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diff --git a/6855.txt b/6855.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..2c2faec --- /dev/null +++ b/6855.txt @@ -0,0 +1,7761 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Ideala, by Sarah Grand + +Copyright laws are changing all over the world. Be sure to check the +copyright laws for your country before downloading or redistributing +this or any other Project Gutenberg eBook. + +This header should be the first thing seen when viewing this Project +Gutenberg file. Please do not remove it. Do not change or edit the +header without written permission. + +Please read the "legal small print," and other information about the +eBook and Project Gutenberg at the bottom of this file. Included is +important information about your specific rights and restrictions in +how the file may be used. You can also find out about how to make a +donation to Project Gutenberg, and how to get involved. + + +**Welcome To The World of Free Plain Vanilla Electronic Texts** + +**eBooks Readable By Both Humans and By Computers, Since 1971** + +*****These eBooks Were Prepared By Thousands of Volunteers!***** + + +Title: Ideala + +Author: Sarah Grand + +Release Date: November, 2004 [EBook #6855] +[Yes, we are more than one year ahead of schedule] +[This file was first posted on February 2, 2003] + +Edition: 10 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII, with a few ISO-8859-1 characters + +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK IDEALA *** + + + + +Produced by Joshua Hutchinson, Tom Allen, David Moynihan, Charles Franks +and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team. + + + + +IDEALA + +BY SARAH GRAND + + "L'esprit ne nous garantit pas + des sottises de notre humeur."--VAUVENARGUES + + + + +PREFACE + + +You will ask me, perhaps, even you who are all charity, why parts of +this book are what they are. I can only answer with another question: +Why are we what we are? But I warn you that it would not be fair to +take any of Ideala's opinions, here given, as final. Much of what she +thought was the mere effervescence of a strong mind in a state of +fermentation, a mind passing successively through the three stages of +the process; the _vinous_, alcoholic, or excitable stage; the +_acetous_, jaundiced, or embittered stage; and the _putrefactive_, +or unwholesome stage; and also embodying, at different times, the +characteristics of all three. But, even during its worst phase, it was +an earnest mind, seeking the truth diligently, and not to be blamed +for stumbling upon good and bad together by the way. It is, in fact, +not a perfect, but a transitional state which I offer for your +consideration, a state which has its repulsive features, but which, it +may be hoped, would result in a beautiful deposit, when at last the +inevitable effervescence had subsided. + +But why exhibit the details of the process, you may ask. To encourage +others, of course. What help is there in the contemplation of +perfection ready made? It only disheartens us. We should lay down our +arms, we should struggle no longer, we should be hopeless, despairing, +reckless, if we never had a glimpse of growth, of those "stepping- +stones of their dead selves" upon which men mount to higher things. The +imperfections must be studied, because it is only from the details of +the process that anything can be learned. Putting aside the people who +criticise, not with a view to mending matters, but because a + + ... low desire + Not to seem lowest makes them level all; + +the people who judge, who condemn, who have no mercy on any faults and +failings but their own, and who, + + ... if they find + Some stain or blemish in a name of note, + Not grieving that their greatest are so small, + Inflate themselves with some insane delight, + +and would ostracise a neighbour for the first offence by ruling that +one mistake must mar a life--anybody's life but their own, of course; +who have no peace in themselves, no habit of sweet thought; whose lives +are one long agony of excitement, objection, envy, hate, and unrest; +the decently clad devils of society who may be known by their eternal +carping, and who are already in torment, and doing their utmost to drag +others after them. Putting them aside, as any one may who has the +courage to face them--for they are terrible cowards--and taking the +best of us, and the best intentioned among us, we find that all are apt +to make some one trait in the characters, some one trick in the +manners, some one incident in the lives of people we meet the text of +an objection to the whole person. And a state of objection is a +miserable state, and a dangerous one, because it stops our growth by +robbing us of half our power to love, in which lies all our strength, +and which, with the delight of being loved, is the one thing worth +living for. When we know in ourselves that love is heaven, and hate is +hell, and all the intervals of like and dislike are antechambers to +either, we possess the key to joy and sorrow, by which alone we can +attain to the mystery that may not be mentioned here, but beyond which +ecstasy awaits us. + +This is why such details are necessary. + +Doctors-spiritual must face the horrors of the dissecting-room, and +learn before they can cure or teach; and even we, poor feeble +creatures, who have no strength, however great our desire, to do +either, can help at least a little by not hindering, if we attend to +our own mental health, which we shall do all the better for knowing +something of our moral anatomy, and the diseases to which it is liable. +We hate and despise in our ignorance, and grow weak; but love and pity +thrive on knowledge, and to love and pity we owe all the beauty of +life, and all our highest power. + +_"It is that life of custom and accident in which many of us pass +much of our time in this world; that life in which we do what we have +not purposed, and speak what we do not mean, and assent to what we do +not understand; that life which is overlaid by the weight of things +external to it, and is moulded by them, instead of assimilating them; +that which, instead of growing and blossoming under any wholesome dew, +is crystallised over with it, as with hoar frost, and becomes to the +true life what an arborescence is to a tree, a candied agglomeration of +thoughts and habits foreign to it, brittle, obstinate, and icy, which +can neither bend nor grow, but must be crushed and broken to bits if it +stands in our way. All men are liable to be in some degree frost-bitten +in this sort; all are partly encumbered and crusted over with idle +matter; only, if they have real life in them, they are always breaking +this bark away in noble rents, until it becomes, like the black strips +upon the birch tree, only a witness of their own inward strength."_ +--RUSKIN. + + + + +IDEALA + + + + +CHAPTER I. + +She came among us without flourish of trumpets. She just slipped into +her place, almost unnoticed, but once she was settled there it seemed +as if we had got something we had wanted all our lives, and we should +have missed her as you would miss the thrushes in the spring, or any +other sweet familiar thing. But what the secret of her charm was I +cannot say. She was full of inconsistencies. She disliked ostentation, +and never wore those ornamental fidgets ladies delight in, but she +would take a piece of priceless lace to cover her head when she went +to water her flowers. And she said rings were a mistake; if your hands +were ugly they drew attention to them, if pretty they hid their +beauty; yet she wore half-a-dozen worthless ones habitually for the +love of those who gave them, to her. It was said that she was striking +in appearance, but cold and indifferent in manner. Some, on whom she +had never turned her eyes, called her repellent. But it was noticed +that men who took her down to dinner, or had any other opportunity of +talking to her, were never very positive in, what they said of her +afterwards. She made every one, men and women alike, feel, and she did +it unconsciously. Without effort, without eccentricity, without +anything you could name or define, she impressed you, and she held you +--or at least she held _me_, always--expectant. Nothing about her ever +seemed to be of the present. When she talked she made you wonder what +her past had been, and when she was silent you began to speculate +about her future. But she did not talk much as a rule, and when she +did speak it was always some subject of interest, some fact that she +wanted to ascertain accurately, or some beautiful idea, that occupied +her; she had absolutely no small talk for any but her most intimate +friends, whom she was wont at times to amuse with an endless stock of +anecdotes and quaint observations; and this made people of limited +capacity hard on her. Some of these called her a cold, ambitious, +unsympathetic woman; and perhaps, from their point of view, she was +so. She certainly aspired to something far above them, and had nothing +but scorn for the dead level of dull mediocrity from which they would +not try to rise. + +"To be distinguished among these people," she once said, "it is only +necessary to have one's heart + + Dowered with the hate of hate, the scorn of scorn, + The love of love. + +There is no need to _do_ anything; if you have the right _feeling_ you +may be as passive as a cow, and still excel them all, for they never +thrill to a noble thought." + +"Then, pity them," I said. + +"No, despise them," she answered. "Pity is for affliction, for such +shortcomings as are hereditary and can hardly be remedied--for the +taint in nature which is all but hopeless. But these people are not +afflicted. They could do better if they would. They know the higher +walk, and deliberately pursue the lower. Their whole feeling is for +themselves, and such things as have power to move them through the +flesh only. I would almost rather sin on the impulse of a generous but +misguided nature, and have the power to appreciate and the will to be +better, than live a perfect, loveless woman, caring only for myself, +like these. I should do more good." + +They called Ideala unsympathetic, yet I have known her silent from +excess of sympathy. She could walk with you, reading your heart and +soul, sorrowing and rejoicing with you, and make you feel without a +word that she did so. It was this power to sympathise, and the longing +she had to find good in everything, that made her forgive the faults +that were patent in a nature with which she was finally brought into +contact, for the sake of the virtues which she discovered hidden away +deep down under a slowly hardening crust of that kind of self- +indulgence which mars a man. + +But her own life was set to a tune that admitted of endless variations. +Sometimes it was difficult even for those who knew her best to detect +the original melody among the clashing cords that concealed it; but, +let it be hidden as it might, one felt that it would resolve itself +eventually, through many a jarring modulation and startling cadence, +perhaps, back to the perfect key. + +I saw her first at a garden party. She scarcely noticed me when we were +introduced. There were great masses of white cloud drifting up over the +blue above the garden, and she was wholly occupied with them when she +could watch them without rudeness to those about her; and even when she +was obliged to look away, I could see that she was still thinking of +the sky. "Do you live much in cloudland?" I asked, and felt for a +moment I had said a silly thing; but she turned to me quickly, and +looked at me for the first time as if she saw me--and when I say she +looked at me, I mean something more than an ordinary look, for Ideala's +eyes were a wonder, affecting you as a poem does which has power to +exalt. + +"Ah, you feel it too," she said. "Are they not beautiful? Will you sit +beside me here? You can see the river as well--down there, beneath the +trees." + +I thought she would have talked after that, but she did not. When I +spoke to her once or twice she answered absently; and presently she +forgot me altogether, and began to sing to herself softly: + + Flow down, cold rivulet, to the sea, + Thy tribute wave deliver; + No more by thee my steps shall be + For ever and for ever. + +Then suddenly recollecting herself, she stopped, and exclaimed, in much +confusion, "O please forgive me! That stupid thing has been running in +my head all day--and it is a way I have. I always forget people and +begin to sing." + +She did not see in the least that her apology might have been +considered an adding of insult to injury, and, of course, I was careful +not to let her know that I thought it so, although I must confess that +for a moment I felt just a trifle aggrieved. I thought my presence had +bored her, and was surprised to see, when I got up to go, that she +would rather have had me stay. + +She cared little for people in general, and had few likings. It was +love with her if anything; but those whom she loved once she loved +always, never changing in her affection for them, however badly they +might treat her. And she had the power of liking people for themselves, +regardless of their feeling for her; indeed, her indifference on this +score was curious. I once heard a lady say to her: "You are one of the +few young married ladies whom I dare chaperon in these degenerate days. +No degree of admiration or worship ever seems to touch you. Is it real +or pretended, your unconsciousness?" + +"Unconsciousness of what?" + +"Of the feeling you excite." + +"The feeling _I_ excite?" Ideala seemed to think a moment; then she +answered gravely: "I do not think I am conscious of anything that +relates to myself, personally, in my intercourse with people. They are +ideas to me for the most part--men especially so." + +That way she had of forgetting people's presence was one of her +peculiarities. If she liked you she was content just to have you there, +but she never showed it except by a regretful glance when you went +away. She was very absent, too. One day I found her with a big, awkward +volume on her knee, heated, excited, and evidently put out. + +"Is anything the matter?" I wanted to know. + +"O yes," she answered desperately; "I've lost my pen, and I'm writing +for the mail." + +"Why, where are you looking for it?" I asked. + +She glanced at me, and then at the book. + +"I--I believe," she faltered, "I was looking for it among the p's in +the French dictionary." + +On another occasion I watched her revising a manuscript. As she wrote +her emendations she gummed them on over the old copy, and she was so +absorbed that at last she put the gum-brush into the ink-bottle. +Discovering her mistake, she gave a little disconcerted sort of laugh, +and took the brush away to wash it. She returned presently, examining +it critically to see if it were perfectly cleansed, and having +satisfied herself, she carefully put it back in the ink-bottle. + +But perhaps the funniest instance of this peculiarity of hers was one +that happened in the Grosvenor Gallery on a certain occasion. She had +been busy with her catalogue, doing the pictures conscientiously, and +not talking at all, when suddenly she burst out laughing. + +"Do you know what I have been doing?" she said. "I wanted to know who +that man is"--indicating a gentleman of peculiar appearance in the +crowd--"and I have been looking all over him for his number, that I +might hunt up his name in the catalogue!" + +Her way of seeing analogies as plausible as the obvious relation of p +to pen, and of acting on wholly wrong conclusions deduced from most +unexceptionable premises, was another characteristic. She always blamed +her early education, or rather want of education, for it. "If I had +been taught to think," she said, "when my memory was being burdened +with historical anecdotes torn from the text, and other useless scraps +of knowledge, I should be able to see both sides of a subject, and +judge rationally, now. As it is, I never see more than one side at a +time, and when I have mastered that, I feel like the old judge in some +Greek play, who, when he had heard one party to a suit, begged that the +other would not speak as it would only poggle what was then clear to +him." + +But in this Ideala was not quite fair to herself. + +It was not always--although, unfortunately, it was oftenest at critical +moments--that she was beset with this inability to see more than one +side of a subject at a time. The odd thing about it was that one never +knew which side, the pathetic or the humorous, would strike her. +Generally, however, it was the one that related least to herself +personally. This self-forgetfulness, with a keen sense of the +ludicrous, led her sometimes, when she had anything amusing to relate, +to overlook considerations which would have kept other people silent. + +"I saw a pair of horses running away with a heavy wagon the other day," +she told us once. "It was in Cross Street, and there was a child in the +way--there always is a child in the way!--and, as there was no one else +to do it, I ran into the road to remove that child. I had to pull it +aside quickly, and there was no time to say 'Allow me'--in fact, there +was no time for anything--and in my hurry I lost my balance and fell in +the mud, and the wagon came tearing over me. It was an unpleasant +sensation, but I wasn't hurt, you know; neither the wheels nor the +horses touched me. I got very dirty, though, and I have no doubt I +looked as ridiculous as I felt, and for that I expected to be tenderly +dealt with; but when I went to ask after the child, a few days later, a +neighbour told me that its mother was out, and it was a good thing too, +as she had been heard to declare she would 'go for that lady the next +time she saw her, for flingin' of her bairn about!'" + +When she had told the story, Ideala was horrified to find that the +fact, which she had overlooked, of her having risked her life to save +the child struck us all much more forcibly than the ingratitude that +amused her. + +Although her sense of humour was keen, it was not always, as I said +before, the humorous side of a subject that struck her. I found her one +day looking utterly miserable. + +"What has happened?" I asked. "You look sad." + +"And I feel sad," she answered. "I was just thinking what a pity it is +those gay, pleasure-loving, flower-clad people of Hawaii are dying +out!" + +She was quite in earnest, and could not be made to see that there was +anything droll in her mourning poignantly for a people so remote. + +Another instance of her absent-mindedness recurs to me. The incident +was related at our house one evening, in Ideala's presence, by Mr. +Lloyd, a mutual friend. A clever drawing by another friend, of Ideala +trying to force a cabman to take ten shillings for a half-crown fare-- +one of the great fears of her life being the chance of not giving +people of that kind as much as they expected--had caused Ideala to +protest that she _did_ understand money matters. + +"O yes, we all know that your capacity for business is quite +extraordinary," Mr. Lloyd said, with a smile that meant something. And +then, addressing us all, he asked: "Did I ever tell you about her +coming to borrow five shillings from me one day? Shall I tell, Ideala?" + +"You may, if you like," Ideala answered, getting very red. "But the +story is not interesting." + +We all began to be anxious to hear it. + +"Judge for yourselves," Mr. Lloyd said. "One day the head clerk came +into my private room at the Bank, looking perplexed and discomfited. +'Please, sir' he said, 'a lady wishes to see you.' 'A lady,' I +answered. 'Ladies have no business here. What does she want?' 'She +would not say, sir, and she would not send in her name. She said it did +not matter.' I began to wonder what I had been doing. 'What is she +like?' I asked. He looked all round as if in search of a simile, and +then he answered: 'Well, sir, she's more like a picture than anything.' +'Show her in,' I said." + +Here the story was interrupted by a shout of laughter. He laughed a +little himself. + +"I should have been polite in any case," he declared, apologetically. +"The clerk ushered in a lady whose extreme embarrassment made me sorry +for her. She changed colour half-a-dozen times in as many seconds, and +then she hurled her errand at my head in these words, without any +previous preparation to break the blow: 'Mr. Lloyd, can you lend me +five shillings?' and before I had recovered she continued--'I came in +by train this morning, and I've lost my purse, and can't get back if +you won't help me--at least I think I've lost my purse. I took it out +to give sixpence to a beggar--and--and here is the sixpence!' and she +held it out to me. She had given her purse to the beggar and carried +the sixpence off in triumph. You may well say 'Oh, Ideala!'" + +"And Mr. Lloyd was so very good as to take me to the station, and see +me into the train," Ideala murmured; "and he gave me his bank-book to +amuse me on the journey, and carried Huxley's _Elementary Physiology_, +which I had come in to buy, off in triumph!" + +But with all her self-forgetfulness there were moments in which she +showed that she must have thought deeply about herself, weighing her +own individuality against others, to see what place she occupied in her +own age, and how she stood with regard to the ages that had gone +before; yet even this she seemed to have done in a selfless way, having +apparently examined herself coolly, critically, fairly, as she might +have examined any other specimen of humanity in which she felt an +interest, unbiassed by any special regard. + +"People always want to know if I write, or paint, or play, or what I +do," she once said to me. "They all expect me to do something. My +function is not to do, but to be. I make no poetry. I am a poem--if you +read me aright." + +And again, in a moment of despondency, she said, "I am one of the weary +women of the nineteenth century. No other age could have produced me." + +When she said she did nothing she must have meant she was not great in +anything, for her time was all occupied, and those things in which she +was interested were never so well done without her help. If any crying +abuse were brought to light in the old Cathedral city; if any large +measure of reform were set on foot; if the local papers suddenly became +eloquent in favour of some good movement, and adroit in their powers of +persuasion; if burdens had to be lifted from the oppressed, and the +weak defended against great odds, you might be sure that Ideala was +busy, and her work could be detected in it all. And she was especially +active when efforts were being made to find amusement for the people. +"That is what they want, poor things," she would say. "Their lives are +such a dreary round of dull monotonous toil, and they have so little +sun to cheer them. They ought to be taught to laugh, and have the +brightness put into themselves, and then it would seem as if they had +been relieved of half the atmospheric pressure beneath which they +groan. Think what your own life would be if day day after day brought +you nothing but toil; if you had nothing to look back upon, nothing to +look forward to, but the labour that makes a machine of you, deadening +the power to care, and holding mind and body in the galling bondage and +weariness of everlasting routine." + +She thought laughter an unfailing specific for most of the ills of +life. "We can none of us be thankful enough for the sensation," she +said. "Nothing relieves the mental oppression, which does such moral +and physical harm, like mirth; of course, I mean legitimate laughter, +not levity, nor the ill-natured rejoicing of small minds in such +subjects for sorrow as their neighbours' faults, follies, and mistakes. +What I am thinking of is the pleasure without excitement which there is +in sympathetic intercourse with those large, loving natures that +elevate, and the laughter without bitterness which is always a part of +it." + +Like most people whose goodness is neither affected nor acquired, but +natural to them, Ideala saw no merit in her own works, and would not +take the credit she deserved for them; nor would she have had her good +deeds known at all if she could have helped it. But knowledge of these +things leaks out somehow, although probably not a third of what she did +will ever be even suspected. + + + + +CHAPTER II. + + +Speaking to me of women one day, she said: "Certainly they are +_vainqueurs des vainqueurs de la terre_ in any sense they choose; but +the pity of it is that they do not choose to exercise their power for +good to any great extent. I agree with Madame Bernier--if it were +Madame Bernier--who said: _'L'ignorance où les femmes sont de leurs +devoirs, l'abus qu'elles font de leur puissance, leur font perdre le +plus beau et le plus précieux de leurs avantages, celui d'être +utiles.'_ But hundreds of other quotations will occur to you, written +by thoughtful men and women in all ages, and all to the same effect; +it is impossible to over-estimate their restraining and refining +influence as the companions and mothers of men--and almost equally +impossible to make them realise their responsibility or care to use +their strength. I would have every woman feel herself a power for good +in the land--and if only half of them did, what a world of difference +it would make to everybody's health and happiness! But women should, +as a rule, be silent powers. There are, of course, occasions when they +_must_ speak--and all honour to those who do so when the need +arises--but our influence is most felt when it is quietly persistent +and unobtrusive. There is no social reform that we might not +accomplish if we agreed among ourselves to do it, and then worked, +each of us using her influence to that end in her own family, and +among her own friends, only. I once induced some ladies to try a +little experiment to prove this. At that time the gentlemen of our +respective families were all wearing a certain kind of necktie. We +agreed to banish the necktie, and in a month it had disappeared, and +not one of those gentlemen was ever able to tell us why he had given +it up. We don't deserve much credit for our ingenuity, though," she +added, lightly. "Men are so easily managed. All you have to do is to +feed them and flatter them." + +"I think that hardly fair," I commented. + +"What? The feeding and flattering?" + +"No, the conspiracy." + +"Well, that occurred to me too--afterwards, when it was too late to do +anything but repent. At the time, I own, I thought of nothing but the +success of the experiment as an example and proof of our will-power." + +"You considered one side of the subject only, as per usual, when you +are eager and interested," I softly insinuated. + +She frowned at me thoughtfully; then, after a pause, she resumed: "Ah, +yes! You may be sure there is a great deal of good motive power in +women, but most of it is lost for want of knowledge and means to apply +it. It works like the sails of a windmill not attached to the +machinery, which whirl round and round with incredible velocity and +every evidence of strength, but serve no better purpose than to show +which way the wind blows." + +This question of the position of women in our own day occupied her a +good deal. + +"The women of my time," she said to me once, "are in an unsettled +state, it may be a state of transition. Much that made life worth +having has lost its charm for them. The old interests pall upon them. +Occupations that used to be the great business of their lives are now +thought trivial, and are left to children and to servants. Principles +accepted since the beginning of time have been called in question. +Weariness and distrust have taken the place of peace and content, and +doubt and dissatisfaction are the order of the day. Women want +something; they are determined to have it, too; and doubtless they +would get it if only they knew what it is that they want. They are +struggling to arrive at something, but opinions differ widely as to +what that something ought to be; and the result is that they have +divided themselves into three classes, not exactly distinct: they +dovetail into each other so nicely that it is hard to say where the +influence of the one set ends and the other begins. There are, first of +all, the women who in their struggles for political power have done so +much to unsex us. They have tried to force themselves into unnatural +positions, and the consequence has been about as pleasing and edifying +as an attempt to make a goose sing. They clamour for change, mistaking +change for progress. But don't let the puzzling dovetail confuse you. +The people I speak of are not those who have so nobly devoted +themselves to the removal of the wrongs of women, though they work +together. But the object of all this class is good. They wish to raise +us, and what they want, for the most part, is a little more common +sense--as is shown in their system of education, for instance, which +cultivates the intellectual at the expense of the physical powers, +girls being crammed as boys (to their great let and hindrance also) are +crammed, just when nature wants all their strength to assist their +growth; the result of which becomes periodically apparent when a number +of amiable young ladies are let loose on society without hair or teeth. +But the thing they clamour for most is equality. There is a great deal +to be said in favour of placing the sexes on an equal footing, and if +social conventions are stronger and more admirable than natural +instincts--and doubtless they are--the thing should be done; but the +innate perversity of women make it difficult--for, I know this, that +whatever the position of a true woman, and however much she may clamour +for equality with men in general, the man she herself loves in +particular will always be her master. + +"But such ridicule as this party has brought upon itself would not have +mattered so much had nothing worse come of it. Unfortunately, there +seems to be no neutral ground for us women: we either do good or harm; +and I hold that first class responsible for the existence of those +people who clamour for change of any kind, regardless of the +consequences. Their ideas, shorn of all good intention, have resulted +in the production of a new creature; and have made it possible for +women who have the faults of both sexes and the virtues of neither to +mix in society. The bad work done by the influence of this second class +is only too apparent. It is to them we owe the fact that there is less +refinement, less courtesy, less of the really good breeding which shows +itself in kindness and consideration for others, and, Heaven help us! +even less modesty among us now than there was some years ago." + +"These are the women, too, who spend their time and talents on the +production of cleverly written books of the most corrupt tendency. +Their works are a special feature of the age, and are doubly dangerous +because they have the art of making the worst ideas attractive, by +presenting them in forms too refined and beautiful to shock even the +most delicate." + +"Besides these two classes there is the third, which is more difficult +to define. It is the one on which our hope rests. The women who belong +to it are dissatisfied like the others, but they are less decided, and +therefore their dissatisfaction takes no positive shape. They also want +something, and go this way and that as if in search of it, but they are +not really trying for anything in particular. They do good and evil +indiscriminately, and for the same motive: they find distraction in +doing something--anything. But the desire to do good is latent in all +of them; show them the way, and it will make itself apparent." + +"But what is the reason of all this dissatisfaction?" I asked. "Why +don't you go to your husbands and brothers to be set right, as of old?" + +"Ah! when you ask me that, you get to the first cause of the trouble," +she answered. "The truth is that we have lost faith in our men. They +claim some superiority for themselves, but we find none. The age +requires people to practise what they preach, and yet expects us to be +guided by the counsels of those whose own lives, we know, have rendered +them contemptible. They are not fit to guide us, and we are not fit to +go alone. I suppose we shall come to an understanding eventually-- +either they must be raised or we must be lowered. It is for the death +of manliness we women mourn. We marry, and find we have taken upon +ourselves misery, and lifelong widowhood of the mind and moral nature. +Do you wonder that some of us ask: Why should we keep ourselves pure if +impurity is to be our bedfellow? You make us breathe corruption, and +wonder that we lose our health." + +"But why do you talk of the death of manliness? Men have as much +courage now as they ever had." + +"Oh, of course--mere animal courage; there is plenty of that, but that +is nothing. A cat will fight for her kittens. It is moral courage that +makes a man, and where do you find it now? Are men self-denying? Are +they scrupulous to a shadow of the truth? Are they disinterested? How +many _gentlemen_ have you met in the course of your life? I know about +half a dozen." + +"What do you call a gentleman, then?" I asked in surprise. "What makes +a man one?" + +"Why, truth and affection, of course," she answered; "the one is the +most ennobling, and the other the most refining quality. As a child I +used to think ladies and gentlemen never told stories; it was only the +common people who were dis-honourable, and that was what made them +common. _Hélas_! one lives and learns!" + +"I don't think the world is worse than it ever was," I said, drily. + +"Not worse, when we know so much better!" she answered with scorn. +"Not worse when we have learnt to see so clearly, and most of us +acknowledge that + + It is our will + Which thus enchains us to permitted ill! + +It is nearly two thousand years since Christianity began its work, and +it is still unaccomplished. Do you know, I sometimes think that all +this talk of virtue, and teaching of religion, is a kind of practical +joke, gravely kept up to find a church parade of respectability for +States, a profession for hundreds, and a means of influencing men by +making a tender point in their nervous system to be touched, as with a +rod, when necessary--a rod that is held over them always _in terrorem_! +We all talk about morality; but try some measure of reform, and you +will find that every man sees the necessity of it for his neighbour +only. Goodness is happiness, and sin is disease. The truism is as old +as the hills, and as evident; but if men were in earnest, do you +suppose they would go on for ever choosing sin and its ghastly +companion as they do? Do you know, there are moments when I think that +even their reverence for the purity of women is a sham. For why do +they keep us pure? Is it not to make each morsel more delicious for +themselves, that sense and sentiment may be satisfied together, and +their own pleasure made more complete? Individuals may be in earnest, +but the great bulk of mankind is a hypocrite. When the history of this +age is written, moral cowardice and self-indulgence will be found to +have been the most striking characteristics of the people. There is no +truth to be found in the inward parts." + +But Ideala did not often adopt this tone, and she would herself check +other people who were preparing to assume it. She had a favourite +quotation, adroitly mangled, to suit such occasions. "When we begin to +inculcate morality as a science, we must discard moralising as a +method," she declared; and she would also beg us to stop the hysteria. +"It is the mortal malady of all well-beloved measures," she said; "and +it spreads to an epidemic if the infected ones are not suppressed at +once to prevent contagion." + +But, although she spoke so positively when taken out of herself by the +interest and importance of a subject, she had no very high opinion of +her own judgment and power to decide. A little more self-esteem would +have been good for her; she was too diffident, "I have not come across +people on whose knowledge I could rely," she told me. "I have been +obliged to study alone, and to form my opinions for myself out of such +scraps of information as I have had the capacity to acquire from +reading and observation. I am, therefore, always prepared to find +myself mistaken, even when I am surest about a thing--for + + What am I? + An infant crying in the night: + An infant crying for the light: + And with no language but a cry! + +In practice, too, she frequently, albeit unconsciously, diverged from +her theories to some considerable extent; as on one occasion, when, +after talking long and earnestly of the sin of selfishness, she +absently picked up a paper I had just cut with intent to enjoy myself, +took it away with her to the drawing-room, and sat on it for the rest +of the morning--as I afterwards heard. + + + + +CHAPTER III. + + +Ideala held that dignity and calm are essential in a woman, but, like +the rest of the world, she found it hard to attain to her own standard +of excellence. Her bursts of enthusiasm were followed by fits of +depression, and these again by periods of indifference, when it was +hard to rouse her to interest in anything. She always said, and was +probably right, that want of proper discipline in childhood was the +reason of this variableness, which she deplored, but could neither +combat nor conceal. Temperament must also have had something to do with +it. Her nervous system was too highly strung, she was too sensitive, +too emotional, too intense. She reflected phases of feeling with which +she was brought into contact as a lake reflects the sky above it, and +the bird that skims across it, and the boats that rest upon its breast; +yet, like the lake's, her own nature remained unchanged; it might be +darkened by shadows, and lashed by tempests till it raged, but the pure +element showed divinely even in its wrath, and the passion of it was +expended always to some good end. + +But even her love of the beautiful was carried to excess. It was a +passion with her which would, in a sturdier age, have been considered a +vice. She delighted in the scent of flowers, the song of the thrushes +in the spring; colour, and beautiful forms. Doubtless the emotion they +caused her was pure enough, and it was natural that, highly bred, +cultivated, and refined as she was, she should feel these delicate, +sensuous pleasures in a greater degree than lower natures do. There was +danger, however, in the over-education of the senses, which made their +ready response inevitable, but neither limited the subjects, nor +regulated the degree, to which they should respond. But it would be +hard in any case to say where cultivation of love for the beautiful +should end, and to determine the exact point at which the result ceases +to be intellectual and begins to be sensual. + +I have sat and watched Ideala lolling at an open window in the summer. +The house stood on a hill, a river wound through the valley below, and +beyond the river--the land sloped up again, green and dotted with +trees, to a range of low hills, crested with a fringe of wood. + +"Do you know what there is beyond those hills?" Ideala asked me once, +abruptly. "_I_ don't know; but I love to believe that the sea is +there, and that the sun is sinking into it now. Sometimes I fancy I +can hear it murmur." + +And then followed a long silence. And the scent of mignonette and roses +blew in upon her, and the twilight deepened, and I saw her grow pale +with pleasure when the nightingale began to sing--and then I stole away +and never was missed. She would lie in a long chair for hours like +that, scarcely moving, and never speaking. At first I used to wonder +what she thought about; but afterwards I knew that at such times she +did not think, she only felt. + +I have some pictures of her as she was then, dressed in a gown of some +quaint blue and white Japanese material, with her white throat bare--I +was just going to catalogue her charms, but it seems indelicate to +describe a woman, point by point, like a horse that is for sale. I have +some other pictures of her, too, as she appeared to me one hot summer +when I was painting a picture by the river, and she used to come down +the towing-path to watch me work, and sit beside me on the grass for +hours together, talking, reading aloud, reciting, or silent, according +to her mood, but always interesting. It was then I learnt to know her +best. And I am always glad to think of her as I used to see her then, +coming towards me in one particular grey frock she wore, tight-fitting +and perfect, yet with no detail evident. It was like an expression of +herself, that dress, so quiet to all seeming, and yet so rich in +material, and so complex in design. The wonder and the beauty of it +grew upon you, and never failed of its effect. + + + + +CHAPTER IV. + + +When I first knew Ideala her religious opinions were all unsettled. "I +neither believe nor disbelieve," she told me; "I am in a state of don't +know; or perhaps it would be more exact to say that I both doubt and +believe at one and the same time. I go indifferently to either church, +Protestant or Catholic, and am thankful when any note of music, or +thrill of feeling in the voice, or noble sentiment, elevates me so that +I can pray. But I am told that both Catholics and Protestants consider +me a weak waverer, and call me incorrigible. Sometimes I cannot pray +for months together, and when I do it is generally to ask for something +I want, not to praise or give thanks. But what a blank it is when one +cannot pray; when one has lost the power to conceive that there is a +something greater than man, to whom man is nevertheless all in all, and +to whom we may look for comfort in all times of our tribulation, and +for sympathy in all times of our wealth! To be able to give thanks to +God when one is happy is the most rapturous, and to be able to call +upon Him in the day of trouble is the most blessed, state of mind I +know. Yet I believe we should only pray for the possible. The leafless +tree may pray for the time of buds and blossoms; will the time come the +sooner? Perhaps not, but it will come." + +"I must confess," she said on another occasion, "that I do have moments +of pure scepticism; but when I cannot believe in the existence of a +God, and a Beyond, I feel as if the sky were nearer, and weighed upon +me, so that I could not lift my head." + +She thought religion consisted much more in doing right than in +believing right, and set morality above faith; but I think she had a +leaning towards the Roman Catholic religion nevertheless. + +"It is a grand old faith," she said, "only it has certain ramifications +with which I should always quarrel, notably that of the Sacred Heart +with which Catholics deface their lovely Lady in the churches. I always +feel that such bad art cannot be good religion. When the Roman Catholic +religion commanded respect it expressed itself better--as in the days +when it carved itself in harmonies of solid stone, and wrote itself in +tint and tone on glowing canvases, and learnt to speak in thundering +mass and mighty hymns of praise! There are people who think these new +shoots good as a sign of life in the tree, and this consideration might +perhaps make their appearance welcome; but a great deal of strength is +expended on their production, and it would be just as well to lop them +off again. The old tree wants pruning and cutting back occasionally, +and it is a false sentiment that is letting it fall to decay for the +sake of these struggling branches. + +"There is another thing, too, for which we should all quarrel with the +Catholic religion. I think the fact his already been noticed by some +writer; at all events, it is evident enough to have occurred to any +one. I mean the fact that the Church, by its narrow views about +education, and its most unspiritual ambition for itself, has retarded +the world's progress for centuries by interfering with the law of +natural selection. As a matter of course for ages all the best men went +into the Church; it was the only career open to them; and so they left +no descendants." + +At our house, on another occasion, when the Roman Catholic religion +happened to be under discussion, she launched forth some observations +in her usual emphatic way. There were only two strangers present, a +lady and her husband. Ideala asked the lady, who was sitting next to +her, if she were a Catholic, to which the lady answered "No;" and +Ideala, satisfied, proceeded to remark: "It may be the true religion, +but it certainly is not the religion of truth. The doctrine of +expediency, or the latitude they allow themselves on the score of +expediency--I don't quite know how they put it--but it has much to +answer for. I never find that my Roman Catholic friends are true, as +my Protestant friends are. There is always a something kept back, a +reservation; a want of straightforwardness, even when there is no +positive deception--I can't describe the thing I mean, but it is quite +perceptible, and causes an uneasy feeling of distrust, which is all +the more tormenting from its vagueness and want of definition. The +low-class Roman Catholics, I find, never hesitate if a lie will serve +their purpose; and Roman Catholic servants are notoriously +untrustworthy. That, of course, proves nothing, for one knows that +low-class people of any religion are not to be depended on--still, +there is no doubt that one finds deception more rife among Catholics +than among Protestants, and one wonders why, if the religion is not to +blame." + +My sister, Claudia, had tried to catch Ideala's eye, and stop her, but +in vain; and the lady next her broke out the moment she paused: +"Indeed, you are quite wrong. You cannot have known many Catholics. +They are not untrue." + +"O yes, I have known numbers," Ideala answered; "I speak from +experience. Yet it always seems to me that the Roman Catholic religion +is good for individuals. There is pleasure in it, and help and comfort +for them. But then it is death to the progress of nations, and the +question is: Would an individual be justified in adding a unit more for +his own benefit to a system which would ruin his country? I think not." + +Here, however, she stopped, seeing at last that something was wrong. + +"What dreadful mistake did I make this evening?" she asked me +afterwards. "Mrs. Jervois declared she wasn't a Catholic." + +"But her husband is," I answered; "and he heard every word." + +Ideala groaned. + +Not long afterwards Mrs. Jervois wrote and told us she had entered the +Catholic Church. "I had, in fact, been received before I went to you," +she confessed. + +"There!" Ideala exclaimed. "It is just what I said. A want of common +honesty is a part of the religion; and you see she had begun to +practise it while she was here." + +"What an eternal lie it is they preach when they tell us life is not +worth having," she said to me once, speaking of preachers generally. "I +have heard an oleosaccharine priest preach for an hour on this subject, +detailing the worthlessness of all earthly pleasures, with which he +seemed to be intimately acquainted--his appearance making one suspect +that he had not even yet exhausted them all himself--and giving a +florid account of the glories of the life to come, about which he +appeared to know as much but to care less; just as if heaven might not +begin on earth if only men would let it." + +One day I had to warn her about acting so often on impulse. She heard +what I had to say very good-naturedly, and, after thinking about it for +a while, she said: "What a pity it is one never sees an impulse coming. +It is impossible to know whether they arise from below, or descend from +above. I always find if I act on one that it has arisen; and as surely +if I leave it alone it proves to have been a good opportunity lost. And +how curiously our thoughts go on, often so irrespective of ourselves. I +was in a Roman Catholic church the other day, and the priest--a friend +of mine, who looks like the last of the Mohicans minus the feathers in +his hair; but a good man, with nice, soft, velvety brown eyes--preached +most impressively. He told us that the Lord was there--there on that +very altar, ready to answer our prayers; and, oh dear! when I came to +think of it, there were so many of my prayers waiting to be answered! I +'felt like' presenting them all over again, it seemed such a good +opportunity. And then they sang the _O salutaris Hostia_ divinely-- +so divinely that I thought if the Lord really had been there He would +certainly have made them sing it again--and I could not pray any more +after that. You call this rank irreverence, do you not? _I_ do. +And I wish I had not thought it. Yet it was one of those involuntary +tricks of the mind for which I cannot believe that we are to be held +responsible. Theologians would say it was a temptation of the devil, +but they are wrong. The first cause of these mental lapses is to be +found in some habit of levity, acquired young, and not easily got rid +of, but still not hopeless. But prevention is better than cure, and +children should be taught right-mindedness early. I wish I had been. +Happy is the child who is started in life with a set of fixed +principles, and the power to respect." + +I used to wish that there might be a universal religion, but Ideala did +not share my feeling on this subject. "I suppose it is a fine idea," +she said; "but while minds run in so many different grooves, it seems +to me far finer for one system of morality to have found expressions +enough to satisfy nearly everybody." + +She had very decided views about what heaven ought to be. + +"The mere material notion of abundance of gold and precious stones, +which appealed to the early churchmen, has no charm for us," she +declared. "We must have new powers of perception, and new pleasures +provided for us, such, for instance, as Mr. Andrew Lang suggests in an +exquisite little poem about the Homeric Phæacia--the land whose +inhabitants were friends of the gods, a sort of heaven upon earth." And +then she quoted: + + The languid sunset, mother of roses, + Lingers, a light on the magic seas; + The wide fire flames as a flower uncloses; + Heavy with odour and loose to the breeze. + + * * * * * + + The strange flowers' perfume turns to singing, + Heard afar over moonlit seas; + The siren's song, grown faint with winging, + Falls in scent on the cedar trees. + +"Those lines were the first to make me grasp the possibility of having +new faculties added to our old ones in another state of existence," +she said, "faculties which should give us a deeper insight into the +nature of things, and enable us to discover new pleasures in the unity +which may be expected to underlie beauty and excellence in all their +manifestations, as Mr. Norman Pearson puts it. Did you ever read that +paper of his, 'After Death,' in the _Nineteenth Century_? It embodies +what I had long felt, but could never grasp before I found his +admirable expression of it. 'I can see no reason,' he says, in one +passage in particular which I remember word for word, I think, it +gives me such pleasure to recall it--'I can see no reason for +supposing that _some such_ insight would be impossible to the +quickened faculties of a higher development. With a nature material so +far as the existence of those faculties might require, but spiritual +to the highest degree in their exercise and enjoyment: under physical +conditions which might render us _practically_ independent of space, +and _actually_ free from the host of physical evils to which we are +now exposed, we might well attain a consummation of happiness, +_generally_ akin to that for which we now strive, but idealised into +something like perfection. The faculties which would enable us to +obtain a deeper and truer view of all the manifestations of cosmic +energy would at the same time reveal to us new forms of beauty, new +possibilities of pleasure on every side: and--to take a single +instance--the emotions to which the sight of Niagara now appeals might +then be gratified by a contemplation of the fierce grandeur of some +sun's chromosphere or the calmer glories of its corona.' That +satisfies, does it not?" she added, with a sigh. "It suggests such +infinite possibilities." + + * * * * * + +One day, when she was making herself miserable for want of a religion, +I tried to comfort her by talking of the different people whose lives +had been good and pure and noble, although they had had no faith. + +"I suppose my principles are right," she said; "but if they are, they +have come right by accident. The children of the people are sent to +Sunday-schools, and taught the difference between right and wrong; +_we_ seem to be expected to know it instinctively. I think if I had +learnt I might have profited, because I cling so fondly to the one +principle I ever heard clearly enunciated. It was on the sin of +shooting foxes; and I cannot tell you the horror I have of the crime, +even down to the present day. But, now I think of it, I did receive +two other scraps of religious training. My governess taught me the Ten +Commandments by making me say them after her when I was eating bread +and sugar for breakfast before going to church on Sunday. The thought +of them always brings back the flavour of bread and sugar. And the +other scrap I got from a clergyman to whom I was sent on a single +occasion when I was thought old enough to be confirmed. He asked me +which was the commandment with promise, and I didn't know, so he told +me; and then I made him laugh about a horse of mine that used to have +great fun trying to break my neck, and after that he said I should do. +I did not agree with him, however, and I positively refused to be +confirmed until I knew more about it. My mother said I was the most +disagreeable child she had ever known, which was probably true, but as +an argument it failed to convince. It was her last remark on the +subject, happily, and after that the thing was allowed to drop." + +Ideala was fourteen when she refused to be confirmed for conscientious +scruples, and although she made light of it in this way, she had +suffered a good deal and been severely punished at the time for her +refusal, but vainly, for she never gave in. + +In after-life she held, of course, that Christianity was the highest +moral revelation the world had ever known; but when she saw that legal +right was not always moral right, I think she began to look for a +higher. + +By baptism she belonged to the Church of England, but she seems to have +thought of the Sacrament always with the idea of transubstantiation in +her mind. She spoke of it reverently, but had never been able to take +it, and for a curious reason: she said the idea of it nauseated her. +She felt that the elements were unnatural food, and therefore she could +not touch them--and this feeling never left her but once, when she was +dangerously ill, and yearned, as she told me, for the Sacrament more +than for life and health. Day and night the longing never left her; +but, not having been confirmed, she did not like to ask for it, and as +she recovered the old feeling gradually returned. + +Religious difficulties always tormented her more or less. As she grew +older she felt with Shelley that belief is involuntary, and a man is +neither to be praised nor blamed for it; and she was always ready to +acknowledge with Sir Philip Sidney that "Reason cannot show itself more +reasonable than to leave reasoning on things above reason," but +nevertheless her mind did not rest. + +I have also heard her quote, "Credulity is the man's weakness, but the +child's strength," and add that in matters of faith and religion we are +all children, and I have thought at times that she had been able to +leave it so; but something always fell from her sooner or later which +showed that the old trouble was rankling still--as when she told me +once: "I have never heard the Divine voice which has called you and all +my friends. I listen for it, but it does not speak. I call, but there +is no reply. I wait, but it does not come. The heaven of heavens is +dark to me, and the yearning of my soul meets no response. Will it be +so for ever?" + +No, not for ever--but she was led by tortuous ways, and left to work +out her own salvation in very fear and trembling, till the dear human +love was given to her in pity to help her to know something of that +which is Divine. And then, I hope, above the trouble of her senses, and +the turmoil of the world, the Divine voice did call her, and she was +able at last to hear. + + + + +CHAPTER V. + + +Ideala often recurred to the subject of work for women. + +"There are so many thousands of us," she said, "who have no object in +life, and nothing to make us take it seriously. My own is a case in +point. I am not necessary, even to my husband. There is nothing I am +bound to do for him, or that he requires of me, nothing but to be +agreeable when he is with me, which would not interfere with a serious +occupation if I had one, and is scarcely interest enough in life for an +energetic woman. My household duties take, on an average, half an hour +a day; and everything in our house is done regularly, and well done. My +social duties may be got through at odd moments, and the more of a +pastime I make them the better I fulfil them; and, with the exception +of these, there is nothing in my life that I cannot have done for me by +some one better able to do it than I am. And even if I had children I +should not be much more occupied, for the things they ought to learn +from their mothers are best taught by example. For all practical +purposes, parents, as a rule, are bad masters for any but very young +children. They err on the side of over severity or the reverse. So you +see I have no obligations of consequence, and there is, therefore, +nothing in my life to inspire a sense of responsibility. And all this +seems to me a grievous waste of Me. I remember Lord Wensum telling me, +when we discussed this subject, that he was travelling once with a +well-known editor, and, noticing the number of villas that had sprung +up of late years along the whole line of rail they were on, he said: 'I +wonder what the ladies in those villas do with their time? I suppose +their social duties are limited, and they are too well off to be +obliged to trouble themselves about anything.' 'It is the existence of +those villas,' the editor answered, 'that makes the present profession +of the novelist possible.' But I think," said Ideala, "that those women +might find something better to do than to make a profession for +novelists." + +"But you do a good deal yourself, Ideala," I ventured. + +"Yes, in a purposeless way. All my acts are isolated; it would make +little difference if they had never been done." + +"Then you are not content, after all, to be merely a poem?" I said, +maliciously. "You would like to do as well as to be?" + +She laughed. Then, after a little, she said earnestly: "Do you know, I +always feel as if I _could_ do something--teach something--or help +others in a small way with some work of importance. I never believe I +was born just to live and die. But I have a queer feeling about it. I +am sure I shall be made to go down into some great depth of sin and +misery myself, in order to learn what it is I have to teach." + +She loved music, and painting, and poetry, and science, and none of her +loves were barren. She embraced them each in turn with an ardour that +resulted in the production of an offspring--a song, a picture, a poem, +or book on some most serious subject, and all worthy of note. But she +was inconstant, and these children of her thought or fancy were +generally isolated efforts that marked the culminating point of her +devotion, and lessened her interest if they did not exhaust her +strength. + +Perhaps, though, I wrong her when I call her inconstant. It seems to me +now that each new interest was a step by which she mounted upwards, +learning to sympathise practically and perfectly with all men in their +work as she passed them on her way to find her own. + + + + +CHAPTER VI. + + +She knew the poor of the place well, and took a lively interest in all +that concerned them; and occasionally she would confide some of her own +odd observations and reflections to me. + +"On Sunday morning all the women wash their doorsteps," she told me; "I +think it is part of their religion." + +And on another occasion she said: "They have such lovely children here, +and such swarms of them. I am always hard on the women with lovely +children. People say it is envy, hatred, malice, and all +uncharitableness, that makes me so; but it really is because I think +women who have nice children should be better than other women. It +would be worse for one of them to do a wrong thing than for poor +childless me." + +This conclusion may be quarrelled with as illogical, but the feeling +that led to it was beautiful beyond question; and, indeed, all her +ideas on that subject were beautiful. + +She went once, soon after she came among us, to comfort a lady in the +neighbourhood who had lost a baby at its birth. + +"It is sad that you should lose your child," Ideala said to her; "but +you are better off than I am, for I never knew what it was to be a +mother." + +She would have thought it a privilege to have experienced even the +sorrows of maternity. + +Talking about the people, she told me: "They draw such nice +distinctions. They speak of 'a lady' and 'a real lady.' A 'real lady' +is a person who gives no trouble. If Mrs. Vanbrugh wants anything from +the butcher, and he has already sent to her house once that day, she +does not expect him to send again; she sends to him--and she is 'a real +lady.' Mrs. Stanton is also thoughtful, but she is something more; she +is sociable and kind, and talks to them all in a friendly way, just as +if they were human beings; and she is something more than 'a real +lady'--she's 'a real nice lady.' + +"Do you know Mrs. Polter at the fish-shop? What a fine-looking woman +she is! Middle-aged, intelligent, and a very good specimen of her +class, I should think. She has eight children already, and would +consider the ninth a further blessing. Her husband is a good-looking +man, too, and most devoted. In fact, they are quite an ideal pair with +their eight children and their fish-shop. He had to go to Yarmouth the +other day to buy bloaters, and while he was away she went by the five +o'clock train every morning to choose the day's supply of fish for the +shop, and he was quite unhappy about it. He was afraid she would +'overdo' herself, and rather than that should happen he desired her to +let the business go to the--ahem! He made her write every day to say +how she was, and was wretched till he returned to relieve her of her +arduous duties. She made friends with me during the scarlet fever +epidemic. Number eight was a baby then, and she was afraid he might +catch the disease and be taken to the hospital and die for want of her; +and I sympathised strongly with her denunciations of the cruelty of the +act. Fancy taking little babies from their mothers! Barbarous, don't +you think it? One day a lady came into the shop while I was there. She +was dressed in a bright pink costume, with a large hat all smothered in +pink feathers. I thought of the Queen of Sheba, and felt alarmed. Mrs. +Polter told me afterwards she was 'just a lady,' rolling in recently +acquired wealth, and 'as hard to please as if she had never washed her +own doorstep.' It was then I learnt the difference between 'a lady' and +'a real lady.'" + +One of Ideala's exploits got into the paper somehow, and she was +annoyed about it, and anxious to make us believe the account of the +risk she ran had been greatly exaggerated. I was present when she gave +her own version of the story, which was characteristic in every way. + +"I heard frantic cries from the river," she said. "Some one was +shrieking, 'The child will be drowned!' and I ran to see what was the +matter. A man was tearing up and down on the bank, a child was +struggling in the water, and as there was nobody else to be seen he +looked to _me_ for assistance! I advised him to go in and bring +the child out, but the idea did not appear to commend itself to him, so +he took to running up and down again, bawling, 'The child will be +drowned!' And indeed it seemed very likely; so I was obliged to go in +and bring it out myself. The man was overjoyed when I restored it to +him. He clasped it in his arms with every demonstration of affection; +and then he looked at me and became embarrassed. He evidently felt that +he ought to say something, but the difficulty was what to say. At last +a bright idea seemed to strike him. His countenance cleared, and he +spoke with much feeling. 'I am afraid you are rather wet,' he observed; +and then he left me, and a sympathetic landlady, who keeps a little +public-house by the river, and had witnessed the occurrence, took me in +and dried me. She gave me whisky and hot water, and entertained me for +the rest of the afternoon. She is a remarkable woman, and I should +visit her often were it not for her love of, and faith in, whisky and +hot water. I tell her there are five things which make the nose red-- +viz., cold, tight-lacing, disease of the right side of the heart, +dyspepsia, and alcohol, and the greatest of these is alcohol; but she +says a little colour anywhere would be an improvement to me, and I feel +that I can have nothing in common with a woman who has such bad taste +in the distribution of colour." + + + + +CHAPTER VII. + + +Ideala's notions of propriety were altogether unconventional. She never +could be made to understand that it was not the proper thing to talk +familiarly to any one she met, and discuss any subject they were equal +to with them. + +"It is good for people to talk, and natural, and therefore proper," she +said. "If I can give pleasure to a stranger by doing so, or he can give +pleasure to me, it would not be right to keep silent." + +She carried this idea of her duty to her neighbour rather far +sometimes. + +I remember her telling me once about two old gentlemen she had +travelled with the day before. + +"The sun came in and bothered me, and one of them offered to draw the +blind," she said, "and he remarked it was rather a treat to see the +sun, we have so little of it now; and I said that was true, and told +him how I pitied the farmers. I had to stay in my room the other day +with a bad cold, and I amused myself watching one of them at work in +some fields opposite. The state of his mind was expressed by his +boots. On Monday the sun was shining, the air was mild, and it seemed +as if we were going to have a continuance of fine weather, and the +farmer appeared of a cheerful countenance, and his boots were polished +and laced. On Tuesday there was an east wind, veering south, with +showers, and his boots were laced, but not polished. On Wednesday +there was frost, fog, and gloom, and they were neither laced nor +polished. On Thursday there was a snowstorm, and he had no boots at +all on; and after that I did not see him, and I wondered if he had +committed suicide--in which case I thought the jury might almost have +brought in a verdict of 'justifiable _felo-de-se_.' And when I told +that story the other old gentleman shut his book, and began to talk +too. And I said I thought the weather was much colder than it used to +be, for I could remember wearing muslin dresses in May, and I could +not wear them at all now; but I did not know if the change were in the +climate or in myself--perhaps a little of both--though, indeed, I knew +that, to a certain extent, it was in the climate, which had been very +much altered in different districts by drainage, and cutting, or +planting--altered for the better, however, as a rule. And one old +gentleman had heard that before, but did not understand it exactly, so +I explained it to him; and then I talked about changes of climate in +general, and the formation of beds of coal, and the ice period, and +sun-spots, and the theory of comets, and about my husband getting up +to see the last one, and going out in a felt hat and dressing-gown +with a bed-candle to look for it--and about that dream of mine, did I +tell you? I dreamt the comet came into our drawing-room, and the leg +of a Chinese table turned into a snake and snorted at it, and the +comet looked so taken aback that I woke myself with a shout of +laughter. And then we talked of popular superstitions about comets, +and dreams, and ghosts-- particularly ghosts, and I told a number of +creepy stories, and one old gentleman pretended he didn't believe in +them, but he did, and so did the other without any pretence; and we +talked about Darwinism, and the nature of the soul, and Nihilism, and +the state of society--and--and a few other things. And they were such +dear delightful old gentlemen, and they knew such a lot, and were so +clever; and one of them was a Railway Director, and the other couldn't +let his farms, and was bothered about his pheasants, and wanted to +have the trains altered to suit him. I should so like to meet them +both again." + +"And how long did all this take, Ideala?" + +"Oh, some hours. I fancy their dreams would be rather confused last +night," she added, naively. + +"Poor old gentlemen!" said I. + +This sociability and inclination to talk the matter out, and, I may +say, a certain amount of innocence and lack of worldly wisdom into the +bargain, betrayed her occasionally into small improprieties of conduct +that were not to be excused, and would possibly not have been forgiven +in any one but Ideala. But such things were allowed in her as certain +things are allowed in certain people--not because the things are right +in themselves, but because the people who do them see no harm in them. +There are people, too, who seem to enjoy the privilege of making wrong +right by doing it. Society, however, only accords this privilege to a +limited and distinguished few. + +When Ideala saw for herself that she had done an unjustifiable thing +she was very ready to confess it. I always fancied she had some latent +idea of making atonement in that way. It never mattered how much a +story told against herself, nor how much malicious people might make of +it to her discredit; she told all, inimitably, and with scrupulous +fidelity to fact. + +One day she was standing waiting for a train at the station at York, +and in her absent way she fixed her eyes on a gentleman who was walking +about the platform. + +Presently he went up to her, and, without any apology or show of +respect, remarked: "I am sure I have seen you before." + +"Probably," Ideala rejoined, as if the occurrence were the most natural +thing in the world, "but I do not remember you. Perhaps if I heard your +name----?" + +"Oh, I don't suppose you ever heard my name," he said. + +"In that case I can never have known you," she answered, calmly. "I +never know any one except by name. I suppose you are an Englishman?" + +"Yes," he said, eagerly; "I am in the 5th----" + +"Ah, I thought so," she interrupted, placidly. "Englishmen in the 5th, +and some other regiments, are apt to have but the one idea----" + +"And that is?" + +"And that is a bad one." + +He looked at her for a moment, and then, hat in hand, he made her a low +bow, and left her without another word. + +"I think he felt ill, and went to have some refreshment," she added, +when she told me. + +From what happened afterwards I am sure that at the time she had no +idea of the real significance of the position in which she found +herself placed on this occasion. But, as a rule, if she did or said the +wrong thing, she became painfully conscious of the fact immediately +afterwards--indeed, it was generally _afterwards_ that she grasped +the full meaning of most things. She was ready with repartee without +being in the least quick of understanding; she had to think things +over, and even then she was not sure to do the right thing next time. + +"Mr. Graves is ten years younger than his wife," she told me once, "and +only fancy what I said one day. It was in his studio, and she was +there. I declared a woman could have no sense of propriety at all who +married a man younger than herself--that no good could possibly come of +such marriages--and a lot more. Then I suddenly remembered, and you can +imagine my feelings! But what do you think I did? I went there the next +year, and said the same thing again exactly!" + + + + +CHAPTER VIII. + + +When we were a small party of intimate friends, and Ideala was quite at +her ease with us, it was pleasant to see her lolling, a little +languidly as was her wont (for physically her energy was fitful), in +the corner of a couch, looking happy and interested, her face, which +was sad in repose, lit up for the time with amusement, as she quietly +listened to our talk, and observed all that was going on around her. +Even when she did not speak a word she somehow managed to make her +presence felt, and, as a rule, she spoke little on these occasions. But +sometimes we managed to draw her out, and sometimes she would burst +forth suddenly of her own accord, with a torrent of eloquence that +silenced us all; and even when she was utterly wrong she charmed us. +Her chance observations were generally noteworthy either for their +sense or their humour. It was only her sense of humour, I think, that +saved her from being sentimental; but she gave expression to it in +season and out of season, and would let it carry her too far sometimes, +for she made enemies for herself more than once by the way she exposed +the absurdity of certain things to the very people who believed in +them. Every lapse of this kind caused her infinite regret, but the +fault seemed incurable: she was always either repenting of it or +committing it, although, having so many quirks of her own, she felt +that she, of all people in the world, should have dealt most tenderly +with the weaknesses of others. + +She knew how narrowly she escaped being sentimental, and would often +joke about her danger in that respect. "This lovely summer weather +makes me _sickly_ sentimental," she told me once. "I feel like the +heroine of a three-volume novel written by a young lady of eighteen, +and I think continually of _him_. I don't know in the least who +_he_ is, but that makes no difference. The thought of him delights +me, and I want to write long letters to him, and make verses about him +the whole day long. And he wants me to be good." + +She had two or three pet abominations of her own, any allusion to which +was sure to make her outrageous--false sentiment and affectation of any +kind were amongst them. She had little habits, too, that we were all +pleased to fall in with. Sitting in the corner of a couch, and of one +couch in particular in every house, was one of these; and people got +into the way of giving up that seat to her whenever she appeared. I +think it would have puzzled us all to say why or wherefore, for she +never said or looked anything that could make us think she wished to +appropriate it; she simply took it as a matter of course when it was +offered to her, and probably did not know that she invariably sat +there. Ideala was a splendid horsewoman, and swam like a fish; but she +was not good at tennis or games of any kind, and she did not dance, for +a curious reason: she objected to be touched by people for whom she had +no special affection. She even disliked to shake hands, and often +wished some one would put the custom out of fashion. With regard to +dancing I have heard her say, too, that she sympathised entirely with +the Oriental feeling on the subject. She thought it delightful to be +danced to, to lie still with a pleasant companion near her who would +not talk too much, and listen to the music, and enjoy the poetry of +motion coolly and at ease. "I love to see the 'dancers dancing in +tune,'" she said; "but to have to dance myself would be as great a +bother as to have to cook my dinner as well as eat it. I suppose it is +a healthy amusement--indeed, I know it is when you take it as I do; for +when all you people come down the morning after a dance with haggard +eyes and no power to do anything, I am as fresh as a lark, and have +decidedly the best of it." + +She was not good at games because she was not ambitious. She did not +care to have her skill commended, and was content to lose or win with +equal indifference--so long as only the honour of the thing was +involved; but when the stakes were more material she showed a vice of +which she was quite conscious. + +"I daren't play for money," she said to me. "I never have, and I have +always said that I never will. All the women of my family are born +gamblers. My mother has often told me that regularly, when she was a +girl, the day after she received her allowance she had either doubled +it or lost it all; and before she was twenty she hadn't a jewel worth +anything in her possession--and my aunts were as bad. One of them +staked herself one night to a gentleman she was playing with, and he +won, and married her. Gambling was more the custom then than it is now, +but for me it is as much in the air as if it were still the fashion. +When there is any talk of play I feel fascinated, and when I see a pack +of cards the temptation is so irresistible that I have often to go away +to save my resolution." + +Which made me think of a favourite quotation of Lessing's from +_Minna_:--"_Tout les gens d'esprit aiment le jeu à la folie_." + + + + +CHAPTER IX. + + +Ideala's low esteem for "mere animal courage" was probably due to the +fact that she possessed it herself in a high degree. Yet soon after I +met her I began to suspect, and was afterwards convinced, that +something in her manner which had puzzled me at first arose from fear. +There was that in her life which made her afraid of the world, which +would, had it guessed the truth, have pryed with curious eyes into her +sorrow, and found an interest in seeing her suffer. The trouble was her +husband. She rarely spoke of him herself, and I think I ought to follow +her example, and say as little about him as possible. He was jealous of +her, jealous of her popularity, and jealous of every one who approached +her. He carried it so far that she scarcely dared to show a preference, +and was even obliged to be cold and reserved with some of her best +friends. I was a privileged person, allowed to be intimate with her +from the first, partly because I insisted on it when I saw how matters +stood, and partly because my position and reputation gave me a right to +insist. I never had occasion to brave insults for her sake, but, like +many others, I would have done so had it been necessary. Her friends +were constantly being driven from her on one pretext or another. People +would have taken her part readily enough had she complained, but +complaint was contrary to her nature and her principles. Some, who +suspected the truth, blamed her reticence; but I always thought it +right, and on one occasion when we approached the subject indirectly I +told her "Silence is best." I ought to have qualified the advice, for +she carried it too far, and was silent afterwards when she should have +spoken--that is to say, when it had become evident that endurance was +useless and degrading. + +She fought hard to preserve her dignity, and was determined that "as +the husband is, the wife is," should not be true in her case. But he +did lower her insensibly, nevertheless. As her life became more and +more unendurable she became a little reckless in speech; it was a sort +of safety-valve by means of which she regained her composure, and I +soon began to recognise the sign, and to judge of the amount she had +suffered by the length to which she afterwards went in search of +relief, and the extent to which suffering made her untrue to herself. + +As a rule, when with him, she was yielding, but she had fits of +determination, too, when she knew she was right. One night, as they +were driving home from a ball together, her husband suddenly declared +that he would not allow her to be one of the patronesses of a fancy +fair which was to be held for a charitable purpose, although she had +already consented and he had made no objection at the time. + +"But why may I not?" Ideala asked. + +"Because I object. Do you hear? I will not have it, and you must +withdraw." + +"I must decline to obey any such arbitrary injunction," she answered, +quietly. + +He detained her on the doorstep until the carriage had driven round to +the stables. + +"Now, are you going to obey me?" he asked. + +"Yes, if you give me a reason for what you require," she answered, +wearily. + +"Oh, you are obstinate, are you?" he rejoined, in a jeering tone. +"Well, stay in the garden and think it over. Perhaps reflection will +make you more dutiful. I shall tell your maid you will not want her +to-night. When you have made up your mind you can ring." And so saying +he walked into the house and shut the door upon her. + +It was a summer night, but Ideala felt chilly with only a thin shawl +over her ball dress. She walked about as long as she could, but fatigue +overcame her at last, and she was obliged to lie down on one of the +garden seats. She wrapped the train of her dress round her shoulders, +and lay looking up at the stars. The air was heavy with the scent of +flowers. The night was very still. Once or twice the rush of a passing +train in the distance became audible; and the ceaseless, solemn, +inarticulate murmur of the night was broken by a nightingale that sang +out at intervals, divinely. + +Ideala never thought of submitting; she simply lay there, waiting +without expecting. The night air overcame her more and more with a +sense of fatigue, but she could not sleep. She saw the darkness fade +and the dawn appear, and when at last the servants began to move in the +house she watched her opportunity and slipped in unobserved. She went +to one of the spare rooms, undressed, rang, and got into bed. When the +bell was answered she ordered a hot bath and hot coffee immediately. +The maid supposed she had slept there, and seemed surprised; but as her +mistress offered no explanation she could make no remark; and so the +matter ended. + +But I do not think Ideala suffered much on that occasion. Her strong +young womanhood saved her somewhat--and there was a charm for her in +the beauty of the night and the novelty of her position, which a less +healthy organism would not have appreciated, had it been able to +discover it--at such a time. + + + + +CHAPTER X. + + +Ideala had been married eight years, and two months after that night +the long-delayed hope of her life, which she had begun to believe was +beyond hope, was at last realised. Her child was a boy, and her joy in +him is something that one is glad to have seen. But it was short-lived. +I do not know if her husband were jealous of her happiness, or if he +thought the child was more to her than he was, or if he were merely +making a proposition, by way of experiment, which he never meant to +carry into effect--probably the latter. At all events, he went to her +one day when the child was about six weeks old, and told her he thought +she must give up nursing him. + +The mother's nature was up in arms in a moment. I suppose she had not +quite regained her strength, for she had been very ill, and, being +weak, she was excitable. + +"I will not give my baby up! How can you think it?" she exclaimed. + +"Oh, well," he answered, coolly, "just as you like, you know. But I +should think you'd better--for the child's sake, at least." + +"It isn't true. I don't believe it," she said, piteously. + +"Ask the doctor, then;" and he sauntered out, smiling, and perhaps not +dreaming that she would. + +But "for the child's sake" had alarmed Ideala, and she sent for the +doctor. It was hours before he could come to her, and, in the meantime, +not knowing that her state of mind would affect the child, she had +fidgeted and fretted herself into a fever, and when the doctor saw her, +he could only confirm her husband's verdict. + +"I am afraid you must give up nursing," he said. "You are in such a +nervous state it will do the child harm. But he's such a fine fellow! +He'll thrive all right--you needn't be frightened." + +Ideala said nothing, but she sat in her own room night after night for +a week, and heard the child crying for her, and could not go to him-- +and even when he did not cry she fancied she heard him still. I think +as the milk slowly and painfully left her, her last spark of affection +for her husband dried up too. + +The child died of diphtheria some time afterwards, and in a little +while, Ideala, who was then in her twenty-sixth year, returned to her +old pursuits, and no one ever knew what she felt about it: + + For, it is with feelings as with waters-- + The shallow murmur, but the deep are dumb! + + + + +CHAPTER XI. + + +My widowed sister, Claudia, was one of Ideala's most intimate friends. +She was a good deal older than Ideala, whom she loved as a mother loves +a naughty child, for ever finding fault with her, but ready to be up in +arms in a moment if any one else ventured to do likewise. She was +inclined to quarrel with me because, although I never doubted Ideala's +truth and earnestness (no one could), knowing her weak point, I feared +for her. I thought if all the passion in her were ever focussed on one +object she would do something extravagant--a prediction which Claudia, +with good intent, rashly repeated to her once. + +Claudia was mistress of my house, and she and I had agreed from the +first that, whatever happened, we would watch over Ideala and befriend +her. + +My sister was one of the people who thought it would have been better +for Ideala to have talked of her troubles. When I praised Ideala's +loyalty, and her uncomplaining devotion to an uncongenial duty, Claudia +said: "Loyalty is all very well; but I don't see much merit in a life- +long devotion to a bad cause. If there were any good to be done by it, +it would be different, of course; but, as it is, Ideala is simply +sacrificing herself for nothing--and worse, she is setting a bad +example by showing men they need not mend their manners since wives +will endure anything. It is immoral for a woman to live with such a +husband. I don't understand Ideala's meekness; it amounts to weakness +sometimes, I think. I believe if he struck her she would say, 'Thank +you,' and fetch him his slippers. I feel sure she thinks some unknown +defect in herself is at the bottom of all his misdeeds." + +"I don't think she knows half as much about his misdeeds as we do," I +observed. + +"Then I think it would be a charity to enlighten her," Claudia +answered, decidedly. "One can't touch pitch without being defiled, and +when it is too late we shall find she has suffered 'some taint in +nature,' in spite of herself. Will you kindly take us to the Palace +this evening? The Bishop wants us to go in after dinner, and Ideala has +promised to come too." + +Ideala was fastidious about her dress, and being in one of her moods +that evening she teased Claudia unmercifully, on the way to the Palace, +about a blue woollen shawl she was wearing. "A delicate and refined +nature expresses itself by nothing more certainly than elegant wraps," +she said, parodying another famous dictum; "and I should not like to be +able to understand the state of mind a lady was in when she bought +herself a blue woollen shawl; but I could believe she was suffering at +the time from a temporary aberration of intellect--only, if she wore it +afterwards the thing would be quite inexplicable." Claudia drew the +wrap round her with dignity, and made no reply; then Ideala laughed and +turned to me. "Certainly your friend," she said, alluding to a young +sculptor who was staying with me, "can 'invest his portraits with +artistic merit.' Claudia's likeness in the Exhibition is capital, and +the fame of it is being noised abroad with a vengeance. But I think +something should be done to stop the little newspaper-boy nuisance: the +reports they spread are quite alarming." + +"Ideala, what nonsense are you talking about sculptors and newspaper- +boys?" Claudia exclaimed. + +"I'll tell you," said Ideala. "There was a small boy with a big voice +standing at the corner of the market-place this afternoon. He had a +sheaf of evening papers under his arm, and was yelling with much +enthusiasm to an edified crowd:--'Noose of the War! Hawful mutilation +of the dead! Fearful collision in the Channel! Eighty-eight lives lost! +Narrative of survivors! Thrilling details! Shindy in Parl'ment! Hirish +members to the front again! 'Orrible haccident in our own town! The +Lady Claudia's bust!'" + +"Ideala, how _dare_ you?"--but just then the carriage stopped, and we +had to get out. + +The good Bishop met us in the hall. Ideala positively declined to go +upstairs when he asked her. + +"It is too much trouble," she said, not seeing in her absence what was +meant. "I would rather leave my things here." + +"But I am afraid I _must_ trouble you," the Bishop answered, in +despair. "The fact is, my wife is not so well this evening, and she +was afraid of the cold, and is staying in her own sitting-room." + +The "sitting-room" was a snug apartment, warm, cosy, luxurious, and we +found a genial little party of intimate acquaintances there when we +arrived. Ideala's husband was not one of them. He did not take her out +much at that time. Probably he was engaged in some private pursuit of +his own, and insisted on her going everywhere alone to keep her out of +the way. A little while before he would scarcely allow her to pay a +call without him. But, as a rule, whatever his mood was, she did as he +wished--and provoked him sometimes, I think, by her patient compliance; +a little resistance would have made the exercise of his authority more +exciting. + +When we entered the sitting-room "an ominous silence feel on the +group," which was broken at last by one of the ladies remarking that a +kind heart was an admirable thing. Another agreed, and made some +observations on the merits of self-sacrifice generally. + +"But some people are not satisfied with merely _doing_ a good deed," a +gentleman declared, with profound gravity. "They think there is no +merit in it if they do not suffer for it in some way themselves." + +There was a good deal more of this kind of thing, and we were beginning +to feel rather out of it, when presently the preternatural gravity of +the party was broken by a laugh, and then it was explained. + +Ideala had gone to a neighbouring town one day by train, and before she +started a poor woman got into the carriage. The woman had a third-class +ticket, but she was evidently ill, and when the guard came and wanted +to turn her out, Ideala took pity on her, insisted on changing tickets, +and travelled third class herself. The woman had been to the Palace, +and described the incident to the Bishop's wife that morning, and she +had just told her guests, wondering who the lady could have been, and +they in turn had put their heads together and decided that there was no +one in the community but Ideala who would have done the thing in that +way. + +"But what else could I have done?" she asked, when she saw we were +laughing at her. + +"Well, my dear," said the Bishop, who always treated her with the kind +indulgence that is accorded to a favourite child, "you might have paid +the difference for the woman, and travelled comfortably yourself, don't +you know?" + +Ideala never thought of that! + +Presently the dear old Bishop nestled back in his chair, and with a +benign glance round, which, his scapegrace son said, meant: "Bless you, +my children! Be happy and good in your own way, but don't make a +noise!" he sank into a gentle doze, and the rest of the party relapsed +into trivial gossip, some of which I give for what it is worth by way +of illustration. It shows Ideala at about her worst, but marks a period +in her career, a turning-point for the better. She was seldom bitter, +and still more rarely frivolous, after that night. + +"Clare Turner will take none of the blame of that affair on his own +shoulders," some one remarked. + +"Mr. Clare Turner is the little boy who always said 'It wasn't me!' +grown up," Ideala decided, from the corner of her couch. "He is a sort +of two-reason man." + +"How do you mean 'a two-reason man,' Ideala?" + +"Well, he has only two reasons for everything; one is his reason for +doing anything he likes himself, which is always a good one; and the +other is his reason why the rest of the world should not do likewise, +which is equally clear--to himself. He thinks there should be one law +for him and another for everybody else. I don't believe in him." + +"Nor I," said one of the gentlemen. "Underhand bowling was all he was +celebrated for at school; he bowled most frightful sneaks all the time +he was there." + +"Talking about Clare Turner," Charlie Lloyd put in, "I've brought a new +book of poems--author unknown. I picked it up at the station to-day. +There's one thing in it, called 'The Passion of Delysle,' that seems to +be intense; but I've only just glanced at it, and don't really know +what it's like. Shall I read it?" + +"Oh, do!" was the general exclamation, and we all settled ourselves to +enjoy the following treat. + +Charlie began softly: + + O day and night! Oh day and night! and is this madness? + O day and night! O day and night! and is this joy? + Whence comes this bursting sense of life, and love, and gladness, + This pain of pleasure, perfected, without alloy? + Lo, flowing past me are the restless rivers, + Or swelling round me is the boundless sea; + Or else the widening waste of sand that quivers + In shining stretches, shuts the world from me-- + Or seems to shut it, while I would that what it seems might be. + + O day and night! O day and night! this mountain island, + This saintly shrine, this fort--I scarce know what 'tis yet-- + This sand, or sea-girt, rocky, town-clad, church-crown'd highland, + This dull and rugged gem in golden deserts set, + Has some delicious, unknown charm to hold me, + To draw me to itself and keep me here; + The old grey walls, it seems, with joy enfold me-- + Or is it I that make the dead stones dear, + And send the throbbing summer in my blood thro' all things near? + + O day and night! O day and night! where else do flowers + Open their velvet lids like these to greet the light? + Or raise such sun-kissed lips aglow to meet cool showers? + Or cast more subtle scents abroad upon the night? + These trees and trailing weeds that climb the cliff-side steep, + The dusky pine trees, draped with wreaths of vine, + Make bowers where love might lie and list the sea-voice deep, + And drink the perfumed air, the light, like wine, + Which threads intoxication through these hot, glad veins of mine. + + O day and night! O day and night! I sought this haven, + From place and power, and wealth I flew in search of rest; + They forced and bound me to a hard, detested craven, + Who mocked my loathing with his head upon my breast. + With deathless love I moaned for my young lover; + To make me great they drove him from my side, + And foully wrought with shame his name to cover-- + My boy, my lord, my prince! In vain they lied! + But should I always suffer for their false, inhuman pride? + + O day and night! O day and night! I left them flying, + I fled by day and night as flies the nomad breeze, + Across the silent land when light to dark was dying, + And onward like a spirit lost across the seas; + And on from sea and shore thro' apple-orchards blooming, + Till all things melted in a moving haze; + And on with rush and ring by tower and townlet glooming, + By wood, and field, and hill, by verdant ways, + While dawn to mid-day drew, and noon was lost in sunset blaze. + + O day and night! O day and night! light once more waxing, + Still on with courage high, tho' strength was well-nigh spent; + Grim spectres of pursuit the wearied brain perplexing, + Fear-fraught, but ever met with spirit dedolent. + The landscape reeled, there came a sense of slumber, + And myriad shadows rose and wanned and waned, + And flitting figures, visions without number, + Took shape above the land till sight was pained, + And floated round me till at last the longed-for goal I gained. + + O day and night! O day and night! with rest abounding, + The soothing sinking down on hard-earned holy rest, + With grateful ease that grew from all the calm surrounding, + A languid, dreamful ease, my soul became possessed. + The hoarse sea-wind comes soughing, sighing, singing, + Its constant message from the patient waves. + While high above cathedral bells were ringing, + Or falling voices chanted hymns of praise, + And all the land seemed filled with peace and promised length of days. + + * * * * * + + O day and night! O day and night! once, all unheeding, + By sun and summer wind with tender touch caressed, + I wandered where the strains, the sacred strains, were pleading, + And, kneeling in the fane, my thoughts to prayer addressed. + And softly rose the murmur'd organ mystery, + And swell'd around the colonnaded aisle, + Where smiled the pictured saints of holy history + On prostrate penitents who prayed the while: + I could not pray there, but I felt that God Himself might smile. + + O day and night! O day and night! while I was kneeling + There came the strangest sense of some loved presence near; + A re-awakening rush of well-remembered feeling + Thrill'd thro' me, held me still, with vague expectant fear. + Half turn'd from me, there stood beside the altar, + Where incense-clouds nigh veiled him from my sight, + A fair-haired priest--my quicken'd heart-beats falter! + Or is he priest, or is he acolyte, + Or layman devotee who prays in novice robes bedight? + + O day and night! O day and night! whence comes this feeling? + For all unreal seem day and night and life and death, + And all unreal the hope that sets my senses reeling, + And stills my pulse an instant, checks my lab'ring breath. + Yet louder rolls the mighty organ thund'ring. + And downward slopes a beam of light divine, + The perfumed clouds are cleft: he looks up wond'ring-- + Looks up--what does he there before the shrine? + He could not give himself to God, for he is mine, is mine! + + O day and night! O day and night! I go forth trembling, + He did not meet my eyes, he never saw my face. + My bosom swells with joy and jealousy resembling + A war of good and evil waged in a holy place. + No longer soft the day, the sun in splendour + Pours all his might upon this green incline; + I lie and watch the cirrus clouds surrender, + Their glowing forms to one hot kiss resign-- + How could he give himself to God when he is mine, is mine? + + O day and night! O day and night! beneath your glory + The crimson flood of life itself has turned to fire! + The rugged brows of those old rocks, storm-rent and hoary, + Are quivering in their grim surprise at my desire. + The mother earth, throbbing with pain and pleasure, + Would sink her voices for the languid noon, + But light airs wake a reckless madd'ning measure, + And wavelets dance and sparkle to the tune. + And mock the mocking malice of yon day-dimm'd gibbous moon. + + * * * * * + + O day and night! O day and night! a fisher maiden + Is wand'ring up the path to where unseen I lie; + She comes with some light spoil from off the shore beladen. + And softly singing of the sea goes slowly by. + And slowly rise great sun-tipped white cloud masses, + Sublimely still their shadows flit and flee: + How silently the work of nature passes-- + The roll of worlds, the growth of flower and tree! + Angels of God in heaven! give him to me! give him to me! + + O day and night! O day and night! the hours rolling + Bring ev'ry one its change, its song, or chant, or chime: + Now solemnly their sounds a distant death-knell tolling. + And now the bells above beat forth the flight of time. + I lie, unconsciously each trifle noting, + The far-off sailors toiling on the quay, + Or o'er the sand a broad-wing'd sea-bird floating, + Or passing hum of honey-laden'd bee-- + Angels of God in heaven! give him to me! give him to me! + + O day and night! O day and night! the scene surrounding + Grows dim and all unreal beneath the sunset glow; + And all the heat and rage pass into peace abounding, + I moan, I fear no more, but wait, while still tears flow. + The warm sweet airs scarce move the flowerets slender, + A pause and hush have settled on the sea, + A bird trills forth its love-song low and tender: + O bird rejoice! thy love and thou art free- + Angels of God in heaven! give him to me! give him to me! + + * * * * * + + O day and night! O day and night! ye knew it ever! + Ye saw it written in the world's first golden prime! + And smiled your giant smile at all my rash endeavour + To snatch the cup unfill'd from out the hand of Time. + He comes, O day and night! Spirits attending, + Swift formless messengers my ev'ry sense apprise! + He comes! the bright fair head o'er some old book low bending + Dear Lord, at last! his eyes have met my eyes-- + Gleam of light goes quivering across the happy skies! + + * * * * * + + O day and night! O day and night! Love sits between us. + Far out the rising tide comas sweeping o'er the sand. + The murmurous pine trees lend their purple shade to screen us, + And breathe their fragrant sighs above the quiet land. + And, like a sigh, the sunset blaze is over, + The folding grey has veiled its colours bright; + While swift from view fade out the gulls that hover, + As round us sinks at last, on pinions light, + The dark and radiant clarity of the beautiful still night. + + O day and night! O day and night! no words are spoken. + Such pleasant joy profound no words could well express: + His wand'ring fingers smooth my hair in silent token, + And all my being answers to the tender mute caress. + My head is resting on his breast for pillow, + And as by music moved my soul is thrill'd; + Flow on and clasp the land, O bursting billow! + O breezes, tell the mountains many-rill'd! + Our hearts now know each other, and our hope is all-fulfill'd. + + O day and night! O day and night! no shadow crosses + This long'd-for solemn hour of all-forgetful bliss; + No chilling thought, or stalking dread arising, tosses + A poison'd drop of bitterness to spoil the ling'ring kiss: + No mem'ries past or future fears assailing-- + As soon might doubt bedim the stars that shine! + Or souls released reach Paradise bewailing + The end of pain, and clemency divine: + The glorious present holds us: I am his and he is mine!" + + * * * * * + + O day and night! O day and night! and was it madness? + Lo! all is changing, even sky, and sea, and shore; + The heaving water ebbs itself away in sadness, + The waves receding sigh, "Delight returns no more!" + Far down the East the dawn is dimly burning, + Its first chill breath has shivered thro' my frame, + And with the light comes cruel Thought returning, + The air seems full of voices speaking blame; + Another day commences, but the world is not the same! + + O day and night! O day and night! its rashes pass'd us, + We stand upon the brink and watch, the strong deep tide, + And shrink already from the howls that soon must blast us, + The world that sins unchidden, and the laws that would divide. + "O Love, they rest in peace whom ocean covers!" + One plunge, one clasp supernal, one long kiss! + Then downward, like those old Italian lovers. + Descend for ever through the long abyss, + And float together, happy, all eternity like this! + +The charm of the reader's voice had held us spellbound, and the poem +was well received; but after the usual compliments there was a pause, +and then Ideala burst out impetuously: "I am sick of those old Italian +lovers," she said; "they float into everything. Their story is the +essence with which two-thirds of our love literature is flavoured. We +should never have received them in society; why do we tolerate them in +books? I like my company to be respectable even there; and when an +author asks me to admire and sympathise with such people he insults +me." + +"They must be brought in, though, for the sake of contrast," somebody +observed. + +"They should be kept in their proper place, then," she answered. "You +may choose what you please to point a moral, but for pity's sake be +careful about what you use to adorn a tale." + +"Moral or no moral," said the young sculptor, "I think a new poem of +any kind a thing to be thankful for." + +"And do you call that kind of thing new?" said Ideala. "I should say it +was a fine compound of all the poems of the kind, and several other +kinds, that have ever been written, with a dash of the peculiarly +refined immorality of our own times, from which nothing is sacred; +thrown in to make weight. Such writing, + + Like a new disease, unknown to men, + Creeps, no precaution used, among the crowd, + . . . . . . . . . . . and saps + The fealty of our friends, and stirs the pulse + With devil's leaps, and poisons half the young. + +It is the feeling of the day accurately defined. Nobody sighs for love +and peace now. The cry is for the indulgence of some fiery passion for +an hour, and then, perdition!--if you like--since that is the +recognised price of it." + +"Our loves are more intense than they used to be," said the sculptor, +sighing. + +"Love!" Ideala answered. "Oh, do not desecrate 'the eternal God-word, +love!' There is little enough of that in the business that goes by its +name now-a-days. I am a lady--I cannot use the right word. But it is +none the less the thing I mean because it calls blasphemously on God +Almighty to help it to fulfil itself." + +"Well," said Charlie Lloyd, deprecatingly, "I didn't offer this, you +know, as an admirable specimen of what our day can produce. I told you +I hadn't read it, and now that I have I don't suppose any one has +offered it to the public as a serious expression of sentiment." + +"You do not think people write books about what they really feel?" said +Ideala. "I believe they do when the feeling is shameful. If you want to +keep a secret, publish the exact truth in a book, and nobody will +believe a word of it. I think people who publish such productions +should be burned on a pile of their own works." + +"The writer is young, doubtless," I said, apologetically. It gives one +a shock to hear a woman say harsh things. + +"He was evidently not too young to have bad thoughts," said Claudia, +supporting her friend; "and he was certainly old enough to know +better." + +"He!" ejaculated Ideala. "It is far more likely to be _she_. Do +you read the reviews? You will find that all the most objectionable +books are written by women--and condemned by men who lift up their +voices now, as they have done from time immemorial, and insist that we +should do as they say, and not as they do." + +"I am afraid you are right," said Charlie Lloyd. "So many of our best +women--I mean the women who are likely to make most impression on the +age--are going that way now." + +"But what horrid things you say, Ideala," one of the ladies chimed in, +"and you make everybody else say horrid things. That 'Passion of +Delysle' is not a bit worse than Tennyson's 'Fatima'--and there's a lot +more in it--that part about 'the roll of worlds,' you know, is quite +grand." + +"I always liked that idea," Ideala observed. + +"And--and--" the lady continued, "where she looks at everything, you +know. She was very properly seeking distraction, and found it for a +moment in the contemplation of nature, and that softened her mood, so +that when the inevitable rush of recollection comes and forces the +thought of him back upon her, her feeling finds expression in a prayer +--instead of--instead of--" + +"A blasphemous remonstrance," Ideala put in. "Oh, I don't deny that +there is just enough to be said in favour of all these things to make +them sell--and this one has two unusual points of interest. It opens +with a riddle, and the lady's lover is a priest, which gives an +additional zest to the charm of wrong-doing, a _sauce piquante_ for +jaded appetites." + +"Why do you call the opening verses a riddle?" said Charlie Lloyd. + +"Because I fancy no one will ever guess what kind of a place it was-- + + This mountain island, + This saintly shrine, this fort-- + +I forget how it goes on." + +"Oh, the description of the place is not bad," Charlie answered, after +reading it over again to himself. "It would do for the Mont St. Michael +in Normandy." + +"Well, let that pass, then," said Ideala; "also the dear familiar +'subtle scents abroad upon the night.' But what does she mean by 'On +with rush and ring'?" + +"She means the train, obviously." + +"What an outlandish periphrasis! And how about + + The rugged brows of those old rocks, storm-rent and hoary, + Are quivering in their grim surprise?" + +"That is a 'pathetic fallacy.' She is not speaking of the things as +they were, but as they appeared to her excited fancy. She chronicles +her own death, though----" + +"So did Moses," said Ideala. "If you really want to justify 'The +Passion of Delysle' I can help you. You see she was dreadfully badly +treated by her friends, poor thing! and her marriage after all was no +marriage, because she loved another man all the time; and your husband +isn't properly your husband if you don't love him, love being the only +possible sanctification--in fact, the only true marriage. And then her +lover, thinking he had lost her, became a priest, and vows made under a +misapprehension like that cannot be binding--it would be too much to +expect us to suffer always for such mistakes. And then the world--but +we all know how cruel the world is! And appearances were sadly against +them, poor things! No one would ever have believed that they had stayed +out all night to discuss their religious experiences. Suicide is +shocking, of course; but still, when people are driven to it like that, +we can only be sorry for them, and hope they will never do it again!" +She nestled back more comfortably on her couch, and then continued in +an altered tone: "But it is appalling to think of the quantity of +machine-made verses like those that are imposed on the public year by +year, verses the mere result of much reading and writing, without a +scrap of inspiration in them, and as far removed from even schoolboy +efforts of genius, as an oleograph is from an oil painting. Poets are +as rare now as prophets, and inspiration has left us for our sins. I +think any fairly educated one of us, with a tolerable memory and the +habit of composition, could write that 'Passion of Delysle' again in +half-an-hour." + +"Oh, could they, though!" said Ralph, the son of the house. "I dare bet +anything you couldn't do it yourself in twice the time." + +"Dare you?" she answered, with a little smile. "Well, to adopt your +elegant phraseology, Master Ralph, I bet I will produce the same story, +with the same conclusion, but a different moral, in an hour--since you +allow me twice the time I named--if I may be permitted to write it in +blank verse, that is, and of course, with the understanding that what I +write is not intended to be anything but mere versified prose." + +"Done with you!" cried Ralph. + +"Hush--h--h!" his mother exclaimed, deprecatingly. "Betting, and +before the Bishop, too!" + +"What the Bishop don't know will do him no harm, Ma," said the youth in +a stage whisper. "Sit down, Ideala, and begin. It's ten minutes to ten +now." + +The Bishop slept serenely; conversation flagged; and Ideala wrote +steadily for about three-quarters of an hour; then she gathered up the +manuscript, rose from the table, and returned to her old seat. + +"'The Passion of Delysle' has become 'The Choice,'" she said. "Will you +read it for me, Mr. Lloyd? I think it should have that advantage, at +least." + +Charlie took the manuscript, and read: + + Once on a time, not very long gone by, + A noble lady had a noble choice. + The daughter of an ancient house was she, + Beauty, and wealth, and highest rank were hers, + But love was not, for of a proud, cold race + Her people were, caring for nought but lands, + Riches, and power; holding all tender thoughts + As weakly folly, only fit for babes. + The lady learnt their creed; her heart seem'd hard-- + She thought it so; and when the moment came + To choose 'twixt love, young love, and pride of place, + She still'd an unwonted feeling that would rise, + And saying calmly: "I have got no heart, + And love is vain!" she chose to be the wife + Of sinful age, corruption, and untruth, + Scorning the steadfast love of one who yearn'd + To win her from the crooked paths she trod, + And break the sordid chains that bound her soul, + And sweep the defiling dust of common thoughts + From out her mind, until it shone at last + With large imaginings of God and good. + + She chose: no more they met: her life was pass'd + In constant round of pomp and proud display. + But when he went, and never more there came + The love-sad eyes to question and entreat, + The voice of music praising noble deeds, + The graceful presence and the golden hair, + She miss'd the boy; but scoff'd at first and said: + "One misses all things, common pets one spurn'd, + Good slaves and bad alike when both are gone,-- + A small thing makes the habit of a life!" + But days wore on, and adulation palled. + She knew not what she lack'd, nor that she loath'd + The hollow semblance, the dull mockery, + Which she had gain'd for joy by choosing rank, + And money's worth, instead of peace and love. + + Yet ever as the long days grew to months + More heavy hung the time, moved slower by. + And all things troubled her and gave her pain, + And morning, noon, and night the thought would rise, + And grew insistent when she would not hear: + "One loved me! out of all this crowd but one! + And he is gone, and I have driven him forth!" + + Then in the silent solitude of night + An old weird story that she once had heard + Tormented her; a story speaking much + Of a rock-island on the Norman coast, + A mountain peak rising from barren sand, + Or standing sea-girt when the tide returns, + And beaten by the winds on ev'ry side, + With wall'd-in town, and castle on the height, + And high above the castle, strangely placed, + A grey cathedral with its summit tipp'd + By a gold figure of St. Michael crown'd, + With burnished wings and flashing sword that shone + A beacon in the sunset, seen for miles, + As tho' the Archangel floated in the air. + The castle and the church a sanctuary + And refuge were, to which men often fled + For rest or safety, finding what they sought. + And as the lady thought about the place, + A notion came that she would like to kneel + And pray for peace at that far lonely shrine. + The longing grew: she rested not nor slept. + And should she fly and leave her wretched wealth? + And if she fled she never could return; + Yet if she stay'd she felt that she should die. + So go or stay meant misery for her-- + But misery is lessened when we move. + Yes, she would go! and then she laugh'd to think + Of the wild fury of her harsh old Lord + When he should wake one day and find her gone-- + Laugh'd! the first time for long and weary months. + + By Mont St. Michael, on the Norman coast, + A restless river, changing oft its course, + Flows sullenly; and racehorse-like the tide, + Which, going, leaves a wilderness of sand. + Comes rushing back, a foam-topp'd, wat'ry wall; + And those who, wand'ring, 'scape the quicksand's grip, + Are often caught and drown'd ere help can come. + But fair the prospect from the Mount when bright + The sunshine falls on Avranches far away, + A white town straggling o'er a verdant hill; + And on the tree-clad country toward the west, + On apple orchards, and the fairy bloom + Of feath'ry tam'risk bushes on the shore; + Whilst high above in silent majesty + Of hue and form the floating clouds support + The far-extending vault of azure sky + + Such was the shrine the lady sought, and there + In mute appeal for what she lack'd she knelt, + Not knowing what she lack'd; but finding peace + Steal o'er her soul there as she faintly heard + The slow and solemn chanting of the priests, + The mild monotony of murmured prayers, + And hush of pauses when she seemed to feel + The heart she deem'd so hard was melting fast, + And listen'd to a voice within her say-- + "Love is not vain! Love all things and rejoice!" + And found warm tears were stealing down her cheeks. + + The mystery of love, of love, of love, + Of hope, of joy, of life itself, she felt; + The crown of life, which she had sacrificed + In scornful pride for lust of power and place. + The lady bow'd her head, and o'er her swept + A wave of anguish, and she knew despair. + "Could I but see him once again!" she moan'd, + "See him, and beg forgiveness, and then die!" + Did the Archangel Michael, standing there + Upon her left, in shining silver, hear? + Who knows? Her prayer was answer'd like a flash; + For at that moment, clear and sweet o'er all + The mingled music of the chanting choir, + There rose a voice that thrill'd her inmost soul: + It breathed a blessing; utter'd soft a prayer. + No need to look: and yet she look'd, and saw + A hooded monk before the altar kneel, + A graceful presence, tho' in sordid dress. + And as she gazed the cowl slipp'd back and show'd + (But dimly thro' the incense-perfumed cloud) + A pure pale face, a golden tonsured head, + And blue eyes raised to heaven. Then the truth + Was there reveal'd to her that he had left + The world to watch and pray for such as she. + + Out of the castled-gate she hurried forth: + What matter'd where she went, to east or west? + What matter'd peasant's warning that the sand + Was shifting ever, and the rushing tide + Gave them no quarter whom it overtook? + 'Twas death she courted, and with heedless step + Onward to meet it swift the lady fled. + Death is so beautiful at such a time, + When all the land in summer sunshine lies, + And lapse of distant waves breaks pleasantly + The silence with a soothing dreamy sound, + And danger seems no nearer than the sky, + He tempts us from afar with hope of rest. + She hurried on in search of death, nor heard + That eager footsteps followed where she went. + The voice that call'd her was not real, she thought, + But a sweet portion of a strange sweet dream-- + For now the terrible anguish quickly pass'd, + And sense of peace at hand was all she felt. + "O stop!" + + Ah! that was real. She turn'd and saw, + Nor saw a moment till she felt his grasp + Strong and determined on her rounded arm. + "Thou shalt not die!" he cried. "What madness this?" + "Madness!" she echoed: "nay, my love, 'tis bliss-- + The first my life has known--to stand here still + With thee beside me, and to wait for death. + I know my heart at last, but all too late! + I may not love thee, I another's wife; + Thou mayst not love me, thou hast wedded heaven. + We cannot be together in this world; + I cannot live alone and know thee here. + And thou art troubled! I for beneath that garb + Thy heart beats ever hot with love for me; + For love will not be quell'd by monkish vows. + But all things change in death! so let us die + Thus, hand in hand, and so together pass, + And be together thro' eternity!" + + There was a struggle in the young monk's breast; + He would not meet her pleading eyes and yield, + But gazing up to heaven prayed for strength, + Strength to resist, and guidance how to act, + For death like that with her was luring--sweet-- + A strong temptation, but he must resist, + And strive to save and show her how to live. + "We cannot make hereafter for ourselves," + He answered softly; "all that we can do + Is so to live that we shall win reward + Of praise, and peace, and happy life to come. + Thy duty lies before thee; so does mine. + Let each return, and toil and watch and pray, + Knowing each other's heart is fix'd on heaven. + And do the good we can; not seeking death + Nor shunning it, but living pure and true, + With conscience clear to meet our God at last, + And win each other for our great reward." + + The moving music of his words sank deep + Her alter'd heart thrill'd high to holy thoughts. + "Be thou my guide," she said. "My duty now + Shall bring me peace; so shall I toil like thee + To win the love I yearn for in the end." + + It might not be. The treach'rous, working sand + Already clutched their feet, and check'd their speed; + And dancing, sparkling, like a joyful thing, + A glitt'ring, glassy wall of foam-fleck'd wave + Towards them glided with that fatal speed + You cannot mark because it is so swift. + No use to struggle now: no time to fly! + He clasp'd her to him: "God hath will'd it thus. + Courage, my sister!" "Is this death?" she cried. + "Yes, this is death." "It is not death, but joy!" + And as she spoke the spot where they were seen + Became a wat'ry waste of battling waves: + While high above the summer sun shone on-- + A passing seabird hoarsely shriek'd along! + All things were changed, with that vast change which makes + It seem as tho' nought else had ever been. + +"Well done, Ideala!" said Ralph, patronisingly; "you certainly have a +memory, and are quite as good at patchwork as the author of 'Delysle.' +I could criticise on another count, but taking into consideration +time, place, circumstances, and the female intellect, I refrain. That +is the generous sort of creature _I_ am. So, without expressing my own +opinion further--except to remark that, though I don't think much of +either of them, personally I prefer 'Delysle.' The other is +wholesomer, doubtless, for those who like a mild diet. Milk and water +doesn't agree with me. But I put it to the vote. Ladies and gentlemen, +do you or do you not consider that this lady has won her bet?" + +"Oh, won it, most decidedly!" we all agreed. + +"By-the-by, what was the bet?" I asked. + +"My Pa's gaiters against Ideala's blue stockings. I regret to say that +circumstances over which I have no control"--and he glanced at the +unconscious Bishop--"prevent the immediate payment of my debt--unless, +indeed, he has a second pair;" and he left the room hurriedly as if to +see. + +He did not come back to us that evening, but I believe he was to be +heard of later at the sign of the "Billiard and Cue." + +"Well," said the young sculptor, returning to the old point of +departure, "for my own part, I find much that is elevating in modern +works." + +"So do I," said Ideala; "I find much that raises me on stilts." + +"But even that eminence would enable you to look over other people's +heads and beyond." + +"It would," she answered, "if human nature didn't desire a sense of +security; but, as it is, when I am artificially set up, I find that all +I can do is to look at my own feet, and tremble lest I fall. Modern +literature stimulates; it doesn't nourish. It makes you feel like a +giant for a moment, but leaves you crushed like a worm, and without +faith, without love, without hope. It excites you pleasurably, and when +you see life through its medium you never suspect that the vision is +distorted. It makes you think the Iconoclast the greatest hero, and +causes you to feel that you share his glory when you help him with your +approval to overthrow all the images you ever cherished; but when the +work of destruction is over, and you look about you once more with +sober eyes, you find you have sacrificed your all for nothing. Your +false guide fails you when you want him most. He robs you, and leaves +you hungry, thirsty, and alone in the wilderness to which he has +beguiled you. There is no need for new theories of Life and Religion; +all we require is strength and courage to perfect the old ones. +[Footnote: She quite changed her mind upon this subject eventually, and +held that there was not only need of new theories, but good hope that +we should have them.] What the mind wants is food it can grow upon, not +stimulants which inflate it for a time with a fancied sense of power +that has no real existence. But I have small hope for our nation when I +think of the sparkling trash that the mind of the multitude daily +imbibes and craves for. I mean our novels. What a fine affectation of +goodness there is in most of them! And what a perfect moral is tacked +on to them!--like the _balayeuse_ at the bottom of a lady's dress; +but, like the _balayeuse_, it is only meant to be a protection and +a finish, and, however precious it may be, it suffers from contact with +the dirt, and sooner or later has to be cut out and cast aside, soiled +and useless. Some doggerel a friend of mine scribbled on one book in +particular describes dozens of popular novels exactly: + + O what a beautiful history! + Think what temptations they passed! + Each one more cruelly trying, + More tempting, indeed, than the last. + And what a lesson it teaches; + No passion from evil's exempted-- + Whilst admiring the moral it preaches, + It makes you quite long to be tempted. + +I agree with those who tell us that society is breaking up, or will +break up unless something is done at once to stop the dissolution. We +have no high ideals of anything. Marriage itself is a mere commercial +treaty, and only professional preachers speak of it in other terms--and +those young people, with a passion for each other, who are about to be +united--a passion that dies the death inevitably for want of knowledge, +and wholesome principle, and self-control to support it. Some of us +like our bargains better than others, but you can judge of the +estimation in which marriage is held when you see how much happiness +people generally find in it. If men and women were kept apart, and made +to live purely from their cradles, they would still scarcely be fit for +marriage; yet any man thinks he may marry, and never cares to be the +nobler or the better for it. And when you see that this, the only +perfect state, the most sacred bond of union between man and woman, is +everywhere lightly considered, don't you think there is reason in the +fear that we are falling on bad times? Oh, don't quote the Romans to +me, and the Inevitable. We know better than the Romans, and could do +better if we chose. But we have to mourn for the death of our manhood! +Where is our manhood? Where are our men? Is there any wonder that we +are losing what is best in life when only women are left to defend it? +Believe me, the degradation of marriage is the tune to which the whole +fabric of society is going to pieces----" + +"Eh, what!" exclaimed the Bishop, waking up with a start--"whole fabric +of society going to pieces? Nonsense! When so many people come to +church. And then look at all the societies at work for the--for the-- +ah--prevention of everything. Why, I belong to a dozen at least myself; +the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, and the Rational Dress Reform, +for doing away with petticoats--no, by-the-by, it is my wife who +belongs to that. But, at any rate, everything is being done that should +be done, and you talk nonsense, my dear"--looking at Ideala severely-- +"because you don't know anything about it." + +"The faults we are hardest on in others are those we are most conscious +of in ourselves--perhaps because we know how easy it would be to +conquer them," Ideala observed vaguely. + +"Oh, come, now, my dear," said the Bishop, beaming round on all of us, +"you must not believe what you hear about society being in such a bad +state. I know idle people say so, and it is very wrong of them. Why, +_I_ never see anything wrong." + +"Of course not," said Ideala. "We are all on our best behaviour before +you." + +The Bishop patted his apron good-humouredly. "Well, now, take yourself +for example," he said. "I am sure _you_ never do wrong--tell stories, +you know, and that kind of thing." + +"Haven't I, though!" she answered, mischievously. "Not that it was much +use, for I always repented and confessed; and now I have abandoned the +practice to the best of my ability. It is horrid to feel you don't +deserve the confidence that is placed in you, Bishop, isn't it?" + +"Ideala!" Claudia protested. + +The Bishop looked puzzled. + +"I can assure you I have suffered agonies of remorse because, in an +idle moment, I deceived my cat--a big, comfortable creature, who used +to come to me every day to be fed, and preferred to eat out of my hand. +He was greedy, though, and snapped, and one day I offered him a piece +of preserved ginger, and he dashed at it as usual, and swallowed it +before he knew what it was. Then he just looked at me and walked away. +He trusted me, and I had deceived him. It was an unpardonable breach of +confidence, and I have always felt that I never could look that cat in +the face again." + +The Bishop smiled and sighed at the little reminiscence. "I think you +are right, though, in one way, Ideala," he presently observed. "The +powers of Light and Darkness are certainly having a hard fight for it +in our day; but we have every reason to hope. + + Oh, yet we trust that somehow good + Will be the final goal of ill." + +"And, granted that the popular literature of the day is corrupt," the +young sculptor put in, "and that the standard of society is being +yearly lowered by it, still there is Art----" + +"But there is so little of it," said Ideala; "I mean so little that +elevates. Most of the subjects chosen are not worth painting; and what +profit is there in contemplating a thing that is neither grand nor +beautiful in itself, nor suggestive, by association, of anything that +is grand or beautiful? The pictures one generally sees are not +calculated to suggest anything to the minds that need suggestion most. +The technical part may be good and gratifying to those who understand +it, but that is the mere trade of the thing. We prefer to see it well +done, of course, but if the canvas has nothing but the paint to +recommend it, the artist might have saved himself the trouble of +putting it on, for all the good it does or the pleasure it gives." + +"Oh, Ideala, do you know nothing of the charm of colour?" asked a lady +who painted. + +"_I_ do," said Ideala, "but I may be supposed to have enjoyed +exceptional advantages. And it is hardly charm we want to elevate us. +There will always be enough in all conscience to appeal to the senses. +But there is an absence even of charm." + +"Many a noble thought has been expressed in a coat of colour," said the +lady. + +"I know it has," Ideala answered; "and all best thoughts give pleasure. +I have been so thrilled by a noble idea, well expressed, that I could +do nothing but sit with closed eyes and revel in the joy of it. But if +such an idea were placed before you, and you did not know the language +in which it was written, what good would it do you? An uneducated +person seeing a picture of a donkey in a field sees only a donkey in a +field, however well it may be painted; and I fancy very exceptional +ability would be required to make any of us think a grey donkey +sublime, or believe an ordinary green field to be one of the Elysian." + +"Talking about charm," the sculptor broke in, enthusiastically, "I +suppose you haven't seen the new picture, 'Venus getting into the +Bath?' That is a feast of colour, and realism, if you like! She is +standing beside the bath with a dreamy look on her face. Her lovely +eyes are fixed on the water. One arched and blue-veined foot is +slightly raised as if the touch of the marble chilled her. Her limbs +are in an easy attitude, and beautifully modelled. She is represented +as a slight young girl, and the figure stands out in exquisite nudity +from a background of Pompeian red, and the dark green of myrtles. With +one hand she is holding aloft the masses of her rich brown hair--the +attitude suggests the stretching of the muscles after repose; with the +other"--but here his memory failed him. "What _is_ she doing with her +other hand?" + +"Scratching herself!" slipped from Ideala, involuntarily, to her own +horror and the delight of some. But she recovered herself quickly, and +turning to the good Bishop, who was looking mildly astonished and much +amused, she said: "There, my Lord, is an instance of the corrupt state +of society in our own day. You see, even your restraining presence +doesn't always keep us in order. I hope," she whispered to me, "I'm not +going to be made the horrid example to prove the truth of all my +theories." + +Soon after this the party broke up. Claudia returned in her wraps to +say good-night to the Bishop's wife. + +"Claudia!" Ideala exclaimed, "you have forgotten that detestable old +blue shawl." + +Claudia tried to stop her with a significant gesture, but in vain. +Ideala was obtuse. + +"Claudia came out this evening in the most extraordinary covering I +ever saw a lady wear," she said to the Bishop's wife. "I really think +she must have borrowed it from one of the maids." + +"I am afraid you must mean the blue shawl I lent to Lady Claudia the +other evening," the Bishop's wife replied, with a hurt smile. + +"Oh!" said Ideala, disconcerted for a moment. "But, really, Bishopess, +you deserve to be upbraided. You should set a better example, and not +provoke us to scorn on the subject of your shawls." + +Later, when I was alone with my sister, I said: "Ideala did nothing but +put her foot in it this evening. What was the matter with her? I never +heard her speak so strongly before, except when she was alone with us. +And I don't think she ought to discuss such subjects with such people; +it is hardly delicate." + +Claudia sighed wearily. "Who knows what pain is at the bottom of it +all?" she said. "But one thing always puzzles me. Ideala rails at evils +that never hurt her, and yet she speaks of marriage, which has been her +bane, as if it were a holy and perfect state, upon which it is a +privilege to enter." + +"Plenty of people have condemned marriage simply because their own +experience of it has been unfortunate," I answered; "but Ideala is +above that. She will let no petty personal mishap prejudice her +judgment on the subject. She sees and feels the possibility of infinite +happiness in marriage when there is such love and such devotion on both +sides as she herself could have brought to it; and she understands that +her own unhappy experience need only be exceptional." + +"I wish it were!" sighed Claudia. + +Some years later, Ideala confessed to me that she had written "The +Passion of Delysle" herself, but had had no idea of its significance +until she heard it read aloud that night, and then, as she elegantly +expressed it, she could have cut her throat with shame and +mortification, which I consider a warning to young ladies not to trust +to their poetical inspirations, for--if the shade of Shelley will +pardon the conclusion--alas! _apparently_, they know not what they do +when they write verses! + +"I can't think how you could have criticised it like that, Ideala," I +said, "now that I know you wrote it." + +"Neither can I," she answered. + +"You ought to have confessed you had written it, or have said nothing +about it," I told her, frankly. + +"Yes," she assented. "Not doing so was a kind of falsehood. But +neither course occurred to me." And then she explained: "I never see +the meaning of what I write till the light of public opinion is turned +upon it, or some cold critic comes and damps my enthusiasm. When a +subject possesses me, and shapes itself into verse, it boils in my +brain, and my pen is the only way of escape for it, the one +safety-valve I have to ease the pressure. And I can't judge of its +merits myself for long enough after it _is_ written, because the +boiling begins again, you see, whenever I read it, and then there is +such a steam of feeling I cannot see to think. For the verses, however +poor they appear to you, contain for me the whole poem as I have it in +my inner consciousness. It is beautiful as it exists there, but the +power of expression is lacking. If only I could make you feel it as I +do, I should be the greatest poet alive." + +It was a trick of Ideala's to miss the true import of a thing--often an +act of her own--until the occasion had passed, or to see it strangely +distorted, as she frequently did at this time--though that gradually +ceased altogether as she grew older; but it was this peculiarity, so +strongly marked in her, which first helped me to comprehend a curious +trait there is in the moral nature of men and women while it is still +in process of development. Many men, Frenchmen especially, have thought +the trait peculiar to women. La Bruyére declares that "Women have no +principles as men understand the word. They are guided by their +feelings, and have full faith in their guide. Their notions of +propriety and impropriety, right and wrong, they get from the little +world embraced by their affections." And Alphonse Karr says: "Never +attempt to prove anything to a woman: she believes only according to +her feelings. Endeavour to please and persuade: she may yield to the +person who reasons with her, not to his arguments"--opinions, however, +which apply to men as often as not, and only to the young, impressible, +passionate, and imperfectly educated of either sex. But there is +scarcely a generalisation for one sex which does not apply equally to +the other, so perfectly alike in nature are men and women. The +difference is only in circumstance. Reverse the position of the sexes, +require men to be modest and obedient, and they will develop every +woman's weakness in a generation. If a man would comprehend a woman, +let him consider himself; the woman has the same joys, sorrows, hopes, +fears, pleasures, and passions--expressed in another way, that is all. +But, certainly, for a long time Ideala's guide was her feeling about a +thing. I have often said to her, when at last she decided to take some +step which had obviously been the only course open to her from the +first: "But, Ideala, _why_ have you hesitated so long? You knew it +was right to begin with." + +"Yes," she would answer, "I _knew_ it was right; but I have only just +now _felt_ that it was." + +She had never thought of acting on the mere cold knowledge. For feeling +to knowledge, in young minds, is like the match to a fire laid in a +grate; knowledge without feeling being as cheerless and impotent as the +fire unlit. + + + + +CHAPTER XII. + + +A little while after that evening at the Palace we learnt to our dismay +that Ideala's husband had taken a house in one of the rough +manufacturing districts, to which he meant to remove immediately. +Business was the pretext, as he had money in some great ironworks +there; but I think the nearness of a large city, where a man of his +stamp would be able to indulge all his tastes without let or hindrance, +had something to do with the change. + +Ideala had kept up very well while she was among us, but soon after she +went away we gathered from the tone of her letters that there was a +change in her which alarmed us. Her health, which had hitherto been +splendid, seemed to be giving way, and it was evident that her new +position did not please her, and that, even after she had been there +for months, she continued to feel herself "a stranger in a strange +land." The people were uncongenial, and I think it likely they regarded +Ideala's oddities with some suspicion, and did not take to her as we +had done. She had not that extreme youth which had been her excuse when +she came to us, and which, somehow, we had not missed when she lost it; +and her habitual reserve on all matters that immediately concerned +herself must also have tended to make her unpopular with people whose +predominant quality was "an eminent curiosity." + +"They are far above books," Ideala wrote to Claudia; "what they study +is each other, and in the pursuit of this branch of knowledge they are +indefatigable. When they can get nothing out of me about myself, they +question me about my husband and friends, and it is in vain that I +answer them with those words of wisdom (I feel sure I misquote them)-- +'All that is mine own is yours till the end of my life; but the secret +of my friend is not mine own'--they persevere. + +"Our house is near the town, Eighteen big chimneys darken our daylight +and deluge us with smuts when the wind brings the smoke, our way; and +besides the smoke we are subject to unsavoury vapours from chemical +works in the other direction, so that when the wind shifts we only +exchange evils. They say these chemical fumes are not unwholesome, and +quote the death-rate, which is lower than any other place of the size +in England. In fact, scarcely anybody dies here. They go away as soon +as they begin to feel ill--perhaps that accounts for it. But those +horrid chemical fumes have a great deal to answer for. They have killed +the trees for miles around. It is the oaks that suffer principally. The +tops are nipped first, and then they gradually die downwards till the +whole tree is decayed all through. The absence of trees makes the +country bleak and desolate, and I cannot help thinking the unlovely +surroundings affect us all. The people themselves are unlovely in +thought, and word, and deed; but I have found a good deal of rough +kindliness amongst them nevertheless. They did mob me on one occasion, +and made most unkind remarks about my nether garments, when I was +obliged to walk through the town in my riding habit; but, as a rule, +the mill girls merely observe 'That's a lady,' and let me go by +unmolested--unless I happen to be carrying flowers. They do so love +flowers, poor things and I cannot resist their pathetic entreaties when +they beg for 'One, missus, on'y one!' Some of my lady friends are not +let off so easily as I am. The girls chaff them unmercifully about +their dress and personal peculiarities, and if they show signs of +annoyance they call them names that are not to be repeated. The mill +girls wear bright-coloured gowns, white aprons, and nothing on their +heads. If a policeman catches them at any mischief they either clatter +off in their clogs with shrieks of laughter, or knock him down and kick +him most unmercifully. They are as strong as men, and as beautiful, +some of them, as saints; but they are very unsaintlike creatures +really--irresponsible, and with little or no idea of right and wrong. +One scarcely believes that they have souls--and I am always surprised +to find that anything not cruel and coarse can survive in the hearts of +people, begrimed, body and mind, like these, by their hard +surroundings; but it is there, nevertheless--the human nature, and the +poetry, and the something ready to thrill to better things. A gentleman +has a lovely place not far from us, where the trees have been spared by +a miracle. Nightingales seldom wander so far north, but a few years ago +a stray one was heard there, and the wonder and the beauty of its voice +brought hundreds from the mills and crowded streets to hear it sing. +Special trains were run from the neighbouring city to accommodate the +crowds that came nightly to wait in the moonlight and listen; and an +enterprising trader set up a stall, and sold gingerbeer. The story ends +there, but I like it, don't you? especially the gingerbeer part of it. +It was told me by one who remembers the circumstance. + +"My greatest pleasure in life is in my flowers, they are dearer to me +than any I ever had before, because they are all so delicate, and +require such infinite care and tenderness to keep them alive in this +uncongenial climate. I have my thrushes also--two, which I stole from +a nest in a wood one moonlight night, and brought up by hand on bread +and milk and scraped beef. I had to get up at daylight, and feed them +every hour until dark; but the clergy will not allow that this +obligation was a proper excuse for staying away from church, and just +now I am unhappy in the feeling that their religion must be inhuman. +But my thrushes have well repaid the trouble. They call me when I go +into the room, and come to me when I open the door of their cage, and +perch on my shoulder. One of them, Israfil, sings divinely. People who +come to hear him see only a little brown bird with speckled breast, +and call him a thrush; but _I_ know he is Israfil, 'the angel of song, +and most melodious of God's creatures;' and _he_ thinks that I have +wings. He told me so! + +"I wish you would send me a basket of snails packed up in lettuce +leaves. I don't know why, but I can find none here, and I cannot hear +of one ever having been seen in the county. But please do not send them +unless you are quite sure you can spare them." + +"Ideala is trying to hide herself behind these pretty trivialities," +Claudia said. "I always suspect that there is something more wrong than +usual when she adopts this playful tone and childlike simplicity of +taste." + +"It must be trying to have a friend who believes so little in one as +you do in Ideala," I answered. + +"Oh, how exasperating you are!" Claudia exclaimed. "You know what I +mean quite well enough." + +Later, Ideala wrote: "You are anxious about my health. The fact is, I +have developed a most extraordinary talent for taking cold. I went by +train to see the museum in the city the other day. I took off my cloak +while I was there, and stayed an hour, and when I came away, the +antiquary, who knew I was a precious specimen, wrapped me up carefully +himself. Nevertheless I caught cold. Then I went to stay with some +people near here who clamoured much for the pleasure of my company. +They live in a palace and are entertaining. The lady's papa took me in +to dinner he first evening. He asked me about Major Gorst, and wanted +to know, in an impressive tone of voice, if I had heard that he was the +next heir but one to the Hearldom of Cathcourt. + +"The next day my hostess said to her husband: 'Dearest, do let me ride +Oscar,' and he replied: 'No, my darling, I can't till I know he's safe. +I must get some one to try him first'--and he looked at me--'Perhaps +you wouldn't mind?' + +"They had never seen me on horseback, and I was longing to distinguish +myself. I did distinguish myself. Oscar was a merry horse, but one +never knew how he would take things. The first bridge we came to--I +was 'sitting easy to a canter' with my foot out of the stirrup and my +leg _over_ the third crutch--a bad habit I learnt from a foreign +friend--and an express train rushed by. Oscar went on abruptly, but I +remained. The next difficulty was at a brook. We ought to have crossed +it together; but Oscar changed his mind at the last moment, so he +remained and I went on. And after that we came to cross-roads, and had +a difference of opinion about which was the right one. That ended in +our coming over together, which made me feel solemn--disheartened, in +fact--and then I thought we should never understand each other and be +friends, so I gave him up. I did not talk much about riding to those +people after that. + +"But I wore my summer habit that day, and of course I caught cold. And +when that was nearly well I went downstairs to be civil to some people +who had driven a long way to see me. The drawing-room was damp from +disuse, and the fire had only just been lighted--and of course I caught +cold. When that was better I went for a drive. The wind was east, and +the carriage was open--and of course I caught cold. I don't know how it +may strike you, but argument seems to me useless when a person has such +a constitution." + +"Can you read between the lines of that letter?" Claudia asked me. + +"She seems to be dreadfully _don't care_," I said. + +"Exactly. She is more reckless, and therefore more miserable, than she +used to be. I wouldn't live with him." + +"Ideala won't shirk her duty because it is hard and unpalatable," I +answered. + +"I believe she likes it!" Claudia exclaimed; and then, smiling at her +own inconsistency, she explained, "I mean if she really is miserable +she ought to speak and let us do something." + +"It is contrary to her principles. She would think it wrong to disturb +_your_ mind for a moment because her own life is a burden to her. +That is why she always tries to seem happy, and is cheerful on the +surface. If she made lament, we should suffer in sympathy, and all the +more because there is so very little we could do to help her. Silence +is best. If she ever gives way, she will not be able to bear it again." + +"But why _should_ she bear it?" Claudia demanded. + +"It is her duty." + +"I know she thinks so, and is sacrificing her life to that principle. +But will you kindly tell me where a woman's duty to her husband ends +and her duty to herself begins? I suppose you will allow that she has a +duty to herself? And the line should be drawn somewhere." + +Claudia's mind was a sort of boomerang just then, returning inevitably +to this point of departure; but I could make no suggestion that +satisfied her. And I was uneasy myself. Ideala refused to come to us, +and had made some excuse to prevent it when Claudia offered to go to +her. This puzzled me; but we induced her at last to promise to meet us +in London in May. It was April then, and we thought if she could be +persuaded to stay two months of the season in town with us, and go with +us afterwards to a place of mine in the North which she loved, she +would probably recover her health and spirits. + + + + +CHAPTER XIII. + + +In the meantime, however, something decisive happened, as we afterwards +learnt. + +It seems that after they left our neighbourhood Ideala had, by +accident, made a number of small discoveries about her husband which +had the effect of destroying any remnant of respect she may still have +felt for him. She found that he was in the habit of examining her +private papers in her absence, and that he had opened her letters and +resealed them. His manner to her was unctuous as a rule; but she knew +he lied to her without hesitation if it suited his purpose--and that +alone would have been enough to destroy her liking for him, for it is +not in the nature of such a woman to love a man who has looked her in +the face and lied to her. + +These things, and the loneliness he brought upon her by driving from +her the few people with whom she had any intellectual fellowship, she +would have borne in the old uncomplaining way, but he did not stop +there. + +One day she drove into town with a friend who got out to do some +shopping. Ideala waited in the carriage, which had stopped opposite a +public-house, and from where she sat she could see the little sitting- +room behind the bar, and its occupants. They were her husband and the +barmaid, who was sitting on his knee. + +Ideala arranged her parasol so that they might not see her if they +chanced to look that way, and calmly resumed the conversation when her +friend returned. + +She dined alone with her husband that evening, and talked as usual, +telling him all she had done and what news there was in the paper, as +she always did, to save him the trouble of reading it. In return he +told her he had been at the ironworks all day, only leaving them in +time to dress for dinner, a piece of news she received with a still +countenance, and her soft eyes fixed on the fire. + +She was standing on the hearth at the time, and as he spoke he laid his +hand upon her shoulder caressingly, but she could not bear it. Her +powers of endurance were at an end, and for the first time she shrank +from him openly. + +"How you do loathe me, Ideala," he exclaimed. + +"Yes, I loathe you," she answered. + +And then, in a sudden burst of rage, he raised his hand and struck her. + +Ideala's determination to be faithful to what she conceived to be her +duty had kept her quiet hitherto, but now a sense of personal +degradation made her desperate, and she forgot all that. Her first +impulse was to consult somebody, to speak and find means to put an end +to her misery; but I was not there, and to whom should she go for +advice. Her impatience brooked no delay. She must see some one +instantly. She thought of the Rector of the parish, but felt he would +not do. He was a fine-looking, well-mannered old gentleman, much +engaged in scientific pursuits, who always spoke of the Deity as if he +were on intimate terms with Him, and had probably never been asked to +administer any but the most formal kind of spiritual consolation in his +life. + +The training and experience of a Roman Catholic priest, accustoming +them as it does to deal with every phase of human suffering and +passion, would have been more useful to her in such an emergency, but +she knew none of the priests in that district, and did not think of +going to them. But while she was considering the matter, as if by +inspiration, she remembered something an acquaintance had lately +written to her. This lady was a person for whom she felt much respect, +and that doubtless influenced her decision considerably. The lady +wrote: "It must be convenient to be only twenty minutes by train from +such a big place. I suppose you go over for shopping, &c.? When you are +there again I wish you would go and see my cousin Lorrimer. He is +Adviser in General at the Great Hospital--a responsible position; and I +am sure, if you go, he will be glad to do the honours of the place, +which is most interesting." + +Ideala had felt from the first that she would rather consult a stranger +who would be disinterested and unprejudiced. This gentleman's name +promised well for him, for he belonged to people whose integrity was +well known; and his position vouched for his ability--and also for his +age to Ideala, whose imagination had pictured a learned old gentleman, +bald, spectacled, benevolent, full of knowledge of the world, "wise +saws and modern instances." No one, she thought, could be better suited +for her purpose; and accordingly, next day, after attending to her +household duties, she went by an early train to consult him. + + + + +CHAPTER XIV. + + +The Great Hospital had been founded by an eccentric old gentleman of +enormous wealth for an entirely original purpose. He observed that +great buildings were erected everywhere to receive patients suffering +from all imaginable bodily ills, chronic mania, of course, when the +brain was diseased, being one of them; but no one had thought of making +provision for such troubles, mental, moral, and religious, as affect +the mind; and he held that such suffering was as real, and, without +proper treatment, as incurable and disastrous, as any form of physical +ailment. He therefore determined to found an hospital for these unhappy +ones, which should contain every requisite that Divine Revelation had +suggested, or human ingenuity could devise, for the promotion of peace +of mind. The idea had grown out of some great mental trouble with which +he himself had been afflicted in early life, and for which the world, +as it was, could offer him no relief. + +The first thing he did towards the carrying out of his plan was to buy +a site for his hospital near a growing town on the banks of a big +river. The building was to be surrounded by green fields, for the +colour is refreshing; and within sight of a great volume of calmly +flowing water, the silent power of which is solemn and tranquillising +to the spirit; and human society was to be within easy reach, for many +people find it beneficial. As soon as he had found the site, which was +entirely satisfactory, he set about maturing his plan for the building. +Such a scheme could not be carried out in a moment, and he spent thirty +years in travelling to study human nature, and architecture, and all +else that should help to bring his work to perfection. At the end of +thirty years he had finished a plan for the building to his own entire +satisfaction; but Mr. Ruskin had been growing up in the meantime, and +had begun to write, and the founder, happening to come across his works +by accident one day, discovered his own ideas to be wrong from +beginning to end. However, as it was the Truth he was aiming at, and +not a justification of himself, he calmly burnt his plans, put his +fingers in his ears (figuratively speaking) that he might not hear the +rest of the world bray, and for ten years more devoted himself to the +study of Mr. Ruskin. At the end of that time he knew something about +proportion, about masses and intervals of light and shade; about the +grandeur and sublimity of size, and the grace and beauty of ornament; +about depth and harmony of colour, and all the other wonders that make +one sick with longing to behold them; and when he had mastered all this +he determined to begin at the very beginning, that is to say, with the +walls that were to enclose his vast experiment. Everything was to be +real, everything was to be solid, everything had to be endowed with a +power of expression that could not fail of its effect. And as soon as +he felt he might safely begin, he hastened away to inspect the long +neglected site for his wonderful building. But here an unexpected check +awaited him. While he himself had been so hard at work, his future +neighbours had not been idle. The town had grown to a city; the river's +banks were crowded with wharves and human habitations; the river itself +cradled a fleet on its bosom, its waters, once so sublimely clear and +still, were turbid and yellow, befouled by the city sewers, and useful +only; and all that remained to remind him of what had once been were a +few acres of weeds enclosed by an iron railing--an eyesore to the +inhabitants of that region, as the Corporation told him, with a polite +hope that he would either build on it soon or leave it alone, which was +their diplomatic way of requesting him to hand the lot over to +themselves. And this he might have done had they said "Please;" but +when he found the young city so ignorant, he thought it his duty to +teach it manners, so he took a year or two more to consider the matter. +Then he perceived that if he built his house on the site as it was now +he should do even more good than he had intended, for the constant +contemplation of such a stately pile would help to elevate the citizens +outside the building, while those within might find comfort in seeing +themselves surrounded by even greater misery than their own. + +And so the building rose and grew to perfection, and they found after +all that no better site could have been chosen for it; for from every +side as you approached it, it was seen to advantage, and the majesty +and power of it were made manifest. Outside, the design was so evident +in its grandeur that the mind was not wearied and perplexed by an +effort to understand; it was simply elevated to a state of enjoyment +bordering on exaltation--exaltation without excitement, and near akin +to peace. And the interior of the building as you entered it maintained +this first impression. Such ornament as there was touched you, as the +clouds do, with a sense of suitability that left nothing to be desired. +Art was so perfectly hidden that there seemed to have been no striving +for effect in decoration or construction, it looked like a work of +Nature, accomplished without effort, and beautiful without design; and +the mind brought under its influence, and left free of conjecture, was +gently compelled to revel in the peace which harmonious surroundings +insensibly produce. Disturbing thoughts vanished as being too common +and mean, too human, for such a place, and the spirit was soothed with +a sense of repose--of sensuous restfulness, really, for the pleasure, +as intended, affected the senses more than the intellect, which could +here make holiday. Work-wearied brains were thus eased from pressure, +and minds a prey to doubts and other disturbing thoughts which impaired +their strength, if they did not render them useless, were at once +relieved. And this was the beginning of the treatment which was +afterwards continued in other parts of the building, and by other +means, until the cure was complete--arrangements being made for the +removal of cases that proved to be hopeless to those older +establishments which have long existed at the expense of the country, +or as the outcomes of private enterprise. + +Of course the staff of such a place had to be formed of men of a high +order. Some of these had been patients themselves, and had been chosen +on that account, it being thought that those who had suffered from +certain ills would be apt to detect the symptoms in others, and able to +devise remedies for them, which proved to be the case. The +establishment was munificently endowed and liberally supported, and the +Master, as he was reverently called, lived just long enough to see that +it was a success. + +He had not thought of extending the charity to women, being under the +impression that no such provision was necessary for them. He +acknowledged that they had a large share of physical suffering to +endure, but asserted that Nature, to preserve her balance, must have +arranged their minds so as to render them incapable of suffering in any +other way. Sentimentality, hysteria, and silliness, he said, were at +the bottom of all their mental troubles, which did not, therefore, +merit serious attention. + + + + +CHAPTER XV. + + +But of all this Ideala knew little or nothing when she went there, +except that the Great Hospital existed for some learned purpose. She +felt the power of the place, however, preoccupied as she was, and +stopped involuntarily when she saw the building, ceasing for a moment +to be conscious of anything but the awe and admiration it inspired. +Then she passed up the broad steps, beneath the massive pillars of the +portico, and entered the hall. A man-servant took her card to Mr. +Lorrimer, and, returning presently, requested her to follow him. They +left the great hall by a flight of low steps at the end of it, and, +turning to the right, passed through glass doors into quite another +part of the building. A long, dimly-lighted gallery led away into the +distance. A few doors opened on to it, and at one of these the servant +stopped and knocked. A tall gentleman opened the door himself, and, +begging Ideala to enter, bade her be seated at a writing-table which +stood in the middle of the room, and himself took the chair in front of +it, and looked at Ideala's card which lay before him. Another +gentleman, whom Lorrimer introduced as "My brother Julian," lounged on +a high-backed chair at the other side of the table. The room was a good +size, but so crowded with things that there was scarcely space to turn +round. The light fell full upon Lorrimer as he sat facing the window, +and Ideala saw a fair man of about thirty, not at all the sort of man +she had imagined, and quite impossible for her purpose. + +An awkward pause followed her entrance. She was unable to tell him the +real reason of her visit, and at a loss to invent a fictitious one. + +"I don't suppose you know in the least who I am," she said, seeing that +he glanced at her card again, and then she explained, telling him what +his cousin had written to her. + + +"And you would like to see the Hospital?" he asked. + +"Please." + +He rose, took down a bunch of keys, and requested her to follow him. +She felt no interest in the place, and knew it was a bore to him to +show it to her; but the thing had to be done. He led her through halls +and lecture-rooms, places of recreation and places for work; he showed +her picture galleries, statuary, the library, and a museum, and told +her the plan of it all clearly, like one reciting a lesson, and +indifferently, like one performing a task that must be got through +somehow, but making it all most interesting, nevertheless. + +Ideala began to be taken out of herself. + +"What a delightful place!" she said, when they came to the library. +"And there is a whole row of books I want to consult. How I should like +to come and read them." + +"Oh, pray do," he answered, "whenever you like. Ladies frequently do +so. You have only to write and tell me when you wish to come, and I +will see that you are properly attended to." + +"Thank you," Ideala rejoined. "It is just the very thing for me, for I +am writing a little book, and cannot get on till I have consulted some +authorities on the subject." In the museum they stopped to look at a +mummy. + +"Oh, happy mummy!" burst from Ideala, involuntarily. + +"Why?" asked Lorrimer, aroused from his apathy. + +"It has done with it all, you know," she answered. + +Then he turned and looked at her, and she saw that he was something +more than cold, pale-faced, and indifferent, which had been her first +idea of him. His eyes were large, dark grey, and penetrating. She would +have called his face fine, rather than handsome; but the upper part was +certainly beautiful, in spite of some hard lines on it. There was +something in the expression, more than in the formation, of the mouth +and chin, however, that did not satisfy. His head and throat were +splendid; the former narrowed a little at the back, but the forehead +made up for the defect, which was not striking. He made Ideala think of +Tito Melema and of Bayard. + +That remark of hers having broken the ice, they began to talk like +human beings with something in common. But Ideala's mood was not +calculated to produce a good impression. The failure of her enterprise +brought on a fit of recklessness such as we understood, and she said +some things which must have made a stranger think her peculiar. +Lorrimer had begun to be amused before they returned to the great +entrance hall. Once or twice he looked at her curiously. "What sort of +a person are you, I wonder?" he was thinking, + +"I was dying of dulness," she said, telling him about the place she +came from, "and so I came to see you." + +He left her for a moment, but presently returned with his brother. + +"You had better come and have some luncheon before you go back," he +said. + +And she went. + +As they left the building Lorrimer asked her: "Where on earth did my +cousin meet _you?"_--with the slightest possible emphasis. Ideala +understood him, and laughed. + +"Upon my word I don't know who introduced her," she answered, standing +on her dignity nevertheless. "I can't remember." + +They went to the refreshment-room at the station. It was crowded, but +they managed to get a table to themselves. There was a vacant seat at +it, and an old gentleman begged to be allowed to occupy it as there was +no other in the room. The three chatted while they waited, each hiding +him, or her, self beneath the light froth of easy conversation; and +people, not accustomed to look on the surface for signs of what is +working beneath, would have thought them merry enough. As she began to +know her companions better, Ideala was more and more drawn to Lorrimer. +His brother, who was a dark man, and very different in character, did +not attract her. + +The old gentleman, meanwhile, was absorbed in his newspaper, and he +marked his enjoyment of it by inhaling his breath and exhaling it again +in that particular way which is called "blowing like a porpoise." + +Lorrimer, by an intelligent glance, expressed what he thought of the +peculiarity to Ideala, who remarked: "It is the next gale developing +dangerous energy on its way to the North British and Norwegian coasts." + +The laugh that followed caused the old gentleman to fold up his paper, +and look benignly at the young people over his pince-nez. + +It was early in the season, and peas were a rare and forced vegetable. +A small dish of them was brought, and handed to the dangerous gale, who +absently took them all. + +"You have taken all the peas, sir; allow me to give you all the +pepper," said Lorrimer, dexterously suiting the action to the word. + +The dangerous gale, though disconcerted at first, was finally moved to +mirth. + +"Ah, young people! young people!" he said, and sighed--and being a +merry and wise old gentleman, he found pleasure in their pleasure, and +entered into their mood, little suspecting that Black Care was one of +the party, or that a black bruise which would have aroused all the pity +and indignation of his honest old heart, had he seen it, was almost +under his eyes. + +And they all loved him. + +Presently he rose to go; but before he departed, he observed, looking +kindly at Ideala and Lorrimer; "You're a handsome pair, my dears! Let +me congratulate you; and may your children have the mother's sweetness +and the father's strength, and may the love you have for each other +last for ever--there's nothing like it. Thank God for it, and remember +Him always--and keep yourselves unspotted from the world." And so +saying, he went his way in peace. + +"Dear embarrassing old man!" said Lorrimer, regretfully. "I wish I +hadn't spilt the pepper on his plate. + +"Is there a chance for Lorrimer?" his brother asked. + +But Ideala only stared at him. There was something in his tone that +made her feel ill at ease, and brought back the recollection of her +misery in a moment. Then all at once she became depressed, and both the +young men noticed it. + +"I'm afraid you're rather down about something," Julian said. "You'd +better tell us what it is. Perhaps we could cheer you up. And I'm a +lawyer, you know. I might be able to help you." + +Lorrimer was looking at her, and seemed to wait for her to speak; but +she only showed by a change of expression that the fact of his brother +being a lawyer possessed a special interest for her. + +"If you will trust us," he said at last, "perhaps we _can_ help +you." + +"I wish I could," she answered, wistfully; "I came to tell you." + +"This sounds serious," Julian said, lightly. "You will have to begin at +the beginning, you know. Come, Lorrimer, we'll go down the river. And," +to Ideala, "you might tell us all about it on the way, you know." + +"Yes, come," said Lorrimer. Ideala rose to accompany them without a +thought. It all came about so easily that no question of propriety +suggested itself--and if any had occurred to her she would probably +have considered it an insult to these gentlemen to suppose they would +allow her to put herself in a questionable position; and when Julian +lit a cigarette without asking her permission, she was surprised. + +On the way to the river Ideala's spirits rose again, and they all +talked lightly, making a jest of everything; but while they were +waiting for a boat, Julian took up a bunch of charms that were attached +to Ideala's watch-chain and began to examine them coolly, and the +unwonted familiarity startled her. With a sudden revulsion of feeling +she turned to Lorrimer. She was annoyed by the slight indignity, and +also a little frightened. Whatever Lorrimer may have thought of her +before, he understood her look now, and his whole manner changed. + +Julian left them for a moment. "I _am_ so ashamed of myself," Ideala +said. "I have made some dreadful mistake. I have done something +wrong." + +"I am very sorry for you," he answered, gravely--and then, to his +brother, who had returned--"You can go on if you like. I am going +back." + +"Oh, we can't go on without you," Ideala inter-posed; "and I would +rather go back too." + +They began to retrace their steps, and Lorrimer, as they walked, +managed, with a few adroit questions, to learn from Ideala that the +trouble had something to do with her husband. + +"Regy Beaumont is coming to me this afternoon," he said to his brother. +"Would you mind being there to receive him?" + +They exchanged glances, and Julian took his leave. + +"Now, tell me," Lorrimer said to Ideala. + +But an unconquerable fit of shyness came over her the moment they were +left alone together. "I cannot tell you," she answered. "It is too +dreadful to speak of." + +"Your husband has done you some great wrong?" he said. + +"Yes." + +"Something for which you can get legal redress?" + +"Yes." + +"And that made you desperate?" + +"Yes." + +"And what did you do?" He put the question abruptly, startling Ideala, +as he had intended. + +"_I_? Oh, I--did nothing," she stammered. There was a pause. + +"My ideal of marriage is a high one," he said at last, "and I should be +very hard on any short-comings of that kind." + +Ideala longed to confide in him, but her shyness continued, and she +walked by his side like one in a dream. + +He took her to the station, and when they parted he said, "You will +write and tell me?" + +Ideala looked up. There were no hard lines in his face now; he was +slightly flushed. + +"Yes, I will write," she answered, almost in a whisper. + +And then the train, "with rush and ring," bore her away through the +spring-country; but she neither saw the young green of the hedgerows, +nor "the young lambs bleating in the meadows," nor the broad river as +she passed it, nor the fleecy clouds that flecked the blue. She was not +really conscious of anything for the moment, but that sudden great +unspeakable uplifting of the spirit, which is joy. + + + + +CHAPTER XVI. + + +The following week Ideala came to London, but not to us--she had +promised to stay with some other people first. She wrote three times to +Lorrimer while she was with them--first to thank him for his kindness, +to which he replied briefly, begging her to confide in him, and let him +help her. + +In her second letter Ideala told him what had occurred. His reply was +business-like. He urged her to let him consult his legal friends about +her case; pointed out that she could not be expected to remain with her +husband now; and showed her that she would not have to suffer much from +all the publicity which was necessary to free her from him. She replied +that her first impulse had been to obtain legal redress, but that now +she could not make up her mind to face the publicity. She would see +him, however, when she returned, and consult him about it; and she +would also like to consult those books in the library. Her buoyant +spirit was already recovering under the influence of a new interest in +life. + +Lorrimer's answer was formal, as his other notes had been. He begged +her to make any use of the library she pleased, only to let him know +when to expect her, that she might have no trouble with the officials; +and offered her any other help in his power. + +In the meantime my sister Claudia had seen Ideala, and had been pleased +to find her, not looking well, certainly, but just as cheerful as +usual. "It is evident the place does not agree with her," Claudia said; +"but a few weeks with us will set her all right again." + +They drove in the park together one afternoon, and talked, as usual, of +many things, the state of society being one of them. This was a subject +upon which my sister descanted frequently, and it was from her that +Ideala learnt all she knew of it. + +"Can you wonder," Claudia said on this occasion, "that men are immoral +when ladies in society rather pride themselves than otherwise on +imitating the _demi-monde_?" + +"Have you ever noticed," Ideala answered, indirectly, "how frequently a +word or phrase which you know quite well by sight, but have never +thought of and do not understand, is suddenly brought home to you as it +were? You come across it everywhere, and at last take the trouble to +find out what it means in self-defence. That expression--_demi- +monde_--has begun to haunt me since I came to town, and I feel I +shall be obliged to look it up at once to stop the nuisance. We went to +a theatre the other night, and when we were settled there I saw my +husband in the stalls with a lady in flame-coloured robes. I didn't +know he was in town. The rest of our party saw him, too, and the +gentlemen had a mysterious little consultation at the back of the box. +Then one of them left us, but returned almost immediately, and told us +the carriage had not gone, and hadn't we better try some other theatre +--the piece at that one was not so good as they had supposed. But I knew +they had taken a lot of trouble, entirely on my account, to get a box +there, as I had expressed a wish to see that particular piece, and I +said I had come to enjoy it, and meant to. I did enjoy it, too. It was +so absorbing that I forgot all about my husband, and don't know when he +left the theatre. I only know that he disappeared without coming near +us. When we got back, Lilian came to my room and told me they were all +saying downstairs that I had behaved splendidly, and I said I was +delighted to hear it, particularly as I did not know how, or when, or +where, I had come to deserve such praise. And then she asked me if I +knew who it was my husband was with. I said, no; some alderman's wife, +I supposed. 'Nothing half so good,' she answered. 'That woman is +notorious: she is one of the _demimonde!_' 'Well,' I said, 'I don't +suppose she is in society.' And then Lilian said, 'Good gracious, +Ideala! how can you be so tranquil? You _must_ care. I think you are +the most extraordinary person I ever met.' And I told her that the +only extraordinary thing about me just then was a great 'exposition of +sleep' that had come upon me. And then she left me; but she told me +afterwards that she thought I was acting, and came back later to see +if I really could sleep." + +"And you did sleep, Ideala?" + +"Like a top--why not? But now you are following suit with your ill- +conducted people, and your _demi-monde_. I want to know what you mean +by that phrase?" + +Then Claudia explained it to her. + +"But I thought all that had ended with the Roman Empire," Ideala +protested. + +Claudia laughed, and then went on without pity, describing the class as +they sink lower and lower, and cruelly omitting no detail that might +complete the picture. + +"But the men are as bad," said Ideala. + +"Oh, as bad, yes!" was the answer. + +Ideala was pale with disgust. "And we have to touch them!" she said. + +Her ignorance of this phase of life had been so complete, and her faith +in those about her so perfect, that the shock of this dreadful +revelation was almost too much for her. At first, as the carriage drove +on through the crowded streets, she saw in every woman's face a +hopeless degradation, and in every man's eyes a loathsome sin; and she +exclaimed, as another woman had exclaimed on a similar occasion: "Oh, +Claudia! why did you tell me? It is too dreadful. I cannot bear to know +it." + +"How a woman can be at once so clever and such a fool as you are, +Ideala, puzzles me," Claudia remonstrated, not unkindly. + +She had warmed as she went on, and forgot in her indignation to take +advantage of this long-looked-for opportunity to speak to Ideala about +her own troubles; and afterwards, when she showed an inclination to +open the subject, Ideala put her off with a jest. + +"'_Le mariage est beau pour les amants et utile pour les saints,_'" +she quoted, lightly. "Class me with the saints, and talk of something +interesting." + +A few days later Claudia came to me in dismay. + +"What do you think?" she said. "Ideala is not coming to us at all! She +says she must go back at once." + +"Go back!" I exclaimed, "and why?" + +"She is going to write something, for which she requires to read a +great deal, and she says she must go back to work." + +"But that is nonsense," I protested. "She can work as much as she likes +here--I can even help her." + +"I know that," Claudia answered; "but she spoke so positively I could +not insist. I suppose the truth is her husband has ordered her back, +and she is going to be a good, obedient child, as usual." + +"Does she seem at all unhappy?" + +"No, and that is the strange part of it. She has coolly broken I don't +know how many other engagements to return at once, and instead of +seeming disappointed, she simply 'glows and is glad.' She says nothing, +but I can see it. I don't know what on earth she is up to now." And +Claudia left the room, frowning and perplexed. + +When I heard she was not unhappy, this sudden whim of Ideala's did not +disturb me much; indeed, I was rather glad to think she had found +something to be enthusiastic about. Her fits of enthusiasm were rarer +now, and I thought this symptom of one a good sign. It was odd, though, +that I had not seen her while she was in town. I was half inclined to +believe she had avoided me. + + + + +CHAPTER XVII. + + +To give the story continuity it will be necessary to piece the events +together as they followed. Many of them only came to my knowledge some +time after they occurred, and even then I was left to surmise a good +deal; but I am able now, with the help of papers that have lately come +into my possession, to verify most of my conjectures and arrange the +details. + +The summer weather had begun now. Laburnums and lilacs were in full +flower, the air was sweet with scent and song, and to one who had borne +the heavy winter with a heavy heart, but was able at last to lay down a +load of care, the transition must have been like a sudden change from +painful sickness to perfect health. Ideala went to the Great Hospital +at once. She had written to fix a day, and Lorrimer was waiting for +her. She was not taken to his room, however, as on the previous +occasion, but to another part of the building, a long gallery hung with +pictures, where she found him superintending the arrangement of some +precious things in cabinets. Ideala looked better and younger that day +in her summer dress than she had done in her heavy winter wraps on the +occasion of their first meeting; but when she found herself face to +face with Lorrimer she began to tremble, and was overcome with +nervousness in a way that was new to her. He saw the change in her +appearance and manner at a glance, and, smiling slightly, begged her to +follow him, and led the way through long passages and many doors, +passing numbers of people, to his own room. He spoke to her once or +twice on the way, but she was only able to answer confusedly, in a +voice that was rendered strident by the great effort she had to make to +control it. He busied himself with some papers for a few minutes when +they reached his room, to give her time to recover herself, and then he +said, standing with his back to the fireplace, looking down at her, and +speaking in a tone that was even more musical and caressing than she +remembered it: "Well, and how are you? And how has it been with you +since your return?" + +"I am utterly shaken and unnerved, as you see," she answered; then +added passionately: "I cannot bear my life; it is too hateful." + +"There is no need to bear it," he said. "Nothing is easier than to get +a separation after what has occurred. Was there any witness?" + +"No; and I don't think any one in the house suspects that there is +anything wrong. And none of my friends know. I have never told them. I +wonder why I told you?" + +"You wanted me to help you," he suggested. + +"I don't think I did," she said. "How could I want you to help me when +I don't mean to do anything? I fancy I told you because I was afraid +you would think me a little mad that day, and I would rather you knew +the truth than think me mad. I don't mean to try for a separation. I +can't leave him entirely to his own devices. If I did, he would +certainly go from bad to worse." + +"And if you don't what will become of you? I think much more of such a +life would make you reckless." + +She was silent for a little, then she exclaimed: "Help me not to grow +reckless. I am so alone." + +He took her hands and looked down into her eyes. A sudden deep flush +spread over his face, smoothing out all the lines, as she had seen it +do once before, and transforming him. + +"It is like walking on the edge of a precipice in the dark," he said in +a low voice, and his grasp tightened as he spoke. + +There was something mesmeric in his touch that overpowered Ideala. She +felt a change in herself at the moment, and she was never the same +woman again. + +"I will help you, if I can," he said, after another pause, and then he +let her go. + +After that they talked for some time. He tried to persuade her to +reconsider her decision and leave her husband. He honestly believed it +was the best thing she could do, and told her why he thought so. She +acknowledged the wisdom of his advice, but declined to follow it, and +he was somewhat puzzled, for the reasons she gave were hardly enough to +account for her determination. They wandered away from that subject at +last, however, and talked of many other things. He told Ideala of his +first coming to the Great Hospital as a patient, and gave her some of +the details of his own case, and told her enough of his private history +to arouse her sympathy and interest; but of the nature of these +confidences I know nothing. Ideala felt in honour bound not to repeat +them, as they were made to her in the course of a private conversation, +and she was always scrupulously faithful to all such trusts. I know, +however, that he was a man who had suffered acutely, both from unhappy +circumstances and from those troubles of the mind which beset clever +men at the outset of their career, and sometimes never leave them +entirely at peace. But this man was something more than a clever man; +he was a man in a thousand. He had in a strong degree all that is worst +and best in a man. The highest and most spiritual aspirations warred in +him with the most carnal impulses, and he spent his days in fighting to +attain to the one and subdue the other. + +Ideala had never known a man like this man. His talents, his rapid +changes of mood, as sense or conscience got the upper hand, and his +versatility charmed her imagination and excited her interest; and he +had, besides, that magnetic power over her by which it is given to some +men to compel people of certain temperaments to their will. While she +was with him he could have made her believe that black was white, and +not only believe it, but be glad to think that it was so; and he always +compelled her to say exactly what she had in her mind at the moment, +even when it was something that she would very much rather not have +said. + +"But I am forgetting my other object in coming," Ideala broke off at +last. "May I look at the books?" + +Lorrimer took out his watch. "You ought to have some lunch first," he +said. "If you will come now and have some, we can return and look at +the books afterwards." + +Ideala acquiesced, fearing it was his own lunch time, and knowing it +would detain him if she did not accompany him. + +Ladies not being allowed to lunch at the Great Hospital, they went, as +before, to the station close by, and sat down side by side, perfectly +happy together, chatting, laughing, talking about their childhood, and +making those trifling confidences which go so far to promote intimacy, +and are often the first evidence of affection. Now and then they +touched on graver matters. He upheld all that was old, and believed we +can have no better institutions in the future than those which have +already existed in the past. Ideala had begun to think differently. + +"I am sure it is a mistake to be for ever looking back to the past for +precedents," she said. "The past has its charm, of course, but it is +the charm of the charnel house--it is the dead past, and what was good +for one age is bad for another." + +"As one man's meat is another man's poison?" he said. + +"Proverbs prove nothing," she answered lightly. "Have you noticed that +they go in pairs? There is always one for each side of an argument. +'One man's meat is another man's poison' is met by 'What is sauce for +the goose is sauce for the gander'--and so on. But don't you think it +absurd to cling to old customs that are dying a natural death? Learn of +the past, if you like, but live in the present, and make your laws to +meet its needs. It is this eternal waiting on the past to copy it +rather than to be warned by its failures, to do as it did, under the +impression, apparently, that we must succeed better than it did, +following in its footsteps though we know they led to ruin once, and, +because the way was pleasant, being surprised to find that it must end +again in disaster--it is this abandonment of all hope of finding new +and efficacious remedies for the old diseases of society that has +checked our progress for hundreds of years, and will keep the world in +some respects just as it was at the time of the Crucifixion. For my own +part, I cannot see that history does repeat itself, except in trifling +details, and in the lives of unimportant individuals. + +"I think," he rejoined, "if you have studied the decline of the Roman +Empire, you must have seen a striking analogy between that and our own +history at the present time. With the exception of changes of manners, +which only affect the surface of society, we are in much the same state +now as the Romans were then." + +"I know many people say so, and believe it," Ideala answered; "and +there is evidence enough to prove it to people who are trying to arrive +at a foregone conclusion; but it is not the resemblances we should look +to, but the differences. It is in them that our hope lies, and they +seem to me to be essential. Take the one grand difference that has been +made by the teaching for hundreds of years of the perfect morality of +the Christian religion! Do you think it possible for men, while they +cling to it, to 'reel back into the beast and be no more'?" + +"But are men clinging to it?" + +"Yes, in a way, for it has insensibly become a part of all of us, and +has made it possible for us to show whole communities of moral +philosophers now in a generation; the ancients had only an occasional +one in a century." + +"But such a one!" + +"The old moral philosophers were grand, certainly, but not grander than +our own men are, of whom we only hear less because there are so many +more of them." + +"But do you mean to say society is less sinful than it was?" + +"There is one section of society at the present day, they tell me, +which is most desperately wicked. It is worse than any class was when +the world was young, because it knows so much better. But I believe the +bulk of the people like right so well that they only want a strong +impulse to make them follow it. I feel sure sometimes that we are all +living on the brink of a great change for the better, and that there is +only one thing wanting now--a great calamity, or a great teacher--to +startle us out of our apathy and set us to work. We are not bold +enough. We should try more experiments; they can but fail, and if they +do, we should still have learnt something from them. But I do not think +we shall fail for ever. What we want is somewhere, and must be found +eventually." + +"They tried some experiments with the marriage laws in France once," +Lorrimer observed, tentatively. + +"Yes, and failed contemptibly because their motive was contemptible. +They did not want to improve society, but to make self-indulgence +possible without shame. I think our own marriage laws might be +improved." + +"People are trying to improve them," he said, with a slight laugh. "A +friend of mine has just married a girl who objected to take the oath of +obedience. How absurd it is for a girl of nineteen to imagine she knows +better than all the ages." "I think," said Ideala, "that it is more +absurd for 'all the ages' to subscribe to an oath which something +stronger than themselves makes it impossible for half of them to keep. +Strength of character must decide the question of place in a household +as it does elsewhere; and it is surely folly to require, and useless to +insist on, the submission of the strong to the weak. The marriage oath +is farcical. A woman is made to swear to love a man who will probably +prove unlovable, to honour a man who is as likely as not to be +undeserving of honour, and to obey a man who may be incapable of +judging what is best either for himself or her. I have no respect for +the ages that uphold such nonsense. There was never any need to bind us +with an oath. If men were all they ought to be, wouldn't we obey them +gladly? To be able to do so is all we ask." + +"Well, it is a difficult question," he answered, "and I don't think we +need trouble ourselves about it any way. Do you like flowers?" + +"Yes," she burst out in another tone; "and easy chairs, and pictures, +and china, and everything that is beautiful, and all sensual +pleasures." + +She said it, but she knew in a moment that she had used the wrong word, +and was covered with confusion. + +Lorrimer looked at her and laughed. + +"And so do I," he said. + +"Oh! if only I could unsay that!" thought Ideala; but the word had gone +forth, and was already garnered against her. + +Then came an awful moment for her--the moment of going and paying. It +was hateful to let him pay for her lunch, but she could not help it. +She was seized with one of those fits of shyness which made it just a +degree less painful to allow it than to make the effort to prevent it. + +They returned to Lorrimer's room and pored together over a catalogue, +looking up the books she wanted. When they had found their names and +numbers Lorrimer sent for them from the library, but it was too late to +do anything that day, and so she rose to go. + +Lorrimer walked with her to the station, and saw her into the train. On +the way they talked of little children. He loved them as she did. + +"A friend of mine," he said, "has the most beautiful child I ever saw. +Just to look at it makes me feel a better man." + + + + +CHAPTER XVIII. + + +In the days that followed a singular change came over Ideala. No +external circumstance affected her. She moved like one in a dream; +thought had ceased for her; all life was one delicious sensation, and +at times she could not bear the delight of it in silence. She would +tell it in low songs in the twilight; she would make her piano speak it +in a hundred chords: and it would burst from her in some sudden glow of +enthusiasm that made people wonder--the apparent cause being too slight +to account for it. While this lasted nothing hurt her. She saw the +sufferings of others unmoved. She met her husband's brutalities with a +smiling countenance, and bore the physical discomfort of a bad sprain +without much consciousness of pain. And she knew nothing of time, and +never asked herself to what she owed this joy. + +The utter forgetfulness of everything that came upon her when she was +alone was almost incredible. One evening she spent two hours in walking +a distance she might easily have done in forty minutes. She had been to +see a sick person, and when she found herself in the fresh air, after +having spent some time in a small, close room, the dream-like feeling +came over her, and her spirit was uplifted with inexpressible gladness. +The summer air was sweet and warm, a light rain was falling, and she +took off her hat and wandered on, looking up, but noting nothing, and +singing Schubert's "Hark! hark! the lark," to herself softly as she +came. A man standing at a cottage door begged her to go in and shelter. +She looked at him, and her face was radiant--the rain-drops sparkled on +her hair. He was only a working man, "clay--and common clay," but the +light in her eyes passed through him, and the memory of her stayed with +him, a thing apart from his daily life, held sacred, and not to be +described. A man might live a hundred years and never see a woman look +like that. + +"I did not know it was raining," she said. "It is only light rain, and +the air is so sweet, and the glow down there in the west is like +heaven. How beautiful life is!" + +"Ay, lady!" he answered, and stood there spellbound, watching her as +she passed on slowly, and listening to her singing as she went. + +A few days later she saw Lorrimer again. She found him in his room this +time. He knew she was coming, and flushed with pleasure when he met her +at the door. Ideala was not nervous; it all seemed a matter of course +to her now. The books he had got for her from the library were where +she had left them. He placed a chair for her beside his writing-table, +and then went on with his own work. She had understood that she was to +read in the library, but she did not think of that now; she simply +acquiesced in this arrangement as she would have done in any other he +might have made for her. A secretary was busy in another part of the +room when she entered, but after awhile he left them. Then Lorrimer +looked up and smiled. + +"You are looking better to-day," he said. "Tell me what you have been +doing since I saw you." + +"Lotus-eating," she answered. "How lovely the summer is! Since I saw +you I have wanted to do nothing but rest and dream." + +"You have been happy, then?" + +"Yes." + +"Is he kind to you?" + +"Oh--he! He is just the same. There is no change in my life. The change +is in me." + +"Then you mean to be happy in spite of him? I call that the beginning +of wisdom. I know two other ladies who hate their husbands, and they +manage to enjoy life pretty well. And I don't see why _you_ should +be miserable always because you happen to have married the wrong man. +How was it you married him? Were you very much in love with him?" + +"No, not in the least." + +"Spooney, then?" + +"Not even 'spooney,' as you call it. I was very young at the time. Very +young girls know nothing of love and marriage." + +"Very young," he repeated thoughtfully. He was drawing figures with his +pen on the blotting-paper before him. "But why did you marry him, +then?" + +"I can give you no reason--except that I was not happy at home." + +"You all say that," slipped from him, with a gesture of impatience. + +"I wish I had been more original," said Ideala. + +She took up her book again, and he resumed his writing, and for some +time there was silence. But Ideala's attention wandered. She began to +examine the room, which was, as usual, in a state of disorder. One side +of it was lined with cabinets of various sizes and periods. Labels +indicated the contents of some of them. Only one picture hung on that +side of the room--it was the portrait of a gentleman--but several +others stood on the ground against the cabinets. The walls were painted +some dark colour. A Japanese screen was drawn across the door, and +beside it was a hard narrow settee covered with dark green velvet. +Books were piled upon it, and heavily embroidered foreign stuffs, and +near it a number of Japanese drawings stood on a stand. The mantelpiece +was crowded with an odd mixture of china and other curios, all looking +as if they had just been unpacked. Above it another picture was hung, a +steel engraving. The writing-table by which they sat was nearly in the +middle of the room. In the window was another table, covered also with +a miscellaneous collection of curios; and on every other available +article of furniture books were piled. The high backs of the chairs +were elaborately carved, the seats being of the same green velvet as +the settee. A high wire-guard surrounded the fire place, and this +unusual precaution made one think, that the contents of the room must +be precious. The occupant of this apartment might have been an artist, +a man of letters, or a virtuoso--probably the latter; but whatever he +was, it was evident that his study was a workshop, and not a showroom. + +From the room Ideala looked to her companion. He was writing rapidly, +and seemed absorbed in his subject. He was frowning slightly, his face +was pale and set, and he looked older by ten years than when he had +spoken last, and seemed cold and unimpassioned as a judge; but Ideala +thought again that the face was a fine one. + +Presently he became conscious of her earnest gaze. He did not look up, +but every feature softened, and a warm glow spread from forehead to +chin; it was as if a deep shadow had been lifted, and a younger, but +less noble, man revealed. + +"How you change!" Ideala exclaimed--"not from day to day, but from +moment to moment. You are like two men. I wish I could get behind that +horrid veil of flesh that hides you from me. I want to see your soul." + +He smiled. "You are getting tired," he said. "Do let me persuade you to +come and have some lunch. When you begin to speculate, I know you have +done enough." + +But Ideala could not go through the ordeal of who should pay for lunch +again. She preferred to starve. The _camaraderie_ between them was +mental enough to be manlike already, but only as long as there was no +question of material outlay. + +"Mayn't I stay here and read?" she said. "I can have something by-and- +by, when I want it. Do go and leave me." + +And he was obliged to go at last, wondering somewhat at her want of +appetite. + +When he returned she was still working diligently, and they spent the +rest of the afternoon together, reading, writing, and chatting, until +it was time for Ideala to go. Lorrimer saw her into her train, and +fixed another day for her to return and go on with her work. + +And so the thing became a settled arrangement. Whenever she could spare +the time she went and worked beside him, and he was always the same, +kindly, considerate, helping her now and then, but not, as a rule, +interfering with her. She just came and went as she pleased, and as she +would have done had he been her brother. Sometimes they were alone +together for hours, sometimes his secretary worked in the room with +them, and always there were people coming and going. There was nothing +to suggest a thought of impropriety, and they were soon on quarrelling +terms, falling out about a great many things--which is always the sign +of a good understanding; but after the first they touched on no +dangerous subject for a long time. At last, however, there came a +change. Ideala noticed one day that Lorrimer was restless and +irritable. + +"Am I interfering with your work to-day?" she said. "Do tell me. Any +other day will suit me just as well." + +"Oh, no," he answered. "I am lazy, that is all. How are you getting on? +Let me see." And he took the paper she was engaged upon, and looked at +it. + +She watched him, and saw that he was not reading, although he held it +before his eyes for some time. He was paler than usual, and there was a +look of indecision in his face, very unlike its habitual expression, +which was serene and self-contained. + +Looking up all at once, he met her eyes fixed on him frankly and +affectionately, but he did not respond to her smile. + +"How do you suppose all this is going to end?" he said, abruptly. + +"Won't it do?" she answered, thinking of her paper. "Had I better give +it up, or re-write it?" + +He threw the paper down with a gesture of impatience, and got up; and +then, as if ashamed of his irritability, he took it again, and gave it +back to her. In doing so his hand accidentally touched hers. + +"How cold you are," he said. "Let me warm your hands for you." + +"They are benumbed," she answered, letting him take them and rub them. + +After a moment he said, without looking at her, "Do you know, it is +very good of you to come here like this." + +"Why?" she asked. "It suits my own convenience." + +"I know. But it is refreshing to find some one who will suit their own +convenience so." "That sounds as if it were not the right thing to do!" +she exclaimed. + +"Nonsense!" he answered. "You misunderstand me." + +Ideala withdrew her hands hastily, and half rose. + +"What is the matter?" he said. "Come, don't be idle! You should have +mastered that book by this time." + +But Ideala was disturbed. "I can't read," she said. "Tell me what you +thought of me when I came to you that first day? I fancied you were +old. And I have been afraid since, in spite of your cousin's +suggestion, that you may have considered it odd of me to introduce +myself like that." + +"Oh, it is quite customary here," he answered. "But even if it had not +been, we can't all be bound by the same common laws. The ordinary stars +and planets have an ordinary course mapped out for them, and they +daren't diverge an inch. But every now and then a comet comes and goes +its own eccentric way, and all the lesser lights wonder and admire and +let it go." + +"That would be very fine for us if only we were comets among the +stars," she said. + +"Oh, you might condescend to claim a kindred with them," he answered +lightly. + +"The only heavenly body I ever feel akin to is one of those meteors +that flash and fall," she said. "They go their own way, too, do they +not, and are lost?" "There is no question of being lost here," he +interposed. "The most scrupulous have made an exception in favour of +one person, and the world has not blamed them. After having endured so +much you are entitled to some relaxation. I should do as I liked now, +if I were you." + +She looked at him inquiringly. It seemed as if he were not expressing +himself, but trying the effect of what he said upon her. + +He was sitting in his usual place now, drawing figures on the blotting- +pad. + +"You have read, I suppose?" he added, after a pause, and without +looking up. "I wish I had never read anything," she exclaimed +passionately. "I wish I could neither read, write, nor think." + +But the trouble now was, if only she could have recognised it, that she +did not think; she only felt. + +She got up and went to the mantelpiece; he remained where he was, +sitting with his back to her. Presently she began to look at the china, +absently at first, but afterwards with interest. There were some new +specimens, just unpacked, and all crowded together. + +"What a lovely lotus-leaf," she said at last. "Satsuma, I suppose--no, +Kioto; but what a good specimen. And it is broken, too. What a pity! I +should so like to mend it." + +"Would you?" he said, rousing himself. "Then you shall." + +He went to one of the cabinets and got out the materials, and in a few +minutes they were bending busily over the broken plaque, as interested +and eager about it as if no subject of more vital importance had ever +distracted them. They were like two children together, often as +quarrelsome, always as inconsequent; happy hard at work, and equally +happy idling; apt to torment each other at times about trifles, but +always ready to forget and forgive, and with that habit in common of +forgetting everything utterly but the occupation of the moment. + +They talked on now for a little longer, but not brilliantly. They were +both considered brilliant in conversation, but somehow on these +occasions neither of them shone. I suppose when two such bright and +shining lights come together they put each other out. + +Then it was time for Ideala to go. A bitter wind met them in the face +on their way to the station, and before they had gone far Ideala +noticed that Lorrimer's mood had changed again. His face grew pale, his +step less elastic, his manner cold and formal. All the brightness, all +the sympathy, which made their intimacy seem the most natural, because +it was the pleasantest, thing in the world to Ideala, had gone; he was +like a man seized with a sudden fit of remorse, disgusted with himself, +and moved to repent. + +"I should bear with your husband, if I were you," he said at last, +breaking the silence. "He behaves like a brute, but I dare say he can't +help it. A man can't help his temperament, and probably you provoke him +more than you think." + +Ideala was surprised, it was so long since they had mentioned her +husband. "I fear I am provoking," she answered, humbly. "But how am I +to help it? I have tried so hard, and for so long, to be patient. And I +only want to do right." + +They were parting then, and he looked down at her in silence for some +seconds, and when Ideala saw the expression of his face, her heart +sank. In that one moment she realised all that his friendship had been +to her, and foresaw the terrible blank there would be for her if it +should ever end. That there was any danger, that there could be +anything but friendship between men and women who must not marry, had +not even yet occurred to her. Her intimacy with myself had prepared the +way for Lorrimer, and made this new intimacy seem also perfectly right. + +"What is the matter with you to-day?" she said. "What spirit of +dissatisfaction has got hold of you?" + +"I _am_ dissatisfied," he said, raising his hat, and brushing his +hand back over his hair. Then he looked at her. "Why don't you help +me?" he asked. + +"How can I help you?" she answered. "I don't understand you." + +"You ought to. I wish to goodness you did"--and then his face cleared. +"But you will come again," he added, in the old way. "I shall expect +you soon." + +And so he let her go; and Ideala was glad, because an unpleasant jar +was over. She did not trouble herself about his private worries; if he +wished her to know he would tell her. Lorrimer had a temper--but then +she had known that all along; and Lorrimer was Lorrimer--that was all +about it. + + + + +CHAPTER XIX. + + +He let her go, somewhat bewildered, and not understanding herself or +him, nor caring to understand, only happy, dangerously happy. The train +bore her through an enchanted region of brightness and summer, and, +although the power of thought was for the moment suspended, she was +conscious of this, and her own delight was like the unreasoning +pleasure of earth when the sun is upon it. + +There was no carriage to meet her at the station, and she set off to +walk home. It was the first time she had been alone on foot in the +squalid disorderly streets of that dingy place, and her way, which she +was not quite sure of, took her through some of the worst of them. They +were filled with loud-laughing uncleanly women, and skulking hang-dog- +looking men, and the grime-clogged atmosphere was heavy with foul +odours; but she noticed nothing of this. The golden glow the sun made +in his efforts to shine through the clouds of smoke might have been a +visible expression of her own ecstatic feeling, and she would have +thought so at any other time, but now she never saw it. + +In a somewhat open and more lonely part of the road she met a tramp, a +great rude, hulking, common fellow, with fine blue eyes. He stopped in +the middle of the road and stared at Ideala as she came up to him, +walking, as usual, with a slight undulating movement that made you +think of a yacht in a breeze, her face up-raised and her lips parted. +He took off his cap as she approached. The gesture attracted her +attention, and, thinking he wanted to beg or ask some question, she +stopped and looked at him inquiringly. + +"Well, you _are_ a nice lady!" he exclaimed. + +He hadn't the gift of language, but she saw the soul of a man in his +eyes, and she understood him. + +"Thank you," she answered, and passed on, unsurprised. + +In the next street a breathless creature came running after her, a +tawdry, painted, dishevelled girl. She stopped Ideala and stood +panting, with hot dry lips, and eyes full of animal suffering. Her +clothes exhaled the smell of some vile scent that was overpowering. +Involuntarily Ideala shrank from her, and all the joy left her face. + +"I've run"--the girl gasped--"such a way--they said you'd gone this +road. I've waited about all day to catch you. Come, for God's sake!" + +"But where?" + +"There's a girl dying"--and she clutched Ideala's arm, trying to drag +her along with her--"or she would die and have done with it, but she +can't till she's seen you. She've something on her mind--something to +tell you. Come, my lady, come, for the love of the Lord and the Blessed +Virgin. No harm'll happen to you." Ideala made a gesture. "Show me the +way," she said. "But you don't seem able to walk. There's an empty cab +coming. Get in and tell the man where to drive to." + +They stopped at a row of many-storeyed houses in a low by-street. A +stout elderly woman with an evil countenance met them at the door. She +began some speech in a cringing tone to Ideala, but the tawdry girl +pushed her aside rudely. + +"Hold your jaw, and get out of the way," she said. "I'll show the lady +up." + +The woman muttered something which Ideala fortunately did not hear, and +let them pass. They went upstairs to the very top of the house, and +entered a low room, furnished with a broken chair and a small bed only. +On the bed lay a girl, who, in spite of disease and approaching death, +looked not more than twenty, and was probably two years younger. She +turned her haggard face to the door as it opened, and a gleam of +satisfaction caused her eyes to dilate when she saw Ideala. They were +large dark eyes, but her face was so distorted with suffering and +discoloured by disease, it was impossible to imagine what it once had +been. + +"Here she is, Polly," said the Tawdry One, triumphantly. "I said I'd +bring her, now didn't I?" + +Ideala knelt down by the bed. + +"My! but you're a game un!" said the Tawdry One, admiringly. "You ain't +afraid of catching nothing! Now, I'd have asked what was up before I'd +have done that; and I wouldn't touch her with the tongs, nor stay in +the room with her was it ever so. You just holler when you want me and +I'll come back." And so saying she left them. + +"You are not afraid to touch me--you don't mind?" said the dying girl +when Ideala had taken off her gloves, and knelt, holding her hands. + +"Afraid? Mind?" Ideala whispered, her eyes full of pity. "I only wish +you would let me do something for you." + +At that moment they were startled by an uproar downstairs. A man and +woman were quarrelling at the top of their voices. At first only their +tones were audible, but these grew more distinct, and in a few seconds +Ideala could hear what was said, and it was evident that the combatants +were approaching. + +"I tell you the lady's all right," the woman Ideala had seen downstairs +was heard to shriek, with sundry vile epithets. "Polly's dying, and +she've come to visit her." + +"Seein' 's believin'," the man rejoined, doggedly. "Just show me the +lady and shut up, you foul-mouthed devil you." + +The door was flung open, and there stood the fat harridan, and towering +over her was a great red-haired policeman, who seemed both relieved and +abashed when he saw Ideala. + +"What is the meaning of this?" she said, rising, and drawing herself up +indignantly. "Don't you see how ill this girl is? Such an uproar at +such a time is indecent." + +The woman shrank from her gaze and slunk away. The policeman wiped his +hot face with a red handkerchief. + +"I saw the girl fetch you here, ma'am," he said, apologetically, "and I +thought it was a trap. It ain't safe for a woman, let alone a lady, to +come to no such a place. I'll just wait and see you safe out of it." + +He shut the door, and Ideala heard him walking up and down on the +landing outside. + +The dying girl seemed scarcely conscious of what was passing. Ideala +looked round for something to revive her. There was not even a cup of +water in the room. She knelt once more beside the bed, and raised her +in her arms, and let her head rest on her shoulder. All the mother in +her was throbbing with tenderness for this poor outcast. The girl drew +a long deep sigh. + +"Could you take anything?" Ideala asked. + +"No, lady, not now. The thirst was awful awhile ago, and I cried and +cried, although I knew no one would listen to me, or come if they +heard. They'd rather we'd die when we get ill. It's a bad thing for the +house." She could only speak in gasps. + +"And what have you had?" Ideala asked. + +"The scarlet fever, ma'am. There's an awful bad kind about, and I +caught it. They all die that gets it." + +Ideala drew her closer, and laid her own cool cheek on her damp +forehead. + +"Tell me why you wished to see me," she said. "You are so good," the +girl answered--"I thought you'd better know--and get--away from--that +low brute." Ideala understood, and would fain have stopped the story, +but it seemed a relief to the girl to speak, and so she listened. It +was the old story, the old story aggravated by every incident that +could make it more repulsive--and her husband was the hero of it. + +"Shall I go to hell?" the girl asked, shrinking closer. + +"For these Christ died," Ideala murmured. The words flashed through her +mind, and the meaning of them was new to her. Her heart was wrung for +the desolate girl, dying alone in sin and sorrow without a creature to +care for her--dying alone in the arms of a strange woman, with a +policeman outside guarding her. Ideala cried in her heart with an +exceeding bitter cry: "God do so to him, and more also." + +"Pray for me, lady." + +But Ideala could not pray with a curse on her lips--and, besides, the +power to pray had been taken from her for many a weary day before that. +She thought of the policeman, and called him in. + +"See, she is dying," she said, looking up at him helplessly; "and she +has asked me to pray, and I can't. Will you?" + +And, quite simply and reverently, as if it had been part of his +ordinary duty, he took off his helmet and knelt down, a great rough- +looking man in a hideous dress, and prayed: "Dear Lord, forgive her!" + +They were the last words she heard. + + + + +CHAPTER XX. + + +The people seemed to have deserted the house. Even the Tawdry One had +disappeared, and Ideala was obliged to lay out the poor dear girl +herself, and make her ready for decent burial. As soon as she could +leave the place she went, escorted by the policeman, to the fever +hospital to have her things fumigated. The risk of infection had not +troubled her till she remembered the likelihood of taking it to others, +but as soon as she thought of that she took the necessary precautions +to prevent it. She sent a message from the hospital to her maid, +telling her to pack up some things and meet her at the station in time +for the mail at eleven o'clock that night. She had thought of some +friends who lived a nine hours' journey from her home, and had +determined to go to them for a time. + +She wrote to her husband also from the hospital. "The girl, Mary +Morris, died of scarlet fever this afternoon in the house to which you +sent her when you were tired of her," she said. "I was with her when +she died. I am going to the Trelawneys to-night; but at present I have +formed no plans for the future." + +During the first few days of her stay with the Trelawneys she just +lived from hour to hour, not thinking of anything, past, present, or to +come; but out of this apathy a desire grew by degrees. She wanted to +see Lorrimer. She could speak to him, and she was sure he would help +and advise her. She wrote to him, telling him she particularly wished +to see him on a certain day, and asking him to meet her at the station, +adding by way of postscript: "I do not think I quite know what you +meant when you advised me to go my own way; but if any wrong-doing were +part of the programme I should not be able to carry it out. However, I +feel sure that you would be the last person in the world to let me do +wrong, even if I were inclined to." + +She knew that her husband was away from home, and her intention had +been to sleep there that night, and go on to Lorrimer the next morning; +but she had been misinformed about the trains, and after many changes +and tedious waits, she found herself alone in the middle of the night +at a little railway junction, with no chance of a train to take her on +for several hours; and what was worse, without money enough in her +purse to pay her bill if she went to an hotel. The waiting-rooms were +all closed for the night, and there seemed nothing for it but to wander +about the station till the train came and released her. She told her +dilemma to an old Scotch inspector who was waiting to see what she +meant to do. He gave the matter his best consideration, but it +evidently perplexed him. + +"If you was a box," he said, rubbing his chin thoughtfully, "we could +put you in the left-luggage office." + +"But I am not a box," Ideala answered, as if only the most positive +denial would prevent mistake on the subject. + +It was raining hard, and bitterly cold. Only part of the platform was +roofed in, and every now and then a gust of wind splashed the raindrops +into their faces as they stood beside Ideala's luggage in a circle of +yellow light cast upwards by a lantern which the inspector had put on +the ground at their feet. + +"There's me and Tom, the porter," he said at last; "we've got to wait +for the two o'clock down and the four o'clock up. Tom, he'll come 'ome +and sit over the kitchen fire with me. I suppose, now, you wouldn't +like to do that?" + +"Indeed I should be very glad to," Ideala answered; "that is," she +added quickly, "if it would not inconvenience you." + +He made an inexplicable gesture, and seemed to consider the matter +settled. + +"I'll just put this here luggage in the office," he said, shouldering a +box and taking up a portmanteau; but he muttered as he went: "It's a +pity, now, you wasn't luggage." + +Ideala followed him meekly from the luggage-office out into the lane, +and down a country path to a little cottage. The door opened into the +kitchen, and a young man in a porter's uniform was sitting over a +cheery fire reading a newspaper by the light of a tallow candle. The +kitchen was large for the size of the house. Besides the door they had +entered by there were two others, both closed. The walls were panelled +from floor to ceiling with wood darkened by age. Several of the panels +were doors of cupboards that projected slightly from the wall, and +shelves had been sunk in flush with it, and placed angle-wise in the +corners. The shelves were covered with old china. There was a row of +brass candlesticks of good design on the high mantelpiece, and more +china stood behind them. On a panel above the mantelpiece a curious +design of dogs and horses in a wood had been carved with much patience +and some skill. The furniture of the place was an old oak table +standing in the window--the window itself had a deep sill, on which +was arranged a row of flower-pots, from which a faint perfume came at +intervals--a long narrow oak chest, carved and polished, with the +date, 1700, on the side of it, a settle, and a dresser covered with +the ordinary crockery used by poor people. The brick floor was +_rudded_ and sanded, the hearthstone was yellow, and the part under +the grate was white. One high-backed old-fashioned chair stood on each +side of the hearth. Tom the Porter was sitting in one of them, and at +his elbow was a small round table with a pipe, tobacco jar, and two or +three books upon it. A square table in the middle of the room was laid +out for supper, with a dish, two plates, a beer mug, and half a loaf +of bread. Some potatoes were roasting on the hob. + +"The old woman's asleep, I expects. You'll mind and not make a noise," +the inspector said to Ideala, as if he were warning a child to be good. + +Tom the Porter rose, and gazed at the lady with his mouth open in a +state of astonishment that was justified by the time and place of her +advent; but he offered her his chair with the courtesy of a gentleman, +and the old inspector bade her make herself at home, which she did by +removing her hat and wraps and taking off her gloves. In a higher +sphere of life those two men would have stared her out of countenance, +but Tom the Porter and the old inspector, not from want of +appreciation, but from the refinement that seems natural to people who +come of an old stock, whatever their station, and have had china and +carved oak in their possession from one generation to another--forebore +even to look at her lest she should be embarrassed by their curiosity. +They did the honours of the house with dignity, and without vulgar +apology for a state of things that was natural to them, and Ideala at +once adapted herself to the circumstances, and burnt her fingers while +attending to the baked potatoes, which Tom had somewhat neglected. + +She always declared afterwards that there was nothing so good in the +world as baked potatoes and salt, provided the company was agreeable; +and now and then she would thrill us with reminiscences of that +evening's entertainment--with wonderful accounts of railway accidents-- +and of one in particular that happened on a pitch-dark night when fires +had to be made to light the workers as they toiled fearfully amongst +the wreck of the trains, searching for the mangled and mutilated, the +dying and the dead, while the air was filled with horrid shrieks and +groans. + +For it seems these three, when they had finished the baked potatoes, +drew their chairs to the fire and talked. And one can well imagine what +Ideala's stories were--her tales of the Japanese with whom she had +lived; of Chinese prisons into which she had peeped; of earthquakes, +tornadoes and shipwrecks, and other perils by land and sea, all told in +a voice that thrilled you, whatever it said. Tom the Porter and the old +Scotch inspector were in luck that night, and they knew it. When at +last it was time for Ideala to go, and in return for her thanks for his +kind hospitality, and the contents of her purse, which had rather more +in it than she had fancied, the inspector expressed his appreciation +with an earnest smack. + +"Well," he said, "you're rare good company. I shan't mind when you come +along this way again." + +The train was late in arriving, and she had only time to rush up to the +house, change her dress, and return to the station to catch the one by +which she had asked Lorrimer to meet her. Perhaps it was the thought of +what she had come to tell him that made her heart beat nervously as the +train drew up at her destination, and she leant forward to look for him +among the people on the platform. She looked in vain--he was not there. +Something, of course, had happened to detain him; doubtless he had sent +a message to explain. She waited a little, but nobody appeared to be +looking for her. Then she left the station and walked in the direction +of the Hospital, thinking he had missed the train, and she should +probably meet him on the way. Her nervousness increased as she went. +She was not used to be alone in crowded streets, and she began to feel +faint and bewildered. Her heart seemed to stop whenever she saw a fair- +headed man, but she reached the Hospital at last, and no Lorrimer had +met her. + +Then a new fear disturbed her. Perhaps he was ill. She went up to the +door, and there, just coming out, Lorrimer's secretary met her. + +"I was just coming to meet you, madam," he said; "I am sorry I am too +late. Mr. Lorrimer has been detained by visitors, and sent me to +apologise for his absence. If you will be so good as to come to the +library, he will join you there as soon as he is disengaged." + +When she was settled in the library a servant brought her books to her. +She had not come to read, but work was the daily habit of her life, and +she went on now, mechanically, but carefully as usual, though with a +curious sinking of the heart, and benumbing sense of loss and pain. As +she came along in the train she had been thinking how it would amuse +Lorrimer to hear of her night's adventure, and of the relief it would +be to tell him of all the other things she had come to tell; but now +she felt like one bidden to a bridal, and brought to a burial. People +were going and coming continually in the library. A gentleman sat at a +table near her, busily writing. Servants went backwards and forwards +with books. Another gentleman came in and looked at her curiously, and +then went away. She began to feel uncomfortable, and wondered what was +keeping Lorrimer so long. She thought, too, of leaving the place at +once, and going back by an earlier train than she had intended, but it +would hardly have been polite. A servant came and told her the library +was closed to visitors at two. + +"I am waiting for Mr. Lorrimer," she said. + +"Oh, in that case----" and the man withdrew. The name was an open +sesame to all parts of the building. + +At last he came. She rose with a great sense of relief. + +"Let me take your books," he said. + +"I have done with them," she answered. + +And without another word he led the way to his own room. + +They took their accustomed seats. + +"I am sorry I could not meet you," he said. "I hope you do not think me +rude. Some wretched people turned up at the last moment, and wanted to +see everything. Just look at the room!" + +Every cabinet seemed to have been ransacked, and treasures of all kinds +were lying about in most admired disorder. Lorrimer looked round him +desperately, and pushed his hat back from his forehead. Ideala smiled. +It was so like him to forget he had it on. + +Outside a heavy thundercloud gathered and darkened the room. Presently +big drops of rain splashed against the window, and it began to lighten. +Long claps of thunder rolled and muttered incessantly away in the +distance, and every now and then one would burst directly above them, +as it seemed, with splendid effect. + +Lorrimer looked up at the window straight before him, and played with a +pen; and Ideala, half turning her back to him, sat silent also, +watching the storm. + +There were some high houses opposite of which only the upper storeys +were visible. Two children were playing in a dangerous position at an +open window in one of them. Above the houses a strip of sky, heavy and +dark and changeful, was all that showed. Ideala felt cold and faint. +The long fast and fatigue were beginning to tell upon her. She was +nervous, too; the silence was oppressive, but she could not break it. +She felt some inexplicable change in her relations with Lorrimer which +made it impossible to speak. Furtively she watched him, trying to +discover if he felt it too. The look of age was on his face, and it was +clouded with discontent. Anxiously she sought some sign of sickness to +account for it. But, no. There was no trace of physical suffering; the +trouble was mental. + +"You are not looking well," Lorrimer said at last. "I suppose you have +been starving yourself since I saw you. You have had no lunch to-day +again. You will kill yourself if you go on like that. I was speaking +about you to a doctor the other day. He said you could not fast as you +do without taking _something_--stimulants or sedatives." Ideala +winced. "What an insulting thing to say," she exclaimed, indignantly. +"I will not allow you to adopt that tone with me. You have no right to +scold me." + +"I have, and shall," he retorted. "I suppose you want to kill yourself. +Perhaps it is the best thing people can do who hate their lives." + +"I don't hate my life; I don't want to die," she rejoined. + +"The other day you said you loathed your life." + +"You are accusing me of inconsistency," she said. "You! who are in two +states of mind every time I see you!" She got up. "And I _do_ mean +what I say," she resumed. "I loathed the old life, but that is done +with. I am living a new life now----" + +He turned to look at her, red chasing white from his face at every +breath; then, yielding to an irresistible impulse, he went to her, +grasped her folded hands in both of his, and looked into her eyes for +one burning moment. The hot blood flamed to her face. She was startled. + +"Don't let us quarrel," he said, hoarsely. + +"Why do you try to?" she retorted. "It is always you who begin." + +"I think you want pluck," he said. + +"Oh, no; not that," she answered. + +"Just now you do." + +"Then I think you want discernment," she retorted with spirit. + +And so they went on, as if neither of them had ever heard of such a +thing as conventional propriety. + +Lorrimer did not answer that last remark. He was standing at a little +distance from her, watching her. Ideala was looking grave. + +"What is your conscience troubling you about now?" he asked. "I never +listen to my conscience." + +"I don't believe you," she answered, promptly. + +"That is polite," he observed. + +Then there was another pause. + +"It must be time for me to go," she said at last. + +The rain was still falling in torrents. + +"Oh, no!" he exclaimed. "You mustn't go yet. Your train does not leave +for another hour. Why do you want to go?" + +She was struggling with the button of a glove, and he went to help her, +but she repulsed him, half unconsciously, as she would have brushed off +a troublesome fly. + +The gesture irritated him. + +"I cannot believe you are not conscientious," she said, with a frown of +intentness. "When a man of talent ceases to be true, he loses half his +power." + +He turned from her coldly, sat down at the writing table, and began to +write. + +Ideala was still putting on her gloves. + +Outside, the rain fell lightly now, and the clouds were clearing. The +children were still playing at the open window of the house opposite. +Lorrimer had often been obliged to answer notes when she was there; she +thought nothing of that; but he was a long time, and at last she +interrupted him. "Forgive me if I disturb you," she said, "but I am +afraid I shall miss my train." + +"Oh, pardon me," he answered, jumping up, and looking at his watch. +"But it is not nearly time yet. I cannot understand why you are in such +a hurry to-day." + +"Yet you know that I always go when I have done my work," she said. + +"You have done unusually early then," he replied; "and I wish to +goodness I had." He looked round the room pettishly, like a schoolboy +out of temper. "I shall have to put all these things away when you're +gone--a task I hate, but nobody can do it but myself." + +"Why wait till I've gone? Let me help you," said Ideala. + +His countenance cleared, and they set to work merrily, he explaining +the curious histories of coins and cameos, of ancient gems, ornaments +of gold and silver, and valuable intaglios, as they returned them to +their places. Both forgot everything in the interest of the collection; +so that, when the last tray was completed, they were surprised to find +that two trains had gone while they were busy, and another had become +due, and there was only time to jump into a hansom to catch it. + +Lorrimer was still irritable. + +"Why on earth does a lady always carry her purse in her hand?" he said, +as they drove along. + +Ideala laughed, and put hers in her pocket. + +"When are you coming to go on with your work?" he asked. + +"I will write and fix a day," she said. + +"I shall be away a good deal for the next three weeks," he continued. +"The twenty-third or twenty-sixth would be the most convenient days for +me, if they would suit you." + +"Thank you," she answered, and hurried down the platform, without +having said a word or given a thought to what she had come to say. + +And then at last the twenty-four hours' fasting, fatigue, and mental +suffering overcame her. A little later she was lying insensible on the +floor of her room, and she was alone. The servants had not seen her +enter, and there was not a creature near her to help her. + + + + +CHAPTER XXI. + + +Ideala was unable to exert herself for many days after this. At last, +however, she began to think of work again, and of Lorrimer. She was +uneasy about him. He had not been himself on that last occasion. +Something was wrong, she could not think what, but she felt anxious; +and out of her anxiety arose an intense longing to see him again. So +she wrote, first of all fixing the twenty-third for her visit; but when +the day came she found herself unequal to the exertion, and wrote +again, begging him to expect her on the twenty-sixth instead. + +He did not reply. He was generally overwhelmed with correspondence, and +she had therefore begged him not to do so if the days she named suited +him. + +Up to this time she had never heard Lorrimer mentioned by any one; but +now, suddenly, his name seemed to be in everybody's mouth. She thought +of him incessantly herself, and it was as if the strength of her own +mind compelled all other minds to think of him while she was present, +and to yield to her will and tell her all they knew. For, curiously +enough, she had begun to want to know about him. I call it curious, +because she was so confiding so unsuspicious, and also so penetrating, +she never seemed to care to know more of people than she learnt from +intercourse with them. But with regard to Lorrimer, she had evidently +begun to distrust her own judgment, which is significant. + +One night, at a dinner-party, she was thinking of a gratuitous piece of +information an old woman, who brought her some milk on one occasion at +the Great Hospital, had given her. Ideala had noticed that the old +woman had a bad cough, and had asked her, in her usual kindly way, if +she were subject to it, and what she did for it, remarking that the +north country air was trying to people with delicate chests, and warmer +clothing and greater care were more necessary there than in the south; +and thereupon the old woman had launched forth, as such people will +upon the slightest provocation, with minute details of her own +sufferings, and the sufferings of all the people she ever knew, from +"the bronchitis" during the winter and spring, Mr. Lorrimer being +included among the number. + +"Does Mr. Lorrimer suffer in that way?" Ideala had asked with interest. + +"Indeed, yes," was the answer, given with many shakings of the head +and that air of importance and pleasure which vulgar bearers of bad +news assume. "He was very bad in the spring. He coughed so as never +was, and had to give in at last and keep his room, which he should +have done at first; but it takes a deal to make him give in, for he +takes no care of hisself though not strong, and we _were_ in a way! +Eh! but it would be a bad thing for this place if anything happened to +Mr. Lorrimer!" Ideala gave the woman half-a-crown. + +"People may have bronchitis without being delicate," she asserted. "Mr. +Lorrimer is very kind to all of you, I suppose?" "If I was to tell you +all his good deeds, ma'am," the woman said, impressively, "I'd not have +done before to-morrow morning. But as to his not being delicate," she +continued--in the hope, perhaps, of scoring another on that point-- +"why, it just depends on what you call delicate." + +Ideala absently gave her another half-crown, and another after that, +but she could not get her to say that Mr. Lorrimer's chest was strong. +Later, when Lorrimerre turned, and they were both at work, he was +interrupted in the middle of some cynical remarks on over-population, +and the good it would do to check it by allowing the spread of +epidemics and encouraging men to kill each other, by the arrival of +another old woman in great distress. + +His manner changed in a moment. "I am afraid he is worse," he said to +her most kindly. + +She could only shake her head. + +"There is the order," he went on, giving her a paper--"get him these +things at once, and tell him I will come as soon as I am disengaged." + +When they were alone again, Ideala looked at Lorrimer and laughed. +"Another instance, I shrewdly suspect, of the difference between theory +and practice," she observed. + +He brushed his hand back over his forehead and hair, a trifle +disconcerted. "He was the only son of his mother, and she was a widow," +he said. + +"And one can approve of capital punishment without having the nerve to +see it inflicted, I suppose," Ideala commented, "and be convinced that +it would be good for the human race to have a certain number of their +children drowned, like kittens, every year, and yet not be able to see +a single one disposed of in that way without risking one's own life to +save it. Verily, I have heard this often, and yet I think I am more +surprised to find it true than if I had never been warned! But that is +always the way. Things surprise us just as much as we expect them to. +When we went up the river to Canton and saw the Pagoda, we all +exclaimed, 'Why, it is just like the pictures--river, and junks, and +all!' If we had not seen the pictures I believe we should scarcely have +noticed it, and certainly we should not have been surprised at all." + +"Haven't you done being surprised yet?" Lorrimer asked. + +"No. Have you?" + +"Quite. Nothing ever surprises me." + +"I have read somewhere," she said, trying hard to recall the passage, +"that fast men, stupid men (_I think_), and rascals, profess to +feel no surprise at anything." + +The colour flew over his face, he seemed about to speak, but took up +his pen again as if the thing were not worth the trouble of a word, +and went on with his work. The habit of treating men as ideas is not +to be got rid of in a moment, and it was only when she thought it over +at dinner this evening that she saw anything to hurt him in what she +had said. Now that she did think of it, however, it certainly seemed +natural that he should object to being classed in any category which +included fast men, stupid men, or rascals; but even while she blamed +herself, and credited him with much forbearance in that he had allowed +her rudeness to pass unpunished, she was conscious of the existence, +in that substratum of thought which goes on continually irrespective +of our will, of a doubt as to whether he might not after all be one of +these--say, a fast man. For what _did_ she know about him? Nothing, +except that his manners were agreeable. True, she had heard of his +good deeds, and there is never smoke without fire; but a man may +balance his accounts, and many men do, in that way, topping up the +scale of good deeds pretty high when the bad ones on the other side +threaten to turn it; and, seeing that she knew nothing definitely +about his private character, suppose she had been deceived in him? +But, no! The thing was impossible. And just as she thought it, a +gentleman, sitting opposite, one whom she had not met before, looked +across the table and asked her if she knew Mr. Lorrimer. + +"I have seen him," she answered, with a burning blush, being taken +unawares. + +"He's a charming fellow--don't you think so?" + +"Yes, I think so," she agreed, with an indescribable sense of relief. + +And the next day a young clergyman whom she stopped to speak to in the +street began at once about Lorrimer. "I met him at dinner the other +night," he said. "I suppose you know him? There is much truth in 'birds +of a feather.' He fascinated us all with his talk of art and +literature. He gave us such new ideas--described such varied +experiences, and all with such grace and power." + +"Yes," she answered, thoughtfully. "I believe he is brilliant." + +"Many people are that," was the reply, given with hearty enthusiasm; +"but Lorrimer is something more. He is good. He makes you feel it, and +know it, and believe in him, without ever saying a word about himself." + +"Ah!" she sighed, "there is power in that. What lovely summer weather! +It makes me dream. Don't you love the time of nasturtiums? Their +pungent scent, and their colours? They seem to penetrate and glow +through everything, and make the time their own." + +And so she left him. + +But that same day, an old gentleman, who came from another county, and +looked as if he had come from another century--an old gentleman with +curious wavy hair, parted in the middle, who worshipped the Idol of +Days--the past and all that belonged to it--and, for evening dress, +wore knee-breeches, frilled shirt, black silk stockings, and diamond +buckles in his shoes; and had a bijou house, filled with a thousand +relics of his Idol of Days, where noble ladies were wont to loll and +listen to him, and drink tea out of his wonderful cups, and love him-- +so it was said--this gentleman called on Ideala. He came to charm and +to be charmed; and he, of all people in the world the one from whom she +would least have expected it, although she knew they had met, began to +sing Lorrimer's praises. + +"He raises the tone of everything he is engaged upon," this gentleman +said. "He has not quite kept faith with me about a matter he promised +to look into for me a year ago, but doubtless he is busy. I suppose you +know him?" + +"Yes, I know him. He seems to be very much above the average." + +"Oh, very much above the average," was the warm response. "He's a +charming fellow, and a thoroughly good fellow, too." + +This was the chorus to everything, and there was only one dissentient +voice--that of a man who admired Ideala, and was a good soul himself, +having gone out of his way to pay her trifling attentions, and even +found occasion to do her some small acts of kindness. He began with the +rest to praise Lorrimer, but when he saw he was doing so at his own +expense, by diverting her attention from himself to his subject, he +somewhat lowered his tone. + +"Every one seems to like Mr. Lorrimer," Ideala said. + +"O yes, he's certainly a nice fellow; but he puts a lot of side on." + +"And well he may, being so very good and well-beloved," she answered, +smiling. + +"So spoilt and conceited, you might say," was the rejoinder; but she +felt that there was jealousy in the tone, and only laughed. + +"What an interesting face he has," a lady remarked, who was having tea +with Ideala, _tete-a-tete_, one afternoon, and had brought the +conversation round to Lorrimer, as seemed inevitable in those days. "He +must make a charming portrait." + +"Yes, it is a fine face," Ideala answered, dreamily--"a face for a bust +in white marble; a face from out of the long ago--not Greek, but Roman +--of the time when men were passing from a strong, simple, manly, into a +luxuriously effeminate, self-indulgent stage; the face of a man who is +midway between the two extremes, and a prey to the desires of both. I +wish I had been his mother." + +"His mother was a noble woman." + +"I know; but she was not omniscient, and she never could have +understood the boy. I daresay he was not enough of an ugly duckling to +attract special attention, and with many other chicks in the brood he +could not have more than the rest, and yet he required it. He ought to +have been an only child. If he had been mine, I should have known what +his dreaminess meant, why he loved to wander away and be alone; what +was the conflict that began in his cradle--or earlier. Surely a mother +must remember what there was in her mind to influence her child; she +must have the key to all that is wrong in him; she must know if his +soul is likely to be at war with his senses." And then Ideala forgot +her listener, and burst out with one of those curious flashes of +insight, irrespective of all knowledge, to which she was subject: "If I +were only a soul to be saved, he would save me; but I am also a body to +be loved, and whether he loves me or not, he suffers. It is the eternal +conflict of mind and matter, spirit and flesh, two prisoners chained +together--the one despising the other, yet ruled by him, and +subservient to the needs of his lower nature." + +The lady stared at her. + +"You know Mr. Lorrimer very well, then, I suppose?" she remarked. + +"Let me see," said Ideala, awaking from her trance, "that is a question +I often ask myself. And sometimes I say I _do_ know him very well, +and sometimes I say I don't. I go to the Great Hospital frequently to +read, and to look up information, and he helps me. He is a man who +makes an instant impression, but he is many-sided, and, now you ask me, +I think on the whole that I do not know him well. I should not be +surprised to hear any number of the most contradictory things about +him." + +"It is not a nice character to have," the lady said. + +"No," Ideala answered, "not at all nice, but very interesting." + +When at last the day arrived she felt an unusual impatience to see him. +And she was in a strange flutter of nervous excitement. Should she tell +him of those things which she had not been able to confide to him on +the last occasion of their meeting? Could she? No; impossible! But she +must see him, nevertheless. The desire was imperative. + +The servant she had been accustomed to see met her at the door of the +Great Hospital. She fancied he looked at her peculiarly. He said he had +heard something about Mr. Lorrimer being absent that day, but he would +inquire. He left her, and, returning in a few minutes, told her Mr. +Lorrimer was not there. + +"Did he leave no note, no message for me?" Ideala asked, faintly. + +"No, madam, nothing," was the reply. + + + + +CHAPTER XXII. + + +For quite three months we heard nothing of Ideala, but we were not +alarmed, as she often neglected us in this way when she was busy. At +last, however, Claudia received a note from her, written in pencil, and +in her usual style. + +"It has been dull down here to a degree," she said. "I am beginning to +think we are all too respectable. Are respectability and imbecility +nearly allied, I wonder? But don't tell me; I don't want to know. All +the trouble in the world comes from knowing too much. And then, I'm so +dreadfully clever! If people take the trouble to explain things to me, +I am sure to acquire some of the information they try to impart. I +heard of the block system the other day. It sounded mysterious. I like +mystery, and I went about in daily dread of having it all made plain to +me by some officious person. One day I was sitting on a rail above the +line watching the trains. A workman came and sat down near me. It is +very hard to have a workman sit down near you and not to talk to him, +so we talked. And before I knew what was coming, he had explained the +whole of that block system to me. Only fancy! and I may never forget +it! It is quite disheartening. + +"He said he was a pointsman, and I asked him if he would send a train +down a wrong line for fifty pounds. He said fifty pounds was a large +sum, and he had a mother depending on him! The people here are +delicious. I think I shall write a book about them some day. + +"Have you felt the fascination of the trains? My favourite seat here is +a lovely spot just above where they pass. I can look down on them, and +into them. The line winds, rather, through meadows and between banks, +where wild flowers grow; and under an ivied bridge or two, and by some +woods. And the trains rush past--some slow, some fast; and now and then +comes one that is just a flash and roar, and I cling to the railing for +a moment till it passes, and quiver with excitement, feeling as if I +must be swept away. I look at the carriage windows, too, trying to +catch a glimpse of the people, and I always hope to see a face I know. +In that lies all the charm. + +"I seem to be expected in town, and some Scotch friends have asked me +to pay them a visit _en route_. I should like to go that way above +everything; one would see so much more of the country! But I daren't go +to London while the Bishop is there. He is making a dead set at me +again (confirmation this time), and I am afraid if he heard of my +arrival he would do something rash--dance down the Row in his gaiters, +perhaps--which might excite comment even if people knew what he was +after." + +And then she went on to say she had been a little out of sorts, and +very lazy, and she thought the north country air would brace her +nerves, and, if we would have her, she would like to go to us at once. + +She arrived late one afternoon, and I did not see her until she came +down to the drawing-room dressed for dinner. + +I had not thought anything of her illness, she made so light of it, and +I was therefore startled beyond measure when she appeared. + +"Why, my dear!" I exclaimed, involuntarily, "what have they done to +you? You're a perfect wreck!" + +"Well, so _I_ thought," she answered; "but I did not like to tell +you. I was afraid you might think I was trying to make much of myself-- +wrecks are so interesting." + +There was a large party staying in the house, and I had no opportunity +of speaking to her that evening; but the next morning she came into my +studio with a brave assumption of her old manner. I cannot tell how it +was that I knew in a moment she had broken down, but I did know it, and +I could only look at her. Perhaps something in my look showed her she +had betrayed herself, for all at once her false composure forsook her, +and she stretched out her hands to me with a piteous little gesture: + +"What am I to do?" she said. "Will it always be like this?" + +But I could not help her. I turned to the picture I was working at, and +went on painting without a word. By-and-by she recovered herself, and +began to talk of other things. + +I blamed myself afterwards. I ought to have let her tell me then; but I +had no notion of the truth. I only thought of her husband, and I +selfishly shrank from encouraging her to speak. Complaint seemed to be +beneath her. But I know now that she never wanted to make any complaint +of him to me. It was of her new acquaintance that she longed to tell +me. She had settled the difficulty with her husband without consulting +any one. She had returned to his house, and remained there as his wife, +nominally, and because he particularly wished that the world should +know nothing of the rupture. I believe that she had done it sorely against +the grain, and only because he represented that by so doing she would +save his reputation. But from that time forward she would accept nothing +from him but house-room, for she held that no high-minded woman could +take anything from a man to whom she was bound by no tie more sacred +than that of a mere legal contract. + +She was very quiet when she first came to us, but beyond that I noticed +nothing unusual in her manner, and after the first I was inclined to +think that being out of health accounted for everything. My sister +Claudia, however, was not so easily deceived. She declared that Ideala +was suffering from some serious trouble, either mental or bodily; and +as the days wore on and there was no change for the better in her, but +rather the contrary, I began to share Claudia's anxiety. Ideala grew +paler and thinner, and more nervous. She was oftenest depressed, but +occasionally had unnatural bursts of hilarity that would end suddenly +in long fits of brooding. + +It seems she had at first believed that Lorrimer's absence was an +intentional slight, and the humiliation, coming as it did upon the long +train of troubles which had weakened her already both in body and mind, +nearly killed her. She had been lying for weeks between life and death, +and we had known nothing of it. But as her strength returned she began +to think she had been unjust to Lorrimer. She could account for his +absence in many ways. He had been called out suddenly, and had left no +message because he expected to be back before she arrived, but had been +detained; or perhaps he had left a message with one of the servants +whom she had not seen--there were so many about the place; or it was +just possible that he had never received her letter at all--a certain +number are lost in the post every day; and altogether it was more +difficult to think badly of him than to believe that there had been +some mistake. But still there was a doubt in her mind, and she bore the +torment of it rather than ask for an explanation which might only +confirm her worst fears. + + + + +CHAPTER XXIII. + + +About a month after she came to us, Ideala caught a bad cold. The +doctor said her chest was very delicate. There was no disease, but she +required great care, and must not go out of doors. Soon afterwards he +ordered her to remain in two rooms, and my sister had a favourite +sitting-room turned into a bedroom for her. It opened into the blue +drawing-room, and we took to sitting there in the evening, so that +Ideala might join us without change of temperature. Ideala had always +been careless about her health, and we expected some trouble with her +now, but she acquiesced in all our arrangements without a word. It was +easy to see, however, that her docility arose from indifference. The +one idea possessed her, and she cared for nothing else. Did he, or did +he not, mean it? was the question she asked herself, morning, noon, and +night, till at last she could bear it no longer. Anything was better +than suspense. She must write to him, she must know the truth one way +or the other. + +I had stayed up in the blue drawing-room to read one night after the +rest of the party had gone to their rooms, but my mind wandered from +the book. Ideala had been very still that evening, and I could not help +thinking about her. Once or twice I had caught her looking at me +intently. It seemed as if she had something to say, but when I went to +speak to her she answered quite at random. I was much troubled about +her, and something happened presently which did not tend to set my mind +at rest. The room was large, and the fire, though bright, and one +shaded lamp standing on a low table, left the greater part of it in +shadow. When I gave up the attempt to read, I had gone to the farther +end of it to lie on a sofa which was quite in the shade. About midnight +the door into Ideala's room opened and she stood on the threshold with +a loose white wrapper round her. She could not see me, and I ought to +have spoken and let her know I was there, but I was startled at first +by her sudden appearance, and afterwards I was afraid of startling her. +She was so nervous and fragile then that a very little might have led +to serious consequences. I did not like to play the spy, but it was a +choice of two evils, and I thought she had come for a book or +something, and would go directly, and if she did discover me she would +suppose me to be asleep. She walked about the room, however, for a +little in an objectless way; then she sank down on the floor with a low +moan beside a chair, and hid her face on her arm. Presently she looked +up, and I saw she held something in her hand. It was a gold crucifix, +and she fixed her eyes on it. The lamplight fell on her face, and I +could see that it was drawn and haggard. Claudia had maintained +latterly that her illness arose more from mental than from physical +trouble; did this explain it? And was it a religious difficulty? + +A weary while she remained in the same attitude, gazing at the +crucifix; but evidently there was no pity for her pain, and no relief. +She neither prayed nor wept, and scarcely moved; and I dared not. At +last, however, a great drowsiness came over me; and when I awoke I +almost thought I had dreamt it all, for the daylight was streaming in, +and I was alone. + +Later in the day when I saw Ideala she had just finished writing a +letter. + +"Shall I take it down for you?" I asked. "The man will come for the +others presently." + +She handed it to me without a word. On the way downstairs I saw that it +was addressed to Lorrimer, of whom I had not then heard, but somehow I +could not help thinking that this letter had something to do with what +I had seen the night before. + +For a day or two after that Ideala seemed better. Then she grew +restless, which was a new phase of her malady; she had been so still +before; and soon it was evident that she was devoured by anxiety which +she could not conceal. I felt sure she was expecting someone, or +something, that never came. For days she wandered up and down, up and +down, and she neither ate nor slept. + +One afternoon I went to ask if she had any letters for the post. At +first she said she had not, then she wanted to know how soon the post +was going. In a few minutes, I told her. She sat down on the impulse of +the moment, and hurriedly wrote a note, which she handed to me. It was +addressed to Lorrimer; but I asked no questions. + +Two days afterwards a single letter came by the post for Ideala. I took +it to her myself, and saw in a moment that it was what she had waited +for so anxiously: the cruel suspense was over at last. + +That evening she was radiant; but she told us she must go home next +day, and we were thunderstruck. It was the depth of winter; the weather +was bitterly cold, and she had not been out of the house for months, +and under the circumstances to take such a journey was utter madness. +But we remonstrated in vain. She was determined to go, and she went. + + + + +CHAPTER XXIV. + + +In a few days she returned to us, and we were amazed at the change in +her. Her voice was clear again, her step elastic, her complexion had +recovered some of its brilliancy; there was a light in her eyes that I +had never seen there before, and about her lips a perpetual smile +hovered. She was tranquil again, and self-possessed; but she was more +than that--she was happy. One could see it in the very poise of her +figure when she crossed the room. + +"This is delightful, is it not?" Claudia whispered to me in the +drawing-room on the evening of her return. + +"Delightful," I answered; but I was puzzled. Ideala's variableness was +all on the surface, and I felt sure that this sudden change, which +looked like ease after agony, meant something serious. + +She did not keep me long in suspense. The next morning she came to my +studio door and looked in shyly. + +"Come in," I said. "I have been expecting you," and then I went on with +my painting. I saw she had something to tell me, and thought, as she +was evidently embarrassed, it would be easier for her to speak if I did +not look at her. "I hope you are going to stay with us some time now, +Ideala," I added, glancing up at her as she came and looked over my +shoulder at the picture. + +Her face clouded. "I--I am afraid not," she answered, hesitating, and +nervously fidgeting with some paint brushes that lay on a table beside +her. + +"I am afraid you will not want me when you know what I am going to do. +I only came back to tell you." + +My heart stood still. "To tell me! Why, what are you going to do?" + +"It is very hard to tell you," she faltered. "You and Claudia are my +dearest friends, and I cannot bear to give you pain. But I must tell +you at once. It is only right that you should know--especially as you +will disapprove." + +I turned to look at her, but she could not meet my eyes. + +"Give us pain! Disapprove!" I exclaimed. "What on earth do you mean, +Ideala? What are you going to do?" + +"An immoral thing," she answered. + +"Good heavens!" I exclaimed, throwing down my palette, and rising to +confront her. "I don't believe it." + +"I mean," she stammered--the blood rushing into her face and then +leaving her white as she spoke--"something which you will consider so. + +"I cannot believe it," I reiterated. + +"But it is true. He says so." + +"_He_--who, in God's name?" + +"Lorrimer." + +"And who on earth is Lorrimer?" + +"That is what I came to tell you," she answered, faintly. + +I gathered up my palette and brushes, and sat down to my easel again. + +"Tell me, then," I said, as calmly as I could. + +I pretended to paint, and after a little while, still standing behind +me so that I could not see her face, she began in a low voice, and told +me, with her habitual accuracy, all that had passed between them. + +"And what did you think when you found he was not there?" I asked, for +at that point she had stopped. + +"At first I thought he did not want to see me, and had gone away on +purpose," she answered; "then I was ill; but after that, when I began +to get better, I was afraid I had been unjust to him. There might have +been some mistake, and I was half inclined to go and see, but I was +frightened. And every day the longing grew, and I used to sit and look +at my watch, and think--'I could be there in an hour;' or, 'I might be +with him in forty minutes.' But I never went. And after a while I +could not bear it any longer, and so I came to you. But the thought of +him came with me, and the desire to know the truth grew and grew, +until at last I could bear that no longer either, and then I wrote; +and day after day I waited, and no answer came; and then I was sure he +had done it on purpose, but yet I could not bear to think it of him. +And I began not to know what people said when they spoke to me, and I +think I should have killed myself; but I come of an old race, you +know, and none of us ever did a cowardly thing, and I would rather +suffer for ever than be the first--_noblesse oblige_. I don't deserve +much credit for that, though, for I knew I should die if I did not see +him again--die of grief, and shame, and humiliation because of what I +had written, for as the days passed, and no answer came, I was afraid +I had said too much, and he had misunderstood me, and would despise +me. If I had only been sure that he did not want to see me again, of +course I should never have written; but so many people have lost their +only chance of happiness because they had not the courage to find out +the truth in some such doubtful matter; and I _did_ believe in him so +--I could not think he would do a _low_ thing. I was in a difficult +position, and I did what I thought was right; but when no answer came +to my letter I began to doubt, and then in a moment of rage, feeling +myself insulted, I wrote again. Yet I don't know what made me write. +It was an impulse--the sort of thing that makes one scream when one is +hurt. It does no good, but the cry is out before you can think of +that. All I said was: 'I understand your silence. You are cruel and +unjust. But I can keep my word, and if I live for nothing else, I +promise that I will make you respect me yet.' I never expected him to +answer that second note, but he did, at once. And he offered to come +here and explain--he was dreadfully distressed. But I preferred to go +to him." + +"And you went?" + +"Yes. And I was frightened, and he was very kind." + +By degrees she told me much of what had passed at that interview. She +seemed to have had no thought of anything but her desire to see him, +and have her mind set at rest, until she found herself face to face +with him, and then she was assailed by all kinds of doubts and fears; +but he had put her at her ease in five minutes--and in five minutes +more she had forgotten everything in the rapid change of ideas, the +delightful intellectual contest and communion, which had made his +companionship everything to her. She did just remember to ask him why +he had not answered her first letter. + +He searched about amongst a pile of newly-arrived documents on his +writing table. "There it is," he said, showing her the letter covered +with stamps and postmarks. "It only arrived this morning--just in time, +though, to speak for itself. I was abroad when you wrote, and it was +sent after me, and has followed me from place to place as you see, so +that I got your second letter first. You might have known there was +some mistake." + +"Pardon me," Ideala answered. "I ought to have known." + +And then she had looked up at him and smiled, and never another doubt +had occurred to her. + +"But, Ideala," I said to her, "you used the word 'immoral' just now. +You were talking at random, surely? You are nervous. For heaven's sake +collect yourself, and tell me what all this means." + +"No, I am not nervous," she answered. "See! my hand is quite steady. It +is you who are trembling. I am calm now, and relieved, because I have +told you. But, oh! I am so sorry to give you pain." + +"I do not yet understand," I answered, hoarsely. + +"He wants me to give up everything, and go to him," she said; "but he +would not accept my consent until he had explained, and made me +understand exactly what I was doing. 'The world will consider it an +immoral thing,' he said, 'and so it would be if the arrangement were +not to be permanent. But any contract which men and women hold to be +binding on themselves should be sufficient now, and will be sufficient +again, as it used to be in the old days, provided we can show good +cause why any previous contract should be broken. You must believe +that. You must be thoroughly satisfied now. For if your conscience were +to trouble you afterwards--your troublesome conscience which keeps you +busy regretting nearly everything you do, but never warns you in time +to stop you--if you were to have any scruples, then there would be no +peace for either of us, and you had better give me up at once.'" + +"And what did you say, Ideala?" + +"I said, perhaps I had. I was beginning to be frightened again." + +"And how did it end?" + +"He made me go home and consider." + +"Yes. And what then?" I demanded impatiently. + +"And next day he came to me--to know my decision--and--and--I was +satisfied. I cannot live without him." I groaned aloud. What was I to +say? What could I do? An arrangement of this sort is carefully +concealed, as a rule, by the people concerned, and denied if +discovered; but here were a lady and gentleman prepared, not only to +take the step, but to justify it--under somewhat peculiar +circumstances, certainly--and carefully making their friends acquainted +with their intention beforehand, as if it were an ordinary engagement. +I knew Ideala, and could understand her being over-persuaded. Something +of the kind was what I had always feared for her. But, Lorrimer--what +sort of a man was he? I own that I was strongly prejudiced against him +from the moment she pronounced his name, and all she had told me of him +subsequently only confirmed the prejudice. + +"Why was he not there that day to receive you?" I asked at last. + +"I don't know," she said. "I quite forgot about that. And I suppose he +forgot too," she added, "since he never told me." + +"Oh, Ideala!" I exclaimed, "how like you that is! It is most important +that you should know whether he intended to slight you on that occasion +or not. It is the key to his whole action in this matter." + +"But supposing he did mean to be rude? I should have to forgive him, +you know, because I have been rude to him--often. He does not approve +of my conduct always, by any means," she placidly assured me. + +"And does he, of all people in the world, presume to sit in judgment +on you?" I answered, indignantly. "I always thought _you_ the most +extraordinary person in the world, Ideala, until I heard of this-- +_gentleman_." + +"Hush!" she protested, as if I had blasphemed. "You must not speak of +him like that. He _is_ a gentleman--as true and loyal as you are +yourself. And he is everything to me." + +But these assurances were only what I had expected from Ideala, and in +no way altered my opinion of Mr. Lorrimer. I knew Ideala's peculiar +conscience well. She might do what all the world would consider wrong +on occasion; but she would never do so until she had persuaded herself +that wrong was right--for _her_ at all events. + +"He may be everything to you, but he has lowered you, Ideala," I +resumed, thinking it best not to spare her. + +"I was degraded when I met him." + +"Circumstances cannot degrade us until they make us act unworthily," I +rejoined. + +"Oh, no, he has not lowered me," she persisted; "quite the contrary. I +have only begun to know the difference between right and wrong since I +met him, and to understand how absolutely necessary for our happiness +is right-doing, even in the veriest trifle. And there is one thing that +I must always be grateful to him for--I can pray now. But I belied +myself to him nevertheless. He asked me if I ever prayed, and I was +shy; I could not tell him, because I only prayed for him. It was easier +to say that sometimes I reviled. Ah! why can we not be true to +ourselves?" + +"But I can't always pray," she went on sorrowfully; "only sometimes; +generally when I am in church. The thought of him comes over me then, +and a great longing to have him beside me, kneeling, with his heart +made tender, and his soul purified and uplifted to God as mine is, +possesses me--a longing so great that it fills my whole being, and +finds a voice: 'My God! my God! give him to me!'" + +"'Angels of God in heaven! give him to me! give him to me!'" I +answered, bitterly. + +"Yes, I remember," she rejoined, "I said it in my arrogant ignorance. I +did not understand, and this is different." + +"It is always _different_ in our own case," I answered. "Do you +remember that passage Ralph Waldo Emerson quotes from Lord Bacon: +'Moral qualities rule the world, but at short distances the senses are +despotic'? it seems to me that when you call upon God in that spirit +you are worshipping Him with your senses only." + +"Then I believe it is possible to make the senses the means of saving +the soul at critical times," she answered; "and at all events I know +this, that I more earnestly desire to be a good woman now than I ever +did before." + +"It would be a dangerous doctrine," I began. + +"Only in cases where the previous moral development had not been of a +high order," she interrupted. I felt it was useless to pursue that part +of the subject, so I waited a little, and then I said: "Am I to +understand, then, that you are going to give up your position in +society, and all your friends, for the sake of this one man, who +probably does not care for you, who certainly does not respect you, and +of whom you know nothing? Verily, he has gained an easy victory! But, +of course, you know now what his object has been from the first." + +"I know what you mean," she answered, indignantly; "but you are quite +wrong; he does care for me. And if I give up my position in society for +his sake, he is worth it, and I am content. And it is my own doing, +too. I know that there cannot be one law for me and another for all the +other women in the world, and if I break through a social convention I +am prepared to abide by the consequences. Do you want to make me +believe that his sympathy was pretended, that he deliberately planned-- +something I have no word to express--and would have carried out his +plan absolutely in cold blood, without a spark of affection for me? It +would be hard to believe it of any man; it is impossible to believe it +of him. He is a man of strong passions, if you will, but of noble +purpose; and if I make a sacrifice for him, he will be making one for +me also. He may have been betrayed at times by grief, or other mental +pain, which weakened his moral nature for the moment, and left him at +the mercy of bad impulses; but I can believe such impulses were +isolated, and any action they led him into was bitterly repented of; +and no one will ever make me alter my conviction that I wronged him +when I doubted him, even for a moment." + +"This is all very well, Ideala," I said, trying not to irritate her by +direct opposition, "if you appeared to him as you appear to me. Do you +think you did? Was there anything in your conduct that might have given +him a low estimate of your character to begin with? Anything that might +have led him to doubt your honesty, and think, when you made your +confession, that you were trying to get up a little play in which you +intended him to take a leading part? That you merely wished to ease +your mind from some inevitable sense of shame in wrong-doing by finding +an excuse for yourself to begin with--an excuse by which you would +excite his interest and sympathy, and save yourself from his contempt?" + +"Oh!" she exclaimed, "could he--could any one--think such a thing +possible?" + +"Such things are being done every day, Ideala, and a man of the world +would naturally be on his guard against deception. If he thought he was +being deceived, do you think it likely he would feel bound to be +scrupulous?" + +"But he _did_ believe in me," she declared, passionately. + +"He pretended to; it was part of the play. You see he only kept it up +until he thoroughly understood you, and then his real feelings +appeared, and he was rude to you. For I call his absence on that +occasion distinctly rude, and intentionally so too, since he sent no +apology." + +"He was only rude to me to save me from myself, then, as Lancelot was +rude to Elaine," she answered. + +"Or is it not just possible that he was disappointed when he found you +better than he had supposed? that he felt he had wasted his time for +nothing, and was irritated----" + +She interrupted me. "I forgive you," she said, "because you do not know +him. But I shall never convince you. You are prejudiced. You do not +think ill of me: why do you think ill of him?" + +I made no answer, and she was silent for a little. Then she began +again, recurring to the point at issue: + +"If he did slight me on that occasion," she said--"and I maintain that +he did not--but if he did, it was accidentally done." + +"The evidence is against him," I answered, drily. + +"Many innocent persons have suffered because it was," she said, with +confidence. + +"You are infatuated," I answered, roughly. And then my heart sent up an +exceeding great and bitter cry: "Ideala! Ideala! how did it ever come +to this?" + +She was silent. But her eyes were bright once more, her figure was +erect, there was new life in her--I could see that--and never a doubt. +She was satisfied. She was happy. + +"Must I give you up?" she said at last, tentatively. + +"No, you must give him up," I answered. + +"Ah, that is impossible!" she cried. "We were made for each other. We +cannot live apart." + +"Ideala," I exclaimed, exasperated, "he never believed in you. He +thought you were as so many women of our set are, and he showed it, if +only you could have understood, when you saw him at the Hospital on +that last occasion. You felt that there was some change, as you say +yourself, and that was it. You talked to him of truth then, and it +irritated him as the devil quoting Scripture might be supposed to +irritate; and when you went back again he showed what he thought of you +by his unexplained absence. He thought you were not worth +consideration, and he gave you none." + +"It would have been paying himself a very poor compliment if he had +thought that only a corrupt woman could care for him," she answered, +confidently. "But, I tell you, I am sure there is some satisfactory +explanation of that business. I only wish I had remembered to ask for +it, that I might satisfy you now. And, at any rate," she added, +"whatever he may have thought, he knows better by this time." + +I could say no more. Baffled and sick at heart, I left her, wondering +if some happy inspiration would come before it was too late, and help +me to save her yet. + + + + +CHAPTER XXV. + + +I went to consult my sister Claudia. The blow was a heavy one for her +also; but I was surprised to find that she did not share my contempt +for the person whom I considered responsible for all this trouble. + +"Ideala is no common character herself," Claudia argued; "and it isn't +likely that a common character would fascinate her as this man has +done." + +"Will you speak to her, Claudia, and see what your influence will do?" + +"It is no use my speaking to her," she answered, disconsolately. +"Ideala is a much cleverer woman than I am. She would make me laugh at +my own advice in five minutes. And, besides, if she be infatuated, as +you say she is, she will be only too glad to be allowed to talk about +him, and that will strengthen her feeling for him. No. She has chosen +you for her confidant, and you had better talk to her yourself--and may +you succeed!" she added, laying her head on the table beside which she +was sitting, and giving way to a burst of grief. + +I tried to comfort her, but I had little hope myself, and I could not +speak at all confidently. + +"I believe," Claudia said, before we parted, "that there is nothing for +her now but a choice of two evils. If she gives him up she will never +care for anything again, and if she does not, she will have done an +unjustifiable thing; and life after that for such a woman as Ideala +would be like one of those fairy gifts which were bestowed subject to +some burdensome condition that made the good of them null and void." + +I did not meet Ideala again until the evening, and then I was not sorry +to see that her manner was less serene. It was just possible that she +had been thinking over what I had said, and that some of the doubts I +had suggested were beginning to disturb her perfect security. + +After dinner she brought the conversation round to those social laws +which govern our lives arbitrarily. I did not see what she was driving +at, neither did the good old Bishop, who was one of the party, nor a +lawyer who was also present. + +"You want to know something," said the latter. "What is it? You must +state your case clearly." + +"I want to know if a thing can be legally right and morally wrong," +Ideala answered. + +"Of course not," the Bishop rashly asserted. + +"That depends," the lawyer said, cautiously. + +"If I signed a contract," Ideala explained, "and found out afterwards +that those who induced me to become a party to it had kept me in +ignorance of the most important clause in it, so that I really did not +know to what I was committing myself, would you call that a moral +contract?" + +"I should say that people had not dealt uprightly with you," the Bishop +answered; "but there might be nothing in the clause to which you could +object." + +"But suppose there _was_ something in the clause to which I very +strongly objected, something of which my conscience disapproved, +something that was repugnant to my whole moral nature; and suppose I +was forced by the law to fulfil it nevertheless, should you say that +was a moral contract? Should you not say that in acting against my +conscience I acted immorally?" + +We all fell into the trap, and looked an encouraging assent. + +"And in that case," she continued, "I suppose my duty would be to evade +the law, and act on my conscience?" + +The Bishop looked puzzled. + +"I should only be doing what the early martyrs had to do," she added. + +"That is true," he rejoined, with evident relief. + +"But I don't see what particular contract you are thinking of," said +the lawyer. + +"The marriage contract," Ideala answered, calmly. + +This announcement created a sensation. + +The lawyer laughed: the Bishop looked grave. + +"Oh, but you cannot describe marriage in that way," he declared, with +emphasis. + +"Humph!" the lawyer observed, meditatively. "I am afraid I must beg to +differ from your Lordship. Many women might describe their marriages in +that way with perfect accuracy." + +"Marriages are made in heaven!" the Bishop ejaculated, feebly. + +"Let us hope that some are, dear Bishop." Claudia sweetly observed, and +all the married people in the room looked "Amen" at her. + +"I think an ideal of marriage should be fixed by law, and lectures +given in all the colleges to teach it," Ideala went on; "and a standard +of excellence ought to be set up for people to attain to before they +could be allowed to marry. They should be obliged to pass examinations +on the subject, and fit themselves for the perfect state by a perfect +life. It should be made a reward for merit, and a goal towards which +goodness only could carry us. Then marriages might seem to have been +made in heaven, and the blessing of God would sanctify a happy union, +instead of being impiously pronounced in order to ratify a business +transaction, or sanction the indulgence of a passing fancy. But only +the love that lasts can sanctify marriage, and a marriage without such +love is an immoral contract." + +"Marriage an immoral contract!" the Bishop exclaimed. "O dear! O dear! +This is not right, you know; this is not at all right. I must make a +note of this--I really must. You are in the habit of saying things of +this sort, my dear. I remember you said something like it once before; +and really it is not a subject to joke about. Such an idea is quite +pernicious; it must not be allowed to spread--even as a joke. I wish, +my dear, you had not promulgated it, even in that spirit. You have--ah +--a knack of making things seem plausible, and of giving weight to +opinions by the way you express them, although the opinions themselves +are quite erroneous, as on the present occasion. Some of your ideas are +so very mistaken, you know; and you really ought to leave these matters +to those who understand them, and can judge. It is very dangerous to +discuss such subjects, especially--ah--when you know nothing about +them, and--ah--cannot judge. I really must preach a sermon on the +subject. Let me see. Next Sunday--ah, yes; next Sunday, if you will +kindly come and hear me." + +We all thanked him as enthusiastically as we could. + +Later, I found Ideala alone in one of the conservatories. She took my +arm affectionately, and we walked up and down for a time in silence. +She was smiling and happy; so happy, indeed, that I found it hard to +say anything to disturb her. For a moment I felt almost as she did +about the step she proposed to take. There had been little joy in her +life, and she had borne her cross long and bravely; what wonder that +she should rebel at last, and claim her reward? + +"Do you remember how you used to talk about the women of the nineteenth +century, Ideala," I said at last, "and describe the power for good +which they never use, and rail at them as artificial, milliner-made, +man-hunting, self-indulgent _animals?_" + +"I know," she answered; "and now you would say I am worse than any of +them? I used to have big ideas about woman and her mission; but I +always looked at the question broadly, as it affects the whole world; +now my vision is narrowed, and I see it only with regard to one +individual. But I am sure that is the right way to look at it. I think +every woman will have to answer for one man's soul, and it seems to me +that the noblest thing a woman can do is to devote her life to that +soul first of all--to raise it if it be low, to help it to peace if +peace be lacking, and to gather all the sunshine there is in the world +for it; and, after that, if her opportunities and powers allow her to +help others also, she should do what she can for them. I do not know +all the places which it is legitimate for women to fill in the world, +but it seems to me that they are many and various, and that the great +object in life for a woman is to help. To be a Pericles I see that a +man must have an Aspasia. Was Aspasia vile? some said so--yet she did a +nobler work, and was finer in her fall, if she fell, than many good +women in all the glory of uprightness are. And was she impure? then it +is strange that her mind was not corrupting in its influence. And was +she low? then whence came her power to raise others? It seems to me +that it only rests with ourselves to make any position in life, which +circumstances render it expedient for us to occupy, desirable." + +"And you propose to be an Aspasia to this modern Pericles?" + +"If you like to put it so. The cases are not dissimilar, as there was +an obstacle in the way of their marriage also." + +"The law was the obstacle." + +"Yes; another of those laws which are more honoured in the breach than +in the observance. They might not marry because she came from Miletus! +and Lorrimer may not marry me because I came out of the house of +bondage. Unwise laws make immoral nations." + +"But you have gone about this business in such an extraordinary way, +Ideala," I said. "You seem to have tried to make it appear as bad for +yourself as you can. Why did you not leave your husband when Lorrimer +advised you to?" + +"If I had gone then I should have been obliged to live somewhere else-- +a long way from Lorrimer; and I might never have seen him again." + +"And do you mean to say you decided to endure a life that had become +hateful to you in every way, simply for the sake of seeing this +gentleman occasionally?" + +"Yes. Ah! you do not know how good he is, nor how he raises me! I never +knew the sort of creature I was until he told me. He said once, when we +quarrelled, that I was fanciful, sentimental, lackadaisical, +hysterical, and in an unhealthy state of mind, and yet--" + +I made a gesture of impatience, and she stopped. + +"But, Ideala," I asked her, after a little pause, "have you never felt +that what you are doing is wrong?" + +"I cannot say that exactly," she answered. "I knew that certain social +conventions forbade the thing--at least I began to acknowledge this to +myself after a time. At first, you know, I thought of nothing. I was +wholly absorbed in my desire to see him; that excluded every other +consideration. Do you know what it is to be sure that a thing is wrong, +and yet not to be able to feel it so--to have your reason acknowledge +what your conscience does not confirm?" + +I made no answer, and we were silent for a little; then she spoke +again: + +"One day when I was in Japan," she said, "I was living up in the hills +at Hakone, a village on a lake three thousand feet above the level of +the sea. The Mayor of the village was entertaining me, and whenever I +went out he sent his son and several of his retainers as an escort, +that I might not be subject to annoyance or insult from strangers. One +day I was crossing the hills by a mountain-path there is between Hakone +and Mianoshita, and after I passed Ashynoyou, where the sulphur springs +are, I found myself in a dense fog. I could not see anything distinctly +three yards in front of me. Kashywaya and the other men never walked +with me; they used to hover about me, leaving me to all intents and +purposes alone if I preferred it. The Japanese are very delicate in +some things; it was weeks before I knew that I had a guard of honour at +all. On that particular day I lost sight of them altogether, but I +could hear them calling to each other through the fog; and I sat down +feeling very wretched and lonely. I thought how all the beauty of life +had been spoiled for me; how, past, present, and to come, it was all a +blank; and I wished in my heart that I might die, and know no more. +And, do you know, just at that moment the fog beneath me parted, and I +saw the sea, sapphire blue and dotted with boats, and the sand a streak +of silver, and the green earth, and a low horizon of shining clouds, +and over all the sun! Dear Lord in heaven! how glad a sight it was!" +She pressed her handkerchief to her eyes. "And I was wandering," she +continued, "in some such mental mist, lost and despairing, when +Lorrimer came into my life, and changed everything for me in a moment, +like the sun. Would you have me believe that he was sent to me then +only for an evil purpose? That the good God, in whom I scarcely +believed until in His mercy He allowed me to feel love for one of His +creatures, and to realise through it the Divine love of which it is +surely the foreshadowing--would you have me believe myself degraded by +love so sent? Would you have me turn from it and call it sin, when I +feel that God Himself is the giver?" + +I was silent, not knowing how to answer her. + +Presently I asked: "But why not have a legal separation, a divorce, +from your husband now?" + +"I cannot," she answered, sadly. "At one time I had written proof of +his turpitude, but I could not make up my mind to use it then, and I +destroyed it eventually; so that now my word would be the only evidence +against him, and that would not do, I suppose, although you all know, +better than I do, I fancy, what his life has been." + +Other people had by this time come into the conservatory, and we were +therefore obliged to change the subject. + +In the days that followed every one seemed to become conscious of some +impending trouble. We were all depressed, and one by one our party left +us, until at last only Ideala remained, for we had not the heart to ask +other guests, even if it had been expedient, and, under the +circumstances, Claudia did not consider it so. + +Ideala spent much of her time in writing to Lorrimer. Some of these +letters were never sent. I fancy she wrote exactly as she felt, and +often feared when she had done so that she had been too frank. How +these two ever came to such an understanding I am at a loss to imagine, +and I have searched in vain for any clue to the mystery. Only one thing +is plain to me, that when at last Ideala understood her feeling for +Lorrimer, she cherished it. After she found that her husband had broken +every tie, disregarded every obligation, legal and moral, that bound +her to him, she seems to have considered herself free. But I feel quite +sure she had not acknowledged this, even to herself, when she returned +to Lorrimer, and that simply because she had not contemplated the +possibility of being asked to take any decided step. When the time +came, however, she apparently never questioned her right to act on this +fancied freedom. The circumstances under which they had met were +probably responsible for a great deal. The whole of their acquaintance +had had something unusual about it, which would naturally predispose +their minds to further unaccustomed issues when any question of right +or expediency arose. The restrictions which men and women have seen fit +to place upon their intercourse with each other are the outcome of ages +of experience, and they who disregard them bring upon themselves the +troubles against which those same restrictions, irksome at times as +they must be, are the only adequate defence. + +One letter I have here shows something of the strength and tenderness +of Ideala's devotion; and I venture to think that, even under the +circumstances, it must be good for a man to have been loved once in +his life like that. The letter begins abruptly--"Oh, the delight of +being able to write to you," she says, "without fear and without +constraint. If it were possible to step from the dreary oppression of +the northern midnight into the full blaze of the southern noon, the +transition would not be greater than is the sense of rest and relief +that has come to me after the weary days which are over. Do you know, +I never believed that any one person could be so much to another as +you are to me; that any one could be so happy as I am! I think I am +_too_ happy. But, dear, I want you! I want you always; but most of all +when anything good or beautiful moves me; I feel nearer to you then, +and I know you would understand. Every good thought, every worthy +aspiration, everything that is best in me, and every possibility of +better things, seems due to your influence, and makes me crave for +your presence. You have been the one thing wanting to me my whole life +long. I believe that no soul is perfect alone, and that each of us +must have a partner-soul _somewhere,_ kept apart from us--by false +marriages, perhaps, or distance, or death, but still to be ours, if +not in this state, then in some other, when both are perfect enough to +make the union possible. We are not all fit for that love which is the +beginning of heaven, and can have no end. [Transcriber's Note: Lengthy +footnote relocated to chapter end.] Does this seem fanciful to you? It +would comfort me if we were ever separated. _If_--I cannot tell you +how it makes my heart sink just to look at that word, although I know +it does not suggest anything that is possible in our case. What power +would take you from me now, when there is no one else in the whole +wide world for me _but_ you? and always you! and only you! You, with +your ready sympathy and perfect refinement; your wit, your rapid +changes, your ideality, your kindness, your cruelty, and the terrible +discontent which makes you untrue to yourself. You are my world. But +unless I can be to you what you are to me, you will always be one of +the lonely ones. Tell me, again, that my absence makes a blank in your +life. You did not write the word, you only left a space, and do you +know how I filled it at first? 'It was such a _relief_ when you left +off coming,' I read, and I raged at you. + +"I have heard it said lately that you are fickle, but these people do +not understand you. You are true to your ideal, but the women you have +hitherto known were only so many imperfect realisations of it, and so +you went from one to the other, always searching, but never satisfied. +And you have it in you to be so much happier or so much more miserable +than other men--I should have trembled for you if your hopes had never +been realised. + +"But what _would_ satisfy you? I often long to be that mummy you +have in the Great Hospital, the one with the short nose and thick lips. +When you looked at me spirit and flesh would grow one with delight, and +I should come to life, and grow round and soft and warm again, and talk +to you of Thebes, and you would be enchanted with me--you could not +help it then. I should be so old, so very old, and genuine! + +"Dear, how I laugh at my fears now, or rather, how I bless them. If I +had never known the horror of doubt, how could I have known what +certainty is? And I did doubt you; I dare acknowledge it now. I wonder +if you can understand what the shame of that doubt was? When I thought +your absence and your silence were intentional slights, I knew how they +felt when 'they called on the rocks to cover them, and I wished--oh, +_how_ I wished!--that a thousand years had passed, and my spirit +could be at the place where we met, and see the pillars broken, and. +the ivy climbing over the ruins, and the lizards at home amongst them, +and the shameless sunlight making bare the spot where we stood. + +"It was as if I had been punished for some awful unknown sin, and when +I seemed to be dying, and I dared not write to you, and all hope of +ever knowing the truth had departed, I used to exclaim in my misery: +'Verily, Lord, if Thy servant sinned she hath suffered! for the anguish +of death has been doubled, and the punishment of the lost has begun +while yet the tortured mind can make its lament and moan with the +tortured body!' + +"But all that bitter past only enhances the present. + +"I wonder where you will be to-day. I believe you are always in that +room of yours. You only leave it to walk to the station with me, after +which you go back to it, and work there till it is dark; and then you +rest, waiting for the daylight, and when it comes you go to work again. +I cannot fancy you anywhere else. I should not like to realise that you +have an existence of which I can know nothing, a life through which I +cannot follow you, even in imagination. + +"But sometimes you come to me, and then how glad I am! You come to me +and kiss me, and it is night and I am dreaming, and not ashamed. + +"Yes, the days do drag on slowly, for after all I am never quite happy, +never at peace even, never for a moment, except when I am with you. I +am sorry I feel so, for it seems ungrateful in the face of all the +kindness and care that is being lavished on me by my friends. One lady +here has seven children--another instance of the unequal distribution +of the good things of this world. She has lent me one of them to +comfort me because I am jealous. He sleeps in my room, and is a fair- +haired boy, with eyes that remind me of you. Will he also, when he +grows up, have 'the conscience of a saint among his warring senses'? I +hope not, I should think when sense and conscience are equally +delicate, and apt to thrill simultaneously, life must be a burden. +Would such a state of things account for moods that vary perpetually, I +wonder?" + +Here she breaks off, and I think these last reflections account for the +fact that the letter was never sent. + +[Relocated Footnote: This passage might have been taken from Plato +verbatim, but Ideala had not read Plato at the time it was written. +The inborn passionate longing of the human soul for perfect +companionship doubtless accounts for the coincidence, which also shows +how deep-rooted and widely spread the hope of eventually obtaining +the desired companionship is. Some will maintain that the desire for +such a possibility has created the belief in it, but others claim to +have met their partner-souls, and to have become united by a bond so +perfect that even distance cannot sever it, there being some +inexplicable means of communication between the two, which enables +each to know what befalls the other wherever they may be. The idea +might probably be traced back to that account of Adam which describes +him as androgynous, or a higher union of man and woman--a union of all +the attributes of either, which, to punish Adam for a grievous fault, +was subsequently sundered into the contrast between man and woman, +leaving each lonely, imperfect, and vainly longing for the other.] + + + + +CHAPTER XXVI. + + +Ideala lingered unwillingly, but the reason of her reluctance to go was +not far to seek. Now that Lorrimer knew she loved him she was ashamed +to go back. It would have been bad enough had he been able to come to +her; but going to him was like reversing the natural order of things +and unsexing herself. I suppose, however, that she forgot her shyness +in her desire to be with him as the time went on, and the effort it +cost her to conquer her fear and go to him was not so dreadful as the +blank she would have been obliged to face had she stayed away. At all +events, she fixed a day at last, and one morning she announced to us, +sadly enough, that on the morrow she must say farewell. She made the +announcement just after breakfast, and Claudia rose and left the room +without a word. My sister had never been able to speak to Ideala on the +subject, but she did not cease to urge me to expostulate, and she had +suggested many arguments which had affected Ideala, and made her +unhappy, but without altering her determination. + +I could not find a word to say to her that morning, and during the slow +hours of the long day that dragged itself on so wearily for all of us, +nothing new occurred to me. + +"It will be a relief when it is over," I said to my sister. + +"Yes," she answered; "it is worse than death." + +In the evening she came to my study and said: "Ideala is alone in the +south drawing-room. I wish you would go to her, and make a last effort +to dissuade her." + +I consented, hopelessly, and went. + +Ideala was standing in a window, looking out listlessly. She was very +pale, and I could see that she had been weeping. I sat down near the +fire; and presently she came and sat on the floor beside me, and laid +her head against my knee. In all the years of my love for her she had +never been so close to me before, and I was glad to let her rest a +long, long time like that. + +"Were you happy while you were with Lorrimer, Ideala?" I asked at last. + +She did not answer at once, and when she did, it was almost in a +whisper. + +"No, never quite happy till this last time," she said; "never entirely +at ease, even. It was when I left him, when I was alone and could think +of him, that the joy came." + +"There was nothing real in your pleasure, then," I went on; "it was +purely imaginary--due to your trick of idealising everything and +everybody, you care for?" + +"I do not know," she said. + +"Do you think it was the same with him?" I asked again--"I mean all +along. Did it always make him happy to have you there?" + +"I cannot tell," she said. "Yes, I think at times he was glad. But a +word would alter his mood, and then he would grow sad and silent." + +"Even on the last occasion?" + +"No, not on the last occasion. He was happy then"--and she smiled at +the recollection--"ah, so happy! It was like new life to him, he was so +young, so fresh, so glad--like a boy." + +"But before, when his moods varied so often, did it ever seem to you +that he was troubled and dissatisfied with himself? that the intimacy +had begun on his part under a misapprehension, and that when he began +to know you better, he had tried to end it, and save you, by not seeing +you on that occasion?" + +"Ah, _that occasion_ again!" she ejaculated. "I forgot to tell you, +but I asked for an explanation just to satisfy you. Here it is!" And +she took a note from her pocket-book and handed it to me. It was one +which she had written to him. + +"I do not understand," I said. + +"Read it," she answered, "and you will find I asked him to expect me +on _Monday_, the 26th. It was a clerical error. Tuesday was the 26th, +and I went on Tuesday. He waited for me the whole long Monday, and +that night he had to set off suddenly for the Continent on business +connected with the Great Hospital. He went, wondering what had +detained me, and expecting an explanation. When he returned he +inquired, but nobody could tell him whether I had been or not. So he +waited, and waited, as I did, expecting to hear, and as much perplexed +and distressed as I was, and as proud, for he never thought of writing +to me--nor did he think of looking at my note again until I wrote the +other day, and then he discovered the mistake. Now, are you +satisfied?" + +"About that--yes," I answered, reluctantly. It was no relief to end him +blameless. + +"But what did he mean when he talked of conscience and scruples?" + +"He used to laugh at my 'troublesome conscience,' as he called it," she +answered, evasively. + +"Would he have known you had a conscience, do you think, if he had had +none himself?" I asked her. "Did he ever say anything that showed he +was yielding to a strong inclination which he could not justify and +would not conquer?" + +"Oh, no!" she said; then added, undecidedly: "at least--he did say +once: 'Of course, in the opinion of the world the thing cannot be +justified,' but then he went on as if it had slipped from him +involuntarily: 'Bah! I am only doing as other men do.'" + +"Which shows he was not exactly satisfied to be only as other men are." + +"That is what I have often told you," she said; "his ideal of life, +both for himself and others, is the highest possible, and he suffers +when he falls below it, or even belies himself with a word." + +"Passion never lasts, and love does not lead to evil," I continued, +meditatively; "if you love him, Ideala, how will you bear to feel that +he has degraded himself by degrading you?" + +"Oh! do not speak like that!" she exclaimed. "There is no degradation +in love. It is sin that degrades, and sin is something that corrupts +our minds, is it not? and makes us unfit for any good work, and +unwilling to undertake any. This is very different." + +"Ideala, do you remember telling me once that you had a strange feeling +about yourself? that you thought you would be made to go down into some +great depth of sin and suffering, in order to learn what it is you have +to teach?" + +"Ah, yes!" she answered, "but I have not gone down. I must obey my own +conscience, not yours; and my conscience tells me the thing is right +which you hold to be wrong. I am quite willing to believe it would be +wrong for you, but for me it is clearly right. You said the other day +he had lowered me. What a fiction that is! In what have I changed for +the worse? Do I fail in any duty of life since I knew him in which I +previously succeeded? Oh, no! he has not lowered me! Love like this +rounds a life and brings it to perfection; it could not wreck it." + +"But, Ideala, you are going to fail in a duty; you are going to fail in +the most important duty of your life--your duty to society." + +"I owe nothing to society," she answered, obstinately. + +"I have always admired you," I pursued, "for not letting your own +experience warp your judgment. Oh, what a falling-off is here! I have +heard you wish to be something more than an independent unit of which +no account need be taken. How can we, any of us, say we owe nothing to +society, when we owe every pleasure in life to it? Do we owe nothing to +those who have gone before, and whom we have to thank for the music, +the painting, the poetry, and all the arts which would leave a big +blank in _your_ life, Ideala, if they ceased to exist? You would +have been a mere savage now, without refinement enough to appreciate +that rose at your waistbelt, but for the labour and self-denial which +the hundreds and thousands who lived, and loved, and suffered in order +to make you what you are have bestowed on you, and on all of us. You +would not say, if you thought a moment, that society had done nothing +for you; and no one can honestly think that they owe it nothing in +return. It seems to me that a rigid observance of the laws which hold +society together, and make life possible for all of us, and pleasant +for some, is the least we can do; and do you know, Ideala, when a woman +ever thinks of doing what you propose to do, she has already gone down +to a low depth--of ingratitude, if of nothing else." + +"I do not propose to do anything that will injure any one," she +answered, coldly. "I am free, am I not, to dispose of myself as I like +--to give myself to whomsoever I please?" + +"We are none of us free in that sense of the word," I replied. + + "All are but parts of one stupendous whole + Whose body Nature is, and God the soul. + +You are, as I know you have desired to be, part of a system, and an +important part. All the toil and trouble of the world, and all the work +which began with the life of man, is directed towards one great end-- +the doing away with sin and suffering, and the establishment of purity +and peace. And this work seems almost hopeless, not because the +multitude do not approve of it, but because individuals are cowardly, +and will not do their share of it. Every act of yours has a meaning; it +either helps or hinders, what is being done to further this, the object +of life. Lately, Ideala, you have been talking wildly, without for a +moment considering the harm you may be doing. You have expressed +opinions which are calculated to make people discontented with things +as they are. You rob them of the content which has made them +comfortable heretofore, and yet you offer them nothing better in return +for it. You would have society turned topsy-turvy, and all for what? +Why, simply to make a wrong thing right for yourself! If your example +were followed by all the unhappy people in the world, how would it end, +do you think? There must be moral laws, and it is inevitable that they +should press hardly on individuals occasionally; but it is clearly the +duty of individuals to sacrifice themselves for the good of the +community at large." + +"I do not understand your morality," she said. "Do you think that, +although I love another man, it would be right for me to go back and +live with my husband?" + +"Right, but, under the circumstances, not advisable. And, at any rate, +nothing would make it moral for you to go to that other man." + +"Oh! do not fill my mind with doubt," she pleaded, piteously. "I love +him. Let me go." + +I did not answer her, and after a while she began again, passionately-- +"We _are_ free agents in these things. Individuals _must_ know what is +best for themselves. If I devote my life to him, as I propose, who +would be hurt by it? Should I be less pure-minded, and would he be +less upright in all his dealings? When things can be legally right +though morally wrong, can they not also be morally right though +legally wrong?" + +"I have already tried to show you, Ideala," I answered, preparing to go +over the old ground again, patiently, "that we none of us stand alone, +that we are all part of this great system, and that, in cases like +yours, individuals must suffer, must even be sacrificed, for the good +of the rest. When the sacrifice is voluntary, we call it noble." + +"If I go to him I shall have sacrificed a good deal." + +"You will have sacrificed others, not yourself. He is all the world to +you, Ideala; the loss would be nothing to the gain"--she hid her face +in her hands--"and what is required of you is self-sacrifice. And +surely it would be happier in the end for you to give him up now, than +to live to feel yourself a millstone round his neck." + +"I do not understand you," she said, looking up quickly. + +"The world, you see, will know nothing of the fine sentiments which +made you determine to take this step," I said. "You will be spoken of +contemptuously, and he will be 'the fellow who is living with another +man's wife, don't you know,' and that will injure him in many ways." + +"Do you think so?" she asked, anxiously. + +"I know it," I replied. "And look at it from that or any other point of +view you like, and you must see you are making a mistake. A woman in +your position sets an example whether she will or not, and even if all +your best reasons for this step were made public, you would do harm by +it, for there are only too many people apt enough as it is at finding +specious excuses for their own shortcomings, who would be glad, if they +dared, to do likewise. And you would not gain your object after all. +You would neither be happy yourself, nor make Lorrimer happy. People +like you are sensitive about their honour--it is the sign of their +superiority; and the indulgence of love, even at the moment, and under +the most favourable circumstances of youth, beauty, and intellectual +equality, does not satisfy such natures, if the indulgence be not +regulated and sanctified by all that men and women have devised to make +their relations moral." + +This was my last argument, and when I had done she sat there for a long +time silent, resting her head against my knee, and scarcely breathing. +She was fighting it out with herself, and I thought it best to leave +her alone--besides, I had already said all there was to say; repetition +would only have irritated her, and there was nothing now for it but to +wait. + +Outside, I could hear the dreary drip of raindrops; somewhere in the +room a clock ticked obtrusively; but it was long past midnight, and the +house was still. I thought that only the night and silence watched with +me, and waited upon the suffering of this one poor soul. + +At last she moved, uttering a low moan, like one in pain. + +"I do see it," she said, almost in a whisper; "and I am willing to give +him up." + +"God in His mercy help you!" I prayed. + +"And forgive me," she answered, humbly. + +She was quite exhausted, and passively submitted when I led her to her +room. I closed the shutters to keep out the cheerless dawn, and made +the fire burn up, and lit the lamps. She sat silently watching me, and +did not seem to think it odd that I should do this for her. She clung +to me then as a little child clings to its father, and, like a father, +I ministered to her, reverently, then left her, as I hoped, to sleep. + +My sister opened her door as I passed. She was dressed, and had been +watching, too, the whole night long. + +"Well?" she asked. + +I kissed her. "It is well," I answered; and she burst into tears. + +"Can I go to her now?" she said. + +"Yes, go." I went to Claudia's room, and waited. After a long time she +returned. + +"She is quiet at last," she told me, sorrowfully. + +And so the long night ended. + + + + +CHAPTER XXVII. + + +Ideala had returned to us quite under the impression that if she took +the step she proposed we should think it right to cast her off; and +that little tentative: "Must I give you up?" was the only protest she +had offered. But such was not our intention. Far from it! We do not +forsake our friends in their bodily ailments, and we are poor, pitiful, +egotistical creatures indeed when we desert them for their mental and +moral maladies, leaving them to struggle against them and fight them +out or succumb to them alone, according to their strength and +circumstances. The world will forsake them fast enough, and that is +sufficient punishment--if they deserve punishment. Of course, Ideala +could never have come back to us as an honoured guest again, after +taking such a step, but she would have continued to fill the same place +in our affections, if not in our esteem. + +"And you will drive everybody else away, and keep the house empty all +the year round, in order to be able to receive her--_and_ Mr. Lorrimer-- +whenever they choose to visit us," Claudia had declared when we +discussed the subject. + +That was not quite what I intended; but I had made Ideala understand +that nothing she could do would affect her intercourse with us. I told +her so at once, because I would not have her alter her determination +for any consideration but the highest. She might at the last have +hesitated to separate herself from us for ever; but I felt sure if that +were the case, and it was not a better motive entirely which deterred +her, she would not be satisfied eventually; and I know now that I was +right. + +Ideala wrote to Lorrimer, and when she had finished her letter I found +that she intended to impose a terrible task upon me. + +"Until you know him yourself you will always misjudge him," she said. +"I want you to take him my letter, and make his acquaintance." + +I hesitated. + +"It is the least you can do," she pleaded. "I shall be easier in my +mind if you will. It will be better for him to see you, and hear all +the things I cannot tell him in my letter; and--and--if I must not see +him myself it will be a comfort to see somebody who has. Do go. I shall +be pained if you refuse." + +This decided me, and I went at once. + +It was a long journey, the same that Ideala herself had taken under +such very different circumstances so short a time before. I thought of +her going in doubt and uncertainty, her own feelings colouring the +aspect of all she saw on the way; and returning in the first warm glow +of her great and unexpected joy--her new-found happiness which was +destined, alas! to be so short-lived. Miserable fate which robbed her +of all that would have made her life worth having--a husband on whom +she could rely; her child; and now the man upon whom she had been +prepared to lavish the long pent-up passion, the concentrated devotion +of her great and noble nature! Poor starved heart, crushed back upon +itself, suffering silently, suffering always, but never hardening--on +the contrary, growing tenderer for others the more it had to endure +itself! Would it always be so? Was there no peace on earth for Ideala? +No one who could be all her own? I felt responsible for this last hard +blow; had I done well? The rush and rattle of the train shaped itself +into a sort of sub-chorus to my thoughts as we sped through the +pleasant fields: _Was it right? Was it right? Was it right?_ And I +saw Ideala, with soft, sad eyes, pleading--mutely pleading--pleading +always for some pleasure in life, some natural, womanly joy, while +youth and the power to love lasted. By an effort of will I banished the +question. I told myself that my action in the matter had been expedient +from every point of view; but presently + + The rush of the grinding steel! + The thundering crank, and the mighty wheel! + +took me to task again, and the chorus now became: _Expediency right! +Expediency right! Expediency right!_ which, when I banished it, +resolved itself into: _Cold, proud Puritan! Cold, proud Puritan!_ +for the rest of the way. + +But the journey ended at last--though that was little relief with the +task I had before me still unaccomplished. + +A bulbous functionary took my card to Lorrimer when I presented myself +at the Great Hospital next day, and returning presently informed me +that Mr. Lorrimer was disengaged, and would see me at once, if I would +be so good as to come this way. How familiar the whole proceeding +seemed! And how well I knew the place! the soothing silence, the +massive grandeur, the long, dimly lighted gallery to the right, the +door at which the servant stopped and knocked, the man who opened it, +and met my eyes fearlessly, bowing with natural grace, and bidding me +enter--a tall, fair man; self-contained and dignified; cold, pale, and +unimpassioned--so I thought--but my equal in every way: the man who was +"all the world" to Ideala. + +When I saw him I understood. + + * * * * * + +Lorrimer, after dismissing his secretary, was the first to speak. + +"You come to me from Ideala?" he said. "Is there anything wrong? Is she +ill?" + +And I fancied he turned a trifle paler as the fear flashed through his +mind. + +I reassured him. "Physically she is better," I said. + +"But mentally?" he interposed. "You give her no peace." + +I was silent. + +"I know you are no friend of mine," he added. + +"On the contrary," I answered. "I hope I am the best friend you have +just now." + +"I know what that means," he said. "You have tried to dissuade Ideala, +and having failed, you have come here to use your influence with me" + +"No," I answered. "I have not come to discuss the subject. I have +brought you a letter from Ideala at her special request, and I am ready +to take her any reply which you may think fit to send." + +I gave him the letter, and rose to go, but he detained me. + +"Stay till I have read it, if you can spare me the time," he said. "It +is just possible that there is something in it which we _ought_ to +discuss." + +I turned to the mantelpiece, and tried to interest myself in the lovely +things with which it was crowded; but never in my life did my heart +sink so for another; never have I endured such moments of pained +suspense. + +I heard him open the envelope; I heard the paper rustle as he turned +the page; and then there was silence-- + + Full of the city's stilly sound-- + +a moment only, but filled with + + Something which possess'd + The darkness of the world, delight, + Life, anguish, death, immortal love. + Ceasing not, mingled, unrepress'd, + Apart from space, witholding time-- + +a moment's silence, and then a heavy fall. Lorrimer had fainted. + + * * * * * + +I stayed three days at the Great Hospital, three days of the most +delightful converse. At first, Lorrimer had rebelled, not realising +that Ideala's last decision was irrevocable. + +"You have over-persuaded her," he said. + +"No," I answered; "I have convinced her. And I shall convince you, +too." + +He pleaded for her pathetically, not for himself at all. "She has had +so little joy!" he said; using the very words that had occurred to me. +"And I wanted to silence her. I wanted to save her from her fate. For +she is _une des cinq ou six creatures humaines qui naissent, dans +tout un siècle, pour aimer la vérité, et pour mourir sans avoir pu la +faire aimer des autres_. She must suffer terribly if she goes on." + +This was a point upon which we differed. He would have given her the +natural joys of a woman--husband, home, children, friends, and only +such intellectual pursuits which are pleasant. _I_ had always hoped to +see her at work in a wider field. But she was one of those rare women +who are born to fulfil both destinies at once, and worthily, if only +circumstances had made it possible for her to combine the two. + +Before I had been with him many hours, I began to be sensible of that +difference of feeling on certain subjects which would have made their +union a veritable linking of the past to the future--his belief that +nothing can be better than what has been, and that the old institutions +revised are all that the world wants; and her faith in future +developments of all good ideas, and further discoveries never yet +imagined. For one thing, Lorrimer considered famine and war inevitable +scourges of the human race, necessary for the removal of the surplus +population, and useless to contend against, because destined to recur, +so long as there is a human race; but he would have limited +intellectual pursuits for women, because culture is held to prevent the +trouble for which the elder expedients only provided a cure--a point +upon which Ideala did not agree with him at all. "Nothing is more +disastrous to social prosperity," she held, "or more likely to add to +the criminal classes, than families which are too large for their +parents to bring up, and educate comfortably, in their own station. If +the higher education of women is a natural check on over-production of +that kind, then encourage it thankfully as a merciful dispensation of +providence for the prevention of much misery. I can see no reason in +nature or ethics for a teeming population only brought into existence +to be removed by famine and war. Why, this old green ball of an earth +would roll on just as merrily without any of us." + + * * * * * + +Lorrimer wrote to her at last. He had been obliged to acquiesce; and I +took Ideala his letter; but she, womanlike, though nothing would have +altered her decision, was not at first satisfied with his compliance. +It seemed to her too ready; and that made her doubt if she might not +have been to blame after all. They wrote to each other once again, and +when she received his last letter, she spoke to me about it. + +"He must have seen it as you do from the first, for he has said no word +to alter my determination--rather the contrary," she told me. "We are +not to meet again, nor to correspond; and doubtless it is a relief to +him to have the matter settled in this way; but one thing puzzles me. +In my last letter I bade him good-bye, adding 'since that is what you +wish,' and he has replied: 'I never said I wished it; will you remember +that?' I do remember it, and it comforts me; but why?" + +I knew that Lorrimer had said little in order to make her sacrifice as +easy for her as possible; and I was silent, too, for the same reason. I +thought if she felt herself to blame, her pride would come to the +rescue, and make her loss appear rather inevitable than voluntary. For, +say what we will, we reconcile ourselves to the inevitable sooner than +to those sorrows which we might have saved ourselves had we deemed it +right. + +"You insinuated once that it was all my fault," she said. "Perhaps it +was--if fault there be. But if I tempted him, it must have been +generosity that made him yield to the temptation. He pitied me, and was +ready to make me happy by devoting himself to me, since that was what I +seemed to require. And I agree with you now. I don't think we should, +either of us, have found any real happiness in that way. But, oh, how I +long for him! for his friendship! for his companionship! for his love! +It is hard, hard, hard, if he does not miss me as I do him." + +Then I told her: "But he does. And he did not yield to your decision +until I had convinced him that he could never make you happy in such a +position." + +A great sigh of relief escaped her. And then I saw that I ought to have +been frank with her from the first. It strengthened her to know that +they still had something left to them in common, though that something +was only their grief. + +I tried to comfort her by speaking of the many ways in which she might +still find happiness. She listened patiently until I was obliged to +stop for want of words, then she said: + +"This is all very well, but you know you are talking nonsense. What is +the use of offering people everything but the one thing needful? What I +say to myself is: + + Well, I have had my turn, have been + Raised from the darkness of the clod, + And for a glorious moment seen + The brightness of the skirts of God. + +And I try to think I have no right to complain, but still I am not +better satisfied than the child that has eaten its cake and wants to +have it too. And I suppose there are many who would call me wretched, +and say that my life, with my sorrowful marriage--which was no +marriage, but a desecration of that holy state, and a sin--and my +hopeless love, is a broken life. Certainly _I_ feel it so. And yet I +don't know. With his nature it seems to me that some wrong-doing was +inevitable. Do you think my suffering might be taken as expiation for +his sins? Do you think we are allowed the happiness of bearing each +other's burdens in that way if we will? If I were sure of that I +should not fancy, as I used to, that I had a work to do in the world; +I should know that my work is done, and that now I may rest. Ah, the +blessing of rest!" + +Not long after this a cruel rumour reached us, on good authority, that +Lorrimer was engaged to be married. I confess that my feeling about it +was one of unmitigated contempt for the man, and I trembled for the +effect of the news upon Ideala. She made no sign, however, when first +she heard it. I was surprised, and fear I showed that I was, in spite +of myself, for she spoke about it. + +"You do not understand," she said. "One event in his career is not of +more consequence to me than another, because all are of the greatest +consequence. But I have none of the dog-in-the-manger spirit. I think +there must be something almost maternal in my feeling for him, which is +why it does not change. Were I less constant it would prove that my +affection is of a lower kind, less enduring because less pure. I do not +care to talk about him, but I think of him always. I think of him as I +saw him last with the sun on him. Do you know his hair is like light +gold with the sun on it. Sometimes the memory of him fades a little, +and I cannot recall his features, and then I am tormented; but of +course he comes back to me--so vividly that I have started often when I +looked up and found myself alone, The desire to be with him never +lessens; it burns in me always, and is both a pain and a pleasure. But +my love is too great to be selfish. His wishes for himself are my +wishes, and what is best for him is happiest for me. Am I never +jealous? Jealous! No! Do you not know that he is mine, mine through +every change? Neither time nor distance separates us really. No common +tie can keep him from me. Let him be bound as and to whomsoever he +pleases, his soul is mine, and must return to me sooner or later. I +like him to be happy in any way that is right, for I know that what he +gives to others is not himself. I was not fit for the dear earthly +love, but perhaps, if I keep myself pure, body and soul, for him, I +shall be made worthy at last, and of something better. And my love is +so great it would draw him in spite of himself; but it will not be in +spite of himself, for he will find by-and-by that he cannot live with a +smaller soul, and then he will come to me. Do you not understand what I +want? His soul--purified, strengthened, ennobled--nothing less will +satisfy me; and his mother might ask as much. If I might be made the +means of saving it--" Then after a little pause, she added: "Ah, how +beautiful death is! He will be glad, as I should be now, to meet it-- +and yet more glad! for then the end will have come for him, but I +should have still to wait." + +The rumour of Lorrimer's engagement, however, proved to be false. It +was another Lorrimer, a cousin of his. + +"Lorrimer is restored to your good graces now, I suppose," Claudia +said, in her half sarcastic way, when the mistake was explained. I had +not told her what was in my mind; she had read my thoughts. "You think +that a man whom Ideala has loved should consider himself sacred," she +added. + +I did not answer. But I hold that all men who have felt or inspired +great love will be sanctified by it if there be any true nobility in +their nature; and I knew that one man, whom Ideala did not love, had +been so sanctified by love for her, and held himself sacred always. + +But it was a relief to my mind to know that Lorrimer was not unworthy. +He was a distinguished man then, and I felt sure that he would become +still more distinguished eventually. He was not one of the many who +come and go, and are forgotten; but one of those destined to live for +ever + + In minds made better by their presence. + +The good in his nature was certainly as far above the average as were +his splendid abilities, and Ideala was right when she declared that she +could answer for his principles. It is impulse that is beyond +calculation, and for his own or another's impulses no wise man will +answer. + +Ideala continued to droop. + +"She will never get over it;" I said to Claudia one day, when we were +alone together. + +"Indeed she will," Claudia answered, confidently. "Out of the depth of +your profound ignorance of natural history do you speak, my brother. I +dread the reaction, though. When it comes she will be overwhelmed with +shame; but it will come. All this is only a phase. She is in a state of +transition now. It is her pride that makes her nurse her grief, and +will not let her give him up. She cannot bear to think that she, of all +women in the world, should have been the victim of anything so trivial +as a passing fancy. Not that it would have been a passing fancy if they +had not been separated; but as it is--why, no fire can burn without +fuel." + +Claudia had evidently changed her mind, and she might be right; but my +own fear was that her first impression would be justified, and that +Ideala would never be able to take a healthy interest in anything +again. + +"I cannot care," was her constant complaint. "Nothing ever touches me +either painfully or pleasurably. Nothing will ever make me glad again." + +She said this one evening when she was sitting alone with Claudia and +myself, and there was a long silence after she had finished speaking, +during which she sat in a dejected attitude, her face buried in her +hands. + +All at once she looked up. + +"It is very strange," she said, "but half that feeling seems to have +gone with the expression of it." + +"I think," Claudia decided, in her common-sense tone, "that you are +nursing this unholy passion, Ideala. You are afraid to give it up lest +there should be nothing left to you. Can you not free your mind from +the trammels of it, and grasp something higher, better, and nobler? Can +you not become mistress of yourself again, and enter on a larger life +which shall be full of love--not the narrow, selfish passion you are +cherishing for one, but that pure and holy love which only the best-- +and such women as you may always be of the best--can feel for all? If +you could but get the fumes of this evil feeling out of yourself, you +would see, as we see, what a common thing it is, and you would +recognise, as we recognise, that your very expression of it is just +such as is given to it by every hysterical man or woman that has ever +experienced it. It is a physical condition caused by contact, and kept +up by your own perverse pleasure in it--nothing more. Every one grows +out of it in time, and any one with proper self-control could conquer +it. You are wavering yourself. You see, now that you have crystallised +the feeling into words, that it is a pitiful thing after all, that the +object is not worth such an expenditure of strength--certainly not +worth the sacrifice of your power to enjoy anything else. Such +devotion to the memory of a dead husband has been thought grand by +some, although for my part I can see nothing grand in any form of self- +indulgence, whether it be the indulgence of sorrow or joy, which +narrows our sphere of usefulness, and causes us to neglect the claims +of those who love us upon our affection, and the claims of our fellow- +creatures generally upon our consideration; but in your case it is +simply----" Claudia paused for want of a word. + +"You would say it is simply degrading," Ideala interposed. "I do not +feel it so. I glory in it." + +"I know," said Claudia, pitilessly. "You all do." And then she got up, +and laid her hand on Ideala's shoulder. "It is time," she said, +earnestly, + + "It is time, O passionate heart and morbid eye, + That old hysterical mock-disease should die." + + + + +CHAPTER XXVIII. + + +I hoped Claudia's plain speaking had made an impression, but for a long +time after that it seemed as if Ideala's interest in life had really +ended, that her sphere of usefulness had contracted, and that she +herself would become like the rest--a doer of unconnected trifles that +have meaning only as the straws have meaning which show which way the +current sets. One cannot help thinking how many of these significant +straws must go down to the ocean and be lost, their little use +unrecognised, their little labour unavailing: because it does so little +good merely to know which way the stream is setting, or what ocean will +receive it at last, if we have no power to profit by the knowledge. At +this time Ideala's own life was not unlike one of these hapless straws, +and it seemed a wretched failure of its early promise, that ending as a +straw on the common stream, when so little might have made her +influence in her own sphere like the river itself, strong and +beautiful. Those who loved her watched her in her trouble with eager +hope that some good might yet come of it; but the hope diminished +always as the days wore on. At first her mind had raged and stormed; +one could see it, though she said so little. Her renunciation was +perfect, but nevertheless she could not reconcile herself to it. She +would not go back, but she could not go on, and so she remained midway +between the past, which was hateful to her, and the future, which was a +blank, raging at both. But gradually the storm subsided; and then came +a period of calm, but whether it was the calm of apathy or the calm of +resignation it was hard to say--and meantime she lost her health again, +and became so fragile that my sister only expressed what I felt when +she was speaking of her one day, and said, sadly: + + "Her cheek is so waxenly thin, + As if deathward 'twere whitening in, + And the cloud of her flesh, still more white, + Were clearing till soul is in sight. + + * * * * * + + Her large eyes too liquidly glister! + Her mouth is too red. + Have they kissed her--- + The angels that bend down to pull + Our buds of the Beautiful, + And whispered their own little Sister?" + +We were anxious to take her abroad, but she would not accompany us. +She talked of going alone, but she did not go, and after a time we +gave up thinking about it. Then one day, quite suddenly, she said: "It +_is_ time this old hysterical mock-disease should die," and she told +us that she had at last decided to travel--somewhere; nothing more +definite than that, for she said she had no fixed plans. We concluded, +however, that she meant to be away some time, for she said something +about perils of the deep, and the uncertainty of life generally, and +she confided her private papers to my care, telling me to look at them +if they would interest me, and make what use of them I pleased; and +that was how those from which I have gathered much of her story came +into my possession. And then she left us, and for a whole year we +heard nothing of her--not one word. Claudia chafed a little, and +complained, as women will when things do not arrange themselves +exactly as they would have ordered them; but I was content to wait, +and, because I expected nothing, the time did not seem so long as +perhaps it might have done. We lived our usual life--part of the year +in one of the eastern counties, and part in London, and then we came +north again. It was winter weather, frosty and clear and bright, and I +was tempted out a great deal, taking long rides, begun before sunset +and ending by moonlight, and generally alone. And always when the +world seemed most beautiful I thought of Ideala, and how she had loved +its beauty-- mountain and plain, flood and field, forest and flower, +the snow and the sunshine, and all the alternations of light and +shade; the wonders of form, and the depth and harmony of colour; the +blue sky by day, with its glories of sunrise and sunset; the dark sky +by night, with its moonlight and starlight--the sky always! that +cloudland to which, when we are wearied by the more monotonous earth, +we had only to lift our eyes and there the scene is changing for +ever--the sky--and the sea: + + In all its vague immensity! + +Would she ever see it again in the old way? When she left us one might +have said of her mental state: + + O dark, dark, dark, amid the blaze of noon-- + Irrecoverably dark, total eclipse + Without all hope of day! + +And where was she now? and was she learning to see again? I own I +sometimes had the presumption to think that if she had stayed with us I +might have helped her. It seemed hardly credible that she should be +able to stand alone at such a time, not to speak of the strength +required to take her out of herself. And was not the loneliness itself +an added misery? She never could bear to be alone, and I always thought +the worst trial of her married life was the mental solitude to which it +had reduced her by making her feel the necessity for reserve, even with +her best friends. Of course she had chosen to go alone; it was quite +her own doing; but I could not help thinking, uneasily at times, that +she would not have gone at all if she had not noticed how anxious we +were about her, and fancied she could relieve us of our trouble by +relieving us of her presence. That would have been so like Ideala! And +then my thoughts would wander off, recalling her numberless little +deeds of love, her perfect selflessness, and all the depth and beauty +of her great and tender nature, as we do recall such things of one who +has gone and will nevermore return, as in the old days, to make us +glad. There was the day I had seen her from the club window stoop to +pick up a little ragged barefooted child that was crying in the street, +and wrap her furs about it and carry it off, smiling and happy, in her +arms, with no more thought of the attention such an action would +attract than if she had been alone with her waif in the desert. But +many and many a time, and in many a way, she had made glad hearts by +deeds like that; and now where was she? And was there never a one in +the whole wide world to help her to bear her own sorrow and ease her +pain? + +One evening in particular I had been more than usually tormented by +such thoughts. I had been blaming myself bitterly for having allowed +her to go away alone, and when I rode up to my own door I was conscious +of a half-formed resolution to follow her without delay and bring her +back. + +Claudia was standing on the steps in the crisp, fresh evening air, +apparently watching for me. She put her arms round my neck when I +alighted, and kissed me. + +"Has she written?" I exclaimed, for Claudia was not demonstrative, and +this meant something. + +"She is here," was the answer. + +My heart gave a great leap, but I could not ask if it were well with +her. I could only look at Claudia, and wonder if it were the moonlight +that made the expression of her face so singularly content and sweet. I +went into the lighted house, and being somewhat dazed and altogether +too eager to see her at once, I dressed for the evening, leisurely, and +then I went to find her. There was a change in the house already. It +was lighted from top to bottom as befits a time of rejoicing, and our +other guests, whom I passed in my search, seemed gayer--or I fancied +so. She was not among them, but I took the liberty of going to her +rooms and knocked at the sitting-room door, and entered. She rose to +receive me, stretching out her hands, and my first impression was that +she had grown; afterwards I understood that it was a change in the +fashion of her dress that made it appear so. She wore a long robe, +exquisitely draped, which was loose, but yet clung to her, and fell in +rich folds about her with a grace that satisfied. I cannot describe the +fashion of this robe, or the form, but I have seen one like it +somewhere--it must have been in a picture, or on a statue of a grand +heroic woman or a saint; and it suggested something womanly and strong, +but not to be defined. + +It was Ideala, herself--not as she had been, but as I always hoped she +would be, and felt she might. She showed the change in every gesture, +but most of all in her clear and steady eyes, which made you feel she +had a purpose now, and a future yet before her. She looked as women +look when they know themselves entrusted with a work, and have the +courage and resolution to be true and worthy of their trust. She was +very gracious, but somehow in the first moment of our meeting I felt +abashed--abashed before this woman who had gone down to the verge of +dishonour, but whose goodness, with the vitality of all goodness, had +raised her again above the best; whose trouble had been to her, because +of this goodness, as is a painful operation which must be gone through +if the patient would ever be strong. + +I fancy she thought me cold because my great respect made me shy, and I +hesitated to show her all the joy I felt. + +"Won't you kiss me once after my long, long voyage?" she said, holding +up her face like a child to be kissed. And it made me inexpressibly +glad, to perceive that, while gaining in dignity and purpose, her +character had lost none of the childlike faith and affection which had +been one of the greatest charms of the old Ideala. I could not help +examining her curiously, looking for traces of a conflict, for those +lines of suffering which are generally left by fierce mental troubles +like scars after a battle, showing that the fight has been no child's +play, but a struggle for life or death. Such a conflict there must have +been, but all trace of it was swept away by the wonderful peace that +had succeeded it. Ideala looked younger, certainly, but the change +showed itself most in her perfect serenity, and in the steadfast +earnestness of her wonderful eyes. + +But I had no time to talk to her, for Claudia, in diamonds and velvet +and lace--her donning of which is her one way of expressing a +satisfaction too deep for words--blazed in upon us. If it had occurred +so her, she would certainly have had the bells of the parish rung-- +provided my authority as lay Rector could have accomplished such an +extravagance. She took us away with her now to join our other guests, +and when dinner was announced I offered Ideala my arm. She was silent +as we went, but looked about her with a grave little smile on her lips, +renewing her acquaintance with familiar objects, and noting every +change. And so busy was she with her own reflections, so thoroughly +absorbed, that, when we were seated at table, she put her serviette +beside her plate and her bread on her lap mechanically, and took up her +knife and fork to eat her soup. She seemed puzzled for a moment when +she found that the implements did not answer, and then she laughed! +Such a fresh, girlish laugh! It did one's heart good to hear her! Yes, +verily! Ideala was herself again, absent-mindedness and all. + +And before dinner was over a wonderful thing had happened. For whereas +we had hitherto been the most commonplace and prosaic party imaginable, +getting along smoothly, taking no particular interest in each other, or +in anything else, and only remarkable for a degree of dulness which +would have astonished us by its bulk could it have been weighed and +measured--to-night, for no apparent reason, we suddenly woke up and +astounded ourselves by more originality than we had been accustomed to +believe was left in the world altogether--while something put into our +conversation just the right amount of polite friction to act as a +counter-irritant, so that, when we left the table, each felt that he +had been at his best--had been brilliant, in fact, and shone with +lustre enough to make any man happy. + +Once in a London theatre I saw an actress walk across the stage. She +did not utter a word, she never looked at the audience, she was +apparently unconscious of everything but what she had in her own mind; +yet before she was half across the stage the people rose to their feet +with a roar. Ideala's coming amongst us had produced some such +startling effect; but _her_ power was altogether occult. The audience +knew what the actress meant, but we did not understand Ideala, and yet +we applauded by laying our best before her, and acknowledged the charm +of her presence in every word. She spoke very little, however. Indeed, +I remember nothing she said until we went to the drawing-room. On the +way thither Claudia had picked up a crumpled paper, and, glancing at +it, had exclaimed--"Why, Ideala, here are some of your verses! Do you +still write verses?" + +It was curious that we all spoke as if she had been away for years. + +"Yes," she answered, tranquilly; and Claudia coolly proceeded to read +the verses aloud, a difficult task, as they were scribbled in pencil on +half a sheet of note-paper, and were scarcely decipherable. Ideala, +meanwhile, listened, with calm eyes fixed on vacancy, like one trying +to be polite, but finding it hard for lack of interest. + + "By Arno, when the tale was o'er, + At sunset, as in days of yore, + I wandered forth and dreamed. + The sky above, the town below. + The solemn river's silent flow, + The ancient story-haunts I know, + In varied colours gleamed. + + By Arno calm my steps I stayed, + Just where the river's bank displayed + A tangled growth of weeds; + Tall houses near, and on the right + An arched bridge upreared its height, + And boats drew near, and passed from sight-- + I heard the tramp of steeds. + + I heard, and saw, but heeded not; + My feet were rooted to the spot, + A fancy checked my breath. + 'Twas here that Tito lay, I knew. + His fair face upward to the blue, + His velvet tunic soaking through, + Most beautiful in death. + + But Baldassarre was not there, + 'Twas I that stooped to kiss the hair, + Besprent with ooze and dew. + Ah, God! light gold the locks caressed-- + I saw no Greek in velvet dressed-- + But wildly to my bosom pressed-- + Not Tito, love, but you! + + The massive, godlike head and throat + Belonged not to those days remote, + The fine grey eye--the limb; + It was the soul I know so well, + So full of earth, and heaven, and hell, + That came from out that time to dwell + In you and make you him. + + And I, the victim of your smiles, + And I, the victim of your wiles, + My vengeance shall prevail. + The river Time shall float you nigh, + And earth and hell your soul shall fly. + And only heaven remain when I + The deed triumphant hail!" + +It surprised me to find that Claudia could read those verses to the +end, their import--to me, at least--was so obvious. But Ideala +continued unmoved; and when the little buzz of friendly criticism had +subsided, she remarked, with unimpassioned directness: + +"I am quite sure that all my verses are rubbish; but nevertheless they +delight me. I should feel dumb without the power to make verses; it is +a means of expression that satisfies when nothing else will. I always +carry my last about in my pocket. I know them by heart, of course, but +still it is a pleasure to read them; and so it continues until I write +some more; and then I immediately perceive that the old ones are bad, +and I destroy them--when I remember. Those were condemned ages ago, so +please oblige me, Claudia, by putting them into the fire." + +Claudia was about to obey, but I interposed. I had a fancy for keeping +those verses. They are rubbishy if you will; but the sentiment which +struggles to find expression in them is far from despicable. + +No one smoked that evening; no one played billiards; no one cared for +music; we just sat round the fire in a circle, and talked. + +"And where have you come from, Ideala?" was the first question. + +"From China," she answered. + +There was a general exclamation. "I have been with the missionaries in +China," she added. + +"Oh, isn't it very strange, the life in China?" some one asked. + +"It looks different," she said, "but its feels like our own. To begin +with, one is struck by the strange appearance of the people, and the +quaint humour of their art; but when the first effect wears off, and +you learn to know them, you find after all that theirs is the same +human nature, only in another garb; the familiar old tune, as it were, +with a new set of variations. The like in unlikeness is common enough, +but still the finding of a remarkable similarity in things apparently +unlike continues to surprise us." + +"But, Ideala, you cannot compare the Chinese to ourselves! Think of the +state of degradation the people are in! Every crime is rife among them +--infanticide is quite common!" + +"Yes," said Ideala, as, if it were the most natural thing in the world. +"Yes, doubtless, the lower classes in China kill their children; here, +in certain districts, they insure them," Ideala concluded gravely. + +"But then," said Claudia--"Oh! Ideala, I don't think you can establish +your parallel. We all know the sort of a life a Chinese lady leads." + + +"When the lady is not at the head of her house it is certainly +vacuous," Ideala agreed, "like the lives of our own ladies when they +are not forced to do anything. Why, at Scarborough this year they had +to take to changing their dresses four times a day; so you can imagine +how they languish for want of occupation." + +"Well, at all events, English girls are not sold into a hateful form of +slavery," some one observed contentedly. + +"Are they not?" Ideala rejoined with a flash. "I can assure you that +both women and men, fathers, husbands, and brothers, of the same class +in England, do sell their young girls--and I can prove it." + +"We have the pull over them in the matter of marriage, then. We don't +give our daughters away against their will as they do." + +"That is not a fair way of putting it. A Chinese girl expects to be so +disposed of, and accepts the arrangement as a matter of course. And the +system has its advantages. The girl has no illusions to be shattered, +she expects no new happiness in her married life, so that any that +comes to her is clear gain. As to our daughters' inclinations not being +forced, I suppose they are not, exactly. But have you never been +conscious of the tender pressure that is brought to bear when a +desirable suitor offers? Have you never seen a girl who won't marry +when she is wanted to, wincing from covert stabs, mourning over cold +looks, and made to feel outside everything--suffering a small martyrdom +under the general displeasure of all for whom she cares, her world, +without whose love life is a burden to her; whom she believes to know +best about everything? As Mrs. Bread said about Madame de Cintre: 'She +is a delicate creature, and they make her feel wicked'--and she ends by +thinking any sacrifice light at the moment, if only it wins her back +the affection and esteem of her friends." + +Ideala had been carried away by her earnestness, and now she stopped +abruptly, somewhat disconcerted to find every one listening to her. The +ladies sat with their eyes on the floor, the gentlemen exchanged +glances, but no one spoke for some time. + +At last my sister made a move, and the spell was broken. We separated +for the night, and many were the lady-like whispers that reached my +ears, all ending in: "So like Ideala!" + +But, as Ideala herself remarked on another occasion, "You can't sweep a +room that requires it without raising a dust; the thing is to let the +dust settle again, and then remove it." + + + + +CHAPTER XXIX. + + +Claudia did not see the change in Ideala all at once. She said: "She is +looking her best, and is our own Ideala again--faults and all! How she +talked last night!" + +"Just in the old way," I agreed, "but with a difference; for in the old +days she talked at random, but now I feel sure she has a plan and a +purpose, and all that she says is part of it." + +This suggested new possibilities to Claudia, and when Ideala joined us +presently, she asked, abruptly: "Are you going back to China?" + +Ideala answered deliberately: "I did think of becoming a +missionary--that was why I went out there. But I know all radical +reforms take time, and when I saw what the Chinese women were doing for +themselves, and compared their state with our own, it seemed to me that +there was work in plenty to be done at home, and so I returned. +Certainly, the Chinese women of the day bind their feet. When a girl is +seven or eight years old, her mother binds them for her, and everybody +approves, If the mother did otherwise, the girl herself would be the +first to reproach her when she grew up. It is wonderful how they endure +the torture; but public opinion has sanctioned the custom for +centuries, and made it as much a duty for a Chinese woman to have small +feet as it is for us to wear clothes! And yet they do a wonderful +thing. When they are taught how wrong the practice is, how it cripples +them, and weakens them, and renders them unfit for their work in the +world, they take off their bandages! Think of that! and remember that +they are timid and sensitive in a womanly way to a degree that is +painful. When I learnt that, and when I remembered that my countrywomen +bind every organ in their bodies, though they know the harm of it, and +public opinion is against it, I did not feel that I had time to stay +and teach the heathen. It seemed to me that there was work enough left +yet to do at home." + +"But, Ideala," Claudia protested, "what is the use of drawing degrading +comparisons between ourselves and other nations? You gave great offence +last night." + +"I said more than I intended," she answered; "I always do. It was +Tourgenieff, was it not, who said that the age of talkers must precede +the age of practical reformers? I seem to have been born in the age of +talkers. But I shall not say much more. Last night I did not really +_intend_ to say anything. You led me on. But I _do_ want to make their +hearts burn within them, and if I succeed, then I shall not care about +the offence. An English-woman is nothing if she is not patriotic. She +will not bear the humiliation, if she is made to see that she is +really no better, with all her opportunities, than a much- despised +Chinese. She would not like the contempt the women of that nation feel +for her if she were made to acknowledge the truth--that she deserved +it. And so much depends on our women now. There are plenty of people, +you know, who believe that no nation can get beyond a certain point of +prosperity, and that when it reaches that point it cannot stay there, +but must begin to go down again; and they say that the English nation +has now reached its extreme point. They compare it with Rome in the +days which immediately preceded her decline and fall--when men ceased +to be brave and self-denying, and became idle, luxurious, and +effeminate; and women traded on their weakness, and made light of +their evil deeds. It is a question of the sanctity of marriage now, as +it was in the days of the decline of Rome. De Quincey traces her fall +to the loosening of the marriage tie. He says that few indeed, if any, +were the obligations in a proper sense _moral_ which pressed upon the +Roman. The main fountains of moral obligation had in Rome, by law or +custom, been thoroughly poisoned. Marriage had corrupted itself +through the facility of divorce, and through the consequences of that +facility (viz., levity in choosing, and fickleness in adhering to the +choice), into so exquisite a traffic of selfishness, that it could not +yield so much as a phantom model of sanctity. The relation of husband +and wife had, for all moral impressions, perished amongst the Romans. +And, although it is not quite so bad with ourselves at present, that +is what it is coming to. + +"But there are two sides to every question, and the one which we must +by no means lose sight of just now is not that which shows the respects +in which we resemble the Romans, so much as the one which shows the +respects in which we differ from them. It is therein that our hope +lies. And we differ from them in two important respects. We differ from +them in the matter of experience, and in the use we are disposed to +make of our experiences. We are beginning to know the rocks upon which +they split, and we shall soon be making use of our knowledge to steer +clear of them. But there is another respect in which we differ from all +the older nations, not even excepting the Jewish. I mean morality. We +have the grandest and purest ideal of morality that was ever preached +upon earth, and, if we do but practise it, there is no doubt that the +promise will be fulfilled, and our days as a nation will be prolonged +with rejoicing. + +"The future of the race has come to be a question of morality and a +question of health. Perhaps I should reverse it, and say a question of +health and morality, since the latter is so dependent on the former. We +want grander minds, and we must have grander bodies to contain them. +And it all rests with us women. To us is confided the care of the +little ones--of the young bodies and the young minds yet unformed. Ours +will be the joy of success or the shame of failure, and we should fit +ourselves for the task both morally and physically by the practice of +every virtue, and by every art known to the science and skill of man." + +"Englishwomen could not sit still and know that their lovely homes will +be wrecked eventually, and left desolate: that this country of theirs +will become a wilderness of ruin, such as Egypt is, but rank and +overgrown, its beauty of sweet grass and stately trees, and all its +rich luxuriance of flowers and fruits and foliage plants, only +accentuating the ruin--bearing witness to the neglect. No, our +greatness shall not depart. The decay may have begun, but it shall be +arrested. I am not afraid." + +"But if it is the fate of nations, Ideala----" + +"I propose to conquer fate," said Ideala. "Fate itself is no match for +one woman with a will, let alone for thousands! When horrid war is +threatened, men flock to fight for their country; and they volunteer +for every other arduous duty to be done. Do you think women are less +brave? No. When they realise the truth they will fight for it. They +will fly to arms. They will use the weapons with which Nature has +provided them; love, constancy, self-sacrifice, their intellectual +strength, and will. And so they will save the nation." + +Claudia, the unimaginative, sat silent and perplexed. + +"I would join," she said at last, "if I were quite sure----Oh, Ideala! +it is not a sort of Woman's Rights business, and all that, you are +going in for, is it? A woman can do good in her own sphere only." + +Ideala laughed. "But 'her own sphere' is such a very indefinite +phrase," she observed. "It is nonsense, really. A woman may do anything +which she can do in a womanly way. They say that our brains are +lighter, and that therefore we must not be taught too much. But why not +educate us to the limit of our capacity, and leave it there? Why, if we +are inferior, should there be any fear of making us superior? We must +stop when we cannot go any further, and all this old-womanish cackle on +the subject, the everlasting trying to prove what is already said to be +proved--the looking for the square in space after laying it down as a +law that only the circle exists--is a curious way of showing us how to +control the 'exuberance of our own verbosity.' They say we shall not be +content when we get what we want, and there they are right, for as soon +as our own 'higher education' is secure we shall begin to clamour for +the higher education of men. For the prayer of every woman worth the +name is not 'Make me superior to my husband,' but, 'Lord, make my +husband superior to me!' Is there any more pitiful position in the +world than that of a right-minded woman who is her husband's superior, +and knows it! There is in every educated and refined woman an inborn +desire to submit, and she must do violence to what is best in herself +when she cannot. You know what the history of such marriages is. The +girl has been taught to expect to find a guide, philosopher, and friend +in her husband. He is to be head of the house and lord of her life and +liberty, sole arbiter on all occasions. It is right and convenient to +have him so; the world requires him to fill that position, and the wife +prefers that he should. But the probabilities are about equal that he, +being morally her inferior, will not be fit for it, and that, +therefore, she will find herself in a false position. There will then +be an interval of intense misery for the wife. Her education and +prejudices will make her try to submit at first to what her sense knows +to be impossible; but eventually she is forced out of her unnatural +position by circumstances. To save her house and family she must rebel, +take the reins of government into her own hands, and face life, a +disappointed and lonely woman." + +"Heaven help her!" said Claudia. "One knows that the future of a woman +in that state of mind is only a question of circumstance and +temperament; she may rise, but----" + +Ideala looked up quickly. "But she may fall, you were going to say-- +yes. But you know if she does it is her own fault. She _must_ know +better." + +"She may not be quite mistress of herself at the time--she may be +fascinated; she may be led on!" I interposed, quickly. Claudia seemed +to have forgotten. "But one thing is certain, if she has any real good +in her she will always stop before it is too late." + +"I think," said Claudia, "it would be better, after all, if women were +taught to expect to find themselves their husbands' equals--the +disappointment would not be so great if the husband proved inferior; +but when a woman has been led to look for so much, her imagination is +full of dreams in which he figures as an infallible being; she expects +him to be her refuge, support, and comfort at all times; and when a man +has such a height to fall from in any one's estimation, there can be +but little of him left if he does fall." + +Ideala sighed, and after a short pause she said: "I have been wondering +what makes it possible for a woman to love a man? Not the flesh that +she sees and can touch, though that may attract her as the colour of +the flower attracts. It must be the mind that is in him--the scent of +the flower, as it were. If she finds eventually that his mind is +corrupt, she must shrink from it as from any other form of corruption, +and finally abandon him on account of it, as she would abandon the +flower if she found its odour fetid--indeed, she has already abandoned +her husband when she acknowledges that he is not what she thought him." +She paused a moment, and then went on passionately: "I cannot tell you +what it was--the battling day by day with a power that was irresistible +because it had to put forth no strength to accomplish its work; it +simply was itself, and by being itself it lowered me. I cannot tell you +what it was to feel myself going down, and not to be able to help it, +try as I would; to feel the gradual change in my mind as it grew to +harbour thoughts which were reflections of his thoughts, low thoughts; +and to be filled with ideas, recollections of his conversations, which +had caused me infinite disgust at the time, but remained with me like +the taste of a nauseous drug, until I almost acquired a morbid liking +for them. Oh, if I could save other women from that!" + +Claudia hastily interposed to divert her. "That is a good idea, the +higher education of men," she said. "I don't know whether they have +abandoned hope, or whether they think themselves already perfect, +certain it is the idea of improving themselves does not seem to occur +to them often. And we want good men in society. If the clergy and +priests are good, it is only what is required of them, what everybody +expects, and, therefore, their goodness is accepted as a matter of +course, and is viewed as indifferently as other matters of course. One +good man in society has more effect as an example than ten priests." + +"But you have not told us what you propose to do, Ideala?" I said. + +"I hope it is nothing unwomanly," Claudia interposed, anxiously. + +Ideala looked at her and laughed, and Claudia laughed too, the moment +after she had spoken. The fear of Ideala doing anything unwomanly was +absurd, even to herself. + +"An unwomanly woman is such a dreadful creature," Claudia added, +apologetically. + +"Yes," said Ideala, "but you should pity her. In nine cases out of ten +there is a great wrong or a great grief at the bottom of all her +unwomanliness--perhaps both; and if she shrieks you may be sure that +she is suffering; ease her pain, and she will be quiet enough. The +average woman who is happy in her marriage does not care to know more +of the world than she can learn in her own nursery, nor to see more of +it, as a rule, than she can see from her own garden gate. She is a +great power; but, unfortunately, there is so very little of her! + +"What I want to do is to make women discontented--you have heard of a +noble spirit of discontent? I thought for a long time that everything +had been done that could be done to make the world better; but now I +see that there is still one thing more to be tried. Women have never +yet united to use their influence steadily and all together against +that of which they disapprove. They work too much for themselves, each +trying to make their own life happier. They have yet to learn to take a +wider view of things, and to be shown that the only way to gain their +end is by working for everybody else, with intent to make the whole +world better, which means happier. And in order to accomplish this they +must be taught that they have only to _will_ it--each in her own +family and amongst her own friends; that, after having agreed with the +rest about what they mean to put down, they have only to go home and +use their influence to that end, quietly, consistently, and without +wavering, and the thing will be done. Our influence is like those +strong currents which run beneath the surface of the ocean without +disturbing it, and yet with irresistible force, and at a rate that may +be calculated. It is to help in the direction of that force that I am +going to devote my life. Do not imagine," she went on hurriedly, "that +I think myself fit for such a work. I have had conscientious scruples-- +been sorely troubled about my own unworthiness, which seemed to unfit +me for any good work. But now I see things differently. One may be made +an instrument for good without merit of one's own. So long as we do not +deceive ourselves by thinking we are worthy, and so long as we are +trying our best to become so, I think we may hope; I think we may even +know that we shall eventually----" She stopped and looked at me. + +"Be made worthy," said Claudia, kissing her; "and if it were not so, +Ideala, if everybody had to begin by being as good themselves as they +want others to be, there would be no good workers left in the world at +all." + +At this moment a noisy party burst in upon our grave debate and carried +Ideala off for a ride. We saw them leave the house, and watched them +ride away until the last glimpse of them was veiled by the misty +brightness of the frosty air and the morning sunshine. + +"How well she looks!" Claudia exclaimed; "better than any of them. She +has quite recovered, and is none the worse." + +"I do not know about recovery," I answered, dubiously. "She will never +----" + +But Claudia interrupted hotly: "I know what you are going to say, and I +do wish you would leave off speaking of Ideala in that way. Any one to +hear you would suppose she had committed a sin, and you know quite well +that that was not the case. If she acted without common prudence--and I +will not deny that she did--it was entirely your own fault. She has +never been intimate with any man but yourself, and you have made her +believe that all men are like you. How could she harbour suspicion when +she did not know what to suspect? Of course she saw everything wrongly +and awry. The old life had become impossible to her, and she nearly +made a mistake as to what the new one should be, that was all. I know +she wavered for a moment, but the weakness was more physical than +moral, I think. Her vision was clouded at the time, but as soon as she +was restored to health she saw things clearly enough. She is a great +and good woman, pure-hearted and full of charity. God bless her for all +her tenderness, and for her wonderful power to love. He alone can count +the number who have reason to wish her well." + +"That is true," I answered. "And I was merely going to remark, when you +interrupted me, that she will never think herself 'none the worse'--" + +"I don't see what difference that makes," Claudia again interposed. +"She always did think herself least of the least when she thought of +herself at all, and that was not often. You are dwelling too long on +the past, really, and making too much of it. Men, when they are saints, +are twice as bad as women." + +I pointed out to my sister something confusing in her way of expressing +the fact, but my kindness seemed to exasperate her. + +"You know what I mean quite well," she said tartly. + +"Yes, _I_ know," I rejoined; "but I wanted to help you to make +yourself intelligible to other people." + +Claudia made a gesture of impatience, but laughed, and left me; and I +remained for a long time thinking over all that Ideala had said, and +also thinking of her as she looked at the time; and the subject was so +inspiring that, although my strong point is landscape, in an ambitious +mood I began to paint an allegorical picture of her as a mother nursing +the Infant Goodness of the race. She saw it when it was nearly +finished, but did not recognise herself, and exclaimed; "What a gaunt +creature! and that baby weighs at least twelve stone!" + +The picture was never finished. + + + + +CHAPTER XXX. + + +We soon found that Ideala, having at last put her hand to the plough, +worked with a will, and although she was true to her principle that a +woman's best work is done beneath the surface, I think her own labours +will eventually make themselves felt with a good result in the world. +But the life she has chosen for herself is martyrdom, and her womanly +shrinking from the suffering she would alleviate is never lessened by +use. Yet she does not waver. Other women admire her devotion, and +follow in her footsteps; they do not doubt but that she has chosen the +better part; but I fancy that most men who have seen her draw the +little children about her and forget everything for a moment but her +delight in them, have felt that there must be something wrong in the +world when such a woman misses her vocation, and has to scatter her +love to the four winds of heaven, for want of an object upon which to +concentrate it in all its strength. + +I do not know if her feeling for Lorrimer has changed. My sister +declares in her positive way that of course it has, completely; but my +sister is not always right. Ideala has never mentioned his name since +she returned to us, nor given us any other clue by which we could +judge. Only on one occasion, when some allusion was made to the course +she had intended to pursue in the past, she exclaimed: "Oh, how could +I!" and covered her face with her hands. + +From where I sit just now I can see her walking up the avenue. She is +as straight as an arrow, young-looking, and fresh. Her step is firm and +light and elastic, and she moves with an easy grace only possible when +every muscle is unconstrained. Her dress is a work of art, light in +weight, but rich in colour and texture. + +"What a beautiful woman!" I think involuntarily. I see her daily, and +pay her that tribute every time we meet, for-- + + Age cannot wither her, nor custom stale + Her infinite variety. + +Her intellect and selflessness preserve her youth. She is changed, +certainly. She has arisen, and can return no more to the lower walks, +to the old purposeless life, and desultory ways; but yet she is the +same Ideala, and holds you always expectant--you, who see beneath the +surface. The world will call her cold and self-contained till the end, +and so she is and will be--a snow-crowned volcano, with wonderful force +of fire working within. And she will not stop where she is; there is +something yet to come--some further development--something more-- +something beyond! and she makes you feel that there is. What she says +of other women is true of herself. "Do not stand in their way," she +begs; "do not hinder them--above all, do not stop them. They are +running water; if you check them they stagnate, and you must suffer +yourself from their noisome exhalations. For the moral nature is like +water; it must have movement and air and sunshine to stay corruption +and keep it sweet and wholesome; and its movement is good works; its +air, faith in their efficiency; its sunshine, the evidence of this and +hope." + +Comparative anatomists have proved that the human brain, from its first +appearance as a semi-fluid and shapeless mass, passes in succession +through the several structures that constitute the permanent and +perfect brains of fishes, reptiles, birds, and mammalia; but ultimately +it passes beyond them all, and acquires a marvellous development of its +own. And so it is with the human soul. It must rise through analogous +stages, and add to its own strength and beauty by daily bread of love +and thought, growing to greatness by help of these aliments only, and +reaching ultimately to such perfection as we cannot divine, for the end +is not here. But we might reach it sooner than we do were it not for +our own impatience. Growth is so exquisitely minute, it bursts upon us +an accomplished fact. We know this, and yet we would see the process; +and not seeing it we lose faith, waver, hesitate, stop, and recoil--a +going back _pour mieux sauter_ it is with the choicer spirit; but +we all are deficient in hope, all have our retrograde moments of +despair. We do not look about us enough to see what is being done for +others, how they are progressing, by what strange paths they are led. +We keep our eyes on our own ground too much, and, because we will not +compare cheerfully, we think our own way the roughest, our own journey +the longest--if there be any end to it at all! Yet all the time we +might see the end if only we would look up. And we need never despair +and lag, need never be cold and comfortless, if we would but love and +remember. + + For, while the tired waves, vainly breaking, + Seem here no painful inch to gain, + Far out, through creeks and inlets making, + Comes silent, flooding in, the main! + +Ideala raises her eyes to mine now, and smiles as she passes beneath my +window. + +Another woman--a woman whom Claudia had long refused to know--is +leaning on her arm, talking to her earnestly. And that is Ideala's +attitude always. She gathers the useless units of society about her, +and makes them worthy women. There is no kind of sorrow for which she +has not found comfort, no folly she has not been successful in +checking, no vice she has not managed to cure, and no form of despair +which she has not relieved with hope. Her own experiences have taught +her to sympathise with every phase of feeling, and be lenient to every +shortcoming and excess. Wherever she is you may be sure that another +woman is there also--some one with a sorrowful history, probably; and +you may be equally sure that she is leaning on Ideala. God bless her! + + + + + + + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Ideala, by Sarah Grand + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK IDEALA *** + +This file should be named 6855.txt or 6855.zip + +Produced by Joshua Hutchinson, Tom Allen, David Moynihan, Charles Franks +and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team. + +Project Gutenberg eBooks are often created from several printed +editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the US +unless a copyright notice is included. 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