VIII.

Esmé Amarinth was generally amusing and whimsical in conversation, but,

like other men, he had his special moments, and the half-hour after

dinner, when the ladies, longing to remain as invisible listeners, had

retired to the bald deserts of feminine society, was usually his time of

triumph. His mental stays were then unfastened. He could breathe forth

his stories freely. His wittiest jokes, nude, no longer clad in the

shadowy garments of more or less conventional propriety, danced like

bacchanals through the conversation, and kicked up heels to fire even

the weary men of society. He expanded into fantastic anecdote, and

mingled many a _bon mot_ with the blue spirals of his mounting

cigarette smoke. But to-night Mr. Smith's gentle, "I never smoke, thank

you," reminded him that the fate of Lord Reggie's anthem was hanging in

the balance. He resolved to tread warily among clerical prejudices, so,

lighting a cigarette, and pushing the claret away from him with one

plump hand, he drew his chair slowly towards Mr. Smith's, and a sweet

smile spread deliberately over his rather large and intelligent face.

"I was very much interested in your remark about doctrine and music at

dinner," he began in his most carefully modulated voice, "and I wanted

to pursue the subject a little farther, only the minds of ladies are so

curious and unexpected, that I thought it better to refrain. Have you

noticed that many women make a kind of profession of being shocked?"

"Surely no," said Mr. Smith, sipping his water with an inquiring air.

"Yes, positively it is so, especially if a truth about religion is

uttered. They are apt to think that all truths about religion are

blasphemous. It is wonderful how ready good women are to find blasphemy

where it is not, and to confuse reasoning with ribaldry."

"Ah!" said the curate, looking the more ascetic because he was slightly

confused in mind.

"Now you spoke of music ousting doctrine. Do you not think that the

truest, the most poignant doctrine, speaks, utters itself through the

arts. Music has its religion and its atheism, painting its holiness

and its sin. A statue, in its white and marble stillness, may suggest

to us dreams in which the angels walk, or visions that I will not

characterise in the presence of an ordained priest. Even architecture

may incline us to worship, and a few broken fragments of stone to faith.

Have you ever been in Greece?"

"I have never been out of my own country," said Mr. Smith, "except once,

when I spent a week in Wales."

"I have never made an exhaustive study of Welsh art," said Amarinth,

"but I believe Mr. Gladstone thinks it gallant, while others prefer to

call it little. But the point I wanted to suggest was merely this, that

we can draw doctrine from the music and the painting of men, as well as

from literature and sermons."

"I have never thought of it before," said Mr. Smith doubtfully.

"Mozart and Bach have given me belief that not even the subversive

impotencies of Sir Arthur Sullivan, and the terribly obvious 'mysteries'

of Dr. A. C. Mackenzie, have been able to take from me," murmured Lord

Reggie.

"Ah! Reggie, each decade has its poet Bunn," remarked Amarinth. "We have

our Bunn in Mr. Joseph Bennett, but where are his plums? Religion dwells

in the arts, Mr. Smith, as irreligion so often, unhappily, lurks in the

sciences."

"Indeed I have no opinion of science," the curate said with

authoritative disapproval.

"Science is too often a thief. Art is a prodigal benefactor. She

provides for us an almshouse in which we can take refuge when we are old

and weary. And in music especially--in good music--all doctrine is

crystallised. The man who has genius gathers together all his highest

thoughts and aspirations, all his beliefs, his trust, his faith, and

gives them forth in his art, in his music, or in his picture. Lord

Reginald, for instance, would convert more men to Christianity by his

exquisite and purple anthem than most preachers by all their sermons."

"Indeed, has Lord Reginald composed an anthem?" asked the curate, gazing

upon Reggie with a priestly approval.

"He has, and one that Roman Catholics have delighted in. Forgive my

allusion to an alien faith, but the Romanists, with all their mistakes,

are not unmusical."

"I see much good in Rome," said Mr. Smith solemnly, "although it is

mingled with many errors. No, not any nuts, thank you; I never touch

nuts. I should like to hear this anthem."

"I could play it to you with pleasure," Reggie said, drooping his fair

head slightly, "but of course it is all wrong on a piano. It requires

the organ and sweet boys' voices."

"We have anthems in the church here," said Mr. Smith. "We have even done

masses."

"How exquisite!" said Amarinth. "A village mass. There is something

beautifully original in the notion. Ah! Mr. Smith, if your boys could

have done Lord Reggie's anthem they would have learnt the doctrine of

music."

"Perhaps they--would it be possible--on Sunday?" Mr. Smith said, glowing

gently.

Amarinth got up, dropping his cigarette end into his finger bowl.

"Reggie, we have found a true artist in Chenecote," he said. "Play Mr.

Smith your purple notes, and I will go and take my coffee on the lawn.

The moon washes the night with silver, and, thank Heaven! there are no

nightingales to ruin the music of the stillness with their well-meant

but ill-produced voices. Nature's songster is the worst sort of songster

I know."

He walked with an ample softness into the little hall, and passed out

through the French windows of the drawing room into the shadowy garden.

On the lawn he found Lady Locke sitting alone, sipping her coffee in a

basket chair. Madame Valtesi and Mrs. Windsor had strolled into the

scented rose garden to discuss the inner details of a forthcoming

divorce case. The murmur of their voices, uttering names of

co-respondents, was faintly heard now and then as they passed up and

down the tiny formal paths.

Esmé Amarinth sank down into a chair by Lady Locke and sighed heavily.

"What is the matter?" she asked.

"You have a beautiful soul," he said softly, "and I have a beautiful

soul too. Why should there not be a sympathy between us? Lady Locke, I

am the victim of depression. I am suffering from the malady of life. I

usually have an attack of it in the morning, but it flies when the stars

come out and leaves me brilliant. What can be the matter with me

to-night? I ask myself the question with the most poignant anxiety, I

can assure you."

She glanced at his large and solemn face, at his ample cheeks and loose

mouth, and smiled slightly.

"Some circumstances have been unkind to you, perhaps?" she said.

"That could not hurt me," he answered, "for, thank Heaven! I am no

philosopher, and never take facts seriously. Circumstances, my dear

Lady Locke, are the lashes laid into us by life. Some of us have to

receive them with bared ivory backs, and others are permitted to keep on

a coat--that is the only difference."

"Are you a pessimist?" she asked.

"I hope so. I look upon optimism as a most quaint disease, an eruption

that breaks out upon the soul, and destroys all its interest, all its

beauty. The optimist dresses up the amazing figures of life like Dresden

shepherds and shepherdesses, and pipes a foolish tune--the Old Hundredth

or some such thing--for them to dance to. We cannot all refuse to see

anything but comic opera peasants around us."

"Yet we need not replace them with pantomime demons."

"Demons, as you call them, are much more interesting. Nothing is so

unattractive as goodness, except, perhaps, a sane mind in a sane body.

Even the children find the fairies monotonous, I believe. An eternal

smile is much more wearisome than a perpetual frown. The one sweeps away

all possibilities, the other suggests a thousand."

"Every one of them sinister."

"Why not? Where would be the drama without the crime? The clash of

swords is the music of the world. People talk so much to me about the

beauty of confidence. They seem to entirely ignore the much more subtle

beauty of doubt. To believe is very dull. To doubt is intensely

engrossing. The Apostle Thomas was artistic up to a certain point. He

appreciated the value of shadows in a picture. To be on the alert is to

live. To be lulled in security is to die."

"But if you pushed that amusing theory to its limits you would arrive at

the contradiction in terms--to be happy is to be miserable."

"Certainly. To be what is commonly called happy is a mental complaint

demanding careful treatment. The happy people of the world have their

value, but only the negative value of foils. They throw up and emphasise

the beauty, and the fascination of the unhappy. Scarlet and black are

the finest of all the colours. And to cease to doubt is to despair--for

a really talented man or woman. That is why people become sceptics. They

desire to save themselves from intellectual annihilation."

"Yet the mental pleasure of proving a case may be keen."

"But it cannot be lasting. You do not see the delight that must attend

upon conjecture. Let me put it to you in another way. Can you conceive

loving a man whom you felt you understood?"

"Certainly. Especially if he were difficult for other people to

understand."

"Ah! you begin to appreciate the value of doubt. We often begin by

desiring others to enjoy what we shall eventually want for ourselves.

The moment we understand a human being, our love for that human being

spreads his wings preparatory to flying out of the window."

Lady Locke, who had begun to look earnest, seemed to recollect herself

with an effort, and dispelled the gravity that was settling over her

face with a smile.

"You go very far in your admirable desire to amuse," she said.

"I think not," he answered, putting down her cup with an elaborate

serenity. "One must perpetually doubt to be faithful. Perplexity and

mistrust fan affection into passion, and so bring about those beautiful

tragedies that alone make life worth living. Women once felt this while

men did not, and so women once ruled the world. But men are awakening

from their mental slumber, and are becoming incomprehensible. Lord

Reggie is an instance of what I mean. The average person finds him

exquisitely difficult to comprehend. He fascinates by being sedulously

unexpected. Listen to his anthem. He is beginning to play it. How

unexpected it is. It always does what the ear wants, and all modern

music does what the ear does not want. Therefore the ear always expects

to be disappointed, and Lord Reggie astonishes it by never disappointing

it."

The faint music of the piano now tinkled out into the night, and

numerous simple harmonies and full closes fell melodiously upon their

hearing.

"Lord Reggie is certainly very unlike his anthem," said Lady Locke,

listening a little sadly.

"Reggie is unlike everything except himself. He is completely wonderful,

and, wonderfully complete. He lives for sensations, while other people

live for faiths, or for convictions, or for prejudices. He would make

any woman unhappy. How beautiful!"

"Is it always a sign of intelligence to be what others are not?"

But she received no direct answer to her question, for at this moment

Madame Valtesi and Mrs. Windsor came to them across the lawn. They had

finished trying the divorce case.

"What is that about intelligence?" Madame Valtesi asked croakily.

"Dear Lady!" said Esmé, getting up out of his chair slowly,

"intelligence is the demon of our age. Mine bores me horribly. I am

always trying to find a remedy for it. I have experimented with

absinthe, but gained no result. I have read the collected works of

Walter Besant. They are said to sap the mental powers. They did not sap

mine. Opium has proved useless, and green tea cigarettes leave me

positively brilliant. What am I to do? I so long for the lethargy, the

sweet peace of stupidity. If only I were Lewis Morris!"

"Unfortunate man! You should treat your complaint with the knife. Become

a popular author."

She laughed without smiling, an uncanny habit of hers, and turned to the

window.

"I hear Mr. Smith saying that he must go," she said.

Mrs. Windsor rustled forward to speed the parting guest.