?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Yes. I think so. Greyish-yellowish stuff.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘A sort of uniform?’ He nodded. ‘With a number on it, perhaps?—a + number on a large disc of metal sewn on to the left sleeve? DKF 78,910—that + sort of thing?’ It was even so. ‘And all of them—men and women alike—looking + very well-cared-for? very Utopian? and smelling rather strongly of + carbolic? and all of them quite hairless?’ I was right every time. Soames + was only not sure whether the men and women were hairless or shorn. ‘I + hadn’t time to look at them very closely,’ he explained. + </p> + <p> + ‘No, of course not. But——’ + </p> + <p> + ‘They stared at ME, I can tell you. I attracted a great deal of + attention.’ At last he had done that! ‘I think I rather scared them. They + moved away whenever I came near. They followed me about at a distance, + wherever I went. The men at the round desk in the middle seemed to have a + sort of panic whenever I went to make inquiries.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘What did you do when you arrived?’ + </p> + <p> + Well, he had gone straight to the catalogue, of course—to the S + volumes, and had stood long before SN—SOF, unable to take this + volume out of the shelf, because his heart was beating so.... At first, he + said, he wasn’t disappointed—he only thought there was some new + arrangement. He went to the middle desk and asked where the catalogue of + TWENTIETH-century books was kept. He gathered that there was still only + one catalogue. Again he looked up his name, stared at the three little + pasted slips he had known so well. Then he went and sat down for a long + time.... + </p> + <p> + ‘And then,’ he droned, ‘I looked up the “Dictionary of National Biography” + and some encyclopedias.... I went back to the middle desk and asked what + was the best modern book on late nineteenth-century literature. They told + me Mr. T. K. Nupton’s book was considered the best. I looked it up in the + catalogue and filled in a form for it. It was brought to me. My name + wasn’t in the index, but—Yes!’ he said with a sudden change of tone. + ‘That’s what I’d forgotten. Where’s that bit of paper? Give it me back.’ + </p> + <p> + I, too, had forgotten that cryptic screed. I found it fallen on the floor, + and handed it to him. + </p> + <p> + He smoothed it out, nodding and smiling at me disagreeably. ‘I found + myself glancing through Nupton’s book,’ he resumed. ‘Not very easy + reading. Some sort of phonetic spelling.... All the modern books I saw + were phonetic.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Then I don’t want to hear any more, Soames, please.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘The proper names seemed all to be spelt in the old way. But for that, I + mightn’t have noticed my own name.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Your own name? Really? Soames, I’m VERY glad.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘And yours.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘No!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I thought I should find you waiting here to-night. So I took the trouble + to copy out the passage. Read it.’ + </p> + <p> + I snatched the paper. Soames’ handwriting was characteristically dim. It, + and the noisome spelling, and my excitement, made me all the slower to + grasp what T. K. Nupton was driving at. + </p> + <p> + The document lies before me at this moment. Strange that the words I here + copy out for you were copied out for me by poor Soames just seventy-eight + years hence.... + </p> + <p> + From p. 234 of ‘Inglish Littracher 1890-1900’ bi T. K. Nupton, publishd bi + th Stait, 1992: + </p> + <p> + ‘Fr egzarmpl, a riter ov th time, naimd Max Beerbohm, hoo woz stil alive + in th twentieth senchri, rote a stauri in wich e pautraid an immajnari + karrakter kauld “Enoch Soames”—a thurd-rait poit hoo beleevz imself + a grate jeneus an maix a bargin with th Devvl in auder ter no wot + posterriti thinx ov im! It iz a sumwot labud sattire but not without vallu + az showing hou seriusli the yung men ov th aiteen-ninetiz took themselvz. + Nou that the littreri profeshn haz bin auganized az a departmnt of publik + servis, our riters hav found their levvl an hav lernt ter doo their duti + without thort ov th morro. “Th laibrer iz werthi ov hiz hire,” an that iz + aul. Thank hevvn we hav no Enoch Soameses amung us to-dai!’ + </p> + <p> + I found that by murmuring the words aloud (a device which I commend to my + reader) I was able to master them, little by little. The clearer they + became, the greater was my bewilderment, my distress and horror. The whole + thing was a nightmare. Afar, the great grisly background of what was in + store for the poor dear art of letters; here, at the table, fixing on me a + gaze that made me hot all over, the poor fellow whom—whom + evidently... but no: whatever down-grade my character might take in coming + years, I should never be such a brute as to—— + </p> + <p> + Again I examined the screed. ‘Immajnari’—but here Soames was, no + more imaginary, alas! than I. And ‘labud’—what on earth was that? + (To this day, I have never made out that word.) ‘It’s all very—baffling,’ + I at length stammered. + </p> + <p> + Soames said nothing, but cruelly did not cease to look at me. + </p> + <p> + ‘Are you sure,’ I temporised, ‘quite sure you copied the thing out + correctly?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Quite.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Well, then it’s this wretched Nupton who must have made—must be + going to make—some idiotic mistake.... Look here, Soames! you know + me better than to suppose that I.... After all, the name “Max Beerbohm” is + not at all an uncommon one, and there must be several Enoch Soameses + running around—or rather, “Enoch Soames” is a name that might occur + to any one writing a story. And I don’t write stories: I’m an essayist, an + observer, a recorder.... I admit that it’s an extraordinary coincidence. + But you must see——’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I see the whole thing,’ said Soames quietly. And he added, with a touch + of his old manner, but with more dignity than I had ever known in him, + ‘Parlons d’autre chose.’ + </p> + <p> + I accepted that suggestion very promptly. I returned straight to the more + immediate future. I spent most of the long evening in renewed appeals to + Soames to slip away and seek refuge somewhere. I remember saying at last + that if indeed I was destined to write about him, the supposed ‘stauri’ + had better have at least a happy ending. Soames repeated those last three + words in a tone of intense scorn. ‘In Life and in Art,’ he said, ‘all that + matters is an INEVITABLE ending.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘But,’ I urged, more hopefully than I felt, ‘an ending that can be avoided + ISN’T inevitable.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘You aren’t an artist,’ he rasped. ‘And you’re so hopelessly not an artist + that, so far from being able to imagine a thing and make it seem true, + you’re going to make even a true thing seem as if you’d made it up. You’re + a miserable bungler. And it’s like my luck.’ + </p> + <p> + I protested that the miserable bungler was not I—was not going to be + I—but T. K. Nupton; and we had a rather heated argument, in the + thick of which it suddenly seemed to me that Soames saw he was in the + wrong: he had quite physically cowered. But I wondered why—and now I + guessed with a cold throb just why—he stared so, past me. The + bringer of that ‘inevitable ending’ filled the doorway. + </p> + <p> + I managed to turn in my chair and to say, not without a semblance of + lightness, ‘Aha, come in!’ Dread was indeed rather blunted in me by his + looking so absurdly like a villain in a melodrama. The sheen of his tilted + hat and of his shirt-front, the repeated twists he was giving to his + moustache, and most of all the magnificence of his sneer, gave token that + he was there only to be foiled. + </p> + <p> + He was at our table in a stride. ‘I am sorry,’ he sneered witheringly, ‘to + break up your pleasant party, but—’ + </p> + <p> + ‘You don’t: you complete it,’ I assured him. ‘Mr. Soames and I want to + have a little talk with you. Won’t you sit? Mr. Soames got nothing—frankly + nothing—by his journey this afternoon. We don’t wish to say that the + whole thing was a swindle—a common swindle. On the contrary, we + believe you meant well. But of course the bargain, such as it was, is + off.’ + </p> + <p> + The Devil gave no verbal answer. He merely looked at Soames and pointed + with rigid forefinger to the door. Soames was wretchedly rising from his + chair when, with a desperate quick gesture, I swept together two + dinner-knives that were on the table, and laid their blades across each + other. The Devil stepped sharp back against the table behind him, averting + his face and shuddering. + </p> + <p> + ‘You are not superstitious!’ he hissed. + </p> + <p> + ‘Not at all,’ I smiled. + </p> + <p> + ‘Soames!’ he said as to an underling, but without turning his face, ‘put + those knives straight!’ + </p> + <p> + With an inhibitive gesture to my friend, ‘Mr. Soames,’ I said emphatically + to the Devil, ‘is a CATHOLIC Diabolist’; but my poor friend did the + Devil’s bidding, not mine; and now, with his master’s eyes again fixed on + him, he arose, he shuffled past me. I tried to speak. It was he that + spoke. ‘Try,’ was the prayer he threw back at me as the Devil pushed him + roughly out through the door, ‘TRY to make them know that I did exist!’ + </p> + <p> + In another instant I too was through that door. I stood staring all ways—up + the street, across it, down it. There was moonlight and lamplight, but + there was not Soames nor that other. + </p> + <p> + Dazed, I stood there. Dazed, I turned back, at length, into the little + room; and I suppose I paid Berthe or Rose for my dinner and luncheon, and + for Soames’: I hope so, for I never went to the Vingtieme again. Ever + since that night I have avoided Greek Street altogether. And for years I + did not set foot even in Soho Square, because on that same night it was + there that I paced and loitered, long and long, with some such dull sense + of hope as a man has in not straying far from the place where he has lost + something.... ‘Round and round the shutter’d Square’—that line came + back to me on my lonely beat, and with it the whole stanza, ringing in my + brain and bearing in on me how tragically different from the happy scene + imagined by him was the poet’s actual experience of that prince in whom of + all princes we should put not our trust. + </p> + <p> + But—strange how the mind of an essayist, be it never so stricken, + roves and ranges!—I remember pausing before a wide doorstep and + wondering if perchance it was on this very one that the young De Quincey + lay ill and faint while poor Ann flew as fast as her feet would carry her + to Oxford Street, the ‘stony-hearted stepmother’ of them both, and came + back bearing that ‘glass of port wine and spices’ but for which he might, + so he thought, actually have died. Was this the very doorstep that the old + De Quincey used to revisit in homage? I pondered Ann’s fate, the cause of + her sudden vanishing from the ken of her boy-friend; and presently I + blamed myself for letting the past over-ride the present. Poor vanished + Soames! + </p> + <p> + And for myself, too, I began to be troubled. What had I better do? Would + there be a hue and cry—Mysterious Disappearance of an Author, and + all that? He had last been seen lunching and dining in my company. Hadn’t + I better get a hansom and drive straight to Scotland Yard?... They would + think I was a lunatic. After all, I reassured myself, London was a very + large place, and one very dim figure might easily drop out of it + unobserved—now especially, in the blinding glare of the near + Jubilee. Better say nothing at all, I thought. + </p> + <p> + And I was right. Soames’ disappearance made no stir at all. He was utterly + forgotten before any one, so far as I am aware, noticed that he was no + longer hanging around. Now and again some poet or prosaist may have said + to another, ‘What has become of that man Soames?’ but I never heard any + such question asked. The solicitor through whom he was paid his annuity + may be presumed to have made inquiries, but no echo of these resounded. + There was something rather ghastly to me in the general unconsciousness + that Soames had existed, and more than once I caught myself wondering + whether Nupton, that babe unborn, were going to be right in thinking him a + figment of my brain. + </p> + <p> + In that extract from Nupton’s repulsive book there is one point which + perhaps puzzles you. How is it that the author, though I have here + mentioned him by name and have quoted the exact words he is going to + write, is not going to grasp the obvious corollary that I have invented + nothing? The answer can be only this: Nupton will not have read the later + passages of this memoir. Such lack of thoroughness is a serious fault in + any one who undertakes to do scholar’s work. And I hope these words will + meet the eye of some contemporary rival to Nupton and be the undoing of + Nupton. + </p> + <p> + I like to think that some time between 1992 and 1997 somebody will have + looked up this memoir, and will have forced on the world his inevitable + and startling conclusions. And I have reasons for believing that this will + be so. You realise that the reading-room into which Soames was projected + by the Devil was in all respects precisely as it will be on the afternoon + of June 3, 1997. You realise, therefore, that on that afternoon, when it + comes round, there the self-same crowd will be, and there Soames too will + be, punctually, he and they doing precisely what they did before. Recall + now Soames’ account of the sensation he made. You may say that the mere + difference of his costume was enough to make him sensational in that + uniformed crowd. You wouldn’t say so if you had ever seen him. I assure + you that in no period could Soames be anything but dim. The fact that + people are going to stare at him, and follow him around, and seem afraid + of him, can be explained only on the hypothesis that they will somehow + have been prepared for his ghostly visitation. They will have been awfully + waiting to see whether he really would come. And when he does come the + effect will of course be—awful. + </p> + <p> + An authentic, guaranteed, proven ghost, but—only a ghost, alas! Only + that. In his first visit, Soames was a creature of flesh and blood, + whereas the creatures into whose midst he was projected were but ghosts, I + take it—solid, palpable, vocal, but unconscious and automatic + ghosts, in a building that was itself an illusion. Next time, that + building and those creatures will be real. It is of Soames that there will + be but the semblance. I wish I could think him destined to revisit the + world actually, physically, consciously. I wish he had this one brief + escape, this one small treat, to look forward to. I never forget him for + long. He is where he is, and forever. The more rigid moralists among you + may say he has only himself to blame. For my part, I think he has been + very hardly used. It is well that vanity should be chastened; and Enoch + Soames’ vanity was, I admit, above the average, and called for special + treatment. But there was no need for vindictiveness. You say he contracted + to pay the price he is paying; yes; but I maintain that he was induced to + do so by fraud. Well-informed in all things, the Devil must have known + that my friend would gain nothing by his visit to futurity. The whole + thing was a very shabby trick. The more I think of it, the more detestable + the Devil seems to me. + </p> + <p> + Of him I have caught sight several times, here and there, since that day + at the Vingtieme. Only once, however, have I seen him at close quarters. + This was in Paris. I was walking, one afternoon, along the Rue d’Antin, + when I saw him advancing from the opposite direction—over-dressed as + ever, and swinging an ebony cane, and altogether behaving as though the + whole pavement belonged to him. At thought of Enoch Soames and the myriads + of other sufferers eternally in this brute’s dominion, a great cold wrath + filled me, and I drew myself up to my full height. But—well, one is + so used to nodding and smiling in the street to anybody whom one knows + that the action becomes almost independent of oneself: to prevent it + requires a very sharp effort and great presence of mind. I was miserably + aware, as I passed the Devil, that I nodded and smiled to him. And my + shame was the deeper and hotter because he, if you please, stared straight + at me with the utmost haughtiness. + </p> + <p> + To be cut—deliberately cut—by HIM! I was, I still am, furious + at having had that happen to me. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0003" id="link2H_4_0003"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + HILARY MALTBY AND STEPHEN BRAXTON + </h2> + <p> + People still go on comparing Thackeray and Dickens, quite cheerfully. But + the fashion of comparing Maltby and Braxton went out so long ago as 1795. + No, I am wrong. But anything that happened in the bland old days before + the war does seem to be a hundred more years ago than actually it is. The + year I mean is the one in whose spring-time we all went bicycling (O + thrill!) in Battersea Park, and ladies wore sleeves that billowed + enormously out from their shoulders, and Lord Rosebery was Prime Minister. + </p> + <p> + In that Park, in that spring-time, in that sea of sleeves, there was + almost as much talk about the respective merits of Braxton and Maltby as + there was about those of Rudge and Humber. For the benefit of my younger + readers, and perhaps, so feeble is human memory, for the benefit of their + elders too, let me state that Rudge and Humber were rival makers of + bicycles, that Hilary Maltby was the author of ‘Ariel in Mayfair,’ and + Stephen Braxton of ‘A Faun on the Cotswolds.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Which do you think is REALLY the best—“Ariel” or “A Faun”?’ Ladies + were always asking one that question. ‘Oh, well, you know, the two are so + different. It’s really very hard to compare them.’ One was always giving + that answer. One was not very brilliant perhaps. + </p> + <p> + The vogue of the two novels lasted throughout the summer. As both were + ‘firstlings,’ and Great Britain had therefore nothing else of Braxton’s or + Maltby’s to fall back on, the horizon was much scanned for what Maltby, + and what Braxton, would give us next. In the autumn Braxton gave us his + secondling. It was an instantaneous failure. No more was he compared with + Maltby. In the spring of ‘96 came Maltby’s secondling. Its failure was + instantaneous. Maltby might once more have been compared with Braxton. But + Braxton was now forgotten. So was Maltby. + </p> + <p> + This was not kind. This was not just. Maltby’s first novel, and Braxton’s, + had brought delight into many thousands of homes. People should have + paused to say of Braxton “Perhaps his third novel will be better than his + second,” and to say as much for Maltby. I blame people for having given no + sign of wanting a third from either; and I blame them with the more zest + because neither ‘A Faun on the Cotswolds’ nor ‘Ariel in Mayfair’ was a + merely popular book: each, I maintain, was a good book. I don’t go so far + as to say that the one had ‘more of natural magic, more of British + woodland glamour, more of the sheer joy of life in it than anything since + “As You Like It,”’ though Higsby went so far as this in the Daily + Chronicle; nor can I allow the claim made for the other by Grigsby in the + Globe that ‘for pungency of satire there has been nothing like it since + Swift laid down his pen, and for sheer sweetness and tenderness of feeling—ex + forti dulcedo—nothing to be mentioned in the same breath with it + since the lute fell from the tired hand of Theocritus.’ These were foolish + exaggerations. But one must not condemn a thing because it has been + over-praised. Maltby’s ‘Ariel’ was a delicate, brilliant work; and + Braxton’s ‘Faun,’ crude though it was in many ways, had yet a genuine + power and beauty. This is not a mere impression remembered from early + youth. It is the reasoned and seasoned judgment of middle age. Both books + have been out of print for many years; but I secured a second-hand copy of + each not long ago, and found them well worth reading again. + </p> + <p> + From the time of Nathaniel Hawthorne to the outbreak of the war, current + literature did not suffer from any lack of fauns. But when Braxton’s first + book appeared fauns had still an air of novelty about them. We had not yet + tired of them and their hoofs and their slanting eyes and their way of + coming suddenly out of woods to wean quiet English villages from + respectability. We did tire later. But Braxton’s faun, even now, seems to + me an admirable specimen of his class—wild and weird, earthy, + goat-like, almost convincing. And I find myself convinced altogether by + Braxton’s rustics. I admit that I do not know much about rustics, except + from novels. But I plead that the little I do know about them by personal + observation does not confirm much of what the many novelists have taught + me. I plead also that Braxton may well have been right about the rustics + of Gloucestershire because he was (as so many interviewers recorded of him + in his brief heyday) the son of a yeoman farmer at Far Oakridge, and his + boyhood had been divided between that village and the Grammar School at + Stroud. Not long ago I happened to be staying in the neighbourhood, and + came across several villagers who might, I assure you, have stepped + straight out of Braxton’s pages. For that matter, Braxton himself, whom I + met often in the spring of ‘95, might have stepped straight out of his own + pages. + </p> + <p> + I am guilty of having wished he would step straight back into them. He was + a very surly fellow, very rugged and gruff. He was the antithesis of + pleasant little Maltby. I used to think that perhaps he would have been + less unamiable if success had come to him earlier. He was thirty years old + when his book was published, and had had a very hard time since coming to + London at the age of sixteen. Little Maltby was a year older, and so had + waited a year longer; but then, he had waited under a comfortable roof at + Twickenham, emerging into the metropolis for no grimmer purpose than to + sit and watch the fashionable riders and walkers in Rotten Row, and then + going home to write a little, or to play lawn-tennis with the young ladies + of Twickenham. He had been the only child of his parents (neither of whom, + alas, survived to take pleasure in their darling’s sudden fame). He had + now migrated from Twickenham and taken rooms in Ryder Street. Had he ever + shared with Braxton the bread of adversity—but no, I think he would + in any case have been pleasant. And conversely I cannot imagine that + Braxton would in any case have been so. + </p> + <p> + No one seeing the two rivals together, no one meeting them at Mr. + Hookworth’s famous luncheon parties in the Authors’ Club, or at Mrs. + Foster-Dugdale’s not less famous garden parties in Greville Place, would + have supposed off-hand that the pair had a single point in common. Dapper + little Maltby—blond, bland, diminutive Maltby, with his monocle and + his gardenia; big black Braxton, with his lanky hair and his square blue + jaw and his square sallow forehead. Canary and crow. Maltby had a + perpetual chirrup of amusing small-talk. Braxton was usually silent, but + very well worth listening to whenever he did croak. He had distinction, I + admit it; the distinction of one who steadfastly refuses to adapt himself + to surroundings. He stood out. He awed Mr. Hookworth. Ladies were always + asking one another, rather intently, what they thought of him. One could + imagine that Mr. Foster-Dugdale, had he come home from the City to attend + the garden parties, might have regarded him as one from whom Mrs. + Foster-Dugdale should be shielded. But the casual observer of Braxton and + Maltby at Mrs. Foster-Dugdale’s or elsewhere was wrong in supposing that + the two were totally unlike. He overlooked one simple and obvious point. + This was that he had met them both at Mrs. Foster-Dugdale’s or elsewhere. + Wherever they were invited, there certainly, there punctually, they would + be. They were both of them gluttons for the fruits and signs of their + success. + </p> + <p> + Interviewers and photographers had as little reason as had hostesses to + complain of two men so earnestly and assiduously ‘on the make’ as Maltby + and Braxton. Maltby, for all his sparkle, was earnest; Braxton, for all + his arrogance, assiduous. + </p> + <p> + ‘A Faun on the Cotswolds’ had no more eager eulogist than the author of + ‘Ariel in Mayfair.’ When any one praised his work, Maltby would lightly + disparage it in comparison with Braxton’s—‘Ah, if I could write like + THAT!’ Maltby won golden opinions in this way. Braxton, on the other hand, + would let slip no opportunity for sneering at Maltby’s work—‘gimcrack,’ + as he called it. This was not good for Maltby. Different men, different + methods. + </p> + <p> + ‘The Rape of the Lock’ was ‘gimcrack,’ if you care to call it so; but it + was a delicate, brilliant work; and so, I repeat, was Maltby’s ‘Ariel.’ + Absurd to compare Maltby with Pope? I am not so sure. I have read ‘Ariel,’ + but have never read ‘The Rape of the Lock.’ Braxton’s opprobrious term for + ‘Ariel’ may not, however, have been due to jealousy alone. Braxton had + imagination, and his rival did not soar above fancy. But the point is that + Maltby’s fancifulness went far and well. In telling how Ariel re-embodied + himself from thin air, leased a small house in Chesterfield Street, was + presented at a Levee, played the part of good fairy in a matter of true + love not running smooth, and worked meanwhile all manner of amusing + changes among the aristocracy before he vanished again, Maltby showed a + very pretty range of ingenuity. In one respect, his work was a more + surprising achievement than Braxton’s. For whereas Braxton had been born + and bred among his rustics, Maltby knew his aristocrats only through + Thackeray, through the photographs and paragraphs in the newspapers, and + through those passionate excursions of his to Rotten Row. Yet I found his + aristocrats as convincing as Braxton’s rustics. It is true that I may have + been convinced wrongly. That is a point which I could settle only by + experience. I shift my ground, claiming for Maltby’s aristocrats just + this: that they pleased me very much. + </p> + <p> + Aristocrats, when they are presented solely through a novelist’s sense of + beauty, do not satisfy us. They may be as beautiful as all that, but, for + fear of thinking ourselves snobbish, we won’t believe it. We do believe + it, however, and revel in it, when the novelist saves his face and ours by + a pervading irony in the treatment of what he loves. The irony must, mark + you, be pervading and obvious. Disraeli’s great ladies and lords won’t do, + for his irony was but latent in his homage, and thus the reader feels + himself called on to worship and in duty bound to scoff. All’s well, + though, when the homage is latent in the irony. Thackeray, inviting us to + laugh and frown over the follies of Mayfair, enables us to reel with him + in a secret orgy of veneration for those fools. + </p> + <p> + Maltby, too, in his measure, enabled us to reel thus. That is mainly why, + before the end of April, his publisher was in a position to state that + ‘the Seventh Large Impression of “Ariel in Mayfair” is almost exhausted.’ + Let it be put to our credit, however, that at the same moment Braxton’s + publisher had ‘the honour to inform the public that an Eighth Large + Impression of “A Faun on the Cotswolds” is in instant preparation.’ + </p> + <p> + Indeed, it seemed impossible for either author to outvie the other in + success and glory. Week in, week out, you saw cancelled either’s every + momentary advantage. A neck-and-neck race. As thus:—Maltby appears + as a Celebrity At Home in the World (Tuesday). Ha! No, Vanity Fair + (Wednesday) has a perfect presentment of Braxton by ‘Spy.’ Neck-and-neck! + No, Vanity Fair says ‘the subject of next week’s cartoon will be Mr. + Hilary Maltby.’ Maltby wins! No, next week Braxton’s in the World. + </p> + <p> + Throughout May I kept, as it were, my eyes glued to my field-glasses. On + the first Monday in June I saw that which drew from me a hoarse + ejaculation. + </p> + <p> + Let me explain that always on Monday mornings at this time of year, when I + opened my daily paper, I looked with respectful interest to see what bevy + of the great world had been entertained since Saturday at Keeb Hall. The + list was always august and inspiring. Statecraft and Diplomacy were well + threaded there with mere Lineage and mere Beauty, with Royalty sometimes, + with mere Wealth never, with privileged Genius now and then. A noble + composition always. It was said that the Duke of Hertfordshire cared for + nothing but his collection of birds’ eggs, and that the collections of + guests at Keeb were formed entirely by his young Duchess. It was said that + he had climbed trees in every corner of every continent. The Duchess’ + hobby was easier. She sat aloft and beckoned desirable specimens up. + </p> + <p> + The list published on that first Monday in June began ordinarily enough, + began with the Austro-Hungarian Ambassador and the Portuguese Minister. + Then came the Duke and Duchess of Mull, followed by four lesser Peers (two + of them Proconsuls, however) with their Peeresses, three Peers without + their Peeresses, four Peeresses without their Peers, and a dozen bearers + of courtesy-titles with or without their wives or husbands. The rear was + brought up by ‘Mr. A. J. Balfour, Mr. Henry Chaplin, and Mr. Hilary + Maltby.’ + </p> + <p> + Youth tends to look at the darker side of things. I confess that my first + thought was for Braxton. + </p> + <p> + I forgave and forgot his faults of manner. Youth is generous. It does not + criticise a strong man stricken. + </p> + <p> + And anon, so habituated was I to the parity of those two strivers, I + conceived that there might be some mistake. Daily newspapers are printed + in a hurry. Might not ‘Henry Chaplin’ be a typographical error for + ‘Stephen Braxton’? I went out and bought another newspaper. But Mr. + Chaplin’s name was in that too. + </p> + <p> + ‘Patience!’ I said to myself. ‘Braxton crouches only to spring. He will be + at Keeb Hall on Saturday next.’ + </p> + <p> + My mind was free now to dwell with pleasure on Maltby’s great achievement. + I thought of writing to congratulate him, but feared this might be in bad + taste. I did, however, write asking him to lunch with me. He did not + answer my letter. I was, therefore, all the more sorry, next Monday, at + not finding ‘and Mr. Stephen Braxton’ in Keeb’s week-end catalogue. + </p> + <p> + A few days later I met Mr. Hookworth. He mentioned that Stephen Braxton + had left town. ‘He has taken,’ said Hookworth, ‘a delightful bungalow on + the east coast. He has gone there to WORK.’ He added that he had a great + liking for Braxton—‘a man utterly UNSPOILT.’ I inferred that he, + too, had written to Maltby and received no answer. + </p> + <p> + That butterfly did not, however, appear to be hovering from flower to + flower in the parterres of rank and fashion. In the daily lists of guests + at dinners, receptions, dances, balls, the name of Maltby figured never. + Maltby had not caught on. + </p> + <p> + Presently I heard that he, too, had left town. I gathered that he had gone + quite early in June—quite soon after Keeb. Nobody seemed to know + where he was. My own theory was that he had taken a delightful bungalow on + the west coast, to balance Braxton. Anyhow, the parity of the two strivers + was now somewhat re-established. + </p> + <p> + In point of fact, the disparity had been less than I supposed. While + Maltby was at Keeb, there Braxton was also—in a sense.... It was a + strange story. I did not hear it at the time. Nobody did. I heard it + seventeen years later. I heard it in Lucca. + </p> + <p> + Little Lucca I found so enchanting that, though I had only a day or two to + spare, I stayed there a whole month. I formed the habit of walking, every + morning, round that high-pitched path which girdles Lucca, that wide and + tree-shaded path from which one looks down over the city wall at the + fertile plains beneath Lucca. There were never many people there; but the + few who did come came daily, so that I grew to like seeing them and took a + mild personal interest in them. + </p> + <p> + One of them was an old lady in a wheeled chair. She was not less than + seventy years old, and might or might not have once been beautiful. Her + chair was slowly propelled by an Italian woman. She herself was obviously + Italian. Not so, however, the little gentleman who walked assiduously + beside her. Him I guessed to be English. He was a very stout little + gentleman, with gleaming spectacles and a full blond beard, and he seemed + to radiate cheerfulness. I thought at first that he might be the old + lady’s resident physician; but no, there was something subtly + un-professional about him: I became sure that his constancy was + gratuitous, and his radiance real. And one day, I know not how, there + dawned on me a suspicion that he was—who?—some one I had known—some + writer—what’s-his-name—something with an M—Maltby—Hilary + Maltby of the long-ago! + </p> + <p> + At sight of him on the morrow this suspicion hardened almost to certainty. + I wished I could meet him alone and ask him if I were not right, and what + he had been doing all these years, and why he had left England. He was + always with the old lady. It was only on my last day in Lucca that my + chance came. + </p> + <p> + I had just lunched, and was seated on a comfortable bench outside my + hotel, with a cup of coffee on the table before me, gazing across the + faded old sunny piazza and wondering what to do with my last afternoon. It + was then that I espied yonder the back of the putative Maltby. I hastened + forth to him. He was buying some pink roses, a great bunch of them, from a + market-woman under an umbrella. He looked very blank, he flushed greatly, + when I ventured to accost him. He admitted that his name was Hilary + Maltby. I told him my own name, and by degrees he remembered me. He + apologised for his confusion. He explained that he had not talked English, + had not talked to an Englishman, ‘for—oh, hundreds of years.’ He + said that he had, in the course of his long residence in Lucca, seen two + or three people whom he had known in England, but that none of them had + recognised him. He accepted (but as though he were embarking on the oddest + adventure in the world) my invitation that he should come and sit down and + take coffee with me. He laughed with pleasure and surprise at finding that + he could still speak his native tongue quite fluently and idiomatically. + ‘I know absolutely nothing,’ he said, ‘about England nowadays—except + from stray references to it in the Corriere della Sera; nor did he show + the faintest desire that I should enlighten him. ‘England,’ he mused, ‘—how + it all comes back to me!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘But not you to it?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Ah, no indeed,’ he said gravely, looking at the roses which he had laid + carefully on the marble table. ‘I am the happiest of men.’ + </p> + <p> + He sipped his coffee, and stared out across the piazza, out beyond it into + the past. + </p> + <p> + ‘I am the happiest of men,’ he repeated. I plied him with the spur of + silence. + </p> + <p> + ‘And I owe it all to having once yielded to a bad impulse. Absurd, the + threads our destinies hang on!’ + </p> + <p> + Again I plied him with that spur. As it seemed not to prick him, I + repeated the words he had last spoken. ‘For instance?’ I added. + </p> + <p> + ‘Take,’ he said, ‘a certain evening in the spring of ‘95. If, on that + evening, the Duchess of Hertfordshire had had a bad cold; or if she had + decided that it WOULDN’T be rather interesting to go on to that party—that + Annual Soiree, I think it was—of the Inkwomen’s Club; or again—to + go a step further back—if she hadn’t ever written that one little + poem, and if it HADN’T been printed in “The Gentlewoman,” and if the + Inkwomen’s committee HADN’T instantly and unanimously elected her an + Honorary Vice-President because of that one little poem; or if—well, + if a million-and-one utterly irrelevant things hadn’t happened, + don’t-you-know, I shouldn’t be here.... I might be THERE,’ he smiled, with + a vague gesture indicating England. + </p> + <p> + ‘Suppose,’ he went on, ‘I hadn’t been invited to that Annual Soiree; or + suppose that other fellow,— + </p> + <p> + ‘Braxton?’ I suggested. I had remembered Braxton at the moment of + recognising Maltby. + </p> + <p> + ‘Suppose HE hadn’t been asked.... But of course we both were. It happened + that I was the first to be presented to the Duchess.... It was a great + moment. I hoped I should keep my head. She wore a tiara. I had often seen + women in tiaras, at the Opera. But I had never talked to a woman in a + tiara. Tiaras were symbols to me. Eyes are just a human feature. I fixed + mine on the Duchess’s. I kept my head by not looking at hers. I behaved as + one human being to another. She seemed very intelligent. We got on very + well. Presently she asked whether I should think her VERY bold if she said + how PERFECTLY divine she thought my book. I said something about doing my + best, and asked with animation whether she had read “A Faun on the + Cotswolds.” She had. She said it was TOO wonderful, she said it was TOO + great. If she hadn’t been a Duchess, I might have thought her slightly + hysterical. Her innate good-sense quickly reasserted itself. She used her + great power. With a wave of her magic wand she turned into a fact the + glittering possibility that had haunted me. She asked me down to Keeb. + </p> + <p> + ‘She seemed very pleased that I would come. Was I, by any chance, free on + Saturday week? She hoped there would be some amusing people to meet me. + Could I come by the 3.30? It was only an hour-and-a-quarter from Victoria. + On Saturday there were always compartments reserved for people coming to + Keeb by the 3.30. She hoped I would bring my bicycle with me. She hoped I + wouldn’t find it very dull. She hoped I wouldn’t forget to come. She said + how lovely it must be to spend one’s life among clever people. She + supposed I knew everybody here to-night. She asked me to tell her who + everybody was. She asked who was the tall, dark man, over there. I told + her it was Stephen Braxton. She said they had promised to introduce her to + him. She added that he looked rather wonderful. “Oh, he is, very,” I + assured her. She turned to me with a sudden appeal: “DO you think, if I + took my courage in both hands and asked him, he’d care to come to Keeb?” + </p> + <p> + ‘I hesitated. It would be easy to say that Satan answered FOR me; easy but + untrue; it was I that babbled: “Well—as a matter of fact—since + you ask me—if I were you—really I think you’d better not. He’s + very odd in some ways. He has an extraordinary hatred of sleeping out of + London. He has the real Gloucestershire LOVE of London. At the same time, + he’s very shy; and if you asked him he wouldn’t very well know how to + refuse. I think it would be KINDER not to ask him.” + </p> + <p> + ‘At that moment, Mrs. Wilpham—the President—loomed up to us, + bringing Braxton. He bore himself well. Rough dignity with a touch of + mellowness. I daresay you never saw him smile. He smiled gravely down at + the Duchess, while she talked in her pretty little quick humble way. He + made a great impression. + </p> + <p> + ‘What I had done was not merely base: it was very dangerous. I was in + terror that she might rally him on his devotion to London. I didn’t dare + to move away. I was immensely relieved when at length she said she must be + going. + </p> + <p> + ‘Braxton seemed loth to relax his grip on her hand at parting. I feared + she wouldn’t escape without uttering that invitation. But all was well.... + In saying good night to me, she added in a murmur, “Don’t forget Keeb—Saturday + week—the 3.30.” Merely an exquisite murmur. But Braxton heard it. I + knew, by the diabolical look he gave me, that Braxton had heard it.... If + he hadn’t, I shouldn’t be here. + </p> + <p> + ‘Was I a prey to remorse? Well, in the days between that Soiree and that + Saturday, remorse often claimed me, but rapture wouldn’t give me up. + Arcady, Olympus, the right people, at last! I hadn’t realised how good my + book was—not till it got me this guerdon; not till I got it this + huge advertisement. I foresaw how pleased my publisher would be. In some + great houses, I knew, it was possible to stay without any one knowing you + had been there. But the Duchess of Hertfordshire hid her light under no + bushel. Exclusive she was, but not of publicity. Next to Windsor Castle, + Keeb Hall was the most advertised house in all England. + </p> + <p> + ‘Meanwhile, I had plenty to do. I rather thought of engaging a valet, but + decided that this wasn’t necessary. On the other hand, I felt a need for + three new summer suits, and a new evening suit, and some new white + waistcoats. Also a smoking suit. And had any man ever stayed at Keeb + without a dressing-case? Hitherto I had been content with a pair of wooden + brushes, and so forth. I was afraid these would appal the footman who + unpacked my things. I ordered, for his sake, a large dressing-case, with + my initials engraved throughout it. It looked compromisingly new when it + came to me from the shop. I had to kick it industriously, and throw it + about and scratch it, so as to avert possible suspicion. The tailor did + not send my things home till the Friday evening. I had to sit up late, + wearing the new suits in rotation. + </p> + <p> + ‘Next day, at Victoria, I saw strolling on the platform many people, male + and female, who looked as if they were going to Keeb—tall, cool, + ornate people who hadn’t packed their own things and had reached Victoria + in broughams. I was ornate, but not tall nor cool. My porter was rather + off-hand in his manner as he wheeled my things along to the 3.30. I asked + severely if there were any compartments reserved for people going to stay + with the Duke of Hertfordshire. This worked an instant change in him. + Having set me in one of those shrines, he seemed almost loth to accept a + tip. A snob, I am afraid. + </p> + <p> + ‘A selection of the tall, the cool, the ornate, the intimately acquainted + with one another, soon filled the compartment. There I was, and I think + they felt they ought to try to bring me into the conversation. As they + were all talking about a cotillion of the previous night, I shouldn’t have + been able to shine. I gazed out of the window, with middle-class + aloofness. Presently the talk drifted on to the topic of bicycles. But by + this time it was too late for me to come in. + </p> + <p> + ‘I gazed at the squalid outskirts of London as they flew by. I doubted, as + I listened to my fellow-passengers, whether I should be able to shine at + Keeb. I rather wished I were going to spend the week-end at one of those + little houses with back-gardens beneath the railway-line. I was filled + with fears. + </p> + <p> + ‘For shame! thought I. Was I nobody? Was the author of “Ariel in Mayfair” + nobody? + </p> + <p> + ‘I reminded myself how glad Braxton would be if he knew of my + faint-heartedness. I thought of Braxton sitting, at this moment, in his + room in Clifford’s Inn and glowering with envy of his hated rival in the + 3.30. And after all, how enviable I was! My spirits rose. I would acquit + myself well.... + </p> + <p> + ‘I much admired the scene at the little railway station where we alighted. + It was like a fete by Lancret. I knew from the talk of my + fellow-passengers that some people had been going down by an earlier + train, and that others were coming by a later. But the 3.30 had brought a + full score of us. Us! That was the final touch of beauty. + </p> + <p> + ‘Outside there were two broughams, a landau, dog-carts, a phaeton, a + wagonette, I know not what. But almost everybody, it seemed, was going to + bicycle. Lady Rodfitten said SHE was going to bicycle. Year after year, I + had seen that famous Countess riding or driving in the Park. I had been + told at fourth hand that she had a masculine intellect and could make and + unmake Ministries. She was nearly sixty now, a trifle dyed and stout and + weather-beaten, but still tremendously handsome, and hard as nails. One + would not have said she had grown older, but merely that she belonged now + to a rather later period of the Roman Empire. I had never dreamed of a + time when one roof would shelter Lady Rodfitten and me. Somehow, she + struck my imagination more than any of these others—more than Count + Deym, more than Mr. Balfour, more than the lovely Lady Thisbe Crowborough. + </p> + <p> + ‘I might have had a ducal vehicle all to myself, and should have liked + that; but it seemed more correct that I should use my bicycle. On the + other hand, I didn’t want to ride with all these people—a stranger + in their midst. I lingered around the luggage till they were off, and then + followed at a long distance. + </p> + <p> + ‘The sun had gone behind clouds. But I rode slowly, so as to be sure not + to arrive hot. I passed, not without a thrill, through the massive open + gates into the Duke’s park. A massive man with a cockade saluted me—hearteningly—from + the door of the lodge. The park seemed endless. I came, at length, to a + long straight avenue of elms that were almost blatantly immemorial. At the + end of it was—well, I felt like a gnat going to stay in a public + building. + </p> + <p> + ‘If there had been turnstiles—IN and OUT—and a shilling to + pay, I should have felt easier as I passed into that hall—that + Palladio-Gargantuan hall. Some one, some butler or groom-of-the-chamber, + murmured that her Grace was in the garden. I passed out through the great + opposite doorway on to a wide spectacular terrace with lawns beyond. Tea + was on the nearest of these lawns. In the central group of people—some + standing, others sitting—I espied the Duchess. She sat pouring out + tea, a deft and animated little figure. I advanced firmly down the steps + from the terrace, feeling that all would be well so soon as I had reported + myself to the Duchess. + </p> + <p> + ‘But I had a staggering surprise on my way to her. I espied in one of the + smaller groups—whom d’you think? Braxton. + </p> + <p> + ‘I had no time to wonder how he had got there—time merely to grasp + the black fact that he WAS there. + </p> + <p> + ‘The Duchess seemed really pleased to see me. She said it was TOO splendid + of me to come. “You know Mr. Maltby?” she asked Lady Rodfitten, who + exclaimed “Not Mr. HILARY Maltby?” with a vigorous grace that was + overwhelming. Lady Rodfitten declared she was the greatest of my admirers; + and I could well believe that in whatever she did she excelled all + competitors. On the other hand, I found it hard to believe she was afraid + of me. Yet I had her word for it that she was. + </p> + <p> + ‘Her womanly charm gave place now to her masculine grip. She eulogised me + in the language of a seasoned reviewer on the staff of a long-established + journal—wordy perhaps, but sound. I revered and loved her. I wished + I could give her my undivided attention. But, whilst I sat there, teacup, + in hand, between her and the Duchess, part of my brain was fearfully + concerned with that glimpse I had had of Braxton. It didn’t so much matter + that he was here to halve my triumph. But suppose he knew what I had told + the Duchess! And suppose he had—no, surely if he HAD shown me up in + all my meanness she wouldn’t have received me so very cordially. I + wondered where she could have met him since that evening of the Inkwomen. + I heard Lady Rodfitten concluding her review of “Ariel” with two or three + sentences that might have been framed specially to give the publisher an + easy “quote.” And then I heard myself asking mechanically whether she had + read “A Faun on the Cotswolds.” The Duchess heard me too. She turned from + talking to other people and said “I did like Mr. Braxton so VERY much.” + </p> + <p> + ‘“Yes,” I threw out with a sickly smile, “I’m so glad you asked him to + come.” + </p> + <p> + ‘“But I didn’t ask him. I didn’t DARE.” + </p> + <p> + ‘“But—but—surely he wouldn’t be—be HERE if—” We + stared at each other blankly. “Here?” she echoed, glancing at the + scattered little groups of people on the lawn. I glanced too. I was much + embarrassed. I explained that I had seen Braxton “standing just over + there” when I arrived, and had supposed he was one of the people who came + by the earlier train. “Well,” she said with a slightly irritated laugh, + “you must have mistaken some one else for him.” She dropped the subject, + talked to other people, and presently moved away. + </p> + <p> + ‘Surely, thought I, she didn’t suspect me of trying to make fun of her? On + the other hand, surely she hadn’t conspired with Braxton to make a fool of + ME? And yet, how could Braxton be here without an invitation, and without + her knowledge? My brain whirled. One thing only was clear. I could NOT + have mistaken anybody for Braxton. There Braxton had stood—Stephen + Braxton, in that old pepper-and-salt suit of his, with his red tie all + askew, and without a hat—his hair hanging over his forehead. All + this I had seen sharp and clean-cut. There he had stood, just beside one + of the women who travelled down in the same compartment as I; a very + pretty woman in a pale blue dress; a tall woman—but I had noticed + how small she looked beside Braxton. This woman was now walking to and + fro, yonder, with M. de Soveral. I had seen Braxton beside her as clearly + as I now saw M. de Soveral. + </p> + <p> + ‘Lady Rodfitten was talking about India to a recent Viceroy. She seemed to + have as firm a grip of India as of “Ariel.” I sat forgotten. I wanted to + arise and wander off—in a vague search for Braxton. But I feared + this might look as if I were angry at being ignored. Presently Lady + Rodfitten herself arose, to have what she called her “annual look round.” + She bade me come too, and strode off between me and the recent Viceroy, + noting improvements that had been made in the grounds, suggesting + improvements that might be made, indicating improvements that MUST be + made. She was great on landscape-gardening. The recent Viceroy was less + great on it, but great enough. I don’t say I walked forgotten: the eminent + woman constantly asked my opinion; but my opinion, though of course it + always coincided with hers, sounded quite worthless, somehow. I longed to + shine. I could only bother about Braxton. + </p> + <p> + ‘Lady Rodfitten’s voice sounded over-strong for the stillness of evening. + The shadows lengthened. My spirits sank lower and lower, with the sun. I + was a naturally cheerful person, but always, towards sunset, I had a vague + sense of melancholy: I seemed always to have grown weaker; morbid + misgivings would come to me. On this particular evening there was one such + misgiving that crept in and out of me again and again... a very horrible + misgiving as to the NATURE of what I had seen. + </p> + <p> + ‘Well, dressing for dinner is a great tonic. Especially if one shaves. My + spirits rose as I lathered my face. I smiled to my reflection in the + mirror. The afterglow of the sun came through the window behind the + dressing-table, but I had switched on all the lights. My new silver-topped + bottles and things made a fine array. To-night <i>I</i> was going to + shine, too. I felt I might yet be the life and soul of the party. Anyway, + my new evening suit was without a fault. And meanwhile this new razor was + perfect. Having shaved “down,” I lathered myself again and proceeded to + shave “up.” It was then that I uttered a sharp sound and swung round on my + heel. + </p> + <p> + ‘No one was there. Yet this I knew: Stephen Braxton had just looked over + my shoulder. I had seen the reflection of his face beside mine—craned + forward to the mirror. I had met his eyes. + </p> + <p> + ‘He had been with me. This I knew. + </p> + <p> + ‘I turned to look again at that mirror. One of my cheeks was all covered + with blood. I stanched it with a towel. Three long cuts where the razor + had slipped and skipped. I plunged the towel into cold water and held it + to my cheek. The bleeding went on—alarmingly. I rang the bell. No + one came. I vowed I wouldn’t bleed to death for Braxton. I rang again. At + last a very tall powdered footman appeared—more reproachful-looking + than sympathetic, as though I hadn’t ordered that dressing-case specially + on his behalf. He said he thought one of the housemaids would have some + sticking-plaster. He was very sorry he was needed downstairs, but he would + tell one of the housemaids. I continued to dab and to curse. The blood + flowed less. I showed great spirit. I vowed Braxton should not prevent me + from going down to dinner. + </p> + <p> + ‘But—a pretty sight I was when I did go down. Pale but determined, + with three long strips of black sticking-plaster forming a sort of Z on my + left cheek. Mr. Hilary Maltby at Keeb. Literature’s Ambassador. + </p> + <p> + ‘I don’t know how late I was. Dinner was in full swing. Some servant + piloted me to my place. I sat down unobserved. The woman on either side of + me was talking to her other neighbour. I was near the Duchess’ end of the + table. Soup was served to me—that dark-red soup that you pour cream + into—Bortsch. I felt it would steady me. I raised the first spoonful + to my lips, and—my hand gave a sudden jerk. + </p> + <p> + ‘I was aware of two separate horrors—a horror that had been, a + horror that was. Braxton had vanished. Not for more than an instant had he + stood scowling at me from behind the opposite diners. Not for more than + the fraction of an instant. But he had left his mark on me. I gazed down + with a frozen stare at my shirtfront, at my white waistcoat, both dark + with Bortsch. I rubbed them with a napkin. I made them worse. + </p> + <p> + ‘I looked at my glass of champagne. I raised it carefully and drained it + at one draught. It nerved me. But behind that shirtfront was a broken + heart. + </p> + <p> + ‘The woman on my left was Lady Thisbe Crowborough. I don’t know who was + the woman on my right. She was the first to turn and see me. I thought it + best to say something about my shirtfront at once. I said it to her + sideways, without showing my left cheek. Her handsome eyes rested on the + splashes. She said, after a moment’s thought, that they looked “rather + gay.” She said she thought the eternal black and white of men’s evening + clothes was “so very dreary.” She did her best.... Lady Thisbe Crowborough + did her best, too, I suppose; but breeding isn’t proof against all + possible shocks: she visibly started at sight of me and my Z. I explained + that I had cut myself shaving. I said, with an attempt at lightness, that + shy men ought always to cut themselves shaving: it made such a good + conversational opening. “But surely,” she said after a pause, “you don’t + cut yourself on purpose?” She was an abysmal fool. I didn’t think so at + the time. She was Lady Thisbe Crowborough. This fact hallowed her. That we + didn’t get on at all well was a misfortune for which I blamed only myself + and my repulsive appearance and—the unforgettable horror that + distracted me. Nor did I blame Lady Thisbe for turning rather soon to the + man on her other side. + </p> + <p> + ‘The woman on my right was talking to the man on HER other side; so that I + was left a prey to secret memory and dread. I wasn’t wondering, wasn’t + attempting to explain; I was merely remembering—and dreading. And—how + odd one is!—on the top-layer of my consciousness I hated to be seen + talking to no one. Mr. Maltby at Keeb. I caught the Duchess’ eye once or + twice, and she nodded encouragingly, as who should say “You do look rather + awful, and you do seem rather out of it, but I don’t for a moment regret + having asked you to come.” Presently I had another chance of talking. I + heard myself talk. My feverish anxiety to please rather touched ME. But I + noticed that the eyes of my listener wandered. And yet I was sorry when + the ladies went away. I had a sense of greater exposure. Men who hadn’t + seen me saw me now. The Duke, as he came round to the Duchess’ end of the + table, must have wondered who I was. But he shyly offered me his hand as + he passed, and said it was so good of me to come. I had thought of + slipping away to put on another shirt and waistcoat, but had decided that + this would make me the more ridiculous. I sat drinking port—poison + to me after champagne, but a lulling poison—and listened to noblemen + with unstained shirtfronts talking about the Australian cricket match.... + </p> + <p> + ‘Is Rubicon Bezique still played in England? There was a mania for it at + that time. The floor of Keeb’s Palladio-Gargantuan hall was dotted with + innumerable little tables. I didn’t know how to play. My hostess told me I + must “come and amuse the dear old Duke and Duchess of Mull,” and led me to + a remote sofa on which an old gentleman had just sat down beside an old + lady. They looked at me with a dim kind interest. My hostess had set me + and left me on a small gilt chair in front of them. Before going she had + conveyed to them loudly—one of them was very deaf—that I was + “the famous writer.” It was a long time before they understood that I was + not a political writer. The Duke asked me, after a troubled pause, whether + I had known “old Mr. Abraham Hayward.” The Duchess said I was too young to + have known Mr. Hayward, and asked if I knew her “clever friend Mr. + Mallock.” I said I had just been reading Mr. Mallock’s new novel. I heard + myself shouting a confused precis of the plot. The place where we were + sitting was near the foot of the great marble staircase. I said how + beautiful the staircase was. The Duchess of Mull said she had never cared + very much for that staircase. The Duke, after a pause, said he had “often + heard old Mr. Abraham Hayward hold a whole dinner table.” There were long + and frequent pauses—between which I heard myself talking loudly, + frantically, sinking lower and lower in the esteem of my small audience. I + felt like a man drowning under the eyes of an elderly couple who sit on + the bank regretting that they can offer NO assistance. Presently the Duke + looked at his watch and said to the Duchess that it was “time to be + thinking of bed.” + </p> + <p> + ‘They rose, as it were from the bank, and left me, so to speak, under + water. I watched them as they passed slowly out of sight up the marble + staircase which I had mispraised. I turned and surveyed the brilliant, + silent scene presented by the card-players. + </p> + <p> + ‘I wondered what old Mr. Abraham Hayward would have done in my place. + Would he have just darted in among those tables and “held” them? I + presumed that he would not have stolen silently away, quickly and cravenly + away, up the marble staircase—as <i>I</i> did. + </p> + <p> + ‘I don’t know which was the greater, the relief or the humiliation of + finding myself in my bedroom. Perhaps the humiliation was the greater. + There, on a chair, was my grand new smoking-suit, laid out for me—what + a mockery! Once I had foreseen myself wearing it in the smoking-room at a + late hour—the centre of a group of eminent men entranced by the + brilliancy of my conversation. And now—! I was nothing but a small, + dull, soup-stained, sticking-plastered, nerve-racked recluse. Nerves, yes. + I assured myself that I had not seen—what I had seemed to see. All + very odd, of course, and very unpleasant, but easily explained. Nerves. + Excitement of coming to Keeb too much for me. A good night’s rest: that + was all I needed. To-morrow I should laugh at myself. + </p> + <p> + ‘I wondered that I wasn’t tired physically. There my grand new silk + pyjamas were, yet I felt no desire to go to bed... none while it was still + possible for me to go. The little writing-table at the foot of my bed + seemed to invite me. I had brought with me in my portmanteau a sheaf of + letters, letters that I had purposely left unanswered in order that I + might answer them on KEEB HALL note-paper. These the footman had neatly + laid beside the blotting-pad on that little writing-table at the foot of + the bed. I regretted that the notepaper stacked there had no ducal coronet + on it. What matter? The address sufficed. If I hadn’t yet made a good + impression on the people who were staying here, I could at any rate make + one on the people who weren’t. I sat down. I set to work. I wrote a + prodigious number of fluent and graceful notes. + </p> + <p> + ‘Some of these were to strangers who wanted my autograph. I was always + delighted to send my autograph, and never perfunctory in the manner of + sending it.... “Dear Madam,” I remember writing to somebody that night, + “were it not that you make your request for it so charmingly, I should + hesitate to send you that which rarity alone can render valuable.—Yours + truly, Hilary Maltby.” I remember reading this over and wondering whether + the word “render” looked rather commercial. It was in the act of wondering + thus that I raised my eyes from the note-paper and saw, through the bars + of the brass bedstead, the naked sole of a large human foot—saw + beyond it the calf of a great leg; a nightshirt; and the face of Stephen + Braxton. I did not move. + </p> + <p> + ‘I thought of making a dash for the door, dashing out into the corridor, + shouting at the top of my voice for help. I sat quite still. + </p> + <p> + ‘What kept me to my chair was the fear that if I tried to reach the door + Braxton would spring off the bed to intercept me. If I sat quite still + perhaps he wouldn’t move. I felt that if he moved I should collapse + utterly. + </p> + <p> + ‘I watched him, and he watched me. He lay there with his body half-raised, + one elbow propped on the pillow, his jaw sunk on his breast; and from + under his black brows he watched me steadily. + </p> + <p> + ‘No question of mere nerves now. That hope was gone. No mere optical + delusion, this abiding presence. Here Braxton was. He and I were together + in the bright, silent room. How long would he be content to watch me? + </p> + <p> + ‘Eleven nights ago he had given me one horrible look. It was this look + that I had to meet, in infinite prolongation, now, not daring to shift my + eyes. He lay as motionless as I sat. I did not hear him breathing, but I + knew, by the rise and fall of his chest under his nightshirt, that he was + breathing heavily. Suddenly I started to my feet. For he had moved. He had + raised one hand slowly. He was stroking his chin. And as he did so, and as + he watched me, his mouth gradually slackened to a grin. It was worse, it + was more malign, this grin, than the scowl that remained with it; and its + immediate effect on me was an impulse that was as hard to resist as it was + hateful. The window was open. It was nearer to me than the door. I could + have reached it in time.... + </p> + <p> + ‘Well, I live to tell the tale. I stood my ground. And there dawned on me + now a new fact in regard to my companion. I had all the while been + conscious of something abnormal in his attitude—a lack of ease in + his gross possessiveness. I saw now the reason for this effect. The pillow + on which his elbow rested was still uniformly puffed and convex; like a + pillow untouched. His elbow rested but on the very surface of it, not + changing the shape of it at all. His body made not the least furrow along + the bed.... He had no weight. + </p> + <p> + ‘I knew that if I leaned forward and thrust my hand between those brass + rails, to clutch his foot, I should clutch—nothing. He wasn’t + tangible. He was realistic. He wasn’t real. He was opaque. He wasn’t + solid. + </p> + <p> + ‘Odd as it may seem to you, these certainties took the edge off my horror. + During that walk with Lady Rodfitten, I had been appalled by the doubt + that haunted me. But now the very confirmation of that doubt gave me a + sort of courage: I could cope better with anything to-night than with + actual Braxton. And the measure of the relief I felt is that I sat down + again on my chair. + </p> + <p> + ‘More than once there came to me a wild hope that the thing might be an + optical delusion, after all. Then would I shut my eyes tightly, shaking my + head sharply; but, when I looked again, there the presence was, of course. + It—he—not actual Braxton but, roughly speaking, Braxton—had + come to stay. I was conscious of intense fatigue, taut and alert though + every particle of me was; so that I became, in the course of that ghastly + night, conscious of a great envy also. For some time before the dawn came + in through the window, Braxton’s eyes had been closed; little by little + now his head drooped sideways, then fell on his forearm and rested there. + He was asleep. + </p> + <p> + ‘Cut off from sleep, I had a great longing for smoke. I had cigarettes on + me, I had matches on me. But I didn’t dare to strike a match. The sound + might have waked Braxton up. In slumber he was less terrible, though + perhaps more odious. I wasn’t so much afraid now as indignant. “It’s + intolerable,” I sat saying to myself, “utterly intolerable!” + </p> + <p> + ‘I had to bear it, nevertheless. I was aware that I had, in some degree, + brought it on myself. If I hadn’t interfered and lied, actual Braxton + would have been here at Keeb, and I at this moment sleeping soundly. But + this was no excuse for Braxton. Braxton didn’t know what I had done. He + was merely envious of me. And—wanly I puzzled it out in the dawn—by + very force of the envy, hatred, and malice in him he had projected hither + into my presence this simulacrum of himself. I had known that he would be + thinking of me. I had known that the thought of me at Keeb Hall would be + of the last bitterness to his most sacred feelings. But—I had + reckoned without the passionate force and intensity of the man’s nature. + </p> + <p> + ‘If by this same strength and intensity he had merely projected himself as + an invisible guest under the Duchess’ roof—if his feat had been + wholly, as perhaps it was in part, a feat of mere wistfulness and longing—then + I should have felt really sorry for him; and my conscience would have + soundly rated me in his behalf. But no; if the wretched creature HAD been + invisible to me, I shouldn’t have thought of Braxton at all—except + with gladness that he wasn’t here. That he was visible to me, and to me + alone, wasn’t any sign of proper remorse within me. It was but the gauge + of his incredible ill-will. + </p> + <p> + ‘Well, it seemed to me that he was avenged—with a vengeance. There I + sat, hot-browed from sleeplessness, cold in the feet, stiff in the legs, + cowed and indignant all through—sat there in the broadening + daylight, and in that new evening suit of mine with the Braxtonised + shirtfront and waistcoat that by day were more than ever loathsome. + Literature’s Ambassador at Keeb.... I rose gingerly from my chair, and + caught sight of my face, of my Braxtonised cheek, in the mirror. I heard + the twittering of birds in distant trees. I saw through my window the + elaborate landscape of the Duke’s grounds, all soft in the grey bloom of + early morning. I think I was nearer to tears than I had ever been since I + was a child. But the weakness passed. I turned towards the personage on my + bed, and, summoning all such power as was in me, WILLED him to be gone. My + effort was not without result—an inadequate result. Braxton turned + in his sleep. + </p> + <p> + ‘I resumed my seat, and... and... sat up staring and blinking, at a tall + man with red hair. “I must have fallen asleep,” I said. “Yessir,” he + replied; and his toneless voice touched in me one or two springs of + memory: I was at Keeb; this was the footman who looked after me. But—why + wasn’t I in bed? Had I—no, surely it had been no nightmare. Surely I + had SEEN Braxton on that white bed. + </p> + <p> + ‘The footman was impassively putting away my smoking-suit. I was too dazed + to wonder what he thought of me. Nor did I attempt to stifle a cry when, a + moment later, turning in my chair, I beheld Braxton leaning moodily + against the mantelpiece. “Are you unwell sir?” asked the footman. “No,” I + said faintly, “I’m quite well.”—“Yessir. Will you wear the blue suit + or the grey?”—“The grey.”—“Yessir.”—It seemed almost + incredible that HE didn’t see Braxton; HE didn’t appear to me one whit + more solid than the night-shirted brute who stood against the mantelpiece + and watched him lay out my things.—“Shall I let your bath-water run + now sir?”—“Please, yes.”—“Your bathroom’s the second door to + the left sir.”—He went out with my bath-towel and sponge, leaving me + alone with Braxton. + </p> + <p> + ‘I rose to my feet, mustering once more all the strength that was in me. + Hoping against hope, with set teeth and clenched hands, I faced him, + thrust forth my will at him, with everything but words commanded him to + vanish—to cease to be. + </p> + <p> + ‘Suddenly, utterly, he vanished. And you can imagine the truly exquisite + sense of triumph that thrilled me and continued to thrill me till I went + into the bathroom and found him in my bath. + </p> + <p> + ‘Quivering with rage, I returned to my bedroom. “Intolerable,” I heard + myself repeating like a parrot that knew no other word. A bath was just + what I had needed. Could I have lain for a long time basking in very hot + water, and then have sponged myself with cold water, I should have emerged + calm and brave; comparatively so, at any rate. I should have looked less + ghastly, and have had less of a headache, and something of an appetite, + when I went down to breakfast. Also, I shouldn’t have been the very first + guest to appear on the scene. There were five or six round tables, instead + of last night’s long table. At the further end of the room the butler and + two other servants were lighting the little lamps under the hot dishes. I + didn’t like to make myself ridiculous by running away. On the other hand, + was it right for me to begin breakfast all by myself at one of these round + tables? I supposed it was. But I dreaded to be found eating, alone in that + vast room, by the first downcomer. I sat dallying with dry toast and + watching the door. It occurred to me that Braxton might occur at any + moment. Should I be able to ignore him? + </p> + <p> + ‘Some man and wife—a very handsome couple—were the first to + appear. They nodded and said “good morning” when they noticed me on their + way to the hot dishes. I rose—uncomfortably, guiltily—and sat + down again. I rose again when the wife drifted to my table, followed by + the husband with two steaming plates. She asked me if it wasn’t a heavenly + morning, and I replied with nervous enthusiasm that it was. She then ate + kedgeree in silence. “You just finishing, what?” the husband asked, + looking at my plate. “Oh, no—no—only just beginning,” I + assured him, and helped myself to butter. He then ate kedgeree in silence. + He looked like some splendid bull, and she like some splendid cow, + grazing. I envied them their eupeptic calm. I surmised that ten thousand + Braxtons would not have prevented THEM from sleeping soundly by night and + grazing steadily by day. Perhaps their stolidity infected me a little. Or + perhaps what braced me was the great quantity of strong tea that I + consumed. Anyhow I had begun to feel that if Braxton came in now I + shouldn’t blench nor falter. + </p> + <p> + ‘Well, I wasn’t put to the test. Plenty of people drifted in, but Braxton + wasn’t one of them. Lady Rodfitten—no, she didn’t drift, she + marched, in; and presently, at an adjacent table, she was drawing a + comparison, in clarion tones, between Jean and Edouard de Reszke. It + seemed to me that her own voice had much in common with Edouard’s. Even + more was it akin to a military band. I found myself beating time to it + with my foot. Decidedly, my spirits had risen. I was in a mood to face and + outface anything. When I rose from the table and made my way to the door, + I walked with something of a swing—to the tune of Lady Rodfitten. + </p> + <p> + ‘My buoyancy didn’t last long, though. There was no swing in my walk when, + a little later, I passed out on to the spectacular terrace. I had seen my + enemy again, and had beaten a furious retreat. No doubt I should see him + yet again soon—here, perhaps, on this terrace. Two of the guests + were bicycling slowly up and down the long paven expanse, both of them + smiling with pride in the new delicious form of locomotion. There was a + great array of bicycles propped neatly along the balustrade. I recognised + my own among them. I wondered whether Braxton had projected from + Clifford’s Inn an image of his own bicycle. He may have done so; but I’ve + no evidence that he did. I myself was bicycling when next I saw him; but + he, I remember, was on foot. + </p> + <p> + ‘This was a few minutes later. I was bicycling with dear Lady Rodfitten. + She seemed really to like me. She had come out and accosted me heartily on + the terrace, asking me, because of my sticking-plaster, with whom I had + fought a duel since yesterday. I did not tell her with whom, and she had + already branched off on the subject of duelling in general. She regretted + the extinction of duelling in England, and gave cogent reasons for her + regret. Then she asked me what my next book was to be. I confided that I + was writing a sort of sequel—“Ariel Returns to Mayfair.” She shook + her head, said with her usual soundness that sequels were very dangerous + things, and asked me to tell her “briefly” the lines along which I was + working. I did so. She pointed out two or three weak points in my scheme. + She said she could judge better if I would let her see my manuscript. She + asked me to come and lunch with her next Friday—“just our two + selves”—at Rodfitten House, and to bring my manuscript with me. Need + I say that I walked on air? + </p> + <p> + ‘“And now,” she said strenuously, “let us take a turn on our bicycles.” By + this time there were a dozen riders on the terrace, all of them smiling + with pride and rapture. We mounted and rode along together. The terrace + ran round two sides of the house, and before we came to the end of it + these words had provisionally marshalled themselves in my mind: + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + TO + ELEANOR + COUNTESS OF RODFITTEN + THIS BOOK WHICH OWES ALL + TO HER WISE COUNSEL + AND UNWEARYING SUPERVISION + IS GRATEFULLY DEDICATED + BY HER FRIEND + THE AUTHOR +</pre> + <p> + ‘Smiled to masonically by the passing bicyclists, and smiling masonically + to them in return, I began to feel that the rest of my visit would run + smooth, if only— + </p> + <p> + ‘“Let’s go a little faster. Let’s race!” said Lady Rodfitten; and we did + so—“just our two selves.” I was on the side nearer to the + balustrade, and it was on that side that Braxton suddenly appeared from + nowhere, solid-looking as a rock, his arms akimbo, less than three yards + ahead of me, so that I swerved involuntarily, sharply, striking broadside + the front wheel of Lady Rodfitten and collapsing with her, and with a + crash of machinery, to the ground. + </p> + <p> + ‘I wasn’t hurt. She had broken my fall. I wished I was dead. She was + furious. She sat speechless with fury. A crowd had quickly collected—just + as in the case of a street accident. She accused me now to the crowd. She + said I had done it on purpose. She said such terrible things of me that I + think the crowd’s sympathy must have veered towards me. She was assisted + to her feet. I tried to be one of the assistants. “Don’t let him come near + me!” she thundered. I caught sight of Braxton on the fringe of the crowd, + grinning at me. “It was all HIS fault,” I madly cried, pointing at him. + Everybody looked at Mr. Balfour, just behind whom Braxton was standing. + There was a general murmur of surprise, in which I have no doubt Mr. + Balfour joined. He gave a charming, blank, deprecating smile. “I mean—I + can’t explain what I mean,” I groaned. Lady Rodfitten moved away, refusing + support, limping terribly, towards the house. The crowd followed her, + solicitous. I stood helplessly, desperately, where I was. + </p> + <p> + ‘I stood an outlaw, a speck on the now empty terrace. Mechanically I + picked up my straw hat, and wheeled the two bent bicycles to the + balustrade. I suppose Mr. Balfour has a charming nature. For he presently + came out again—on purpose, I am sure, to alleviate my misery. He + told me that Lady Rodfitten had suffered no harm. He took me for a stroll + up and down the terrace, talking thoughtfully and enchantingly about + things in general. Then, having done his deed of mercy, this Good + Samaritan went back into the house. My eyes followed him with gratitude; + but I was still bleeding from wounds beyond his skill. I escaped down into + the gardens. I wanted to see no one. Still more did I want to be seen by + no one. I dreaded in every nerve of me my reappearance among those people. + I walked ever faster and faster, to stifle thought; but in vain. Why + hadn’t I simply ridden THROUGH Braxton? I was aware of being now in the + park, among great trees and undulations of wild green ground. But Nature + did not achieve the task that Mr. Balfour had attempted; and my anguish + was unassuaged. + </p> + <p> + ‘I paused to lean against a tree in the huge avenue that led to the huge + hateful house. I leaned wondering whether the thought of re-entering that + house were the more hateful because I should have to face my fellow-guests + or because I should probably have to face Braxton. A church bell began + ringing somewhere. And anon I was aware of another sound—a twitter + of voices. A consignment of hatted and parasoled ladies was coming fast + adown the avenue. My first impulse was to dodge behind my tree. But I + feared that I had been observed; so that what was left to me of + self-respect compelled me to meet these ladies. + </p> + <p> + ‘The Duchess was among them. I had seen her from afar at breakfast, but + not since. She carried a prayer-book, which she waved to me as I + approached. I was a disastrous guest, but still a guest, and nothing could + have been prettier than her smile. “Most of my men this week,” she said, + “are Pagans, and all the others have dispatch-boxes to go through—except + the dear old Duke of Mull, who’s a member of the Free Kirk. You’re Pagan, + of course?” + </p> + <p> + ‘I said—and indeed it was a heart-cry—that I should like very + much to come to church. “If I shan’t be in the way,” I rather abjectly + added. It didn’t strike me that Braxton would try to intercept me. I don’t + know why, but it never occurred to me, as I walked briskly along beside + the Duchess, that I should meet him so far from the house. The church was + in a corner of the park, and the way to it was by a side path that + branched off from the end of the avenue. A little way along, casting its + shadow across the path, was a large oak. It was from behind this tree, + when we came to it, that Braxton sprang suddenly forth and tripped me up + with his foot. + </p> + <p> + ‘Absurd to be tripped up by the mere semblance of a foot? But remember, I + was walking quickly, and the whole thing happened in a flash of time. It + was inevitable that I should throw out my hands and come down headlong—just + as though the obstacle had been as real as it looked. Down I came on palms + and knee-caps, and up I scrambled, very much hurt and shaken and + apologetic. “POOR Mr. Maltby! REALLY—!” the Duchess wailed for me in + this latest of my mishaps. Some other lady chased my straw hat, which had + bowled far ahead. Two others helped to brush me. They were all very kind, + with a quaver of mirth in their concern for me. I looked furtively around + for Braxton, but he was gone. The palms of my hands were abraded with + gravel. The Duchess said I must on no account come to church NOW. I was + utterly determined to reach that sanctuary. I marched firmly on with the + Duchess. Come what might on the way, I wasn’t going to be left out here. I + was utterly bent on winning at least one respite. + </p> + <p> + ‘Well, I reached the little church without further molestation. To be + there seemed almost too good to be true. The organ, just as we entered, + sounded its first notes. The ladies rustled into the front pew. I, being + the one male of the party, sat at the end of the pew, beside the Duchess. + I couldn’t help feeling that my position was a proud one. But I had gone + through too much to take instant pleasure in it, and was beset by thoughts + of what new horror might await me on the way back to the house. I hoped + the Service would not be brief. The swelling and dwindling strains of the + “voluntary” on the small organ were strangely soothing. I turned to give + an almost feudal glance to the simple villagers in the pews behind, and + saw a sight that cowed my soul. + </p> + <p> + ‘Braxton was coming up the aisle. He came slowly, casting a tourist’s eye + at the stained-glass windows on either side. Walking heavily, yet with no + sound of boots on the pavement, he reached our pew. There, towering and + glowering, he halted, as though demanding that we should make room for + him. A moment later he edged sullenly into the pew. Instinctively I had + sat tight back, drawing my knees aside, in a shudder of revulsion against + contact. But Braxton did not push past me. What he did was to sit slowly + and fully down on me. + </p> + <p> + ‘No, not down ON me. Down THROUGH me—and around me. What befell me + was not mere ghastly contact with the intangible. It was inclusion, + envelopment, eclipse. What Braxton sat down on was not I, but the seat of + the pew; and what he sat back against was not my face and chest, but the + back of the pew. I didn’t realise this at the moment. All I knew was a + sudden black blotting-out of all things; an infinite and impenetrable + darkness. I dimly conjectured that I was dead. What was wrong with me, in + point of fact, was that my eyes, with the rest of me, were inside Braxton. + You remember what a great hulking fellow Braxton was. I calculate that as + we sat there my eyes were just beneath the roof of his mouth. Horrible! + </p> + <p> + ‘Out of the unfathomable depths of that pitch darkness, I could yet hear + the “voluntary” swelling and dwindling, just as before. It was by this I + knew now that I wasn’t dead. And I suppose I must have craned my head + forward, for I had a sudden glimpse of things—a close quick downward + glimpse of a pepper-and-salt waistcoat and of two great hairy hands + clasped across it. Then darkness again. Either I had drawn back my head, + or Braxton had thrust his forward; I don’t know which. “Are you all + right?” the Duchess’ voice whispered, and no doubt my face was ashen. + “Quite,” whispered my voice. But this pathetic monosyllable was the last + gasp of the social instinct in me. Suddenly, as the “voluntary” swelled to + its close, there was a great sharp shuffling noise. The congregation had + risen to its feet, at the entry of choir and vicar. Braxton had risen, + leaving me in daylight. I beheld his towering back. The Duchess, beside + him, glanced round at me. But I could not, dared not, stand up into that + presented back, into that great waiting darkness. I did but clutch my hat + from beneath the seat and hurry distraught down the aisle, out through the + porch, into the open air. + </p> + <p> + ‘Whither? To what goal? I didn’t reason. I merely fled—like Orestes; + fled like an automaton along the path we had come by. And was followed? + Yes, yes. Glancing back across my shoulder, I saw that brute some twenty + yards behind me, gaining on me. I broke into a sharper run. A few + sickening moments later, he was beside me, scowling down into my face. + </p> + <p> + ‘I swerved, dodged, doubled on my tracks, but he was always at me. Now and + again, for lack of breath, I halted, and he halted with me. And then, when + I had got my wind, I would start running again, in the insane hope of + escaping him. We came, by what twisting and turning course I know not, to + the great avenue, and as I stood there in an agony of panting I had a + dazed vision of the distant Hall. Really I had quite forgotten I was + staying at the Duke of Hertfordshire’s. But Braxton hadn’t forgotten. He + planted himself in front of me. He stood between me and the house. + </p> + <p> + ‘Faint though I was, I could almost have laughed. Good heavens! was THAT + all he wanted: that I shouldn’t go back there? Did he suppose I wanted to + go back there—with HIM? Was I the Duke’s prisoner on parole? What + was there to prevent me from just walking off to the railway station? I + turned to do so. + </p> + <p> + ‘He accompanied me on my way. I thought that when once I had passed + through the lodge gates he might vanish, satisfied. But no, he didn’t + vanish. It was as though he suspected that if he let me out of his sight I + should sneak back to the house. He arrived with me, this quiet companion + of mine, at the little railway station. Evidently he meant to see me off. + I learned from an elderly and solitary porter that the next train to + London was the 4.3. + </p> + <p> + ‘Well, Braxton saw me off by the 4.3. I reflected, as I stepped up into an + empty compartment, that it wasn’t yet twenty-four hours ago since I, or + some one like me, had alighted at that station. + </p> + <p> + ‘The guard blew his whistle; the engine shrieked, and the train jolted + forward and away; but I did not lean out of the window to see the last of + my attentive friend. + </p> + <p> + ‘Really not twenty-four hours ago? Not twenty-four years?’ + </p> + <p> + Maltby paused in his narrative. ‘Well, well,’ he said, ‘I don’t want you + to think I overrate the ordeal of my visit to Keeb. A man of stronger + nerve than mine, and of greater resourcefulness, might have coped + successfully with Braxton from first to last—might have stayed on + till Monday, making a very favourable impression on every one all the + while. Even as it was, even after my manifold failures and sudden flight, + I don’t say my position was impossible. I only say it seemed so to me. A + man less sensitive than I, and less vain, might have cheered up after + writing a letter of apology to his hostess, and have resumed his normal + existence as though nothing very terrible had happened, after all. I wrote + a few lines to the Duchess that night; but I wrote amidst the preparations + for my departure from England: I crossed the Channel next morning. + Throughout that Sunday afternoon with Braxton at the Keeb railway station, + pacing the desolate platform with him, waiting in the desolating + waiting-room with him, I was numb to regrets, and was thinking of nothing + but the 4.3. On the way to Victoria my brain worked and my soul wilted. + Every incident in my stay at Keeb stood out clear to me; a dreadful, a + hideous pattern. I had done for myself, so far as THOSE people were + concerned. And now that I had sampled THEM, what cared I for others? “Too + low for a hawk, too high for a buzzard.” That homely old saying seemed to + sum me up. And suppose I COULD still take pleasure in the company of my + own old upper-middle class, how would that class regard me now? Gossip + percolates. Little by little, I was sure, the story of my Keeb fiasco + would leak down into the drawing-room of Mrs. Foster-Dugdale. I felt I + could never hold up my head in any company where anything of that story + was known. Are you quite sure you never heard anything?’ + </p> + <p> + I assured Maltby that all I had known was the great bare fact of his + having stayed at Keeb Hall. + </p> + <p> + ‘It’s curious,’ he reflected. ‘It’s a fine illustration of the loyalty of + those people to one another. I suppose there was a general agreement for + the Duchess’ sake that nothing should be said about her queer guest. But + even if I had dared hope to be so efficiently hushed up, I couldn’t have + not fled. I wanted to forget. I wanted to leap into some void, far away + from all reminders. I leapt straight from Ryder Street into + Vaule-la-Rochette, a place of which I had once heard that it was the least + frequented seaside-resort in Europe. I leapt leaving no address—leapt + telling my landlord that if a suit-case and a portmanteau arrived for me + he could regard them, them and their contents, as his own for ever. I + daresay the Duchess wrote me a kind little letter, forcing herself to + express a vague hope that I would come again “some other time.” I daresay + Lady Rodfitten did NOT write reminding me of my promise to lunch on Friday + and bring “Ariel Returns to Mayfair” with me. I left that manuscript at + Ryder Street; in my bedroom grate; a shuffle of ashes. Not that I’d yet + given up all thought of writing. But I certainly wasn’t going to write now + about the two things I most needed to forget. I wasn’t going to write + about the British aristocracy, nor about any kind of supernatural + presence.... I did write a novel—my last—while I was at Vaule. + “Mr. and Mrs. Robinson.” Did you ever come across a copy of it? + </p> + <p> + I nodded gravely. + </p> + <p> + ‘Ah; I wasn’t sure,’ said Maltby, ‘whether it was ever published. A dreary + affair, wasn’t it? I knew a great deal about suburban life. But—well, + I suppose one can’t really understand what one doesn’t love, and one can’t + make good fun without real understanding. Besides, what chance of virtue + is there for a book written merely to distract the author’s mind? I had + hoped to be healed by sea and sunshine and solitude. These things were + useless. The labour of “Mr. and Mrs. Robinson” did help, a little. When I + had finished it, I thought I might as well send it off to my publisher. He + had given me a large sum of money, down, after “Ariel,” for my next book—so + large that I was rather loth to disgorge. In the note I sent with the + manuscript, I gave no address, and asked that the proofs should be read in + the office. I didn’t care whether the thing were published or not. I knew + it would be a dead failure if it were. What mattered one more drop in the + foaming cup of my humiliation? I knew Braxton would grin and gloat. I + didn’t mind even that.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Oh, well,’ I said, ‘Braxton was in no mood for grinning and gloating. + “The Drones” had already appeared.’ + </p> + <p> + Maltby had never heard of ‘The Drones’—which I myself had remembered + only in the course of his disclosures. I explained to him that it was + Braxton’s second novel, and was by way of being a savage indictment of the + British aristocracy; that it was written in the worst possible taste, but + was so very dull that it fell utterly flat; that Braxton had forthwith + taken, with all of what Maltby had called ‘the passionate force and + intensity of his nature,’ to drink, and had presently gone under and not + re-emerged. + </p> + <p> + Maltby gave signs of genuine, though not deep, emotion, and cited two or + three of the finest passages from ‘A Faun on the Cotswolds.’ He even + expressed a conviction that ‘The Drones’ must have been misjudged. He said + he blamed himself more than ever for yielding to that bad impulse at that + Soiree. + </p> + <p> + ‘And yet,’ he mused, ‘and yet, honestly, I can’t find it in my heart to + regret that I did yield. I can only wish that all had turned out as well, + in the end, for Braxton as for me. I wish he could have won out, as I did, + into a great and lasting felicity. For about a year after I had finished + “Mr. and Mrs. Robinson” I wandered from place to place, trying to kill + memory, shunning all places frequented by the English. At last I found + myself in Lucca. Here, if anywhere, I thought, might a bruised and + tormented spirit find gradual peace. I determined to move out of my hotel + into some permanent lodging. Not for felicity, not for any complete + restoration of self-respect, was I hoping; only for peace. A “mezzano” + conducted me to a noble and ancient house, of which, he told me, the owner + was anxious to let the first floor. It was in much disrepair, but even so + seemed to me very cheap. According to the simple Luccan standard, I am + rich. I took that first floor for a year, had it repaired, and engaged two + servants. My “padrona” inhabited the ground floor. From time to time she + allowed me to visit her there. She was the Contessa Adriano-Rizzoli, the + last of her line. She is the Contessa Adriano-Rizzoli-Maltby. We have been + married fifteen years.’ + </p> + <p> + Maltby looked at his watch. He rose and took tenderly from the table his + great bunch of roses. ‘She is a lineal descendant,’ he said, ‘of the + Emperor Hadrian.’ + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0004" id="link2H_4_0004"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + ‘SAVONAROLA’ BROWN + </h2> + <p> + I like to remember that I was the first to call him so, for, though he + always deprecated the nickname, in his heart he was pleased by it, I know, + and encouraged to go on. + </p> + <p> + Quite apart from its significance, he had reason to welcome it. He had + been unfortunate at the font. His parents, at the time of his birth, lived + in Ladbroke Crescent, XV. They must have been an extraordinarily + unimaginative couple, for they could think of no better name for their + child than Ladbroke. This was all very well for him till he went to + school. But you can fancy the indignation and delight of us boys at + finding among us a newcomer who, on his own confession, had been named + after a Crescent. I don’t know how it is nowadays, but thirty-five years + ago, certainly, schoolboys regarded the possession of ANY Christian name + as rather unmanly. As we all had these encumbrances, we had to wreak our + scorn on any one who was cumbered in a queer fashion. I myself, bearer of + a Christian name adjudged eccentric though brief, had had much to put up + with in my first term. Brown’s arrival, therefore, at the beginning of my + second term, was a good thing for me, and I am afraid I was very prominent + among his persecutors. Trafalgar Brown, Tottenham Court Brown, Bond Brown—what + names did we little brutes NOT cull for him from the London Directory? + Except how miserable we made his life, I do not remember much about him as + he was at that time, and the only important part of the little else that I + do recall is that already he showed a strong sense for literature. For the + majority of us Carthusians, literature was bounded on the north by Whyte + Melville, on the south by Hawley Smart, on the east by the former, and on + the west by the latter. Little Brown used to read Harrison Ainsworth, + Wilkie Collins, and other writers whom we, had we assayed them, would have + dismissed as ‘deep.’ It has been said by Mr. Arthur Symons that ‘all art + is a mode of escape.’ The art of letters did not, however, enable Brown to + escape so far from us as he would have wished. In my third term he did not + reappear among us. His parents had in some sort atoned. Unimaginative + though they were, it seems they could understand a tale of woe laid before + them circumstantially, and had engaged a private tutor for their boy. + Fifteen years elapsed before I saw him again. + </p> + <p> + This was at the second night of some play. I was dramatic critic for the + Saturday Review, and, weary of meeting the same lot of people over and + over again at first nights, had recently sent a circular to the managers + asking that I might have seats for second nights instead. I found that + there existed as distinct and invariable a lot of second-nighters as of + first-nighters. The second-nighters were less ‘showy’; but then, they came + rather to see than to be seen, and there was an air, that I liked, of + earnestness and hopefulness about them. I used to write a great deal about + the future of the British drama, and they, for their part, used to think + and talk a great deal about it. People who care about books and pictures + find much to interest and please them in the present. It is only the + students of the theatre who always fall back, or rather forward, on the + future. Though second-nighters do come to see, they remain rather to hope + and pray. I should have known anywhere, by the visionary look in his eyes, + that Brown was a confirmed second-nighter. + </p> + <p> + What surprises me is that I knew he was Brown. It is true that he had not + grown much in those fifteen years: his brow was still disproportionate to + his body, and he looked young to have become ‘confirmed’ in any habit. But + it is also true that not once in the past ten years, at any rate, had he + flitted through my mind and poised on my conscience. + </p> + <p> + I hope that I and those other boys had long ago ceased from recurring to + him in nightmares. Cordial though the hand was that I offered him, and + highly civilised my whole demeanour, he seemed afraid that at any moment I + might begin to dance around him, shooting out my lips at him and calling + him Seven-Sisters Brown or something of that kind. It was only after + constant meetings at second nights, and innumerable entr’acte talks about + the future of the drama, that he began to trust me. In course of time we + formed the habit of walking home together as far as Cumberland Place, at + which point our ways diverged. I gathered that he was still living with + his parents, but he did not tell me where, for they had not, as I learned + by reference to the Red Book, moved from Ladbroke Crescent. + </p> + <p> + I found his company restful rather than inspiring. His days were spent in + clerkship at one of the smaller Government Offices, his evenings—except + when there was a second night—in reading and writing. He did not + seem to know much, or to wish to know more, about life. Books and plays, + first editions and second nights, were what he cared for. On matters of + religion and ethics he was as little keen as he seemed to be on human + character in the raw; so that (though I had already suspected him of + writing, or meaning to write, a play) my eyebrows did rise when he told me + he meant to write a play about Savonarola. + </p> + <p> + He made me understand, however, that it was rather the name than the man + that had first attracted him. He said that the name was in itself a great + incentive to blank-verse. He uttered it to me slowly, in a voice so much + deeper than his usual voice, that I nearly laughed. For the actual bearer + of the name he had no hero-worship, and said it was by a mere accident + that he had chosen him as central figure. He had thought of writing a + tragedy about Sardanapalus; but the volume of the “Encyclopedia + Britannica” in which he was going to look up the main facts about + Sardanapalus happened to open at Savonarola. Hence a sudden and complete + peripety in the student’s mind. He told me he had read the Encyclopedia’s + article carefully, and had dipped into one or two of the books there + mentioned as authorities. He seemed almost to wish he hadn’t. ‘Facts get + in one’s way so,’ he complained. ‘History is one thing, drama is another. + Aristotle said drama was more philosophic than history because it showed + us what men WOULD do, not just what they DID. I think that’s so true, + don’t you? I want to show what Savonarola WOULD have done if—’ He + paused. + </p> + <p> + ‘If what?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Well, that’s just the point. I haven’t settled that yet. When I’ve + thought of a plot, I shall go straight ahead.’ + </p> + <p> + I said I supposed he intended his tragedy rather for the study than for + the stage. This seemed to hurt him. I told him that what I meant was that + managers always shied at anything without ‘a strong feminine interest.’ + This seemed to worry him. I advised him not to think about managers. He + promised that he would think only about Savonarola. + </p> + <p> + I know now that this promise was not exactly kept by him; and he may have + felt slightly awkward when, some weeks later, he told me he had begun the + play. ‘I’ve hit on an initial idea,’ he said, ‘and that’s enough to start + with. I gave up my notion of inventing a plot in advance. I thought it + would be a mistake. I don’t want puppets on wires. I want Savonarola to + work out his destiny in his own way. Now that I have the initial idea, + what I’ve got to do is to make Savonarola LIVE. I hope I shall be able to + do this. Once he’s alive, I shan’t interfere with him. I shall just watch + him. Won’t it be interesting? He isn’t alive yet. But there’s plenty of + time. You see, he doesn’t come on at the rise of the curtain. A Friar and + a Sacristan come on and talk about him. By the time they’ve finished, + perhaps he’ll be alive. But they won’t have finished yet. Not that they’re + going to say very much. But I write slowly.’ + </p> + <p> + I remember the mild thrill I had when, one evening, he took me aside and + said in an undertone, ‘Savonarola has come on. Alive!’ For me the MS. + hereinafter printed has an interest that for you it cannot have, so + a-bristle am I with memories of the meetings I had with its author + throughout the nine years he took over it. He never saw me without + reporting progress, or lack of progress. Just what was going on, or + standing still, he did not divulge. After the entry of Savonarola, he + never told me what characters were appearing. ‘All sorts of people + appear,’ he would say rather helplessly. ‘They insist. I can’t prevent + them.’ I used to say it must be great fun to be a creative artist; but at + this he always shook his head: ‘I don’t create. THEY do. Savonarola + especially, of course. I just look on and record. I never know what’s + going to happen next.’ He had the advantage of me in knowing at any rate + what had happened last. But whenever I pled for a glimpse he would again + shake his head: + </p> + <p> + ‘The thing MUST be judged as a whole. Wait till I’ve come to the end of + the Fifth Act.’ + </p> + <p> + So impatient did I become that, as the years went by, I used rather to + resent his presence at second nights. I felt he ought to be at his desk. + His, I used to tell him, was the only drama whose future ought to concern + him now. And in point of fact he had, I think, lost the true spirit of the + second-nighter, and came rather to be seen than to see. He liked the + knowledge that here and there in the auditorium, when he entered it, some + one would be saying ‘Who is that?’ and receiving the answer ‘Oh, don’t you + know? That’s “Savonarola” Brown.’ This sort of thing, however, did not + make him cease to be the modest, unaffected fellow I had known. He always + listened to the advice I used to offer him, though inwardly he must have + chafed at it. Myself a fidgety and uninspired person, unable to begin a + piece of writing before I know just how it shall end, I had always been + afraid that sooner or later Brown would take some turning that led + nowhither—would lose himself and come to grief. This fear crept into + my gladness when, one evening in the spring of 1909, he told me he had + finished the Fourth Act. Would he win out safely through the Fifth? + </p> + <p> + He himself was looking rather glum; and, as we walked away from the + theatre, I said to him, ‘I suppose you feel rather like Thackeray when + he’d “killed the Colonel”: you’ve got to kill the Monk.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Not quite that,’ he answered. ‘But of course he’ll die very soon now. A + couple of years or so. And it does seem rather sad. It’s not merely that + he’s so full of life. He has been becoming much more HUMAN lately. At + first I only respected him. Now I have a real affection for him.’ + </p> + <p> + This was an interesting glimpse at last, but I turned from it to my + besetting fear. + </p> + <p> + ‘Haven’t you,’ I asked, ‘any notion of HOW he is to die?’ + </p> + <p> + Brown shook his head. + </p> + <p> + ‘But in a tragedy,’ I insisted, ‘the catastrophe MUST be led up to, step + by step. My dear Brown, the end of the hero MUST be logical and rational.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I don’t see that,’ he said, as we crossed Piccadilly Circus. ‘In actual + life it isn’t so. What is there to prevent a motor-omnibus from knocking + me over and killing me at this moment?’ + </p> + <p> + At that moment, by what has always seemed to me the strangest of + coincidences, and just the sort of thing that playwrights ought to avoid, + a motor-omnibus knocked Brown over and killed him. + </p> + <p> + He had, as I afterwards learned, made a will in which he appointed me his + literary executor. Thus passed into my hands the unfinished play by whose + name he had become known to so many people. + </p> + <p> + I hate to say that I was disappointed in it, but I had better confess + quite frankly that, on the whole, I was. Had Brown written it quickly and + read it to me soon after our first talk about it, it might in some ways + have exceeded my hopes. But he had become for me, by reason of that quiet + and unhasting devotion to his work while the years came and went, a sort + of hero; and the very mystery involving just what he was about had + addicted me to those ideas of magnificence which the unknown is said + always to foster. + </p> + <p> + Even so, however, I am not blind to the great merits of the play as it + stands. It is well that the writer of poetic drama should be a dramatist + and a poet. Here is a play that abounds in striking situations, and I have + searched it vainly for one line that does not scan. What I nowhere feel is + that I have not elsewhere been thrilled or lulled by the same kind of + thing. I do not go so far as to say that Brown inherited his parents’ + deplorable lack of imagination. But I do wish he had been less sensitive + than he was to impressions, or else had seen and read fewer poetic dramas + ancient and modern. Remembering that visionary look in his eyes, + remembering that he was as displeased as I by the work of all living + playwrights, and as dissatisfied with the great efforts of the + Elizabethans, I wonder that he was not more immune from influences. + </p> + <p> + Also, I cannot but wish still that he had faltered in his decision to make + no scenario. There is much to be said for the theory that a dramatist + should first vitalise his characters and then leave them unfettered; but I + do feel that Brown’s misused the confidence he reposed in them. The labour + of so many years has somewhat the air of being a mere improvisation. + Savonarola himself, after the First Act or so, strikes me as utterly + inconsistent. It may be that he is just complex, like Hamlet. He does in + the Fourth Act show traces of that Prince. I suppose this is why he struck + Brown as having become ‘more human.’ To me he seems merely a poorer + creature. + </p> + <p> + But enough of these reservations. In my anxiety for poor Brown’s sake that + you should not be disappointed, perhaps I have been carrying tactfulness + too far and prejudicing you against that for which I specially want your + favour. Here, without more ado, is + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0005" id="link2H_4_0005"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + SAVONAROLA + </h2> + <h3> + A TRAGEDY + </h3> + <p> + By L. Brown + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + ACT I + + SCENE: A Room in the Monastery of San Marco, Florence. + TIME: 1490, A.D. A summer morning. + + Enter the SACRISTAN and a FRIAR. + + SACR. + Savonarola looks more grim to-day + Than ever. Should I speak my mind, I’d say + That he was fashioning some new great scourge + To flay the backs of men. + + FRI. + ‘Tis even so. + Brother Filippo saw him stand last night + In solitary vigil till the dawn + Lept o’er the Arno, and his face was such + As men may wear in Purgatory—nay, + E’en in the inmost core of Hell’s own fires. + + SACR. + I often wonder if some woman’s face, + Seen at some rout in his old worldling days, + Haunts him e’en now, e’en here, and urges him + To fierier fury ‘gainst the Florentines. + + FRI. + Savonarola love-sick! Ha, ha, ha! + Love-sick? He, love-sick? ‘Tis a goodly jest! + The CONfirm’d misogyn a ladies’ man! + Thou must have eaten of some strange red herb + That takes the reason captive. I will swear + Savonarola never yet hath seen + A woman but he spurn’d her. Hist! He comes. + + [Enter SAVONAROLA, rapt in thought.] + + Give thee good morrow, Brother. + + SACR. + And therewith + A multitude of morrows equal-good + Till thou, by Heaven’s grace, hast wrought the work + Nearest thine heart. + + SAV. + I thank thee, Brother, yet + I thank thee not, for that my thankfulness + (An such there be) gives thanks to Heaven alone. + + FRI. [To SACR.] + ‘Tis a right answer he hath given thee. + Had Sav’narola spoken less than thus, + Methinks me, the less Sav’narola he. + As when the snow lies on yon Apennines, + White as the hem of Mary Mother’s robe, + And insusceptible to the sun’s rays, + Being harder to the touch than temper’d steel, + E’en so this great gaunt monk white-visaged + Upstands to Heaven and to Heav’n devotes + The scarped thoughts that crown the upper slopes + Of his abrupt and AUStere nature. + + SACR. + Aye. + + [Enter LUCREZIA BORGIA, ST. FRANCIS OF ASSISI, and LEONARDO + DA VINCI. LUC. is thickly veiled.] + + ST. FRAN. + This is the place. + + LUC. [Pointing at SAV.] + And this the man! [Aside.] And I— + By the hot blood that courses i’ my veins + I swear it ineluctably—the woman! + + SAV. + Who is this wanton? + [LUC. throws back her hood, revealing her face. SAV. starts back, + gazing at her.] + + ST. FRAN. + Hush, Sir! ‘Tis my little sister + The poisoner, right well-belov’d by all + Whom she as yet hath spared. Hither she came + Mounted upon another little sister of mine— + A mare, caparison’d in goodly wise. + She—I refer now to Lucrezia— + Desireth to have word of thee anent + Some matter that befrets her. + + SAV. [To LUC.] + Hence! Begone! + Savonarola will not tempted be + By face of woman e’en tho’ ‘t be, tho’ ‘tis, + Surpassing fair. All hope abandon therefore. + I charge thee: Vade retro, Satanas. + + LEONARDO + Sirrah, thou speakst in haste, as is the way + Of monkish men. The beauty of Lucrezia + Commends, not discommends, her to the eyes + Of keener thinkers than I take thee for. + I am an artist and an engineer, + Giv’n o’er to subtile dreams of what shall be + On this our planet. I foresee a day + When men shall skim the earth i’ certain chairs + Not drawn by horses but sped on by oil + Or other matter, and shall thread the sky + Birdlike. + + LUC. + It may be as thou sayest, friend, + Or may be not. [To SAV.] As touching this our errand, + I crave of thee, Sir Monk, an audience + Instanter. + + FRI. + Lo! Here Alighieri comes. + I had methought me he was still at Parma. + + [Enter DANTE.] + + ST. FRAN. [To DAN.] + How fares my little sister Beatrice? + + DAN. + She died, alack, last sennight. + + ST. FRAN. + Did she so? + If the condolences of men avail + Thee aught, take mine. + + DAN. + They are of no avail. + + SAV. [To LUC.] + I do refuse thee audience. + + LUC. + Then why + Didst thou not say so promptly when I ask’d it? + + SAV. + Full well thou knowst that I was interrupted + By Alighieri’s entry. + [Noise without. Enter Guelfs and Ghibellines fighting.] + What is this? + + LUC. + I did not think that in this cloister’d spot + There would be so much doing. I had look’d + To find Savonarola all alone + And tempt him in his uneventful cell. + Instead o’ which—Spurn’d am I? I am I. + There was a time, Sir, look to ‘t! O damnation! + What is ‘t? Anon then! These my toys, my gauds, + That in the cradle—aye, ‘t my mother’s breast— + I puled and lisped at,—‘Tis impossible, + Tho’, faith, ‘tis not so, forasmuch as ‘tis. + And I a daughter of the Borgias!— + Or so they told me. Liars! Flatterers! + Currying lick-spoons! Where’s the Hell of ‘t then? + ‘Tis time that I were going. Farewell, Monk, + But I’ll avenge me ere the sun has sunk. + [Exeunt LUC., ST. FRAN., and LEONARDO, followed by DAN. SAV., having + watched LUC. out of sight, sinks to his knees, sobbing. FRI. and SACR. + watch him in amazement. Guelfs and Ghibellines continue fighting as + the Curtain falls.] +</pre> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + ACT II + + TIME: Afternoon of same day. + SCENE: Lucrezia’s Laboratory. Retorts, test-tubes, etc. On small + Renaissance table, up c., is a great poison-bowl, the contents of + which are being stirred by the FIRST APPRENTICE. The SECOND APPRENTICE + stands by, watching him. + + SECOND APP. + For whom is the brew destin’d? + + FIRST APP. + I know not. + Lady Lucrezia did but lay on me + Injunctions as regards the making of ‘t, + The which I have obey’d. It is compounded + Of a malignant and a deadly weed + Found not save in the Gulf of Spezia, + And one small phial of ‘t, I am advis’d, + Were more than ‘nough to slay a regiment + Of Messer Malatesta’s condottieri + In all their armour. + + SECOND APP. + I can well believe it. + Mark how the purple bubbles froth upon + The evil surface of its nether slime! + + [Enter LUC.] + + LUC. [To FIRST APP.] + Is ‘t done, Sir Sluggard? + + FIRST APP. + Madam, to a turn. + + LUC. + Had it not been so, I with mine own hand + Would have outpour’d it down thy gullet, knave. + See, here’s a ring of cunningly-wrought gold + + That I, on a dark night, did purchase from + A goldsmith on the Ponte Vecchio. + Small was his shop, and hoar of visage he. + I did bemark that from the ceiling’s beams + Spiders had spun their webs for many a year, + The which hung erst like swathes of gossamer + Seen in the shadows of a fairy glade, + But now most woefully were weighted o’er + With gather’d dust. Look well now at the ring! + Touch’d here, behold, it opes a cavity + Capacious of three drops of yon fell stuff. + Dost heed? Whoso then puts it on his finger + Dies, and his soul is from his body rapt + To Hell or Heaven as the case may be. + Take thou this toy and pour the three drops in. + + [Hands ring to FIRST APP. and comes down c.] + + So, Sav’narola, thou shalt learn that I + Utter no threats but I do make them good. + Ere this day’s sun hath wester’d from the view + Thou art to preach from out the Loggia + Dei Lanzi to the cits in the Piazza. + I, thy Lucrezia, will be upon the steps + To offer thee with phrases seeming-fair + That which shall seal thine eloquence for ever. + O mighty lips that held the world in spell + But would not meet these little lips of mine + In the sweet way that lovers use—O thin, + Cold, tight-drawn, bloodless lips, which natheless I + Deem of all lips the most magnifical + In this our city— + + [Enter the Borgias’ FOOL.] + + Well, Fool, what’s thy latest? + + FOOL + Aristotle’s or Zeno’s, Lady—‘tis neither latest nor last. For, + marry, if the cobbler stuck to his last, then were his latest his last + in rebus ambulantibus. Argal, I stick at nothing but cobble-stones, + which, by the same token, are stuck to the road by men’s fingers. + + LUC. + How many crows may nest in a grocer’s jerkin? + + FOOL + A full dozen at cock-crow, and something less under the dog-star, by + reason of the dew, which lies heavy on men taken by the scurvy. + + LUC. [To FIRST APP.] + Methinks the Fool is a fool. + + FOOL + And therefore, by auricular deduction, am I own twin to the Lady + Lucrezia! + + [Sings.] + + When pears hang green on the garden wall + With a nid, and a nod, and a niddy-niddy-o + Then prank you, lads and lasses all, + With a yea and a nay and a niddy-o. + + But when the thrush flies out o’ the frost + With a nid, [etc.] + ‘Tis time for loons to count the cost, + With a yea [etc.] + + [Enter the PORTER.] + + PORTER + O my dear Mistress, there is one below + Demanding to have instant word of thee. + I told him that your Ladyship was not + At home. Vain perjury! He would not take + Nay for an answer. + + LUC. + Ah? What manner of man + Is he? + + PORTER + A personage the like of whom + Is wholly unfamiliar to my gaze. + Cowl’d is he, but I saw his great eyes glare + From their deep sockets in such wise as leopards + Glare from their caverns, crouching ere they spring + On their reluctant prey. + + LUC. + And what name gave he? + + PORTER [After a pause.] + Something-arola. + + LUC. + Savon-? [PORTER nods.] Show him up. [Exit PORTER.] + + FOOL + If he be right astronomically, Mistress, then is he the greater dunce + in respect of true learning, the which goes by the globe. Argal, + ‘twere better he widened his wind-pipe. + + [Sings.] + Fly home, sweet self, + Nothing’s for weeping, + Hemp was not made + For lovers’ keeping, Lovers’ keeping, + Cheerly, cheerly, fly away. + Hew no more wood + While ash is glowing, + The longest grass + Is lovers’ mowing, + Lovers’ mowing, + Cheerly, [etc.] + + [Re-enter PORTER, followed by SAV. Exeunt PORTER, FOOL, and FIRST and + SECOND APPS.] + + SAV. + I am no more a monk, I am a man + O’ the world. + [Throws off cowl and frock, and stands forth in the costume of a + Renaissance nobleman. LUCREZIA looks him up and down.] + + LUC. + Thou cutst a sorry figure. + + SAV. + That + Is neither here nor there. I love you, Madam. + + LUC. + And this, methinks, is neither there nor here, + For that my love of thee hath vanished, + Seeing thee thus beprankt. Go pad thy calves! + Thus mightst thou, just conceivably, with luck, + Capture the fancy of some serving-wench. + + SAV. + And this is all thou hast to say to me? + + LUC. + It is. + + SAV. + I am dismiss’d? + + LUC. + Thou art. + + SAV. + ‘Tis well. + [Resumes frock and cowl.] + Savonarola is himself once more. + + LUC. + And all my love for him returns to me + A thousandfold! + + SAV. + Too late! My pride of manhood + Is wounded irremediably. I’ll + To the Piazza, where my flock awaits me. + Thus do we see that men make great mistakes + But may amend them when the conscience wakes. + [Exit.] + + LUC. + I’m half avenged now, but only half: + ‘Tis with the ring I’ll have the final laugh! + Tho’ love be sweet, revenge is sweeter far. + To the Piazza! Ha, ha, ha, ha, har! + [Seizes ring, and exit. Through open door are heard, as the Curtain + falls, sounds of a terrific hubbub in the Piazza.] +</pre> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + ACT III + + SCENE: The Piazza. + TIME: A few minutes anterior to close of preceding Act. + + The Piazza is filled from end to end with a vast seething crowd that + is drawn entirely from the lower orders. There is a sprinkling of + wild-eyed and dishevelled women in it. The men are lantern-jawed, + with several days’ growth of beard. Most of them carry rude weapons— + staves, bill-hooks, crow-bars, and the like—and are in as excited a + condition as the women. Some of them are bare-headed, others affect a + kind of Phrygian cap. Cobblers predominate. + + Enter LORENZO DE MEDICI and COSIMO DE MEDICI. They wear cloaks of scarlet + brocade, and, to avoid notice, hold masks to their faces. + + COS. + What purpose doth the foul and greasy plebs + Ensue to-day here? + + LOR. + I nor know nor care. + + COS. + How thrall’d thou art to the philosophy + Of Epicurus! Naught that’s human I + Deem alien from myself. [To a COBBLER.] Make answer, fellow! + What empty hope hath drawn thee by a thread + Forth from the OBscene hovel where thou starvest? + + COB. + No empty hope, your Honour, but the full + Assurance that to-day, as yesterday, + Savonarola will let loose his thunder + Against the vices of the idle rich + And from the brimming cornucopia + Of his immense vocabulary pour + Scorn on the lamentable heresies + Of the New Learning and on all the art + Later than Giotto. + + COS. + Mark how absolute + The knave is! + + LOR. + Then are parrots rational + When they regurgitate the thing they hear! + This fool is but an unit of the crowd, + And crowds are senseless as the vasty deep + That sinks or surges as the moon dictates. + I know these crowds, and know that any man + That hath a glib tongue and a rolling eye + Can as he willeth with them. + [Removes his mask and mounts steps of Loggia.] + Citizens! + [Prolonged yells and groans from the crowd.] + Yes, I am he, I am that same Lorenzo + Whom you have nicknamed the Magnificent. + [Further terrific yells, shakings of fists, brandishings of bill- + hooks, insistent cries of ‘Death to Lorenzo!’ ‘Down with the + Magnificent!’ Cobblers on fringe of crowd, down c., exhibit especially + all the symptoms of epilepsy, whooping-cough, and other ailments.] + You love not me. + [The crowd makes an ugly rush. LOR. appears likely to be dragged down + and torn limb from limb, but raises one hand in nick of time, and + continues:] + Yet I deserve your love. + [The yells are now variegated with dubious murmurs. A cobbler down c. + thrusts his face feverishly in the face of another and repeats, in a + hoarse interrogative whisper, ‘Deserves our love?’] + Not for the sundry boons I have bestow’d + And benefactions I have lavished + Upon Firenze, City of the Flowers, + But for the love that in this rugged breast + I bear you. + [The yells have now died away, and there is a sharp fall in dubious + murmurs. The cobbler down c. says, in an ear-piercing whisper, ‘The + love he bears us,’ drops his lower jaw, nods his head repeatedly, and + awaits in an intolerable state of suspense the orator’s next words.] + I am not a blameless man, + [Some dubious murmurs.] + Yet for that I have lov’d you passing much, + Shall some things be forgiven me. + [Noises of cordial assent.] + There dwells + In this our city, known unto you all, + A man more virtuous than I am, and + A thousand times more intellectual; + Yet envy not I him, for—shall I name him?— + He loves not you. His name? I will not cut + Your hearts by speaking it. Here let it stay + On tip o’ tongue. + [Insistent clamour.] + Then steel you to the shock!— + Savonarola. + [For a moment or so the crowd reels silently under the shock. Cobbler + down c. is the first to recover himself and cry ‘Death to Savonarola!’ + The cry instantly becomes general. LOR. holds up his hand and + gradually imposes silence.] + His twin bug-bears are + Yourselves and that New Learning which I hold + Less dear than only you. + [Profound sensation. Everybody whispers ‘Than only you’ to everybody + else. A woman near steps of Loggia attempts to kiss hem of LOR.‘s + garment.] + Would you but con + With me the old philosophers of Hellas, + Her fervent bards and calm historians, + You would arise and say ‘We will not hear + Another word against them!’ + [The crowd already says this, repeatedly, with great emphasis.] + Take the Dialogues + Of Plato, for example. You will find + A spirit far more truly Christian + In them than in the ravings of the sour-soul’d + Savonarola. + [Prolonged cries of ‘Death to the Sour-Souled Savonarola!’ Several + cobblers detach themselves from the crowd and rush away to read the + Platonic Dialogues. Enter SAVONAROLA. The crowd, as he makes his way + through it, gives up all further control of its feelings, and makes a + noise for which even the best zoologists might not find a good + comparison. The staves and bill-hooks wave like twigs in a storm. + One would say that SAV. must have died a thousand deaths already. He + is, however, unharmed and unruffled as he reaches the upper step of + the Loggia. LOR. meanwhile has rejoined COS. in the Piazza.] + + SAV. + Pax vobiscum, brothers! + [This does but exacerbate the crowd’s frenzy.] + + VOICE OF A COBBLER + Hear his false lips cry Peace when there is no + Peace! + + SAV. + Are not you ashamed, O Florentines, + [Renewed yells, but also some symptoms of manly shame.] + That hearken’d to Lorenzo and now reel + Inebriate with the exuberance + Of his verbosity? + [The crowd makes an obvious effort to pull itself together.] + A man can fool + Some of the people all the time, and can + Fool all the people sometimes, but he cannot + Fool ALL the people ALL the time. + [Loud cheers. Several cobblers clap one another on the back. Cries + of ‘Death to Lorenzo!’ The meeting is now well in hand.] + To-day + I must adopt a somewhat novel course + In dealing with the awful wickedness + At present noticeable in this city. + I do so with reluctance. Hitherto + I have avoided personalities. + But now my sense of duty forces me + To a departure from my custom of + Naming no names. One name I must and shall + Name. + [All eyes are turned on LOR., who smiles uncomfortably.] + No, I do not mean Lorenzo. He + Is ‘neath contempt. + [Loud and prolonged laughter, accompanied with hideous grimaces at LOR. + Exeunt LOR. and COS.] + I name a woman’s name, + [The women in the crowd eye one another suspiciously.] + A name known to you all—four-syllabled, + Beginning with an L. + [Pause. Enter hurriedly LUC., carrying the ring. She stands, + unobserved by any one, on outskirt of crowd. SAV. utters the name:] + Lucrezia! + + LUC. [With equal intensity.] + Savonarola! + [SAV. starts violently and stares in direction of her voice.] + Yes, I come, I come! + [Forces her way to steps of Loggia. The crowd is much bewildered, and + the cries of ‘Death to Lucrezia Borgia!’ are few and sporadic.] + Why didst thou call me? + [SAV. looks somewhat embarrassed.] + What is thy distress? + I see it all! The sanguinary mob + Clusters to rend thee! As the antler’d stag, + With fine eyes glazed from the too-long chase, + Turns to defy the foam-fleck’d pack, and thinks, + In his last moment, of some graceful hind + Seen once afar upon a mountain-top, + E’en so, Savonarola, didst thou think, + In thy most dire extremity, of me. + And here I am! Courage! The horrid hounds + Droop tail at sight of me and fawn away + Innocuous. + [The crowd does indeed seem to have fallen completely under the sway + of LUC.‘s magnetism, and is evidently convinced that it had been about + to make an end of the monk.] + Take thou, and wear henceforth, + As a sure talisman ‘gainst future perils, + This little, little ring. + [SAV. makes awkward gesture of refusal. Angry murmurs from the crowd. + Cries of ‘Take thou the ring!’ ‘Churl!’ ‘Put it on!’ etc. + Enter the Borgias’ FOOL and stands unnoticed on fringe of crowd.] + I hoped you ‘ld like it— + Neat but not gaudy. Is my taste at fault? + I’d so look’d forward to— + [Sob.] No, I’m not crying, + But just a little hurt. + [Hardly a dry eye in the crowd. Also swayings and snarlings + indicative that SAV.‘s life is again not worth a moment’s purchase. + SAV. makes awkward gesture of acceptance, but just as he is about to + put ring on finger, the FOOL touches his lute and sings:—] + + Wear not the ring, + It hath an unkind sting, + Ding, dong, ding. + Bide a minute, + There’s poison in it, + Poison in it, + Ding-a-dong, dong, ding. + + LUC. + The fellow lies. + [The crowd is torn with conflicting opinions. Mingled cries of ‘Wear + not the ring!’ ‘The fellow lies!’ ‘Bide a minute!’ ‘Death to the + Fool!’ ‘Silence for the Fool!’ ‘Ding-a-dong, dong, ding!’ etc.] + + FOOL [Sings.] + Wear not the ring, + For Death’s a robber-king, + Ding, [etc.] + There’s no trinket + Is what you think it, + What you think it, + Ding-a-dong, [etc.] + + [SAV. throws ring in LUC.‘s face. Enter POPE JULIUS II, with Papal + army.] + POPE + Arrest that man and woman! + [Re-enter Guelfs and Ghibellines fighting. SAV. and LUC. are arrested + by Papal officers. Enter MICHAEL ANGELO. ANDREA DEL SARTO appears for a + moment at a window. PIPPA passes. Brothers of the Misericordia go by, + singing a Requiem for Francesca da Rimini. Enter BOCCACCIO, BENVENUTO + CELLINI, and many others, making remarks highly characteristic of + themselves but scarcely audible through the terrific thunderstorm + which now bursts over Florence and is at its loudest and darkest + crisis as the Curtain falls.] +</pre> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + ACT IV + + TIME: Three hours later. + SCENE: A Dungeon on the ground-floor of the Palazzo Civico. + + The stage is bisected from top to bottom by a wall, on one side of + which is seen the interior of LUCREZIA’S cell, on the other that of + SAVONAROLA’S. + + Neither he nor she knows that the other is in the next cell. The + audience, however, knows this. + + Each cell (because of the width and height of the proscenium) is of + more than the average Florentine size, but is bare even to the point + of severity, its sole amenities being some straw, a hunk of bread, and + a stone pitcher. The door of each is facing the audience. Dimish + light. + + LUCREZIA wears long and clanking chains on her wrists, as does also + SAVONAROLA. Imprisonment has left its mark on both of them. SAVONAROLA’S + hair has turned white. His whole aspect is that of a very old, old + man. LUCREZIA looks no older than before, but has gone mad. + + SAV. + Alas, how long ago this morning seems + This evening! A thousand thousand eons + Are scarce the measure of the gulf betwixt + My then and now. Methinks I must have been + Here since the dim creation of the world + And never in that interval have seen + The tremulous hawthorn burgeon in the brake, + Nor heard the hum o’ bees, nor woven chains + Of buttercups on Mount Fiesole + What time the sap lept in the cypresses, + Imbuing with the friskfulness of Spring + Those melancholy trees. I do forget + The aspect of the sun. Yet I was born + A freeman, and the Saints of Heaven smiled + Down on my crib. What would my sire have said, + And what my dam, had anybody told them + The time would come when I should occupy + A felon’s cell? O the disgrace of it + The scandal, the incredible come-down! + It masters me. I see i’ my mind’s eye + The public prints—‘Sharp Sentence on a Monk.’ + What then? I thought I was of sterner stuff + Than is affrighted by what people think. + Yet thought I so because ‘twas thought of me, + And so ‘twas thought of me because I had + A hawk-like profile and a baleful eye. + Lo! my soul’s chin recedes, soft to the touch + As half-churn’d butter. Seeming hawk is dove, + And dove’s a gaol-bird now. Fie out upon ‘t! + + LUC. + How comes it? I am Empress Dowager + Of China—yet was never crown’d. This must + Be seen to. + [Quickly gathers some straw and weaves a crown, which she puts on.] + + SAV. + O, what a degringolade! + The great career I had mapp’d out for me— + Nipp’d i’ the bud. What life, when I come out, + Awaits me? Why, the very Novices + And callow Postulants will draw aside + As I pass by, and say ‘That man hath done + Time!’ And yet shall I wince? The worst of Time + Is not in having done it, but in doing ‘t. + + LUC. + Ha, ha, ha, ha! Eleven billion pig-tails + Do tremble at my nod imperial,— + The which is as it should be. + + SAV. + I have heard + That gaolers oft are willing to carouse + With them they watch o’er, and do sink at last + Into a drunken sleep, and then’s the time + To snatch the keys and make a bid for freedom. + Gaoler! Ho, Gaoler! + [Sounds of lock being turned and bolts withdrawn. Enter the Borgias’ + FOOL, in plain clothes, carrying bunch of keys.] + I have seen thy face + Before. + + FOOL + I saved thy life this afternoon, Sir. + + SAV. + Thou art the Borgias’ Fool? + + FOOL + Say rather, was. + Unfortunately I have been discharg’d + For my betrayal of Lucrezia, + So that I have to speak like other men— + Decasyllabically, and with sense. + An hour ago the gaoler of this dungeon + Died of an apoplexy. Hearing which, + I ask’d for and obtain’d his billet. + + SAV. + Fetch + A stoup o’ liquor for thyself and me. + [Exit GAOLER.] + Freedom! there’s nothing that thy votaries + Grudge in the cause of thee. That decent man + Is doom’d by me to lose his place again + To-morrow morning when he wakes from out + His hoggish slumber. Yet I care not. + [Re-enter GAOLER with a leathern bottle and two glasses.] + Ho! + This is the stuff to warm our vitals, this + The panacea for all mortal ills + And sure elixir of eternal youth. + Drink, bonniman! + [GAOLER drains a glass and shows signs of instant intoxication. SAV. + claps him on shoulder and replenishes glass. GAOLER drinks again, lies + down on floor, and snores. SAV. snatches the bunch of keys, laughs + long but silently, and creeps out on tip-toe, leaving door ajar. + LUC. meanwhile has lain down on the straw in her cell, and fallen + asleep. + Noise of bolts being shot back, jangling of keys, grating of lock, and + the door of LUC.‘S cell flies open. SAV. takes two steps across the + threshold, his arms outstretched and his upturned face transfigured + with a great joy.] + How sweet the open air + Leaps to my nostrils! O the good brown earth + That yields once more to my elastic tread + And laves these feet with its remember’d dew! + [Takes a few more steps, still looking upwards.] + Free!—I am free! O naked arc of heaven, + Enspangled with innumerable—no, + Stars are not there. Yet neither are there clouds! + The thing looks like a ceiling! [Gazes downward.] And this thing + Looks like a floor. [Gazes around.] And that white bundle yonder + Looks curiously like Lucrezia. + [LUC. awakes at sound of her name, and sits up sane.] + There must be some mistake. + + LUC. [Rises to her feet.] + There is indeed! + A pretty sort of prison I have come to, + In which a self-respecting lady’s cell + Is treated as a lounge! + + SAV. + I had no notion + You were in here. I thought I was out there. + I will explain—but first I’ll make amends. + Here are the keys by which your durance ends. + The gate is somewhere in this corridor, + And so good-bye to this interior! + [Exeunt SAV. and LUC. Noise, a moment later, of a key grating in a + lock, then of gate creaking on its hinges; triumphant laughs of + fugitives; loud slamming of gate behind them. + In SAV.‘s cell the GAOLER starts in his sleep, turns his face to the + wall, and snores more than ever deeply. Through open door comes a + cloaked figure.] + + CLOAKED FIGURE + Sleep on, Savonarola, and awake + Not in this dungeon but in ruby Hell! + [Stabs Gaoler, whose snores cease abruptly. Enter POPE JULIUS II, with + Papal retinue carrying torches. MURDERER steps quickly back into + shadow.] + + POPE [To body of GAOLER.] + Savonarola, I am come to taunt + Thee in thy misery and dire abjection. + Rise, Sir, and hear me out. + + MURD. [Steps forward.] + Great Julius, + Waste not thy breath. Savonarola’s dead. + I murder’d him. + + POPE + Thou hadst no right to do so. + Who art thou, pray? + + MURD. + Cesare Borgia, + Lucrezia’s brother, and I claim a brother’s + Right to assassinate whatever man + Shall wantonly and in cold blood reject + Her timid offer of a poison’d ring. + + POPE + Of this anon. + [Stands over body of GAOLER.] + Our present business + Is general woe. No nobler corse hath ever + Impress’d the ground. O let the trumpets speak it! + [Flourish of trumpets.] + This was the noblest of the Florentines. + His character was flawless, and the world + Held not his parallel. O bear him hence + With all such honours as our State can offer. + He shall interred be with noise of cannon, + As doth befit so militant a nature. + Prepare these obsequies. + [Papal officers lift body of GAOLER.] + + A PAPAL OFFICER + But this is not + Savonarola. It is some one else. + + CESARE + Lo! ‘tis none other than the Fool that I + Hoof’d from my household but two hours agone. + I deem’d him no good riddance, for he had + The knack of setting tables on a roar. + What shadows we pursue! Good night, sweet Fool, + And flights of angels sing thee to thy rest! + + POPE + Interred shall he be with signal pomp. + No honour is too great that we can pay him. + He leaves the world a vacuum. Meanwhile, + Go we in chase of the accursed villain + That hath made escapado from this cell. + To horse! Away! We’ll scour the country round + For Sav’narola till we hold him bound. + Then shall you see a cinder, not a man, + Beneath the lightnings of the Vatican! + [Flourish, alarums and excursions, flashes of Vatican lightning, roll + of drums, etc. Through open door of cell is led in a large milk-white + horse, which the POPE mounts as the Curtain falls.] +</pre> + <p> + Remember, please, before you formulate your impressions, that saying of + Brown’s: ‘The thing must be judged as a whole.’ I like to think that + whatever may seem amiss to us in these Four Acts of his would have been + righted by collation with that Fifth which he did not live to achieve. + </p> + <p> + I like, too, to measure with my eyes the yawning gulf between stage and + study. Very different from the message of cold print to our imagination + are the messages of flesh and blood across footlights to our eyes and + ears. In the warmth and brightness of a crowded theatre ‘Savonarola’ + might, for aught one knows, seem perfect. ‘Then why,’ I hear my gentle + readers asking, ‘did you thrust the play on US, and not on a theatrical + manager?’ + </p> + <p> + That question has a false assumption in it. In the course of the past + eight years I have thrust ‘Savonarola’ on any number of theatrical + managers. They have all of them been (to use the technical phrase) ‘very + kind.’ All have seen great merits in the work; and if I added together all + the various merits thus seen I should have no doubt that ‘Savonarola’ was + the best play never produced. The point on which all the managers are + unanimous is that they have no use for a play without an ending. This is + why I have fallen back, at last, on gentle readers, whom now I hear asking + why I did not, as Brown’s literary executor, try to finish the play + myself. Can they never ask a question without a false assumption in it? I + did try, hard, to finish ‘Savonarola.’ + </p> + <p> + Artistically, of course, the making of such an attempt was indefensible. + Humanly, not so. It is clear throughout the play—especially perhaps + in Acts III and IV—that if Brown had not steadfastly in his mind the + hope of production on the stage, he had nothing in his mind at all. + Horrified though he would have been by the idea of letting me kill his + Monk, he would rather have done even this than doom his play to + everlasting unactedness. I took, therefore, my courage in both hands, and + made out a scenario.... + </p> + <p> + Dawn on summit of Mount Fiesole. Outspread view of Florence (Duomo, + Giotto’s Tower, etc.) as seen from that eminence.—NICCOLO + MACHIAVELLI, asleep on grass, wakes as sun rises. Deplores his exile from + Florence, LORENZO’S unappeasable hostility, etc. Wonders if he could not + somehow secure the POPE’S favour. Very cynical. Breaks off: But who are + these that scale the mountain-side? | Savonarola and Lucrezia | Borgia!—Enter + through a trap-door, back c. [trap-door veiled from audience by a grassy + ridge], SAV. and LUC. Both gasping and footsore from their climb. [Still, + with chains on their wrists? or not?]—MACH. steps unobserved behind + a cypress and listens.—SAV. has a speech to the rising sun—Th’ + effulgent hope that westers from the east | Daily. Says that his hope, on + the contrary, lies in escape To that which easters not from out the west, + | That fix’d abode of freedom which men call | America! Very bitter + against POPE.—LUC. says that she, for her part, means To start + afresh in that uncharted land | Which austers not from out the antipod, | + Australia!—Exit MACH., unobserved, down trap-door behind ridge, to + betray LUC. and SAV.—Several longish speeches by SAV. and LUC. Time + is thus given for MACH. to get into touch with POPE, and time for POPE and + retinue to reach the slope of Fiesole. SAV., glancing down across ridge, + sees these sleuth-hounds, points them out to LUC. and cries Bewray’d! LUC. + By whom? SAV. I know not, but suspect | The hand of that sleek serpent + Niccolo | Machiavelli.—SAV. and LUC. rush down c., but find their + way barred by the footlights.—LUC. We will not be ta’en Alive. And + here availeth us my lore | In what pertains to poison. Yonder herb | + [points to a herb growing down r.] Is deadly nightshade. Quick, Monk! + Pluck we it!—SAV. and LUC. die just as POPE appears over ridge, + followed by retinue in full cry.—POPE’S annoyance at being foiled is + quickly swept away on the great wave of Shakespearean chivalry and charity + that again rises in him. He gives SAV. a funeral oration similar to the + one meant for him in Act IV, but even more laudatory and more stricken. Of + LUC., too, he enumerates the virtues, and hints that the whole terrestrial + globe shall be hollowed to receive her bones. Ends by saying: In deference + to this our double sorrow | Sun shall not shine to-day nor shine + to-morrow.—Sun drops quickly back behind eastern horizon, leaving a + great darkness on which the Curtain slowly falls. + </p> + <p> + All this might be worse, yes. The skeleton passes muster. But in the + attempt to incarnate and ensanguine it I failed wretchedly. I saw that + Brown was, in comparison with me, a master. Thinking I might possibly fare + better in his method of work than in my own, I threw the skeleton into a + cupboard, sat down, and waited to see what Savonarola and those others + would do. + </p> + <p> + They did absolutely nothing. I sat watching them, pen in hand, ready to + record their slightest movement. Not a little finger did they raise. Yet I + knew they must be alive. Brown had always told me they were quite + independent of him. Absurd to suppose that by the accident of his own + death they had ceased to breathe.... Now and then, overcome with + weariness, I dozed at my desk, and whenever I woke I felt that these rigid + creatures had been doing all sorts of wonderful things while my eyes were + shut. I felt that they disliked me. I came to dislike them in return, and + forbade them my room. + </p> + <p> + Some of you, my readers, might have better luck with them than I. Invite + them, propitiate them, watch them! The writer of the best Fifth Act sent + to me shall have his work tacked on to Brown’s; and I suppose I could get + him a free pass for the second night. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </p> + <div>*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 1306 ***</div> +</body> +</html> |