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diff --git a/75492-0.txt b/75492-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..7572ea7 --- /dev/null +++ b/75492-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,3678 @@ + +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 75492 *** + + + + + +THE DANCING FAUN + + + + + _Copyrighted in the United States_ + + _All rights reserved_ + + + + + The + Dancing + Faun + + by + Florence + Farr + + London + Elkin Mathews + and John Lane + + Roberts Brothers + Boston + + 1894 + + + + +Edinburgh: T. and A. CONSTABLE, Printers to Her Majesty + + + + +_Prefatory Note_ + + +_Owing to circumstances which have arisen since this story was written +in the summer of 1893, it seems necessary to state that it is purely a +work of the imagination, and that none of the characters or events are +taken from real life._ + + _Florence Farr._ + + +[Illustration] + + + + +THE DANCING FAUN + + +‘Yes, Lady Geraldine, the only beauty in modern life is its falsehood. +Its reality is ridiculous.’ + +‘Truth always was undignified, Mr. Travers.’ + +‘Just so; that is why the art of life consists in not realising the +truth,’ replied the man, with charming languor. + +‘You are the first person I have met who has dared put these things +into words,’ murmured the woman. + +‘Your life has been a dream hitherto.’ + +‘According to you, I had better not awake.’ + +‘One wants experience to give a wider scope to one’s dreams,’ said he +paternally. + +‘A woman’s imagination has no such needs.’ + +‘That depends. What are your favourite books?’ + +‘I dislike reading. In novels, people always do what you expect. The +only tolerable people are those who do what you do not expect.’ + +‘And this is your first season!’ + +‘I have four elder sisters.’ + +‘Ah!--’ he paused, then he added, ‘one never realises how much women +tell each other.’ + +‘No, in men’s eyes, women are always at daggers drawn, fighting for the +exclusive possession of a masculine heart.’ + +‘Geraldine,’ cried her mother, from the other end of the drawing-room, +‘come and sing to us, my dear. Mr. Clausen has not heard your voice +since your return from Paris.’ + +‘Have you made a serious study of singing, Lady Geraldine?’ asked +Travers. + +‘I had a course of lessons from Sautussi in the winter.’ + +‘Oh yes, Mr. Travers, indeed she has,’ broke in Lady Kirkdale as +she crossed the room; ‘and I insisted on her singing at Sautussi’s +reception, just the same as the other pupils. I think it is the +greatest mistake to make distinctions of rank in matters of art. In art +all are equal. There is something so beautiful in that thought.’ Lady +Kirkdale pulled up the rose-coloured blind. ‘Will you open the piano, +Mr. Travers? I am sure you are devoted to music, you have the musical +physiognomy.’ + +‘Then I fear I have a very foolish physiognomy.’ + +‘Now, now, don’t be severe. Kirkdale tells me you are most delightfully +severe, and say such witty things.’ + +‘Then Lord Kirkdale has done me an infinite wrong: to have the +reputation of a wit precede him is the ruin of a man.’ + +‘I assure you, you are mistaken; most people are much too stupid to +distinguish the qualities of wit; once establish a reputation, half the +world takes you on trust, and considers the other half criticises you +because it envies you.’ + +‘You give me hope, Lady Kirkdale.’ + +‘Mr. Travers, I am afraid you are a very, very bad man. Come, let us go +to the piano.’ + +The Marchioness of Kirkdale had always been enterprising. She had +the experience of life only given to those ladies whose husbands are +thoroughly and brutally immoral: voluptuaries who have no foresight, +who do not realise that it is sometimes amusing to talk to an innocent +woman, when one is thoroughly bored by those who are not innocent. + +Lady Kirkdale’s suspicions had been aroused by the violent friendship +her young son had conceived for George Travers; and having her own +theories about the education of young men, she at once invited her +son’s crony to afternoon tea at the little house they occupied in +Davies Street, Berkeley Square. ‘A man’s behaviour in a drawing-room is +one of the tests you should always apply before you allow him to enjoy +your confidence, Stephen,’ she had said. + +‘A drawing-room is such an inconceivably uninteresting place,’ sighed +Stephen. + +‘That is the reason why, as a test, it is so invaluable; any commonly +brilliant man can amuse men in a club, or women at the Continental; +but it requires the most subtle quintessence of wit to penetrate the +brain of the great world without shocking its susceptibilities; neither +radical paradoxes nor coarse allusions can be brought into play there, +without social ruin.’ + +‘Is social ruin possible nowadays?’ + +‘My dear Kirkdale!’ + +‘I gauge the public feeling of society by its attitude in public, +and when I sit in a box at the theatre and see the stalls greet the +passionate utterances of a ruined woman with a contemptuous smile, +as if that sort of sentiment were quite out of date, I come to the +conclusion that social ruin means nothing now.’ + +‘My poor Kirkdale, if you think society is represented in the stalls at +a theatre, you are still more unsophisticated than I had dared hope. +But you and Geraldine are always puzzling me. There is a persistence of +innocence, I might almost say ignorance, of life about you both, which +I cannot understand.’ + +Kirkdale laughed gaily. ‘The rule of contraries always does surprise +people.’ + +Lady Kirkdale looked hard at her son; he smiled pleasantly; then she +said, ‘You will never appreciate the difficulties of my position, +Kirkdale.’ + +‘Yes, I do, mother, although I may be stupid about obvious truths +everybody else appreciates at once; I have a sort of brain of my own +concealed in my skull. Geraldine and I were both born old, and we’re +growing young by degrees, don’t you see?’ + +‘My dear boy, what nonsense you talk!’ + +‘Every one must have a childhood some time or other on their own +account. In our old home, when my father was alive, childhood was +impossible. Let us enjoy it now.’ + +‘Enjoy it, certainly. But bring this new man to see me.’ Kirkdale +agreed, and Lady Kirkdale sent a note to her old friend John Clausen +asking him to come and meet Mr. Travers. John Clausen was a man of +vast experience. He had never married, and romantic people told a +romantic story of an early love ending tragically in eternal fidelity. +He was a walking peerage and encyclopedia; he could tell you the cast +of every theatrical success, and the scandals about all the ephemeral +celebrities, that have come under the notice of society, and passed +thence into the darkness of the outer world during the last forty +years. As Lady Maisy Potter, one of Lady Kirkdale’s married daughters, +said-- + +‘He is one of those charming observant people, who always listen to +what you say, and notice what you wear.’ + +As he sat in Lady Kirkdale’s drawing-room on this particular hot June +afternoon, he was both listening and observing. Lady Geraldine looked +like a fair and sweet flower as she sang Gounod’s passionate love-song, +_Ce que je suis sans toi_. She was a blonde, with tiny hands which +melted in the touch as it were; they appeared to have no strength, +no bone, they were so soft, so delicate. Yet now she was playing, +you could see they were full of nervous tension; and her style had a +certain vigour and distinction surprising to those who had only seen +her in her idle moments. Mr. Clausen’s eyes wandered from her to the +figure of George Travers: he was of light build, his face was clean +shaven save for a moustache several shades lighter than his hair, his +eyes were brown and rather close together, his nostrils delicate, and +his chin well cut. There was a suggestion of cat-like agility about +him, and good solid muscle at the corners of his mouth gave evidence +that he was a man of endless resource. He stood behind Lady Geraldine, +his hand resting on her brother’s shoulder. When the song was over, +Travers said, ‘I should like to hear you singing to a mandolin on +the lawn, down at my place at Old Windsor. Can you not persuade Lady +Kirkdale to bring you down there one day? It is a charming old place, +filled with quaint things I have collected from all parts of the world. +I am sure it would interest you. What do you say, Stephen, will your +mother and sister come with you and see me in my Arcadia?’ + +‘Certainly, old fellow. I didn’t know you had a place in the country.’ + +‘Oh, it is not a property, I simply lease it; but it is convenient to +have a house of a certain size in which to store one’s collections. I +am such a wanderer that I often forget I possess even this little _pied +à terre_.’ + +‘I hear you have such exquisite taste in furnishing,’ said Lady +Geraldine. ‘Lord Foreshot was telling me you had superintended the +decoration of his chambers in the Albany, and that they are a perfect +dream.’ + +‘I fear Lord Foreshot had some ulterior object in view.’ + +‘I don’t understand you, Mr. Travers.’ + +‘I am sure of that, quite sure of that,’ and Mr. Travers bestowed +upon her a fatherly and forgiving smile. Then he advanced to Lady +Kirkdale to bid her good-bye and invite her to make arrangements for +the expedition to Old Windsor. A minute or two later they were joined +by Kirkdale, who had remained behind talking to Geraldine. The details +were arranged, and the expedition fixed for the following Wednesday by +Mr. Travers, who said, ‘The middle of the week is always best; one can +enjoy one’s-self in one’s own way without being disgusted by seeing too +many other people enjoying themselves in theirs.’ + +He and Kirkdale left the house together. + +‘My sister does not like you,’ said Kirkdale. + +‘I am most fortunate.’ + +‘How so?’ + +‘The degrees in a woman’s favour are, interest, dislike; interest, +hate; interest--well, I suppose I may say more interest.’ + +‘Why do you hesitate, old fellow?’ + +‘Lady Geraldine is a woman who wants a special language to express her. +Unfortunately for me, I have not learned it yet.’ + +‘It would please her to hear that.’ + +‘Would it? Then tell her,’ and Travers gently stroked his moustache as +they turned into Piccadilly. + +Lady Geraldine left the drawing-room by one door as her brother and +George Travers quitted it by the other. So that Lady Kirkdale and Mr. +Clausen were left _tête-a-tête_. She turned to him and said, ‘What is +your opinion of this man?’ + +‘He is the sort of danger Stephen is bound to encounter sooner or +later. The sooner it is over the better; young men must be initiated +personally into the mysteries of life, no mother can bear the tests for +them.’ + +‘You are quite right there; but I could have wished the serpent of +Stephen’s choice had taken another form.’ + +‘There I disagree with you; if you had had a free hand in the matter I +don’t think you could have chosen better.’ + +Lady Geraldine re-entered; her mother made room for her beside her on +the sofa, and said, ‘We were talking of Mr. Travers; what do you think +of him?’ + +‘I dislike him, and told Stephen I did so; there is an uncomfortable +feeling that you are walking on very thin ice when you are talking to +him. I wish we had not arranged this visit to Old Windsor.’ + +‘Shall we write and put him off? We had other engagements for the day; +I can easily make excuses.’ + +‘Oh no, we had better go. The country air will be pleasant in any case.’ + +‘And how are you getting through your first season, Lady Geraldine?’ +said Mr. Clausen. + +‘I feel as if I had been through it again and again before. It +interested me at first; it was amusing to see my sisters’ old +experiences renewing themselves as my turn came. But it is terrible to +think that whether you are in it or not, the world goes on just the +same: in another season, girls now in the schoolroom will be going +through the mill exactly in the same way as I am doing. How one longs +for something different!’ + +‘Yes we all have felt that. I believe it is the strongest passion of +the human race to get at “something different”; it is the secret of all +sin, the secret of all progress.’ + +‘And it is the function of society to suppress this tendency,’ said +Lady Kirkdale. ‘It crystallises, I may say sanctifies, the present +state of things. “Whatever is, is right” must be the ostensible motto +of those who would retain their places in it. It is the solid edifice +round which an empire is gathered.’ + +‘The solid centre of a very wobbling circumference,’ interrupted Mr. +Clausen. + +‘Mr. Travers was saying that the beautiful was only a veil to cover +the ridiculous. It seems to me that in the same way the stupidity of +society is concealed by hiding it behind very high walls,’ murmured +Geraldine, as she leaned her head on the broad back of the Chesterfield +sofa. + +‘There you are wrong; those high walls contain everything. There is +nothing without that is not within; the only difference is that people +in society keep within bounds, others do not.’ + +‘That is a great deal to be thankful for,’ said Lady Kirkdale. ‘I once +had to go down to Richmond by the last underground train from Hampstead +on a Saturday night. I have had a good deal of experience, but never +have I witnessed such a pandemonium. I would not enter one of those +underground stations, when the rabble is at large, to save a hundred +pounds.’ + +‘All vice loses its attraction when it is seen from the outside,’ said +Mr. Clausen. + +‘Has vice any attraction?’ asked Geraldine. + +‘Not to the refined or cultivated pleasure-seeker, but the crude +youngster often finds himself thoroughly enjoying the most vulgar +vices: it is only after being repeatedly shocked at the appearance +of other people when they are enjoying similar ecstasies that our +cultivated perceptions render us incapable of revelling in the +ridiculous.’ + +‘Ah, how true! nothing excites virtue so much as the spectacle of other +people’s vices,’ said Lady Kirkdale. + +‘It is the last rope thrown out by Providence to save us from our +sins,’ replied Mr. Clausen. + +‘How curious it would be,’ said Geraldine, ‘if the next Saviour of the +world should be one who would bestow a universal sense of humour!’ + +‘But nobody is so ridiculous as a humorist,’ cried Lady Kirkdale. + +‘One can forgive anything when it is done with deliberate intent,’ was +Mr. Clausen’s rejoinder, ‘but other people’s instinctive emotions can +never be forgiven, unless we happen to share them.’ + +‘So you think we might be redeemed by a humorist.’ + +‘He certainly should have a trial. Lady Geraldine, here is a chance +for you--start in life as the high priestess of humour.’ + +‘I am not old enough, Mr. Clausen; I am afraid I have not worn out my +instinctive emotions yet.’ + +‘Ah, well! when you have, you will know where to fly for refuge.’ + +Lady Kirkdale sighed, and said, ‘I suppose our most lasting delusion is +that our experiences can be of service to others.’ + +‘It is not a delusion,’ replied Mr. Clausen warmly. ‘Experience teaches +us through our own agony to sympathise with others. When they have +passed through a like experience, we can help to heal their wounds; +but we cannot prevent them fighting out the battle for themselves.’ +He stopped suddenly, walked to the window, looked out, and said in a +lighter tone to Geraldine, ‘And how are all your sisters?’ + +‘They are very well. Mary has just taken the new baby into the country, +where her husband joins her as soon as the session is over. Emily +is still working in the East End; she lectures at Toynbee Hall on +Temperance next Friday. Gladys writes from the Embassy at Vienna that +her life is wasted in writing official notes; and Maisy and her husband +seem to have disappeared altogether ever since they were married; +they were most ridiculously attached to each other, as no doubt you +remember. All the while they were engaged, I was afraid of stirring +about the house, and got into a habit of humming, coughing, and +rattling door handles, which I have not overcome yet.’ + +‘And where were they when you last heard of them?’ + +‘Well, they remained in Egypt on their honeymoon, until it became too +hot to hold them, and now they’ve taken refuge in a yacht.’ + +‘Dear! dear! dear! who would have thought so much romance was left in +the world? How long have they been married?’ + +‘Six months.’ + +‘The other day I heard it said that the first six months of married +life were the most miserable in a woman’s existence. Maisy would not +agree with that.’ + +‘I suppose not; they utterly refused to return to London for the +season, although mamma begged Maisy to come and take me about. Poor +mamma, how tired you must be of chaperoning us!’ + +‘No, I am not. As age comes over one, one begins to take an interest in +details quite incomprehensible to the young.’ + +The door opened, and the footman announced in a loud voice, ‘Mr. Potter +and Lady Maisy Potter.’ + +‘Mamma!’ + +‘Maisy!’ + +‘Robert! Where have you come from?’ + +‘Landed at Portsmouth this morning. Thought we would take you by +surprise.’ + +The reunited family settled itself into groups, more tea was ordered, +and confidences exchanged. + +Maisy, pert, pretty, and blooming with health, sat between her mother +and sister on the sofa. Mr. Clausen and Robert foregathered at the +other end of the room. Geraldine said, ‘Last time you wrote, you said +nothing would induce you to return to England yet.’ + +‘That was all poor dear Robert; he begged and prayed me to stay out +there with him, until I really had to threaten him.’ + +‘My dear Maisy!’ + +‘Yes, mamma, I positively had to threaten him that, if he persisted in +staying I should come home alone.’ + +‘And that brought him round at once, of course,’ said Geraldine. + +‘Oh yes, he can’t bear me to be out of his sight for a moment. People +tell me his devotion positively makes him ridiculous.’ + +‘You don’t mind that, I suppose.’ + +‘Geraldine, what has come over you? What is the matter with her, mamma? +Has she been crossed in love?’ + +‘My dear Maisy, why should you think so?’ + +‘There’s something so nasty, and hard, and cynical about +her--positively there is, mamma; one always notices these changes when +one first comes home more than people who are living in the house.’ + +‘I don’t expect you noticed me at all before you went away.’ + +‘Oh yes, I did; you were always most interested about my affairs, and +anxious to know how Robert had behaved, and what he had said. And I +know very well you never spoke in that tone then. You hurt my feelings, +Geraldine. I’m not used to cynicism. Robert is so straightforward and +manly, he never makes fun of me.’ + +‘I wasn’t making fun, I assure you; I think you the most enviable +woman in the world; really I do.’ + +Maisy aggrievedly allowed herself to be kissed, and peace was restored. +In the meantime, Mr. Clausen was discussing the subject of his return +with Mr. Robert Potter. Clausen began by making the remark, that the +last news had led him to believe that they had not proposed returning +to England yet. Mr. Potter led Mr. Clausen into the recess of the +window and said: ‘The truth is, my wife was most anxious to remain out +there. Personally, I hate missing a season; it is like losing sight of +a generation in the evolution of the race, one is always looking for +the missing link; and the next year one is horribly out of it. However, +I got my wife to believe that this was her own feeling, and after two +months of delicate manœuvring, I induced her to persuade me to return +to England.’ + +‘I congratulate you on your patience.’ + +‘A capacity for patience is the bulwark alike of the solid Englishman +and of the British Constitution. The principle of the Government has +always been to acknowledge such and such a move to be a good one, but +to take no step in the matter until it is forced upon it from the +outside. It endures. I shall endure. What is the use of having such a +splendid public constitution if you do not model your own constitution +upon it?’ + +Mr. Clausen laughed; Mr. Potter smiled. They turned away from the +window and joined the ladies. + + * * * * * + +In a miserable little garret in a small street off the Strand, a young +woman lay tossing and turning in her bed; sometimes a little moan +escaped her, then she would bury her face in her pillow and break +into passionate sobs. As it became light she got up and looked out +of the window; she could see a wide expanse of roofs, and in the +distant sky the thin lines of white light through the grey river mist. +She shuddered at the cold, and crept into bed again. Just as she was +falling asleep, a man in evening dress and a loose overcoat of the +latest fashion softly entered the room, and she sprang up, saying-- + +‘O my George, my dear one, where have you been? I was terrified.’ + +‘My poor little child, all is well, don’t cry: there, there! I have +done great things to-night, and if you are very careful our fortune’s +made. To-morrow we go down to the place on the river Guaschaci has lent +us; but my little wife will have to be very obedient, and do exactly +what her husband tells her. Does she promise not to cry any more, and +not to spoil her pretty eyes?’ He held her face between his hands, and +kissed her on the mouth. + +‘Yes, yes, George, anything. I will do anything you tell me, only +promise me never to leave me again like this. It makes me so unhappy.’ + +‘My darling, I never will; but you should trust me.’ + +She threw her arms round his neck passionately, ‘I do, George, I do. +God knows what will become of me if I ever lose that trust.’ + +‘My sweet love!’ and he sat down on the bed. ‘Now tell me. Do you +remember the simple little cotton dress you wore when I first saw you +on the stage, and when you stole my heart from me all at once, before I +had time to realise my danger? Do you remember it?’ + +‘Yes, George, of course I do, of course I do.’ + +‘Well, what do you think I have in my head?’ + +‘I can’t think. O George! are you going to let me go back on the stage, +and earn money to keep you out of this miserable poverty?’ + +‘Pooh! child, what would five pounds a week be to a man like me? That’s +no good. No, now listen. In this world the only way to make money is +to be supposed to have money. If I can really get the position which is +mine by right, and from which my cursed ill-luck cut me off six years +ago, when that affair about the duel with Prince Blank, I told you +about, came out, the world will be at my feet: I shall be in a position +which will be unassailable, because it will be founded on a rock. My +exile has been useful to me in this way, it has enabled me to find out +secrets which will be invaluable to me; secrets which will make me +feared by the leaders of society.’ + +‘O George, but that sounds dreadful!’ + +‘My Gracie knows her husband would disdain to use the knowledge in his +possession. Of all blackguards the blackmailer is the lowest. But there +are certainly delicate means of working things, called wire-pulling in +diplomatic circles, which have a certain charm--a sensation between +that of a spider weaving its web and the pleasure of exercising skill +experienced by the consummate chess-player. This is a feeling not +ignoble; it is one shared by all great statesmen. It is the exercise +of this power that evolved the Conqueror of Europe from the Corsican +soldier. My wife must learn that all success is the result of carefully +adjusted combinations. She must learn to know that to help her husband, +and herself, she must exercise inviolable secrecy and enduring +self-control.’ + +‘O George, can I help you? Will you trust me? Oh, how happy, how happy +you make me!’ + +‘You can and shall; but at first secretly, and in a way which would +make an ordinary woman quail.’ + +‘I can endure anything, anything for you. Only tell me, you shall see. +I seemed so useless in your real life; it seemed as if I wasn’t really +necessary to you; now I shall be the happiest woman in the world.’ + +‘Well, I’ll tell you my plan. When I go down to Windsor, I want you +to live in the little cottage belonging to The Oaks, and to save you +from scandal you must pretend to be a poor relation of Guaschaci’s. You +shall have a little girl to wait on you; no real hard work. Then at +night, when the house is locked up and the servants are gone to bed, I +shall steal down to you and we will adorn you with silks and jewels and +lace, and you shall be my beautiful transformed bride.’ + +‘But, dearest, why?’ + +‘For two reasons. One is that, to work my present plans, I must not be +supposed to be married, least of all must I be supposed to have married +an actress; and the second is, that that foolish boy whom you met me +walking with the other day has never forgotten you. He is constantly +asking who you were. I said you came from the country, so that he +will not be surprised to find you down at Windsor when he comes next +week. He is quite a boy, and very easy to manage. It will lead to no +unpleasantness for you, my dearest, or you know I should not propose +it. He is the Marquis of Kirkdale, only twenty-one, and by means of his +family, who are in the best set, I propose to get really into the swim; +once there, the rest is easy.’ + +‘I thought we should have such a lovely time down there, boating and +lying about on the lawn; and all the servants to wait on us.’ + +‘It would have been ideal, but, under the circumstances, what am I +to do? I must either make my fortune in society, or out of it. I am +not born to be poor; I have no talent for it. In society all things +are possible, out of it all things are possible; but out of society +diplomacy is called lying; statesmanship, cheating; gallantry, +seduction; a fine taste in champagne, drunkenness. No, Gracie, you +must not ask me to give up society. I am made for it, and it for me. +Besides, am I not providing you with the means of gratifying your taste +for acting?’ + +‘But what will the servants think?’ + +‘A gentleman’s servants know that their first duty is not to think,’ +said Travers, kissing her. + +‘Dear George,’ she murmured, ‘I am a nasty, bad-tempered creature. I +have always been teasing you to let me go back to the stage, and after +all this will be great fun, and I shall have the leading part at last!’ + +‘Yes, the leading part, Gracie. The other women will only be walking +ladies. They will come on, speak a few words to explain the plot, and +be seen no more.’ + +‘Who are the other ladies, George?’ + +‘Only Kirkdale’s mother and sister, Lady Kirkdale and Lady Geraldine +Fitzjustin. They are coming down with him on Wednesday; but if you play +your cards properly he will find The Oaks sufficiently attractive to +come down without them in future.’ + +‘George, do you think it is quite right, all this deception? Wouldn’t +it be better to say you were married, but your wife would never, never +interfere with you?’ + +‘Dear little baby-wife, no. Don’t you see what fun we’re all going to +have? Women never have scruples about anything on their own account, +but they are always full of them when they think their husbands are +risking the purity of their moral characters.’ + +‘Now you are laughing at me, George, but really----’ + +‘No more buts. I’m dead tired,’ and he yawned as he turned out the +light. + + * * * * * + +‘He is a delightful man,’ said Lady Kirkdale, as she leaned back in the +corner of the railway carriage after making a charming bow to George +Travers, who stood on the platform watching their departure from +Datchet station. ‘And the house is a perfect gem of exquisite taste.’ + +‘He is much nicer than I thought at first,’ said Geraldine. ‘It was +too bad of you, Stephen, to stay behind, and let him do all the work. +Punting two women about must be most wearisome.’ + +‘I fancy Travers likes punting; he knows he has a good figure. I didn’t +want to spoil the effect,’ rejoined Stephen. + +‘That’s the first time I’ve heard you speak a word against him,’ said +Lady Kirkdale. + +‘One stands up for a fellow as long as he’s being abused by one’s +people, of course, but when they begin to appreciate him one can slack +off a little.’ + +‘What is the matter with you, Stephen?’ + +‘Oh, nothing--I’m tired, that’s all.’ + +In the meantime George Travers rebalanced the dogcart, fondled the +horse, lighted a cigar, and drove slowly back to The Oaks. It +certainly had been a successful day for him. His was one of those +natures which delighted in gorgeous dreams. He felt realities to be +most inadequate, he hated them. Just as he had mounted the winged steed +of his imagination, some dirty little fact was always seizing the +reins, and dragging him down to earth; but to-day everything had gone +smoothly. + +His father had been a successful actor in the ’sixties, named Swanwick. +Now there are two kinds of bad parents: the parent who looks upon a +child as a machine capable of perfect rectitude if its moral principles +are manufactured on a certain plan, and the parent whose only notion +of a child is that it is a sort of toy sent by Providence for his +amusement. Now it amused old Swanwick to see his little son imitating +the manners behind the footlights, lounging at bars, patronising pretty +girls, advising them as to their costumes, for the actresses soon +discovered that it pleased his father to see him taken notice of, and +pleasing old Swanwick went a long way towards success. It made all the +difference between the smooth and the seamy side of theatrical life. +Blind admiration for him, and his, was all that was necessary; but woe +to any one who suggested an alteration in his arrangements. He would +turn on his most favoured fair one the moment she overstepped the +bounds with which his vanity entrenched him, saying, ‘Am I the stage +manager of this theatre or are you, madam?’ This outburst would be +followed by language unfit for publication, and days of sullen anger, +the clouds only departing after the most complete self-humiliation of +the offending one. Now old Swanwick loved his profession; he loved +trotting along the Strand and turning in to ‘have a drink’ with all +the cronies he met in his progress. He also loved racing. Whenever, +by hook or by crook, he could escape rehearsals, which were much less +intermittent in those days than now, off he would go with his friend +Travers, to Newmarket, Epsom, Sandown, anywhere. Driving for choice, +and making a day of it, getting back to the theatre in a state of +robust hilarity, putting his head in a basin of cold water, and coming +out ‘fresh as a daisy,’ as he put it--at any rate capable of giving a +capital performance of the tender, good-hearted fellow he delighted +in portraying. When he died, his friend Travers adopted the little +orphan boy. He was a man of old family, and felt the necessity, which +old Swanwick had ignored, of doing something more for the boy than +sending him to a day-school. Accordingly he talked seriously to the +small precocious person whom he had taken under his protection; told +him he intended to make him his heir, and that to learn to keep up his +position he must acquire some knowledge of the life led in the world +on this side of the footlights. He spoke in a way which appealed to +the lively imagination of the boy; and when he had stayed for a few +months with Travers in his house in Piccadilly, and had been taken +down to the place in Gloucestershire for the shooting season, he was +completely prepared to ignore his previous experiences; and could treat +them lightly as the excursions of a gentleman’s son into Bohemia. +Travers got very fond of the boy as time went on, and by the time he +was thirteen made up his mind to do his very best for him. He sent him +to Harrow and afterwards to Oxford, but the City of Spires was rather +too much for young Travers, as he was everywhere called now, and he was +sent down after one term. + +However, he had got all he thought necessary out of the university. +He could talk about it, and that was all _he_ wanted. He then was +put in a crack regiment; but unfortunately for him, he had not been +there a year before his patron unexpectedly died, having made no will, +and George Travers was thrown on the world with very little but a +thorough knowledge of the ropes, some talent for backing the right +horse, and a very considerable talent for winning at poker; and it was +not a duel but a card scandal that brought his early career in London +society to an untimely end. He was obliged to leave England, although +circumstances necessitated the hushing up of the scandal. He joined a +theatrical company in America, and made a somewhat substantial success +out there. He returned to England with some money and the intention +of continuing his stage career under his father’s name. While waiting +for a chance, unaccountably to himself, he fell in love with Grace +Lovell; we all have our moments of weakness, and in one of these he +married this child, who was full of dreams, full of ambition, full of +hopes, wild as only those of a young actress who has made her first +success can be. She had been engaged as understudy for one of London’s +favourite soubrettes, had been called upon to play the part at a +moment’s notice. She had done so with such dainty freshness, and had +made her points with such innocent piquancy, that she had attracted +public notice to a very considerable extent. She played the part three +weeks, and during those weeks George Travers came to the theatre, +saw, and conquered. When her engagement was over she married him at a +registry office, and disappeared from the stage. + +As fate would have it, almost the moment he had taken this step George +Travers made the acquaintance of Lord Kirkdale at the Junior Carlton, +whither he had been taken by Charles Melton, an owner of racehorses. +The two got on very well; the next day they lunched together, and, +strolling along Pall Mall afterwards, encountered Mrs. George Travers. +She looked at them expectantly; George smiled, nodded, and gave her a +little sign to pass on without speaking. She did so, but not before +Kirkdale’s curiosity had been vividly aroused. However, Travers +vouchsafed no information, but that she lived in the country and he +supposed she was up in town shopping for the day. + +A week or two later, just as he was changing his last fiver, he +encountered an Italian, Count Guaschaci, whose life he had saved in a +tap-room free fight, out in the Western States. Guaschaci listened to +his troubles sympathetically, and as he was leaving England for six +months, told him he should be really obliged if he would look after his +establishment at Old Windsor; all he asked of him was to keep things +going until his return. + +Then Travers saw his opportunity had come. Ten years had passed since +the old scandal. A new generation ruled; all was forgotten, or could be +explained away. The trustful Count gave him a cheque for two hundred +pounds, and left all his affairs in his hands. It must be noted here +that Travers had many most endearing qualities. He could not bear to +see animals suffer; he got on splendidly with children. He treated +women as if he was their father, and men as if he was their redeemer. +He took a favour as if he were bestowing a benediction. He had +discovered the art of living upon other people with as much grace as if +he belonged to the highest circles; none of the bourgeois arrogance of +the parvenu or the middleman was perceptible; he took other people’s +money, their property, and their affections, with equal grace and +admirable cordiality. + +Grace peeped timidly out of her cottage door as he drove by. He +whispered, ‘All right, little woman, I will be over directly.’ Then he +drove the cart into the stable-yard, threw the reins to the groom, and +strolled into the house through the back way, calling out as he passed +the kitchen, ‘Just bring me a whisky and Seltzer in the grey-room; I +shall want nothing more to-night.’ + +He lighted another cigar and threw himself full length on the white +bear-skin which covered the canopied divan at the upper end of the +room. The walls were hung with dull grey material, and decorated with +strips and borders of faded Eastern embroidery. Guaschaci certainly +knew how to do things well. There was not another man in England for +whose decorations Travers felt he could have brought himself to take +the responsibility. Certainly this place positively did even him +credit; he felt no hesitation whatever in saying that it was his own. A +middle-aged woman brought in the whisky, then courtesying gravely she +asked if the master would speak to her little boy, he cried to see the +master before he went to bed. + +‘Bring him in, certainly, bring him in.’ + +‘I put him to bed, sir; but I can’t get him to sleep; perhaps you will +excuse me bringing him down in his little dressing-gown.’ + +‘Certainly, I’ll put him to sleep in no time; don’t you trouble, Madame +Kudner.’ + +The housekeeper went and fetched her little boy. As she carried him +in he held out his arms to Travers, who lay back on the white divan +laughing gaily. + +‘Want a romp, little man?’ he cried. ‘All right, you shall have one. It +is a shame. I haven’t seen him all day. Come and look in the cupboard, +and see if we can find anything nice there.’ + +And the boy, who was a miracle of baby prettiness, with little brown +curls dancing round his rosy cheeks, and bright eyes, was carried off +in triumph to the old oak chest in which the stores were kept. + +‘There, figs won’t hurt him, will they, Madame Kudner? Now, we’ll take +in the dish; come along. Why, you’ve got no shoes on! Well, jump upon +my back,’ and he raced round the room with the child, carrying the +piece of massive church plate which did duty for a dessert dish in +their curious establishment. + +Little Pierre sat gravely in the corner of the divan with his feet +stretched out straight in front of him, munching the green figs and +gazing with rapture at the purple lusciousness which each fresh bite +discovered. Travers promised to bring him upstairs when he appeared +sleepy, and soon the whole house was still. + +The two had a long serious conversation, and Pierre was instructed in +full detail how to make himself a little paper punt, which he was to +float down the river next evening with a wax taper in it; it was to be +saturated with oil, so that when the taper had burnt down the whole +boat would flare up splendidly and go down the stream like a real +burning ship. Just as this exciting point was reached, a gentle tap was +heard outside the window. + +Travers listened for a moment, then he hurried off his _protégé_, +popped him down on his bed, told him he must go to sleep at once, +kissed him on both cheeks, and ran downstairs. He opened the verandah +windows, at which the taps had become more and more persistent. + +Grace entered in a loose white dress. + +‘Why have you come here? I told you not to on any account.’ + +Grace stopped short, it was the first time he had spoken to her in that +hard voice. + +‘You said you were coming down to the cottage. I saw all the servants’ +lights put out here. I was tired of waiting.’ + +‘I was playing with Pierre.’ + +‘Pierre, at this time of night! You prefer anything to me; even a +child.’ + +‘Even a child! That’s good. Children are the only perfectly +satisfactory companions in the world. They never seriously reproach +you, and as for beauty, no woman can touch them.’ + +‘George, let me go away. Let me go back to London, to my old life.’ + +‘I tell you once for all, I can’t allow my wife to go on the stage.’ + +‘It is too hard, too hard. You make life a perfect torture to me. Why +won’t you let me try to forget you, and my love, my unhappy love for +you?’ she sobbed. + +‘Don’t be ridiculous; and for Heaven’s sake don’t make such a row. How +do I make you miserable?’ + +‘I wouldn’t mind if I never saw you at all. When you were quite away +at Boulogne the other day, I could set to work at things I wanted to +do quite happily; but when I know you are near me, and I am hoping to +see you come in at any moment, my hope tortures me. They say hope is a +pleasant feeling, I think it is the keenest form of torture the devil +ever dressed up as an angel. I sit there in that cottage and wait, and +as time goes on all my love turns sick; I get to hate you for causing +me such pain. I feel as if I could kill you sometimes, to put an end to +it, once for all.’ + +‘Oh dear! oh dear! How absurd, how absolutely ridiculous all this is! +If you had just come out of the schoolroom I could have understood it, +but any woman who has led the life you have must surely have grasped +a few of the elementary realities of life. You appear to think what +people say on the stage is real life, and what you see behind the +scenes is play-acting.’ + +‘So it is. Behind the scenes of a theatre nobody is the same as they +are in their own homes; we all play our parts there, but we put all the +reality we have in us into our acting.’ + +‘Silly child! I am saying the absurd notions you have about love appear +to have come out of plays. Of course, people always say beforehand that +eternity will not be long enough for their raptures. The curtain falls +on this situation; if it was to rise again, they would have to own +ignominiously that half an hour had been found ample.’ + +‘My God! and I believed you when you told me you could not live without +me. In six weeks I see you flirting with another woman.’ + +‘Oh, is that it? Well, I suppose if I had cared to play the spy, I +should have seen you flirting with another man.’ + +‘How dare you! how dare you speak like that, when you know you asked +me to be your decoy! You needn’t deny it; that is the long and short +of it, and I refuse, I will not submit to this. I will go away, and +you can get a divorce if you like. The whole thing is a miserable, +degrading, horrible dream. Now I am awake, and will escape.’ She rushed +to the door; he reached it first, and caught her in his arms. + +‘I never saw you look so beautiful.’ He covered her face with kisses. +She struggled; he murmured, ‘My own dear love, I was only teasing; +don’t let us remember a word we have said.’ + +‘But you were flirting with that Lady Geraldine!’ + +‘Never mind her; she is the sort of woman men always imagine they are +in love with, except when they are alone with her.’ + +‘When were you alone with her?’ + +‘I haven’t been alone with her, but I can read women like books; you +needn’t be afraid that curiosity about the sex will lead me astray.’ + +‘And you really meant it when you said I was the only woman you ever +really loved?’ + +‘You know it well enough, my darling. When a man like me marries, he +has been shot straight through the heart.’ + +After a pause, she said, ‘Well, shall we go back to the cottage?’ + +‘No, we’ll stay here and have a little feast. Come along, we will +forage about and get up a bottle of champagne. You get the things out +of this cupboard, while I go down to the cellar.’ + + * * * * * + +The next morning Grace Travers woke up rather earlier than usual. +The scene of the previous evening had left a distinct memory behind, +although it had ended in a reconciliation. She had exchanged a few +sentences with Lord Kirkdale, and there was an air of truth, candour, +and unsophistication that appealed strongly to her imagination, as a +contrast to her husband’s somewhat brutal analysis of sexual relations. +A civilised woman has very little taste for what may be termed pure +passion; it pleases her instinct perhaps, but it revolts her intellect, +her imagination, her delicacy, her pride. To an intellectual person +the whole business of love-making is ridiculous, and without dignity. +Dreams and fancies are invoked to give it an adventitious interest, +and so a sort of mesmerism is exercised, and blissful dreams of eternal +happiness come into existence, depending for their duration very +much upon the sympathy between the imaginations of the lovers, which +sometimes is powerful enough to build up a reality from a vision. +However this may be, when love comes in at the door intellect flies out +of the window or sleeps the sleep of the disgusted. When it returns to +its habitation it delivers stern judgment on the follies that have been +committed in its absence. Now a lovers’ quarrel interferes considerably +with the glamour of the situation, it disturbs the harmony which is +essential to the conditions described, and the intellect takes the +chance to slip in and give an opinion. So it happened to Grace. She was +clever, and before the madness came over her (for in her case it was +not a sympathetic imagination which attracted her) was considered witty +and brilliant. But the first effect of her love was to make her take +life very, very seriously; she became quite incapable, for a time, of +seeing the humour of any situation. She had hitherto led a wild roving +life, and her ideal had been to settle down in a little nest of her +own and play Joan to George Travers’s Darby for the rest of her life. +Now Travers did not particularly object to her playing Joan, but he +did find himself unequal to the combined _rôles_ of Romeo and Darby. +Romance and domesticity are not a very suitable combination, and poor +Travers may perhaps be forgiven for falling short of the ideal set +before him. + +As has been said by a lady who has made some study of the female heart: +‘What is really necessary to a woman’s happiness is two husbands, +one for everyday and one for Sundays.’ She really meant that she +has discovered that Romeo and Darby cannot be combined in one poor +mortal man, so is willing to take them separately. Grace was not so +reasonable. The romantic attachment she had formed for Romeo, in the +person of Travers, prevented her enduring the presence of Darby, in +the person of Kirkdale. She did not object to Darby’s homage, but it +was certainly not worth thinking of, and would certainly meet with no +reward from her hands. + +All the same, she was conscious that a potential Darby was looming in +the horizon, that she was not the woman to waste her life at the beck +and call of a man who could talk to her as Romeo had last night. As all +this was passing through her mind her eyes fell on an old bookshelf, +on which various dusty old volumes were heaped. She walked over to the +corner, wondering she had not noticed them before, and took one down: +it was a book of plays. She stood reading to herself and laughed, then +she replaced the volume and opened a book of Shelley’s poetry. She +opened it at the last pages of a play and softly murmured the words to +herself. By degrees she read louder, something about her voice struck +her. She listened, it sounded different, a new beauty had come into it. +She read on and on, wondering at the pathos of the tones she uttered, +almost crying with sympathy. As she listened to the laments of Beatrice +di Cenci, it seemed to her some inspired spirit had entered her body +and was making use of her voice to reveal to her what life, and love, +and divine sorrow meant. + +From that day she settled down to hard work. She heard that some of the +words, as she spoke them, sounded round and full, and moved her to the +depths of her heart; others sounded little and thin, and she resolved +to work away until she had got all alike resonantly beautiful. Often +she caught an ugly jarring sound in her voice when calling out to her +little maid, and at once corrected herself. However she was occupied, +she kept the one idea before her of making every sound she uttered +beautiful. + +On Saturday night Travers brought down Lord Kirkdale to stay till +Monday. Grace went to church, and was listening to the curate’s reading +with a severely critical ear when she became aware that Kirkdale had +entered the building. He overtook her as she was crossing the fields on +her way home. He raised his hat, and said-- + +‘So you are still here? I thought you would have left long ago, you +seemed so terribly bored last time I had the pleasure of seeing you.’ + +‘Yes, I’m still here.’ + +‘And still bored?’ + +‘No; I’m not bored now.’ + +‘How is that?’ + +‘I am studying something.’ + +‘What?’ + +‘Well, I suppose you’d laugh at a country girl like me if I told you, +but I’m studying because I want to go back--I mean--I want to go on +the stage.’ + +‘I think it would be a very good idea.’ + +‘Do you really? Oh, how nice it is to hear some one say that!’ + +‘Why, don’t you get any encouragement from your people?’ + +‘No, I don’t’ + +‘Look here! can I help you in any way? I might perhaps be able to; I +sometimes meet actors and fellows who know a lot about the stage.’ + +‘Oh, thanks. I don’t think I want help--yet. But it is most kind of you +to offer. I dare say I shall get a chance some day.’ + +‘But I’ve always heard you can’t learn acting off the stage. You can’t +do much by yourself down here surely?’ + +‘You can’t learn to _act_, but you can learn to _speak_ beautifully; +life teaches you that, more than all the theatres in the world.’ + +He looked at her in surprise. + +‘I don’t know, of course, but that’s my idea of things,’ she said +smiling. + +‘And how do you study?’ + +‘I learn parts, and say them over and over again to myself until I get +just the sound I want into my voice.’ + +‘What parts? Juliet?’ + +‘Well, Beatrice in _The Cenci_ is the one I like best. I don’t like +Juliet; all that sort of sentiment is such a delusion, you know. I +can’t pretend to believe in it; but there is a real, terrible tragedy +in Beatrice, you can’t help feeling it; it takes hold of you, you can’t +escape it.’ + +‘_The Cenci_ is very improper, isn’t it?’ + +‘I dare say; I just read the play through once to understand the part +of Beatrice, I forget about the details. I only know the fact that she +has a real, terrible wrong done her, which makes her loathe herself and +lose her wits for a while, that she revenges it, and is beheaded for +her crime just as life had become possible for her, when the father +that had poisoned the very air in which she grew up had ceased to live. +It seems to me that is the only really tragic part ever written for a +woman. Lady Macbeth was a fiend, Juliet a baby.’ + +‘Will you read some of it to me?’ + +‘No. I can’t bear reading in a room, it is so amateurish.’ + +‘But just quietly, to one person, surely that is different.’ + +‘Well, perhaps I will. No, I’ll tell you what; if you like to come +down to the river mead, I will bring out the book and read a little +of it this afternoon. Now go; I don’t want the girl to see us come +in together.’ He obediently went on ahead. She sat on a stile for a +moment or two thinking. ‘Suppose I go off; suppose I get an engagement, +what then?’ Lord Kirkdale looked round as he turned the corner, which +took him out of her sight. And she wondered why he looked so heavy and +sheepish, and foolish. + +In case my reader should get a wrong impression of Lord Kirkdale, they +must be here informed that he was an extremely well made young man, six +feet one in height, thirteen stone in weight, with fair hair and ruddy +complexion; there was nothing comic or unseemly about his appearance, +but to a woman who had taken it into her head to adore the type of +man represented by the Dancing Faun, no Hercules, however laboriously +devoted, need apply. + + * * * * * + +‘Who is this dreadful ineligible man Robert tells me was dining +here the other night?’ said Maisy. She had been lunching at Davies +Street with her mother and sister, and the three were sitting in the +drawing-room. + +‘I don’t think you need trouble about his being detrimental, unless +it is on mamma’s account; he devotes himself entirely to her,’ said +Geraldine. + +Lady Kirkdale laughed. ‘I was telling Geraldine the other day, that +in a few seasons no woman this side of fifty will have a chance in +society.’ + +‘I wonder what the meaning of it is,’ said Maisy. + +‘Age has its advantages,’ said Lady Kirkdale. ‘Besides, as Edgar Allen +Poe says, “What man truly loves in woman is her womanhood.”’ + +‘That’s so true, dear mamma; a womanly woman can do anything she likes +with a man, the other sort sets his teeth on edge at once.’ + +‘A womanly woman indeed,’ broke out Geraldine; ‘it is only within the +last few years women have dared show their womanhood. At last they +are permitted to possess a small quota of human nature; they may be +something more than waxen masks of doll-like acquiescence without +disgracing themselves in the eyes of the world.’ + +‘My dear Geraldine, don’t be so disgustingly Ibsenish.’ + +‘You make me perfectly wild, Maisy. Do you suppose all these questions +haven’t been working in everybody’s mind for the last fifty years. You +may be pretty sure they have, if _we_ have come to hear of them. I +consider the whole machinery of society to be especially contrived to +keep an influential set of people sufficiently ignorant to effectually +counter-balance the work of men and women of genius, who see clearly +enough what the next stage of progress will be; and the mob would +follow them readily if the dead weight of authority and influence did +not keep them back.’ + +‘Mamma, what is becoming of her? My dear Geraldine, you’ll never get +married if you go on like this. You’ll have to take to lecturing on +temperance or something, like poor Emily.’ + +‘I hate marriage; I think it’s a degrading bargain, which can only be +carried out by unlimited lying on both sides.’ + +‘Really, mamma; why don’t you speak to her?’ + +‘Because I can’t deny the truth of what she says.’ + +‘But--look at Robert and me!’ + +‘Yes, look at you, that’s just what I mean----’ + +‘Geraldine, my dear, my dear, hush!’ cried Lady Kirkdale. ‘You mustn’t +talk like this, you distress Maisy. And after all, you needn’t be so +bitter about it. God knows, if you prefer not to marry, I am not the +woman to wish to force you to it. You’ve been upset, hadn’t you better +go and lie down?’ + +‘Oh no! I’m all right. One must speak sometimes, one can’t spend one’s +life grinning like a Cheshire cat, and pretending one thinks everything +perfect.’ + +‘Well, to change this very unpleasant subject,’ said Maisy, ‘what is +this Mr. George Travers like?’ + +‘He is tall and slight, I should say about forty, with a careworn face +and a charming smile: he can dance, ride, scull, and play billiards to +perfection. There is no subject on which he is not well informed,--in +fact, if he were only safely married, he would be a great acquisition +to society,’ replied Lady Kirkdale. + +‘And Geraldine is in love with him,’ said Maisy. + +‘How dare you say such things!’ cried Geraldine. + +‘When a girl, who is generally good-tempered, becomes snappish and +disagreeable, you may be sure she is in love with a detrimental. +The detrimental is on the spot, you are snappish. The situation is +complete, my dear.’ + +Geraldine walked out of the room and banged the door loudly. + +‘What is to be done about her, mamma?’ + +‘I must take her abroad, I suppose. Love is like bronchitis, a +thorough change is the only cure.’ + +At this moment Mr. Travers was announced. + +‘I must apologise for this untimely call; but I have just been at +the club, and Lord Snordenham was mentioning that he must send round +to tell you that his coach had to start half an hour earlier for +Hurlingham to-morrow than was arranged. I said I should be passing your +door, and he commissioned me to deliver the message.’ + +‘Thank you very much. You are to be one of us, then?’ + +‘I have that honour.’ + +‘May I introduce you to my daughter, Lady Maisy Potter. She has just +returned from her honeymoon.’ + +‘O mamma, don’t give such a wrong impression! I must tell you, Mr. +Travers, my honeymoon lasted six months,’ she said, turning to him with +an engaging smile. + +‘It ought to last for ever,’ he said, bowing. ‘At any rate it has +agreed with you splendidly.’ + +‘Oh, please don’t say that; I know I am terribly sunburnt. It is so +dreadful to come to London looking so healthy, late in the season, +isn’t it?’ + +‘I am afraid my tastes are not sufficiently æsthetic to allow me to +appreciate a sickly style of beauty.’ + +‘I am so glad to hear you say that. It is exactly what I think myself; +only it doesn’t do nowadays to say anything you think, or one might +be taken for one of those dreadful advanced people that are always +clamouring for free thought, and free speech, and free everything. I +feel it so very necessary to keep on thinking just what is right and +proper. Our responsibilities as leaders of thought are so grave. For we +are the leaders of thought, are we not, Mr. Travers?’ + +‘After a certain point necessarily so. Progress is made in circles; +and if you stand still long enough you will find yourself in the van.’ + +‘But,’ said Lady Kirkdale, ‘suppose it doesn’t come back to the same +point exactly, but goes onward in a spiral.’ + +‘That’s the whole problem of life. Is it a circle or a spiral?’ said +Travers. + +‘If it’s the latter I am sorry for all of us.’ + +‘Oh, don’t be afraid, mamma, life is very nice as it is. We’ll take +it for granted it’s a circle, and sit still and not bother ourselves. +Spirals are such uncomfortable-looking things.’ + +The carriage was announced, and Lady Kirkdale asked Travers to drive +with them. He did so, sitting next to Geraldine and opposite Maisy. +They dropped Maisy at the hotel in Albemarle Street she and Mr. Potter +were staying at. Travers of course escorted her in, and as they parted +she hoped he would accept the invitation to come to Cowes that her +husband was going to send him for the yacht-week. + +When he re-entered the carriage he said to Lady Geraldine, ‘I imagined +your sisters were all out of town.’ + +‘So they were when we last spoke of them, but Maisy and Mr. Potter +returned last month.’ + +‘Ah, I met Mr. Potter at your dinner-party on Thursday, of course. I +didn’t know he was a relation.’ + +‘He is an odd man. He has inherited a large fortune from his father. He +is what I call disgustingly rich; he never seems to do anything with +his money. His chief pleasure in life seems to be sitting still and +thinking.’ + +‘What does he think about?’ + +‘Nobody knows. I used to offer him a penny for his thoughts last year, +but he always made one answer.’ + +‘What was that?’ + +‘He only said, “My mind is a perfect blank.”’ + +‘Oh,’ cried Lady Kirkdale, ‘that is like those Indian people who sit +contemplating their big toes all day. What are they called?’ + +‘Do you mean the Yogis?’ + +‘Ah yes, that was it.’ + +‘I am never quite accurate about things. You see, Geraldine, dear, it’s +one of my womanly qualities.’ + +‘Are you going down to Cowes, Mr. Travers? I think I heard Maisy asking +you to join her party.’ + +‘Are you going?’ + +‘We have taken rooms in the hotel.’ + +‘Then I shall certainly take advantage of the proposal. That is, if Mr. +Potter sends the invitation. Does his mind ever cease to be a blank?’ + +‘No one knows.’ + + * * * * * + +It was the first Sunday in August. Lady Kirkdale and Lady Geraldine +Fitzjustin had gone to spend a few days in Essex with Mary, the eldest +daughter of the family, before proceeding to Cowes. Lord Kirkdale, left +in possession at Davies Street, had invited Travers to dinner, and the +two men were sitting in the smoking-room ruminating over their cigars +and whisky and Seltzer. There had been a long pause in the conversation +when Kirkdale suddenly looked up and said, ‘Look here, Travers, who is +this girl down at the cottage?’ + +‘I’ve been waiting for that question for some time; I thought she must +have told you herself.’ + +‘Not a word.’ + +‘Well, I think perhaps I ought to let you know that she is secretly +married to a very dear friend of mine.’ + +‘Ah, I knew it; she is your wife.’ + +‘Ha! ha! ha! that’s good; my dear fellow, you never made such a mistake +in your life. I may be foolish, but I’m not such a fool as to go and +put my head into a noose like that.’ + +‘Travers, I don’t believe you. I am sure she loves you.’ + +‘That’s quite possible.’ + +‘Look here, you think you’re a very clever man; you think you are +deceiving the whole world, because you can deceive a parcel of women. +But the time has come for a little plain speaking, old fellow. I know +all about you. Clausen has told me. He recognised you that first day +you called in Davies Street. He was present when the card-party at +Canning’s ended your career in London society. Since then I have had +many proofs of how a fellow can go from bad to worse; how a man who +begins with cheating at cards can end by picking up half-crowns from +his friend’s dressing-table. No! no! old fellow, hitting me won’t put +it right,’ and he seized Travers by the wrists. + +‘What are you going to do?’ said Travers, helpless and sullen in +Kirkdale’s powerful grasp. + +‘I am going to hear the truth about this girl.’ + +‘And what else?’ + +‘Then I shall decide what to do. Who is she?’ + +‘My wife, you fool! Now are you satisfied?’ + +Kirkdale dropped his hands suddenly. Travers walked over to the +looking-glass, settled his cuffs, and wiped his forehead. Then he +leaned his back against the mantelpiece and surveyed Kirkdale, who had +thrown himself into an armchair on the other side of the room. After a +pause he spoke. + +‘I need not tell you, Kirkdale, that I have long foreseen this +situation: I knew we should have to come to an understanding sooner or +later.’ + +‘And you played your cards accordingly?’ + +‘There is no necessity to be so bitter about it. When a man has +absolutely nothing but his wits to rely upon, he must cultivate them. +Because I have acquired some skill in the marshalling of events, I +don’t see that you need reproach me. We all have our temptations. Your +father succumbed to the temptations of idleness, I to the temptations +of necessity. I was brought up rather more luxuriously than yourself, +for my father’s vices did not make him bad-tempered; your father’s did, +and that always has a chastening effect upon a man’s offspring. As I +was saying, no want of mine was denied until I was practically cast on +my own resources, just at the age when one’s tastes are most expensive. +I needn’t tell you what it means to be in a crack regiment with no +private income. I had not learnt how to make money as a middleman, or +by gambling on the stock exchange; the only resources open to me I took +advantage of and kept afloat for some time, then luck deserted me and +the crash came. I went abroad; I associated with men not fit to black +my boots. My life was a perfect hell. My God! how do you suppose a man +brought up as I have been can earn enough to keep him going in a way +that makes life worth living? One must have at least five thousand a +year. Where is it to come from?’ + +‘Oh, go to the devil!’ + +‘Precisely, that is the only answer to my question. I have been.’ + +Kirkdale rose and walked up and down the room impatiently. He snapped +his fingers. + +‘I don’t care that for you. I am thinking of her.’ + +‘I don’t think that is at all a proper way to talk to a man about his +wife, my dear boy.’ + +‘Oh, damn!’ + +‘By all means.’ + +Kirkdale walked towards Travers, who looked him straight in the face. +After a prolonged stare they both burst out laughing. + +‘O what fools we are! what fools we are!’ cried Kirkdale almost +hysterically, as he flung himself into a chair. + +‘Well, that’s agreed; now let’s clear the ground before us. You are in +love with my wife; I am as much in love with her myself as the holy +estate of matrimony will permit a man to be. She is in love with me, +and not with you, unless I am very much deceived.’ + +‘Yes, yes. I had no hope of that kind. I don’t know if you can +understand or not, but I would do anything on earth to save her pain +and to make her life happy.’ + +‘The feeling does you honour, my dear boy. It is one often roused by +unrequited affection. A woman who does not love you is always an angel, +a woman who does is often a devil.’ + +‘Look here, Travers, don’t keep her down in that wretched hole any +longer. Let her go on the stage.’ + +‘I can’t do that, old fellow.’ + +‘Why not?’ + +‘I know too much about it. The stage isn’t a fit place for a woman +unless she is a firstrate actress; she must be able to boss the show or +quit.’ + +‘But she could boss the show, she’d be firstrate.’ + +‘Not quite that, old fellow. I first saw her on the stage; I could see +all she had in her at a glance; it wasn’t good enough.’ + +‘She has been on the stage, then?’ + +‘Yes; you may have heard of her, there was some talk of her early in +the year. Grace Lovell was her name.’ + +‘I do vaguely remember hearing something or other about her.’ + +‘How long was she on the stage before you met her?’ + +‘Five or six years, I think. She has been working hard down in the +country.’ + +‘What at?’ + +‘Oh, reading things. I know I heard her read a bit of Shelley, which +fetched me more than anything I’ve ever heard on the stage.’ + +‘Well, I’ll see what we can do--with her.’ + +‘You may rely on me, if you want help.’ + +‘Thanks, old fellow.’ + +‘And in the meantime?’ + +‘We shall meet at Cowes on Monday. By-the-bye, can I be of any use to +you?’ and Kirkdale took out his pocket-book. + +‘Well, old man, if you like to make it a pony this time it would be +rather a weight off my mind.’ + +Kirkdale handed over some notes. Travers took them, folded them up +deliberately, buttoned his coat, took up his hat and stick, and walked +out of the room. He nodded pleasantly to Kirkdale as he closed the door +after him. + +Kirkdale sat still for some time, then he lighted a cigar and began to +smoke. As he was finishing it the footman tapped and asked if he was at +home to Mr. Clausen. Kirkdale signified that he would see him, and Mr. +Clausen was shown up. + +‘Stephen, my boy,’ he said, ‘this must be put a stop to. I have just +come round from the club, and that fellow Travers came in and is hand +in glove with every one. Potter was there, and they are sitting down to +_écarté_. You know what it will end in--there will be a devil of a row.’ + +‘I can’t help it, old fellow; I have tied my hands in the matter. I +must let things take their course. It won’t hurt Robert if he does lose +his money.’ + +‘But, my dear fellow, we can’t possibly countenance this sort of thing. +A man must draw the line somewhere, and I draw it at conniving at----’ + +‘It’s no use, I tell you. He must be left alone; at any rate, for the +present.’ + +‘Well, if nothing else will move you, I suppose I shall have to tell +you what I really fear from him. He will marry your sister----’ + +‘Oh no, he won’t.’ + +‘You don’t know her as well as I do. She is a woman who will have her +own way, whatever it costs.’ + +‘He cannot marry her.’ + +‘It is what he has been working for the whole time.’ + +‘You’re a fool!’ yelled Stephen. ‘No, no, no! I dare say you’re right. +I’ve been thinking about something else. I dare say he’s capable of it. +But I tell you she’s quite safe. He is already married.’ + +‘And therefore you consider she is quite safe.’ + +‘She is my sister, sir.’ + +‘And your father’s daughter.’ + +‘You will drive me wild between you all,’ cried Stephen. + +‘My dear boy, it’s for your own sake.’ + +‘All the damnable things done under heaven are done for my sake it +would seem.’ + +‘Have you no regard for duty? Would you like to see your sister fall a +victim to this swindler?’ + +‘She must be told he is married, of course.’ + +‘And that he is a low cad no gentleman would associate with.’ + +‘Yes, Clausen, yes, anything you like--anything you like. Be off with +you and tell her all you told me and all I have told you. Be off now, +no time like the present.’ + +‘Stop a bit! not so fast, my young friend. I want a little more +explanation from you first. You say he is married. Where does he +conceal his wife?’ + +‘She is at Old Windsor.’ + +‘You have made several excursions there lately. What is she like?’ + +‘Oh, young and pretty; much too good for him.’ + +‘Too vague, my boy, describe her.’ + +‘I don’t know how to describe her.’ + +‘Well, is she dark or fair, tall or short?’ + +‘She’s dark. No though, her hair is black and curly, and her eyes are +brown, but she has a most beautifully fair complexion. As you sit and +watch her reading, you wonder which is the whitest, the little bit of +neck shown behind her ear, or the white lawn stuff she ties round her +throat.’ + +‘Is she tall?’ + +‘About a head shorter than I am; I suppose that is tallish for a woman. +Yes, she’s tall, and very, very graceful. She walks beautifully, makes +you remember all the old bits of poetry you learned at school.’ + +‘How does he treat her?’ + +‘I don’t know.’ + +‘How’s that?’ + +‘I have never seen them together.’ + +‘But----’ + +‘She lives at the cottage, he at the house.’ + +‘He isn’t married to her.’ + +‘Oh yes, he is; I made him confess.’ + +‘What was she?’ + +‘An actress.’ + +‘No good, of course.’ + +‘Why?’ + +‘He’d be making money out of her if she were.’ + +‘Her name was Grace Lovell.’ + +‘What! that little girl? Why, she’s got the makings of a great actress +in her. How comes he to be so shortsighted as to let her remain idle?’ + +‘He tells me she’s not good enough.’ + +‘Much he knows! Why, she’s delicious; so fresh, so spontaneous. She’d +take the town in no time. How old is she?’ + +‘About twenty or twenty-one.’ + +‘Well, to think that rascal has got hold of her. I was wondering only +the other day what had become of her, and I asked Horsham what made +him part with her. He said she had insisted on leaving, and he fancied +she’d gone abroad with some man.’ + +‘I wish to God she had! Anything would be better for her than being +tied to such a devil as that.’ Then Kirkdale asked suddenly, ‘By the +way, didn’t you say Travers was the son of that old rascal Swanwick?’ + +‘Ah yes, capital actor he was; we don’t see that sort of thing now. +He knew his business thoroughly, and did it. No high-falutin about +intellect, imagination, and rubbish of that sort. He had the instinct +here’--and Mr. Clausen thumped his chest,--‘and let the new school say +what they like, that’s the place to find the link between an actor and +his audience.’ + +‘That girl has it _there_ too, if ever woman had,’ murmured Kirkdale +dreamily. ‘You should hear her read Shelley.’ + +‘Shelley, nonsense! she’s a comedy actress. No doubt she has the touch +of pathos necessary for that line; but no power, no passion.’ + +‘She may have altered since you saw her, she’s very young.’ + +‘Yes, that’s possible. It happened in the case of Décles. You sometimes +do get a surprise from a woman in that way.’ + +‘Now, Clausen, like a good fellow, think over what’s to be done. I am +determined to get her back on the stage. Shall I take a theatre for +her?’ + +‘What nonsense! As things are at present, you might just as well chuck +your capital into the gutter. She won’t draw until she’s done a good +deal more hard work, and if you gave him such an opportunity, Travers +would spend your money for you and she’d get none of the benefit.’ + +‘No, the first step is evidently to get rid of Travers.’ + +‘That is very easily done. I have only to say what I know.’ + +‘I wonder if he has anything up his sleeve: he’s always vaguely hinting +that certain personages are at his mercy,’ said Kirkdale. + +‘Very likely he has a whole bundle of scurrilous gossip at his +finger-ends; but after all it doesn’t very much matter, people say all +they can now, and no respectable paper gives currency to these things. +Such stories serve two purposes: they give the radicals something to +talk about, and add considerably to the popular interest. “One touch of +nature makes the whole world kin,” and the poor sinner in the street +feels his heart go out to the weaknesses of the great, in a way never +to be invoked by the mere pompous exterior of public ceremonial.’ + +‘But think of the effect on public opinion.’ + +‘My dear boy, when Burke said a country was ruled by its public +opinion, he was right. The only difficulty about it is that the real +public opinion is never expressed; what is expressed is what each man +or woman thinks his or her neighbours consider ought to be his or her +opinion. But to return to Grace Lovell; what do you suppose she would +do if her husband was sent back into limbo?’ + +‘I’m terribly afraid she’d go with him.’ + +‘Have you ever discussed the position with her?’ + +‘She does not even know I am aware of the marriage, she has kept her +own counsel; all she has said to me was, that she was anxious to go on +the stage.’ + +‘Let’s go down and find out about her. I want a little country air, and +have nothing on earth to do on Monday.’ + +‘I was going down to Cowes, but I’m sick of the function there; if I go +down on Tuesday or Wednesday I shall see all I want,’ said Kirkdale. + +‘Agreed; well, I’ll be off. Find out the best train, and call for me in +the morning.’ + +A loud knock at the front door delayed Clausen’s contemplated +departure. He looked at his watch and said, ‘By Jove, it’s two o’clock! +We’d better open the door, the servants will be in bed.’ + +Potter was standing on the doorstep. He entered, and said, ‘Sorry to +disturb you, but it’s rather important I should see you at once, +Kirkdale.’ + +Clausen offered to go. Potter stopped him, saying, ‘It doesn’t signify. +It’ll be all over the place to-morrow. Only I thought I owed it to +Kirkdale here to warn him.’ + +‘Well, come in; sit down and have a smoke.’ + +‘I don’t mind if I do; I want to settle myself a little. To tell the +truth, we’ve had a hell of a row.’ + +‘Ah!’ said Kirkdale, feeling his blood run cold, ‘it’s all out, then?’ + +‘What, you knew? And you allowed such a man to associate with your +mother and sisters. You must be mad.’ + +‘Yes, I suppose I am. What has occurred?’ + +‘I suspected Travers, from the first time I saw him. Then Maisy came +home charmed with him. You’ll pardon my saying so, but I always regard +that as a bad sign; I find she has a natural affinity for rogues.’ + +Clausen chuckled. + +‘I admit it. I am no exception. I am no doubt a rogue myself, but that +doesn’t make me inclined to tolerate other rogues. I met this Travers +at the club two or three times, and I noticed him playing at cards. +To-night I proposed a game of _écarté_, and gave him a good chance for +his particular little game. I caught him in the very act, and, as I +have said, there was a devil of a row.’ + +‘What has become of him?’ + +‘Well, after we had made it sufficiently clear to him that we did not +desire more love and knowledge of him, he went out into the void. I +followed shortly after and came here, thinking he possibly might have +come to give you his version of the affair, and there might be another +chance of wigs on the green. My blood’s up now. That’s the worst of +a nature like mine. Just as I get thoroughly roused and interested +everything is over. And my blood has to simmer down again in a +desolation of peace and good humour.’ + +‘He hasn’t been here. But I’ll tell you what, Potter, I’d have given a +thousand pounds not to have had this happen to-night.’ + +‘I’m very sorry, Kirkdale, but next time you propose to bring a +cardsharper and blackguard into your family circle you had better take +us into your confidence, so that we can have some common basis of +operations. Good night, Clausen. Good night, Stephen. Better luck next +time, eh!’ + + * * * * * + +Grace Lovell was lying asleep when a hansom cab drove up. Travers +opened the door of the cottage with a latch-key, and bursting into her +room told her to give him a couple of sovereigns without delay. She +scrambled up, opened her little desk, and produced the money. He paid +his cab, then came in, sat down heavily on the side of the bed, and +breathed hard for a moment or two. Suddenly he fell forward on the +floor. She sprang to his side, wetted his face, loosened his collar, +held smelling salts to his nose, but for a long time it seemed to her +his heart had altogether ceased to beat. Presently he moved slightly, +and she renewed her efforts to revive him, calling him by all the +endearing terms she could think of. At last he put out his arm and +held her gently against him, whispering that she was his darling wife. +She nestled close to him and kept perfectly still, waiting for him to +speak. After a long time he opened his eyes and sat up; she begged him +to lie down on the bed, which he did, but it was some time before he +spoke. Then he said, ‘It’s all up, Gracie, I’m a ruined man. I shall +have to go away.’ + +‘What has happened, my dearest?’ + +‘They have done for me between them. You know I told you that I knew a +good deal more than some people would like to set about; well, they +came to hear of it, and they have made use of one of their agents, a +despicable man, to ruin me in the eyes of society. He induced me to +play _écarté_ with him; he manipulated the cards in such a way that I +should appear to be cheating; then he denounced me before the whole +club, and they believed him. I had to go.’ + +‘O George, why didn’t you turn the tables on him, and tell them what he +had done?’ + +‘My dear child, it’s no use a woman supposing she can understand these +things; you must take what I tell you on trust; don’t keep making +idiotic suggestions, and asking idiotic questions. I tell you it was +so, that should be enough for you.’ + +‘Yes, George. What are you going to do?’ + +‘God knows.’ + +‘George.’ + +‘Yes.’ + +‘Are you sure you didn’t do it?’ + +‘Didn’t what?’ + +‘Didn’t cheat.’ + +‘Of course not, of course not! Oh, do go to sleep. I’ve talked until +I’m wearied out. I shall go up to the house now.’ + +‘Are you well enough?’ + +‘Don’t bother,’ and he went out banging the door after him. He lay in +bed all day on Monday. About five o’clock he ordered some tea, and +played with little Pierre, then he got up and dined. He did not go down +to the cottage until about ten o’clock. He found Grace busily engaged +packing up. He lounged in, and said, ‘What _are_ you doing?’ + +‘I am going up to London.’ + +‘What for?’ + +‘I am going back to Horsham’s Theatre.’ + +‘No, you are not.’ + +‘Yes, I am.’ + +‘How dare you speak to me like this?’ + +‘Because I dare speak to any one like this, when I do not love them.’ + +‘Oh! oh! that’s it, is it? We’ll see,’ and he came towards her +threateningly. + +She stood perfectly still, looking straight into his eyes. He dropped +his hands and sat down, saying sneeringly, ‘I always thought women were +brutes, now I see it’s perfectly true.’ + +‘Yes,’ she said, ‘women are brutes. If you had loved me, if you had +believed in me, and trusted me last night, nothing would have made +me leave you. I should not have cared if you had been a thief, or a +murderer perhaps.’ Here he interrupted her. + +‘Oh, don’t let us have all these heroics. I know it all: you’d go to +hell for me, wouldn’t you, as long as I feed your insatiable passion +for admiration? I’m sick of women and their melodramas.’ She stood +still looking at him. ‘I’ll just tell you the plain facts of the case,’ +he continued more calmly. ‘Our love was of that resistless kind, +brought about when the appetite is so strong that every other faculty, +all prudence, all considerations of every sort, are thrust on one +side to gratify it. I admit it is a very charming state of things for +the parties concerned, while it lasts, but it does not last long. Our +delirium is over. You are a woman full of dreams and imaginations; you +worry me with the persistent foolishness of your ideas and ideals. I am +a man who knows all the moves, and the long and short of it is that I +know how to play the game; you do not.’ + +‘I shall soon learn, and perhaps my game will not be such a losing one +as yours has been.’ + +‘No one can tell, but the game is over sooner or later, and then it +doesn’t matter much whether you have lost or won, the pleasure is in +the game itself.’ + +‘Perhaps it does matter.’ + +‘I don’t think so. What really matters is letting your chessmen rule +you, that is what all mediocre people do.’ + +‘Why have you never talked seriously to me before?’ + +‘Because you were in love with me.’ + +‘What a horribly unscrupulous wretch you are!’ + +‘In his relations with women a man has to act two parts: at first +he must be Adam, young, ardent, and resistless, then he must be the +serpent, able to teach her all wisdom of the world.’ + +‘And is neither part a serious one?’ + +‘That depends upon the woman. Now we’ll talk things over quietly. You +want to go back to Horsham’s Theatre?’ + +‘Yes.’ + +‘But it’s no use your going on as you used to do.’ + +‘No. I know I was very bad, but I think I shall be better now.’ + +‘Well, let’s see what you’ve got in you, and then I shall know what is +to be done.’ + +He put her through the balcony scene in _Romeo and Juliet_, making +her cry with his severity, torturing her, and finding fault in every +possible way with her efforts to express the feeling of the words she +uttered. At the end of it she stood hopeless and dumfoundered at the +new world opening before her. For the first time it dawned on her what +acting really meant. She looked timidly at Travers. He was sitting in +a chair watching her doubtfully. He said, ‘Yes, that’s very good. You +work away at that, and we’ll do them all yet.’ + +‘You think I can go back to Horsham’s Theatre?’ + +‘No, I do not. But I’ll tell you what we will do. I’ll run you through +the States as a star, and then I’ll bring you over to England as a new +American actress. We’ll do them yet.’ + +‘But who is to pay?’ + +‘I’ll find the money, don’t you worry your head about that.’ + + * * * * * + +On the following Tuesday the waiter at the Crown Hotel, Cowes, +respectfully informed Lady Kirkdale that Mr. Potter had sent the +pinnace of the _Sunflower_ to convey their ladyships on board. + +‘I suppose, as Kirkdale hasn’t arrived yet, you and I will have to go +by ourselves,’ said Lady Kirkdale. + +‘It’s a very funny thing he should suddenly change his mind and leave +us in the lurch like this.’ + +‘Perhaps Mr. Travers will be able to give us some information; he is to +be with the Potters to-day, I believe.’ + +‘I thought he would have called on us this morning. I didn’t +understand, Maisy, that he was to stay on board with them. Don’t you +think it’s rather odd of the Potters to ask him to stay there when +Kirkdale hasn’t anywhere to go to?’ + +‘A great many things in this life are odd, my dear, and I’m afraid my +thinking won’t alter them, so I don’t trouble my head.’ + +As Geraldine climbed the side of the yacht she looked in vain for +Travers. + +‘What has happened to everybody?’ she said to Maisy the moment she +could take her aside. + +‘Why? what have you heard?’ asked Maisy doubtfully. + +‘Nothing. Kirkdale has not sent a word of explanation. I thought we +should get an explanation from Mr. Travers, but he is not here either.’ + +‘Come down to my cabin a minute,’ said Maisy, leading the way into an +exceedingly shipshape-looking little apartment, full of the typical +_multum in parvo_ contrivances which have been invented for the +convenience of those who have little space at command. They sat down on +the locker, and Maisy began-- + +‘A dreadful thing has happened, and I don’t know how to break it to +mamma, I’m sure.’ + +‘To whom?’ + +‘Of course, I think Kirkdale terribly to blame for not making sure +first----’ + +‘What are you talking of? Is Kirkdale dead?’ + +‘No, no, what nonsense! I mean he should have made sure of Mr. Travers.’ + +‘Good God, Maisy! you will drive me mad. Is Mr. Travers dead? Say yes +or no.’ + +‘Perhaps it would be better if he were.’ + +‘Has he had an accident? Is Kirkdale nursing him?’ + +‘I tell you he’s quite well. You won’t let me explain properly what has +happened.’ + +‘Go on,’ said Geraldine, in a dull, toneless voice. + +‘He played a game of _écarté_ with Robert at the club on Saturday +night, and Robert found out that he was cheating him.’ + +‘What did Robert do?’ + +‘Well, he watched him very carefully, and when he was quite sure he got +up and told him he would not play any more with him.’ + +‘Then what happened?’ + +‘The members of the club were very angry, I believe, and agreed that +Mr. Travers should not be re-admitted.’ + +‘I think Robert behaved abominably.’ + +‘Why?’ + +‘I think he owed it to Kirkdale to shield his friend. What does it +matter whether a man cheats at cards or not? Everybody cheats, at other +things besides cards, in their own particular way.’ + +‘My dear Geraldine, how often have I told you we must take things as +we find them? It is considered wrong for men to cheat at cards, and it +disgraces them. It is not considered very wrong for women to cheat at +cards; people rather expect it, and laugh at it. It’s no use arguing +about it. It is so, and there’s an end of it.’ + +‘Why should there be one law for men and another for women?’ + +‘I don’t know, I dare say there are some things winked at in a man +which would not be permitted to women. I don’t know what they are, but +one never can tell.’ + +‘What will Mr. Travers do?’ + +‘Disappear.’ + +‘O Maisy, how dreadful! I expect he is terribly hard up. Can’t we help +him?’ + +‘I expect Kirkdale is seeing after him. Kirkdale is very foolish. It is +a great pity he has not turned out better. He is such a very handsome +man.’ + +‘I don’t think Mr. Travers handsome, if you are talking of him; but +there was a sort of pleasure in his society I never felt with any one +else.’ + +‘Yes, he had a charm, there is no doubt of that.’ + +‘You think so. You felt it too. O Maisy, Maisy, whatever shall I do?’ +Lady Geraldine broke down into passionate sobs. ‘I am a fool! What +shall I do? what shall I do?’ she cried. + +‘My poor dear Gerry, don’t cry; I didn’t know it was as serious as all +this. I took a great fancy to him myself, but I don’t feel as badly as +you do, thank goodness.’ + +‘I know he is the only man in the world I could ever care for,’ sobbed +Geraldine. + +‘Try and think of somebody else.’ + +‘I hate everybody else. If I think of other people, it is only to think +of the difference between him and them. He is so graceful, they are so +proper. He always has something charming to say, they always say the +things one has heard over and over again. He is like the Dancing Faun, +they are like a tailor’s block. Oh, what is the use of saying all this? +He makes my heart beat with happiness when I only hear his footstep. +When I touch other men my blood turns cold, and my heart turns to ice.’ + +‘Geraldine, Geraldine, you are really dreadful. I’m sure it isn’t at +all proper to feel like that. I never felt so about Robert. I always +liked other people. Of course, one feels that one’s husband _is_ one’s +husband. But still----’ + +‘I never thought I felt like this till to-day; I didn’t realise it +before: it has come upon me suddenly. It is as if I had been swimming +about in beautiful blue water, and suddenly found myself being sucked +down by a whirlpool.’ + +‘Don’t you think we had better ask mamma about it? I really don’t know +what to advise.’ + +‘Not on any account. Swear to me you will not breathe a word of this to +any one. I shall get over it. Don’t be afraid. See now, I will bathe my +eyes and come upstairs.’ + +Geraldine soon effaced all traces of her emotion, except a slight +redness about the whites of her eyes, and the two sisters went on deck. + +Robert Potter had in the meantime communicated the news to Lady +Kirkdale, who was sitting under a large Japanese umbrella looking +unusually perturbed. Geraldine took her place under the awning and was +soon surrounded with a group of merrymakers, and she laughed and talked +and picnicked, drank champagne, and made feeble jokes, quite as gaily +as the rest. However, directly she got back to the hotel she told her +mother her head ached. She went and shut herself up in her room. Here +she wrote the following letter:-- + + ‘DEAR MR. TRAVERS,--I am so sorry, so very sorry, for what has + happened. I have been afraid you were in money difficulties for some + time. Will you give me the happiness of helping you out of them? + Believe me, you have my deepest sympathy. I don’t believe in society, + or any of its laws. I enclose twenty-five pounds in notes, hoping + you will accept them as a proof that I will do anything I can to + extricate you from the difficulties in which you are involved.--Yours + always sincerely, + ‘GERALDINE FITZJUSTIN.’ + +She took the letter to the post herself. It was almost the first time +in her life she had left the house unattended. She felt that every one +must know what she was doing, that she was being watched, and that +the post-office clerk guessed the reason of her sending a registered +letter. At last she completed the business, and putting the tell-tale +little flimsy receipt-paper in her purse, she hurried back to the +hotel. Just as she entered it she encountered Lord Kirkdale and Mr. +Clausen, who had that moment arrived. + +‘Out alone, Lady Geraldine?’ + +‘Yes, what is one to do when one’s brother deserts one like this?’ + +‘Your maid?’ + +‘Gone out herself; she didn’t expect us back so soon, I suppose; we +have been on board the _Sunflower_ all the afternoon, you know.’ + +‘Have you heard the news?’ asked Kirkdale as they entered the private +sitting-room. + +‘Yes; what has become of Mr. Travers? Is he at Old Windsor?’ + +‘He is.’ + +She sighed with relief. + +‘Clausen and I went down yesterday and arranged to get his wife +something to do.’ + +‘His wife!’ + +‘Oh! didn’t you know that he was married? I thought you said you had +heard the news.’ + +‘Married? married? When? who to?’ + +‘About three months ago: a most beautiful girl. You may have heard of +her--Grace Lovell--she was an actress.’ + +‘I don’t remember,’ said Geraldine, in a bewildered tone. ‘What did you +say? Why didn’t he tell us?’ + +‘I can’t say. It’s all very ugly, on the face of it; and I tell you +what, Geraldine, I’ve come to the conclusion that he’s one of the +biggest villains on earth. I did you all a terrible wrong in bringing +him to the house. I have to ask your forgiveness.’ + +She looked at her brother a long time, and the tears gathered in her +eyes; then she turned away, and hastily entered her own room. Here she +found her maid laying out her clothes for the evening. + +‘Never mind now, Elizabeth, I want to lie down quietly.’ As she spoke +she crossed to her writing-desk and her eyes fell on a sheet of +note-paper on which she had scribbled the first wild words that had +come into her head when she sat down to write to George Travers. There +they were, staring her in the face, ‘My dearest, dearest one on earth, +I have heard of your ruin. Come and let me see you once more. I will +give you all I have to enable you to----’; then she had stopped herself +and written the more moderate note for his eyes, leaving her real +passionate words, the words which had been the expression of her inmost +feelings, for the eyes of her maid. + +She turned to look at the woman, but found she was calmly taking her +wrapper out of the wardrobe. Had she seen or not? No trace was visible +on her face. Geraldine sat down in front of the glass, and said, ‘You +can wash my head, Elizabeth; I think it will refresh me.’ + +The woman made all the preparations. While she had gone for hot water, +Geraldine seized the incriminating note and tore it into a thousand +pieces. She had just time to thrust it behind the grate and walk +quietly across the room when the maid re-entered. Her eye fell for a +moment on the writing-table. ‘She has read it,’ thought Geraldine. She +sat quite still for a long time; then she said, ‘What should you say if +I were to marry Lord Foreshort after all, Elizabeth?’ + +Elizabeth started visibly. + +‘I should hope your ladyship would be very happy, I’m sure.’ + +‘Why were you so surprised?’ + +‘I didn’t think your ladyship seemed willing to take him before.’ + +There was a long pause while her hair was washed, and Elizabeth was +rubbing vigorously when Lady Geraldine said, ‘How is your poor sister +now?’ + +‘The one that was deceived so cruelly?’ + +‘Yes. The one that fell in love with a married man.’ + +‘Well, your ladyship, I didn’t like to tell you after all your kindness +to her in finding her that place and all, but I’m very much afraid +she’s gone off to America with him.’ + +‘Really! She has done that, has she?’ + +‘I was afraid your ladyship would be annoyed, so I didn’t mention it. +But she disappeared, and some time afterwards I had a letter from her, +telling me about how he had got a bit of land out in Canada, and she +had joined him there.’ + +‘And what were they doing?’ + +‘I’m sorry to say, they seemed doing very well; she wrote most bright +and cheerful like. I must beg your ladyship’s pardon for saying it, but +they do say the wicked flourish like green bay trees, don’t they, your +ladyship?’ + +‘I suppose they do, sometimes; but don’t be sorry they are happy, +Elizabeth.’ + +‘No, your ladyship.’ + +‘Elizabeth, I want you to bring all the letters that come for me into +my bedroom. Tell the waiter to give them to you.’ + +‘Yes, your ladyship.’ + +‘You’d better have that black silk petticoat; it will be nice and cool +for you to wear, and I shall keep to white all the rest of the summer.’ + +‘Yes, your ladyship.’ + +‘Now I will lie down; don’t let me be disturbed until it is time to +dress for dinner.’ + +‘No, your ladyship.’ + + * * * * * + +‘A telegram for your ladyship,’ said Elizabeth as Geraldine entered her +bedroom about twelve o’clock next morning to get ready for a stroll on +the beach. + +‘All right. I shall not want you for a minute or two.’ Elizabeth +discreetly left the room. + +She opened the brown envelope, took out the flimsy pink paper, and +read, ‘Have started for Portsmouth. Will write. Travers.’ + +That she could not prevent, that she could do nothing to stop, him +coming was a thought that filled her with exultation. He was getting +nearer and nearer every moment; and what was more, she was to have +a letter from him--it would arrive that evening by the last post +perhaps; if not, certainly in the morning. Then she thought of his +being married, but it made no difference; she knew he had married +before he saw her, that was all that really mattered to her. She rang +for Elizabeth, and crushing the telegram up put it into the front +of her dress. She dressed, and went out in the highest spirits. She +was charming to every one, and made herself so agreeable that Lord +Foreshort felt quite encouraged. He said, ‘How well this climate agrees +with you!’ + +‘Doesn’t it. It is exactly the sort of place I like: plenty of life +about, and at the same time everything is clean, and spick and span.’ + +‘It’s perfect. Our tastes are so alike.’ + +‘You are always saying that, Lord Foreshort.’ + +‘I am always thinking it, Lady Geraldine.’ + +‘Then you have no time to think about your tastes?’ + +‘No, I am always thinking of yours.’ + +‘So am I.’ + +‘There, I told you we agreed.’ + +‘Well, that’s settled. Now let us talk of something else.’ + +‘When will you begin to let me hope.’ + +‘You are hoping now, are you not?’ + +‘Do you really mean it?’ + +‘Mean what?’ + +‘That I may hope?’ + +‘I can’t prevent you hoping, can I?’ + +‘Yes, you know you can.’ + +‘Well, I’ve tried to a good many times.’ + +‘But you will give up trying now, won’t you? Take another tack.’ + +‘Very well. You have hoped without my permission the whole of the +London season; you can hope with my permission during the shooting +season, then perhaps you will be sick of hope.’ + +‘Yes, I shall claim my reward then.’ + +‘Ah! that’s “another story.” We mustn’t get on too fast.’ + +That evening the expected letter arrived. It ran thus-- + + ‘DEAR LADY GERALDINE,--You have restored my belief in the human race. + I have indeed received a crushing blow from your brother-in-law, and + it is not fitting that I should inform you of the true facts of the + case. Honour seals my lips. But although it is forbidden to me to + justify myself in your eyes without degrading those who must ever be + first in your esteem, your generous letter emboldens me to ask you to + believe me, on my bare word, that things are not as they, no doubt, + have been represented to you. I am coming to Portsmouth so as to hold + myself in readiness to obey any commands you may care to issue to + your most devoted adorer, + ‘GEORGE TRAVERS.’ + +Geraldine wondered a good deal over this letter, but all the same she +wore it next her heart for four days. She wrote in reply-- + + ‘DEAR MR. TRAVERS,--I can’t think of any way of seeing you here, but + next Monday we go to our place near Ringwood. If you will put up at + the village hotel there, I will write and let you know what I can + arrange.--Yours most sincerely, + ‘G. F.’ + +On Sunday she took a long walk with a party of friends. She and +Mr. Clausen were ahead. Mr. Clausen knew the island well, and had +undertaken to act as pioneer. By degrees she led the conversation to +the subject which occupied so many of her thoughts, and Clausen found +himself giving her a full account of what had taken place at Old +Windsor the previous Monday. + +‘Kirkdale and I went down to Datchet and drove to Old Windsor: there +we found Mrs. Travers occupying a little cottage, pretty enough in its +way, but only fit for a labouring man,--the chairs covered and windows +hung with white dimity, an old oak settle, and so on. You know the +kind of thing.’ + +‘What is she like?’ + +‘An exceedingly pretty, dark, slight woman. She is very young; but +she gives you an extraordinary impression of knowing her own mind at +moments.’ + +‘What is her version of their life together?’ + +‘She spoke of nothing but her great desire to go on the stage again; he +has been preventing her doing so, all this time. They appear to have +been exceedingly happy together otherwise.’ + +‘Do you believe he really loves her?’ + +‘He must have, I should think; there seems to have been no other reason +why he should marry her?’ + +‘He may have liked her at first, but perhaps she is a shallow sort of +person. I should think he wanted a very deep nature to sympathise with +him.’ + +‘I don’t think she is shallow; but you mustn’t forget, when you talk +of depth of character, the thinnest sheet of gold-leaf is a good deal +more valuable than a whole bogful of mud.’ + +‘And is she going back to the stage now?’ + +‘We promised to arrange it for her. Horsham is a great friend of mine. +She made her success with him, and he was delighted to hear she was +ready to come back again; but now----’ + +‘What?’ said Lady Geraldine. + +‘Well, I fear her husband has found out what a little gold-mine she may +become. She wrote to me yesterday, saying he had been coaching her in +some leading parts, and proposed touring with her in the States if he +can get some capital to start them.’ + +‘But isn’t he fearfully hard up now?’ + +‘A man like that is never without resources; if he cannot get money out +of men, he can get it out of women.’ + +‘O Mr. Clausen, how dreadful that sounds!’ + +‘Lady Geraldine, I beg your pardon. I should not have said such a +thing to you; forgive me.’ + +‘No, Mr. Clausen, I beg of you, don’t think I am so absurd; girls hear +of all sorts of things nowadays. I want to know what you really think +Mr. Travers will do.’ + +‘He will do anything that he thinks most likely to bring in a quick +return.’ + +‘But what is his object? His tastes are so fastidious. I cannot imagine +his being content to mix with actors and actresses for the rest of +his life, they are such flashy, noisy people. Whenever one sees any +very disagreeable set at Henley or Lords, one is always told they are +actresses.’ + +‘Yes, that is the phrase, of course; still, in justice to the +profession, I must say that a great many actresses go about quite as +dowdily as the royal family. There is no distinctive badge which can be +applied to all the members of the profession.’ + +‘But I cannot imagine Mr. Travers tolerating anything that isn’t in the +best taste.’ + +‘He no doubt prefers everything about him to be of the best; but as +he has effectually cut himself off from it by being twice caught in +the act of cheating at cards, he will have to satisfy himself with the +second best now.’ + +‘Tell me what is a man’s real feeling about this cheating at cards. +Why is it the most terrible sin he can commit? It seems to me, from +hearing people talk, that it is quite possible to break every one of +the commandments without losing a single acquaintance, but directly you +commit this particular crime the whole world cuts you.’ + +‘I will explain. You know among the Arabs there is another unwritten +law, that you may kill or destroy the property of any man who annoys +you; but if you have once eaten salt with him, you must hold your hand, +whatever provocation you may receive. All these things are a sign of a +bond that exists between certain members of the community. Cards are to +the European what salt is to the Arabian. They are the sacred symbol of +fidelity; and any man who does not feel this must be cast out.’ + +‘But why? it seems such an arbitrary thing.’ + +‘I can’t help that. We have all been brought up to believe that it is +a beastly thing to betray our friends; and a man must be regarded as a +friend from the moment you sit down to a game of chance with him.’ + +‘Well, I don’t believe I shall ever understand; but perhaps women have +no moral sense.’ + +‘Exactly what I have always said, Lady Geraldine. The only safe place +for a woman is under lock and key, and even then you ought to stop up +the keyhole with sealing-wax.’ + +‘It is because we are kept under lock and key that we don’t care what +we do. We feel we are unjustly treated, and that we have a perfect +right to cheat, and lie, and prevaricate. It is the only means of +retaliation we have. Oh, I wonder if the time will ever come when we +shall get fair play.’ + +‘No, it will not; I can tell you that much. No man or woman, from the +Queen down to the beggar who spends the night on a doorstep, gets fair +play. There isn’t a single human being in all the world who hasn’t been +kept back from doing all he might by other people, or by circumstances +of one sort or another. This place is meant for a struggle; and the +only way to get through it comfortably is to cultivate a taste for +struggling.’ + +‘I’m sure you know you needn’t say that to me, Mr. Clausen.’ + +‘Yes, you struggle a little--too much, in fact; for the secret of all +success is to discern the difference between the possible and the +impossible. Turn your back on the impossible, and make steadily for the +possible.’ + +‘O Mr. Clausen, how wise you sound now! I wish I had been there to see +when you were young.’ + +‘I wish you had. You would no doubt have found me quite foolish enough +to please you then.’ + +‘And did you turn your back on the impossible?’ + +‘Yes.’ + +‘And are you glad you did?’ + +‘No.’ + +‘Ah, I knew that.’ + +‘It is perfectly true, a temptation resisted gives you no pleasure; but +that does not prevent a temptation yielded to giving you an inevitable +retribution.’ + +‘Oh, that sounds so like a copy-book, I am sure it can’t be true.’ + +‘What do you mean?’ + +‘Mr. Clausen, can’t you understand what it is when a girl grows up and +finds out bit by bit everything she has been taught and told is a pack +of lies.’ + +‘But surely your mother----’ + +‘No, no, it isn’t my mother; it’s the governesses, it’s the nurses, +it’s the silly novels, it’s other girls. It makes me shudder when I +think what a world of shams I’m living in, and what a sham I am myself.’ + +‘My dear child, I fear I have only one consolation to offer you, and +that is, that you would shudder a good deal more if you for one moment +saw the truths which underlie these shams.’ + +‘You talk as if the world was a pest-house. Surely we are some of us +beautiful; we are not all diseased and horrible.’ + +‘One hears a good deal about the beauty of life; but I am very much +afraid you will find in the long run that the beauty of life is like +the beauty of a lady’s complexion--very fleeting, or else sham.’ + +‘There I have cornered you, Mr. Clausen. There’s a beauty about a +gypsy’s skin which isn’t fleeting, and which is very real; and it is +beautiful, just because it is exposed to the sun and the rain. In a +word, freedom is beauty, and gives beauty.’ + +‘Well, perhaps there’s something in what you say; but I don’t think +you’d find gypsies very satisfactory companions at close quarters.’ + +‘I should like to get a chance of seeing for myself.’ + +‘Take my advice, and don’t. I am sure your tastes are too fastidious +for such realities as that,’ said Mr. Clausen, laughing. Here the rest +of the party came up, conversation ceased, and chatter reigned in its +stead. + + * * * * * + +Lady Geraldine’s mind was much perturbed by her conversation with +Clausen. She doubted Travers, but felt she must see him, she must +get some sort of proof herself. Poor girl! after all her outcry, she +was only a very ordinary woman, wrapped up in her own little chaos +of emotions and foolish little thoughts. She thought it would be +a splendid thing to sacrifice herself for love. Mediocrity was her +bugbear, just as it has been the bugbear of thousands of other mediocre +people, and she was ready to take the most desperate measures to escape +from it. The only way she could think of to show how different she was +from the rest of her sex was to cultivate her instincts and let them +lead her whither they would. To overcome the world and remain a slave +to your own passions has been the ideal of all the splendid failures of +history, but she only recognised their splendour, and did not stop to +consider their defeat. So, with her mind strung up to a high pitch of +romantic passion, Lady Geraldine went to meet Travers in the Kirkdale +woods. + +She found him leaning against a tree cleaning a horseshoe he had just +picked up. His little fox-terrier was running about smelling the +rabbit-holes and following trails with a suspicious and preoccupied +air, as if he was not quite sure whether these joys were permitted to +him or not. He ran forward to see who Geraldine was, and licked her +hand; then he hung his head and ran back to his master and sat down by +his side. Travers looked up; he had not seen Geraldine approach, and he +said, ‘So you have actually come to see the last of the poor outcast.’ + +‘Is it the last? Is it true that you are going to America to act?’ + +He started a little, wondering how this could have come to her +knowledge, but recovered himself quickly. ‘There seems nothing else +left for me to do.’ + +‘But if there was?’ + +‘I would gladly take the alternative.’ + +‘I thought so; I didn’t believe you could willingly take up that sort +of life.’ + +‘Indeed you are right there. What an angel you are to come here like +this! I can’t think how I deserved such a thing.’ + +‘I don’t know whether you deserve it or not, and I don’t care much: I +have come because I love you, and because--’ + +He took the hand she held out to him and kissed it; she put her other +hand round his neck, and he kissed her lips. Then feeling he had done +all that was expected of him, he was about to gallantly release her, +when he found she was almost fainting in his arms. + +‘By George, this is serious,’ he murmured, and he led her to a felled +tree, sat her down on it, and went to look for some water. When he +returned he found she was calmer. + +He had a little pocket flask with him and had filled the cup with +water. She refused to drink, but dipped her finger in it and wiped her +forehead. Then he sat down by her side, and she leant on his shoulder +and said-- + +‘What shall we do? Will you come away from England with me, or shall we +stay here?’ + +‘Whichever you think best; your wishes are my law.’ + +‘Well, I’ll tell you exactly how I stand. I have eight hundred pounds +a year now, and shall have four hundred pounds a year more when mamma +dies. It is settled on me, and they cannot take it from me whatever I +do.’ + +‘Ah!’ he said, ‘in the hands of trustees, I suppose.’ + +‘Yes, that is the worst of it: I cannot touch the capital.’ + +‘But, dear Lady Geraldine, have you ever considered what it would be +for two people to try and live on eight hundred pounds a year?’ + +‘I know it would be very difficult, but I am willing to try anything +if it will save you from that dreadful life. We could take a flat in +Venice or Florence, and you would have to be divorced; then we could be +married, and no one would mind in a few years.’ + +‘I am sure you would regret it, if you took such a step.’ + +‘I should never regret it. I hate this life in England. We would have +a beautiful home, and then we could come to your place at Old Windsor +sometimes.’ + +‘That is not my house.’ + +‘Not your house! what do you mean?’ + +‘It belongs to a friend of mine; he asked me to take it.’ Travers +stopped himself, and for once in his life, by a supreme effort, told +the truth. ‘I mean he offered to lend it me because he was going away. +You don’t know what a poor devil I am, Lady Geraldine.’ + +‘Don’t call me by that hateful title. And so you have been very, very +poor. Why, my wretched little eight hundred pounds a year will seem +quite a lot of money to you. I am so glad you know what it is to be +poor.’ + +‘I can’t deny that poverty and I are old bed-fellows, Lady Geraldine; +but all the same----’ + +‘Why are you hesitating?’ + +‘Well, it sounds rather ungrateful; but I think I ought to tell you +that if my wife and I went to America to-morrow, the very smallest +salary I would accept would be one hundred pounds a week between us.’ + +‘But your wife is not a great actress.’ + +‘No. If she were a great actress she would get that sum without having +me thrown in; but during my last engagement at Mallock’s Theatre I had +seventy pounds a week myself.’ + +‘I see; I cannot bribe you high enough. I am sorry to have troubled you +to come here to-night.’ + +‘I am terribly distressed about the whole business; but I am sure you +would be miserable living abroad like that yourself. Think of what it +would mean. I have been disgraced publicly; you would be disgraced; we +should both be shunned as if we were plague-stricken. I am sure you see +things as I do.’ + +Lady Geraldine got up to walk away. Suddenly she turned and flung +herself at Travers’s feet, saying: ‘Oh, don’t let us talk or think +about the hateful money! Act if you like, if you find it so profitable, +but don’t, don’t leave England. Cut yourself free from that woman. I +will do anything you like. I love you wildly, desperately. I cannot, +cannot leave you.’ + +He gently disengaged her fingers. She rose on her knees and looked him +straight in the eyes. Then she cried out-- + +‘You don’t love me the least little bit in the world. Why is it? Am +I not beautiful enough? Haven’t you told me a hundred times I was? O +George, George, tell me what is the meaning of it all!’ + +‘It means I love you too well to wish to injure you.’ + +‘Then you do not love me at all. Is it that you love this other woman, +this wife of yours?’ + +‘Perhaps; I can’t tell what it is.’ + +‘I will sit down quietly by your side now; I won’t rave at you any +more, don’t be afraid. Tell me exactly what you feel.’ She stood for +a moment, then put her hand in her pocket, took out her handkerchief, +then sat down, holding it in her lap. + +‘Now tell me, dear one,’ and she laid her hand on his arm. He shuddered +a little. She noticed it and removed her hand. ‘What do you feel about +her and me?’ + +‘Well,’ he said, ‘I think it must be this. When I fell in love with +her, I did so in the terrible blind, reckless way that only comes over +one once in a lifetime. It is more a nightmare than anything else. I +couldn’t understand myself at the time, and I can’t understand myself +now.’ + +‘Oh, you have got over it, then?’ she said, leaning towards him. + +‘Yes, I have got over it. I am sickened of love. But my wife is a +clever woman. I believe I can do something with her. She has a most +extraordinary talent for acting, and that interests me. I don’t +suppose there is a man alive, take it all in all, who knows more about +the tricks of the trade than I do. These are just what she wants to +be taught, and it is interesting to me to see what she’ll turn out. +This feeling has taken the place of love. She is about as tired of +love-making as I am, and now we are going to set seriously to work +together.’ + +‘But if you are so tired of love, why are you here to-night? Did you +think you would get money out of me to go to America with her?’ + +He laughed a little. ‘Well, it does sound absurd now you put it like +that, but I suppose I did.’ + +She was sitting to his right. Her fingers closed on something that had +been hidden in her handkerchief; then came the loud report of a pistol, +a puff of smoke, a groan from Travers as he fell sideways with a crash +in a heap among the brackens. + +Lady Geraldine sat perfectly motionless for a moment; then she saw the +blood beginning ooze from the wound just over his heart, and she drew +her dress carefully on one side. She did not look at his face for about +five minutes. She turned round then, and saw his eyes fixed on her with +a terrible stare. + +‘No, I will not suffer for you,’ she whispered, as if replying to +their silent menace, and she put the pistol into his hand and closed +the fingers round it. They would not keep as she placed them. At last +she left the thing on the ground by his side, then she walked rapidly +away. Before she had got far she remembered the compromising letters +she had written: she must go back and get them at any price. She found +his pocket-book; she found her three letters in it; she took them, and +replaced the pocket-book. Then she went. Just as she was leaving the +wood, the fox-terrier, which had been off on a hunting expedition, ran +up to her, smelling her dress. She put down her hand to pat its head. +It licked off a little spot of blood that soiled her first finger. She +tried to speak to it, to tell it to go to its master, but she found her +mouth was parched and dry. She could not utter a word. But it went all +the same, following the track of her footsteps into the wood. + +She went through what would probably occur. He would be found alone +with a pistol. She thought of what would happen if the pistol was +identified. She had taken it from the gun-room at home; she had thought +it would add to the romance of the situation. Two of them had been +hanging on the wall; she remembered them all her life. Sometimes her +father had allowed her and her sisters to practise with them on Sunday +afternoons, much to the scandal of the neighbourhood. Kirkdale would +go to look at the body; he would be sure to recognise the pistol. She +got into the house unobserved just as the clock struck eleven. First +she went up to her bedroom and dusted her shoes; her feet were covered +with dust. She took off her stockings and wiped them clean as well as +she could without making a mess. Then she went downstairs. She had sent +her maid to bed. Nobody seemed to be up except Kirkdale and Clausen, +whom she could hear playing billiards as she passed the door. She went +down the passage, entered the gun-room, and examined the window. She +saw it was accessible from the outside. It was one of the old-fashioned +hasp bolts, so she took a rusty pocket-knife she found lying in a +forgotten heap of odds and ends and passed it between the crack of the +window. She scratched the bolt as best she could to make it appear as +if it had been opened from the outside; then she dropped the knife +outside the window, closed the door, and went to bed. She lay awake +wondering if there was any precaution she had forgotten to take; and +when at last she slept, she dreamed that she was a child again, and +that her father was alive. He was in one of his rarely affectionate +moods, dancing her on his knee and calling her his own dear little +girl. He called her mother and sisters and little Stephen to look at +her as he stood her upon the table--Mr. Clausen was there too,--and +then her father laughed and clapped his hands, and said, ‘She’s the +flower of the flock, she’s my very own daughter,’ and he rushed at the +others and chased them out of the room. Then it seemed to her they were +afraid of her as they had been of him. She saw their faces peeping in +at the window at her, as if she was a terror to them. She looked at +her father for explanation, but he no longer spoke or moved; his face +was cold and lifeless, as if formed from damp yellow clay; and she +went and touched his fingers, which closed on hers, and she felt she +was becoming clay too. The cold crept up her arm; she could not stir +hand or foot. Just as the cold reached her heart she woke and tried +to scream, but once again she could utter no sound, and lay there +motionless. At last the morning came. The horror of the dream had taken +all her attention: she thought of nothing else; she felt she must speak +of it, yet feared that in some vague way it might betray her. She could +not bear to stay in the house waiting. She ordered the pony-carriage, +and drove herself over to Lyndhurst, where she found some friends at +home. They got her to put up there, and she did not return to Ringwood +until dinner-time. Driving home she went over in her mind every +possible thing that could happen: they would know the pistol; they +would find it was impossible for the gun-room to have been entered +from the outside; he would have boasted that he was going to meet +her; somebody had seen her in the wood with him. She had gone to her +room with a headache at nine o’clock, and asked not to be disturbed; +perhaps Elizabeth had brought her something just before going to bed, +and had discovered her absence. She imagined herself being driven away +handcuffed between two policemen. She went through all the horrors of +the last scene of all, when she would go blindfold into eternity. She +shuddered terribly, then suddenly remembered the groom was sitting +behind her, and was probably taking notes of her behaviour, and that he +would be able to give his evidence too. As she drove over the bridge a +train was arriving at the station. She pulled up a moment and watched +the passengers alight. She saw a girl get out of a carriage and a tall +man meeting her, and, leading her tenderly through the station, put +her into a closed carriage. She saw that it was Kirkdale. Then she +understood everything had been found out, and they had sent for the +wife. + +She drove into the village, sending the groom into the draper’s to +get her some riding gloves. The man came out to deliver them to her +himself. He looked very serious, and said, ‘Terrible news, isn’t it, my +lady?’ + +‘What is terrible?’ she asked. ‘I have been away all day.’ + +‘A gentleman found murdered in the woods close to Kirkdale Castle.’ + +‘Murdered!’ she cried. + +‘Well, the police are very reticent; I can’t say how it was done, but I +know he was shot through the heart.’ + +‘Dear, dear! I must try and find out as quickly as possible,’ and she +drove off without noticing the man’s parting salutation. + +‘Murdered,’ she said over and over to herself. ‘After all, they know, +they know everything.’ + +Mr. Clausen met her as she drove up to the principal entrance, and +solemnly led her into the library. ‘You have heard?’ he said. + +‘Yes. Weyman told me that he had been found dead.’ + +‘George Travers?’ + +‘Yes.’ + +‘He has not been publicly identified yet. How did Weyman know who he +was?’ + +‘I don’t know, I suppose he heard it somehow.’ She looked up nervously. +She met Mr. Clausen’s eyes looking steadily at hers, and she knew he +guessed. After a pause she said, ‘Tell me what is known.’ + +‘I will. This morning the footman spoke to Kirkdale after breakfast, +and informed him the gun-room had apparently been broken into.’ Mr. +Clausen laid ever so slight a stress on the word ‘apparently.’ He +continued, ‘A careful search was made and nothing was missing but +one of a brace of pistols, that had been hanging together over the +mantelpiece. I formed my own theory on the matter, and was just +about to demonstrate to Kirkdale that it was impossible that the +window should have been entered from the outside, when the news of +the dead body being found reached us. I therefore refrained from +making any remarks, and later in the day, when every one was agog +over the conveyance of the body to the parish room, I went outside +the gun-room window and tried myself to get into it from the outside. +I found it was possible, but very difficult, and I knocked down some +plaster, besides disturbing a good deal of dust which I had noticed +was quite undisturbed in the morning. I may have done away with some +circumstantial evidence, but it is always a satisfaction to try +things for one’s-self.’ Again their eyes met, this time with a fuller +understanding than before. + +‘At the moment Kirkdale and I went at once to the scene of the tragedy, +and found poor Travers dead, with his little terrier by his side, +shivering and trembling, and refusing to stir; indeed, we had the +greatest difficulty to coax it away. While the constable was taking +notes, I saw the revolver lying among the ferns close to his hand, but +the constable did not; I thought it better not to attract Kirkdale’s +attention to it at the time, so I let them remove the body without +saying a word. I then went back to the gun-room and did what I have +told you; and having satisfied myself that the chain of evidence was +complete, I went down to the village, and advised the constable to come +up and search the scene of the fatality more thoroughly. Kirkdale came +too, and it was not long before we found the revolver this time. The +sight of the pistol at once reminded Kirkdale of the open window, and +without a moment’s hesitation he told the constable all he knew. The +constable came along, and having pointed out to him the marks of feet +outside, the footman having given his evidence, and having wired for +Mrs. Travers, whom by the way Lady Kirkdale has most kindly consented +to put up, and who arrived about half an hour ago, I watched for you, +so as to put you in full possession of the facts of the case.’ For the +third time their eyes met. + +‘How can I ever thank you?’ + +‘Good God, woman, don’t thank me! You owe me nothing. It is for your +mother’s sake that I have become your accomplice, and that I have +taken this burden on myself.’ She bent her head. He continued, ‘People +who sin against human life in this way cannot expect sympathy. Your +punishment is that you are cut off from fellowship with your race; the +memory of that murdered man will rise between you and those who guess, +and those who do not guess, your guilt.’ + +‘Supposing, after all, others discover that I did it?’ she whispered. + +‘They shall not, they must not! I command you not to betray yourself; +it is the least you can do.’ + +‘You needn’t be afraid. I dare say you think I am sorry that I did it, +but I am not; I am glad. I should be miserable if it had not been done.’ + +‘He would never have done anything so criminal as this.’ + +‘No, he hadn’t the courage, but he would have sneaked and lied and +shivered through life, taking men’s and women’s souls and bodies and +tearing them to shreds, dragging them down until they could see nothing +in life but a struggle for amusement, nothing beyond but a rest from +torment. I know I did it from a horrible motive, just to gratify my mad +injured pride, to revenge myself on the cur that had turned on me; but +all the same it is a good deed done, and I am glad I did it.’ + +‘I do not understand you, Lady Geraldine.’ + +She got up and walked past him to the door; then she turned and said, +‘I am my father’s daughter. People like him and me belong to a race +apart; we are only mortal clay, while you and mamma, and Maisy and all +the rest of you have immortal souls.’ + +She came towards him once more. ‘Oh, don’t be afraid, I won’t touch +you, I won’t contaminate you. Yes, I see it plainly now: you all of you +have immortal souls, you show it in your lives, don’t you?’ + + * * * * * + +It was the day of the funeral. ‘_Suicide while of unsound mind_’ was +the verdict brought in by the jury. Lady Geraldine was alone with Mrs. +Travers for the first time. They were sitting with books in their hands +pretending to read. Both were dressed in black. Both were somewhat +restless. Lady Kirkdale had left them in the drawing-room. The funeral +had taken place in the little village churchyard early in the morning. +There was nothing more to be done. Mrs. Travers was going to London +the following day to commence rehearsing for a new piece at Horsham’s +Theatre. Lady Kirkdale had suggested she must stay with them and rest, +but she only thanked her very much, and said she should prefer to set +to work at once. + +Lady Geraldine sat eyeing her surreptitiously. At last she said-- + +‘You are very fond of your profession, are you not, Mrs. Travers?’ + +‘Indeed I am. I don’t know how I should have lived during the last few +months if it had not been for the thought of it.’ + +‘You were going to America, I heard?’ + +‘Yes; George spoke of doing so.’ + +‘Will you tell me what your real feeling about this is; you seem very +calm, and yet----’ + +‘And yet I loved him, you mean.’ Lady Geraldine nodded. ‘Yes, I loved +him; and I suppose if this had happened two months ago I should have +gone nearly mad with grief. But a curious change has been taking +place during that time. It used to seem as if great floods of emotion +came over me, enfolded me, and took possession of me. I had no power +to resist them. One day I suddenly found I could, as it were, swim +through; I knew what I was doing; I could guide and control myself; I +could use the emotion as I pleased.’ + +‘Yes, yes; I believe I know what you mean; go on telling me.’ + +‘Well, that is what it comes to. In real life you get an emotion which +masters you; in art, in acting, in all works of genius, I suppose, you +master an emotion. That is why artists are set apart from the rest of +the world; they cannot enjoy the common emotion long, they demand too +much from it.’ + +‘And do you not regret your loss at all?’ + +‘Oh, we are all human, of course. I loved him, but still I feared him. +He made me see things in his way: I had no freedom of judgment. When +he was with me I thought he was a splendidly clever person; even when +I found out how bad he was, and what terrible things he had done, he +only had to make some ridiculous excuse for me to believe every word he +said.’ + +‘Don’t you think it is a good thing for you that he is dead? Don’t you +feel that if you had seen much more of him you would have become a +thoroughly bad woman?’ + +‘Yes, I do. I sometimes wonder even now if I can get away altogether +from his influence. But how did you know this? What made you imagine +it?’ + +‘I will tell you exactly why. You know we were quite ignorant that he +had a wife until about a fortnight ago. I must confess to you that from +the first day I saw him I would have married him at any moment if he +had asked me, and given up everything in the world for him. I found +out by degrees what he was, and I thought that if it were true, I could +not bear that he should live. And now that he is dead I am glad. I feel +a weight is off my soul.’ + +‘Yes,’ whispered Grace Travers, ‘that is just what I feel, a weight is +off my soul: to live with him was to be morally contaminated. Almost +the last time I talked to him, I remember feeling as if it would be a +glorious thing to be a great criminal, and that if you could not rule +by fair means, you should rule by foul. George had such a horror of +mediocrity.’ + +‘He thought anything better than that, eh?’ + +‘Yes, I believe the only person who could really fascinate him would be +some one who could make him suffer terribly.’ + +‘Was there anything that could make him suffer?’ + +‘No, I don’t think there was, he always took things so easily. But he +didn’t want to die; he hated the thought of it. I can’t think how he +ever came to kill himself.’ + +‘Well, it is unfortunate that the only person who could attempt to +fascinate him in the way you suggest would be compelled, by the +circumstances of the case, to prevent him from showing that he was +fascinated.’ + +‘Poor George, what a pity he isn’t here! That would have amused him; it +is just the sort of thing he would have said himself.’ + + +THE END. + + Printed by T. and A. CONSTABLE, Printers to Her Majesty + at the Edinburgh University Press + + + + + List of Books + in + Belles Lettres + + [Illustration: _Elkin Mathews + & John Lane:--Publishers + and Vendors of + Choice & Rare + Editions in + Belles Lettres._] + + ALL BOOKS IN THIS CATALOGUE + ARE PUBLISHED AT NET PRICES + + _1894_ + + _Telegraphic Address_-- + ‘BODLEIAN, LONDON’ + + +‘A word must be said for the manner in which the publishers have +produced the volume (_i.e._ “The Earth Fiend”), a sumptuous folio, +printed by CONSTABLE, the etchings on Japanese paper by MR. GOULDING. +The volume should add not only to MR. STRANG’S fame but to that +of MESSRS. ELKIN MATHEWS AND JOHN LANE, who are rapidly gaining +distinction for their beautiful editions of belles-lettres.’--_Daily +Chronicle_, Sept. 24, 1892. + +_Referring to_ MR. LE GALLIENNE’S ‘English Poems’ _and_ ‘Silhouettes’ +by MR. ARTHUR SYMONS:--‘We only refer to them now to note a fact which +they illustrate, and which we have been observing of late, namely, the +recovery to a certain extent of good taste in the matter of printing +and binding books. These two books, which are turned out by MESSRS. +ELKIN MATHEWS AND JOHN LANE, are models of artistic publishing, and yet +they are simplicity itself. The books with their excellent printing +and their very simplicity make a harmony which is satisfying to the +artistic sense.’--_Sunday Sun_, Oct. 2, 1892. + +‘MR. LE GALLIENNE is a fortunate young gentleman. I don’t know by +what legerdemain he and his publishers work, but here, in an age as +stony to poetry as the ages of Chatterton and Richard Savage, we find +the full edition of his book sold before publication. How is it done, +MESSRS. ELKIN MATHEWS AND JOHN LANE? for, without depreciating MR. +LE GALLIENNE’S sweetness and charm, I doubt that the marvel would +have been wrought under another publisher. These publishers, indeed, +produce books so delightfully that it must give an added pleasure to +the hoarding of first editions.’--KATHARINE TYNAN in _The Irish Daily +Independent_. + +‘To MESSRS. ELKIN MATHEWS AND JOHN LANE almost more than to any other, +we take it, are the thanks of the grateful singer especially due; for +it is they who have managed, by means of limited editions and charming +workmanship, to impress book-buyers with the belief that a volume may +have an æsthetic and commercial value. They have made it possible to +speculate in the latest discovered poet, as in a new company--with +the difference that an operation in the former can be done with three +half-crowns.’--_St. James’s Gazette._ + + + + + _March 1894_ + + List of Books + IN + _BELLES LETTRES_ + + (_Including some Transfers_) + + PUBLISHED BY + Elkin Mathews and John Lane + + The Bodley Head + VIGO STREET, LONDON, W. + + _N.B.--The Authors and Publishers reserve the right of reprinting any + book in this list if a second edition is called for, except in cases + where a stipulation has been made to the contrary, and of printing + a separate edition of any of the books for America irrespective of + the numbers to which the English editions are limited. The numbers + mentioned do not include the copies sent for review or to the public + libraries._ + + +ADAMS (FRANCIS). + + ESSAYS IN MODERNITY. Cr. 8vo. 5s. net. [_Immediately._ + +ALLEN (GRANT). + + THE LOWER SLOPES: A Volume of Verse. 600 copies. 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With a Bibliography (much + enlarged) by JOHN LANE, portrait, etc. Third Edition. Crown 8vo. 5s. + 6d. net. + +LE GALLIENNE (RICHARD). + + THE RELIGION OF A LITERARY MAN. 3rd thousand. Crown 8vo. Purple + cloth. 3s. 6d. net. + + Also a special rubricated edition on hand-made paper. 8vo. 10s. 6d. + net. + +LETTERS TO LIVING ARTISTS. + + 500 copies. Fcap. 8vo. 3s. 6d. net. [_Very few remain._ + +MARSTON (PHILIP BOURKE). + + A LAST HARVEST: LYRICS AND SONNETS FROM THE BOOK OF LOVE. Edited by + LOUISE CHANDLER MOULTON. 500 copies. Fcap. 8vo. 5s. net. + + Also 50 copies on large paper, hand-made. 10s. 6d. net. + [_Very few remain._ + +MARTIN (W. WILSEY). + + QUATRAINS, LIFE’S MYSTERY AND OTHER POEMS. 16mo. 2s. 6d. net. + [_Very few remain._ + +MARZIALS (THEO.). + + THE GALLERY OF PIGEONS AND OTHER POEMS. Fcap. 8vo. 4s. 6d. net. + [_Very few remain._ + + _Transferred by the Author to the present Publishers._ + +MEYNELL (MRS.), (ALICE C. THOMPSON). + + POEMS. Second Edition. Fcap. 8vo. 3s. 6d. net. A few of the 50 large + paper copies (First Edition) remain. 12s. 6d. net. + +MEYNELL (MRS.). + + THE RHYTHM OF LIFE, AND OTHER ESSAYS. Second Edition. Fcap. 8vo. 3s. + 6d. net. A few of the 50 large paper copies (First Edition) remain. + 12s. 6d. net. + +MONKHOUSE (ALLAN). + + BOOKS AND PLAYS: A Volume of Essays. 400 copies. Crown 8vo. 5s. net. + +MURRAY (ALMA). + + PORTRAIT AS BEATRICE CENCI. With critical notice containing four + letters from ROBERT BROWNING. 8vo, wrapper. 2s. net. + +NETTLESHIP (J. T.). + + ROBERT BROWNING: Essays and Thoughts. A Third Edition is in + preparation. Crown 8vo. 5s. 6d. net. Half a dozen of the Whatman + large paper copies (First Edition) remain. £1, 1s. net. + +NOBLE (JAS. ASHCROFT). + + THE SONNET IN ENGLAND AND OTHER ESSAYS. Title-page and Cover Design + by AUSTIN YOUNG. 600 copies. Crown 8vo. 5s. net. + + Also 50 copies large paper. 12s. 6d. net. + +NOEL (HON. RODEN). + + POOR PEOPLE’S CHRISTMAS. 250 copies. 16mo. 1s. net. + [_Very few remain._ + +OXFORD CHARACTERS. + + A series of lithographed portraits by WILL ROTHENSTEIN, with text + by F. YORK POWELL and others. To be issued monthly in term. Each + number will contain two portraits. Parts I. to V. ready. 200 sets + only, folio, wrapper, 5s. net per part; 25 special large paper sets + containing proof impressions of the portraits signed by the artist, + 10s. 6d. net per part. + +PINKERTON (PERCY). + + GALEAZZO: A Venetian Episode and other Poems. Etched Frontispiece. + 16mo. 5s. net. [_Very few remain._ + + _Transferred by the Author to the present Publishers._ + +RADFORD (DOLLIE). + + SONGS. A New Volume of Verse. [_In preparation._ + +RADFORD (ERNEST). + + CHAMBERS TWAIN. Frontispiece by WALTER CRANE. 250 copies. Imp. 16mo. + 5s. net. + + Also 50 copies large paper. 10s. 6d. net. [_Very few remain._ + +RHYS (ERNEST). + + A LONDON ROSE AND OTHER RHYMES. With Title-page designed by SELWYN + IMAGE. 500 copies. Crown 8vo. 5s. net. + +RICKETTS (C. S.) AND C. H. SHANNON. + + HERO AND LEANDER. By CHRISTOPHER MARLOWE and GEORGE CHAPMAN. With + Borders, Initials, and Illustrations designed and engraved on the + wood by C. S. RICKETTS and C. H. SHANNON. Bound in English vellum and + gold. 200 copies only. 35s. net. + +RHYMERS’ CLUB, THE BOOK OF THE. + + A second volume will appear in the Spring of 1894. + +SCHAFF (DR. P.). + + LITERATURE AND POETRY: Papers on Dante, etc. Portrait and Plates, 100 + copies only. 8vo. 10s. net. + +STODDARD (R. H.). + + THE LION’S CUB; WITH OTHER VERSE. Portrait. 100 copies only, bound in + an illuminated Persian design. Fcap. 8vo. 5s. net. [_Very few remain._ + +STREET (G. S.). + + THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A BOY. Passages selected by his friend G. S. S. + With Title-page designed by C. W. FURSE. 500 copies. Fcap. 8vo. 3s. + 6d. net. + +SYMONDS (JOHN ADDINGTON). + + IN THE KEY OF BLUE, AND OTHER PROSE ESSAYS. Cover designed by C. S. + RICKETTS. Second Edition. Thick Crown 8vo. 8s. 6d. net. + +THOMPSON (FRANCIS). + + POEMS. With Frontispiece, Title-page and Cover Design by LAURENCE + HOUSMAN. Fourth Edition. Pott 4to. 5s. net. + +TODHUNTER (JOHN). + + A SICILIAN IDYLL. Frontispiece by WALTER CRANE. 250 copies. Imp. + 16mo. 5s. net. + + Also 50 copies large paper, fcap. 4to. 10s. 6d. net. + [_Very few remain._ + +TOMSON (GRAHAM R.). + + AFTER SUNSET. A Volume of Poems. With Title-page and Cover Design by + R. ANNING BELL. Fcap. 8vo. 5s. net. + + Also a limited large paper edition. 12s. 6d. net. [_In preparation._ + +TREE (H. BEERBOHM). + + THE IMAGINATIVE FACULTY: A Lecture delivered at the Royal + Institution. With portrait of Mr. TREE from an unpublished drawing by + the Marchioness of Granby. Fcap. 8vo, boards. 2s. 6d. net. + +TYNAN HINKSON (KATHARINE). + + CUCKOO SONGS. With Title-page and Cover Design by LAURENCE HOUSMAN. + 500 copies. Fcap. 8vo. 5s. net. + +VAN DYKE (HENRY). + + THE POETRY OF TENNYSON. Third Edition, enlarged. Crown 8vo. 5s. 6d. + net. + + _The late Laureate himself gave valuable aid in correcting various + details._ + +WATSON (WILLIAM). + + THE ELOPING ANGELS: A Caprice. Second Edition. Square 16mo. buckram. + 3s. 6d. net. + +WATSON (WILLIAM). + + EXCURSIONS IN CRITICISM: being some Prose Recreations of a Rhymer. + Second Edition. Cr. 8vo. 5s. net. + +WATSON (WILLIAM). + + THE PRINCE’S QUEST, AND OTHER POEMS. With a Bibliographical Note + added. Second Edition. Fcap. 8vo. 4s. 6d. net. + +WEDMORE (FREDERICK). + + PASTORALS OF FRANCE--RENUNCIATIONS. A volume of Stories. Title-page + by JOHN FULLEYLOVE, R.I. Third Edition. Crown 8vo. 5s. net. + + _A few of the large paper copies of Renunciations (First Edition) + remain. 10s. 6d. net._ + +WICKSTEED (P. H.). + + DANTE. Six Sermons. Third Edition. Crown 8vo. 2s. net. + +WILDE (OSCAR). + + THE SPHINX. A poem decorated throughout in line and colour, and bound + in a design by CHARLES RICKETTS. 250 copies. £2, 2s. net. 25 copies + large paper. £5, 5s. net. + +WILDE (OSCAR). + + The incomparable and ingenious history of Mr. W. H., being the true + secret of Shakespear’s sonnets now for the first time here fully set + forth, with initial letters and cover design by CHARLES RICKETTS. 500 + copies. 10s. 6d. net. + + Also 50 copies large paper. 21s. net. [_In preparation._ + +WILDE (OSCAR). + + DRAMATIC WORKS, now printed for the first time with a specially + designed Title-page and binding to each volume, by CHARLES SHANNON. + 500 copies. Small 4to. 7s. 6d. net per vol. + + Also 50 copies large paper. 15s. net per vol. + + Vol. I. LADY WINDERMERE’S FAN: A Comedy in Four Acts. [_Ready._ + + Vol. II. A WOMAN OF NO IMPORTANCE: A Comedy in Four Acts. [_Shortly._ + + Vol. III. THE DUCHESS OF PADUA: A Blank Verse Tragedy in Five Acts. + [_In preparation._ + +WILDE (OSCAR). + + SALOMÉ: A Tragedy in one Act, done into English. With 11 + Illustrations, Title-page, and Cover Design by AUBREY BEARDSLEY. 500 + copies. Small 4to. 15s. net. + + Also 100 copies, large paper. 30s. net. + +WYNNE (FRANCES). + + WHISPER. A Volume of Verse. With a Memoir by Katharine Tynan and a + Portrait added. Fcap. 8vo. 2s. 6d. net. + + _Transferred by the Author to the present Publishers._ + + + + +The Hobby Horse + + +A new series of this illustrated magazine will be published quarterly +by subscription, under the Editorship of Herbert P. Horne. Subscription +£1 per annum, post free, for the four numbers. Quarto, printed on +hand-made paper, and issued in a limited edition to subscribers only. +The Magazine will contain articles upon Literature, Music, Painting, +Sculpture, Architecture, and the Decorative Arts; Poems; Essays; +Fiction; original Designs; with reproductions of pictures and drawings +by the old masters and contemporary artists. There will be a new +title-page and ornaments designed by the Editor. + +Among the contributors to the Hobby Horse are: + + The late MATTHEW ARNOLD. + LAURENCE BINYON. + WILFRID BLUNT. + FORD MADOX BROWN. + The late ARTHUR BURGESS. + E. BURNE-JONES, A.R.A. + AUSTIN DOBSON. + RICHARD GARNETT, LL.D. + A. J. HIPKINS, F.S.A. + SELWYN IMAGE. + LIONEL JOHNSON. + RICHARD LE GALLIENNE. + SIR F. LEIGHTON, Bart., P.R.A. + T. HOPE MCLACHLAN. + MAY MORRIS. + C. HUBERT H. PARRY, Mus. Doc. + A. W. POLLARD. + F. YORK POWELL. + CHRISTINA G. ROSSETTI. + W. M. ROSSETTI. + JOHN RUSKIN, D.C.L., LL.D. + FREDERICK SANDYS. + The late W. BELL SCOTT. + FREDERICK J. SHIELDS. + J. H. SHORTHOUSE. + The late JAMES SMETHAM. + SIMEON SOLOMON. + A. SOMERVELL. + The late J. ADDINGTON SYMONDS. + KATHARINE TYNAN. + G. F. WATTS, R.A. + FREDERICK WEDMORE. + OSCAR WILDE. + +_Prospectuses on Application._ + +THE BODLEY HEAD, VIGO STREET, LONDON, W. + +‘Nearly every book put out by Messrs. Elkin Mathews & John Lane, at +the Sign of the Bodley Head, is a satisfaction to the special senses +of the modern bookman for bindings, shapes, types, and papers. They +have surpassed themselves, and registered a real achievement in English +bookmaking by the volume of “Poems, Dramatic and Lyrical,” of Lord De +Tabley.’_Newcastle Daily Chronicle._ + +‘A ray of hopefulness is stealing again into English poetry after +the twilight greys of Clough and Arnold and Tennyson. Even unbelief +wears braver colours. Despite the jeremiads, which are the dirges of +the elder gods, England is still a nest of singing-birds (_teste_ the +Catalogue of Elkin Mathews and John Lane).’--Mr. ZANGWILL in _Pall Mall +Magazine_. + +‘All Messrs. Mathews & Lane’s Books are so beautifully printed and so +tastefully issued, that it rejoices the heart of a book-lover to handle +them; but they have shown their sound judgment not less markedly in the +literary quality of their publications. The choiceness of form is not +inappropriate to the matter, which is always of something more than +ephemeral worth. This was a distinction on which the better publishers +at one time prided themselves; they never lent their names to trash; +but some names associated with worthy traditions have proved more than +once a delusion and a snare. The record of Messrs. Elkin Mathews & John +Lane is perfect in this respect, and their imprint is a guarantee of +the worth of what they publish.’--_Birmingham Daily Post_, Nov. 6, 1893. + +‘One can nearly always be certain when one sees on the title-page of +any given book the name of Messrs Elkin Mathews & John Lane as being +the publishers thereof that there will be something worth reading to be +found between the boards.’--_World._ + + +[Illustration] + + Edinburgh: T. and A. CONSTABLE + Printers to Her Majesty + + + + +TRANSCRIBER’S NOTES: + + + Italicized text is surrounded by underscores: _italics_. + + Perceived typographical errors have been corrected. + + Inconsistencies in hyphenation have been standardized. + + Archaic or variant spelling has been retained. + + + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 75492 *** |