“Yes. From what my wife tells me—and Mr. Lathom—and from what I hear
from the poor creature’s relatives, I now feel no doubt at all that
the—the accusation, you know—was entirely unfounded. A nervous
delusion, of course.”
“Yes, yes,” said I.
“I quite understand, of course, your very chivalrous motives for not
putting the blame on her at the time. The position was most awkward for
you. You might perhaps have given me a hint—but I perfectly understand.
And my wife, you will realise, was so very much upset——”
“Please,” I broke in, “do not blame her or yourself for a single
moment.”
“Thank you. It is very kind of you to take it in this reasonable spirit:
I cannot say how much I regret the misunderstanding. I hope you are very
well and prosperous. You are quite a famous man now, of course. And
married. Will you do me the honour to present me to your wife? I hope
you will come and see us some day.”
I was not keen to make the introduction, but it could scarcely be
avoided. The preposterous situation was there, and had to be imagined
away. Mrs. Harrison glowed. For the first time I saw her in full
prismatic loveliness, soaked and vibrating with colour and light. I
asked her what she thought of the show.
“We haven’t seen much of it yet,” she said, laughing, “we came straight
to see _the_ picture. Is it going to be the picture of the year as they
call it, do you think, Mr. Munting?”
“It looks rather like it,” said I.
“Fancy that! It does make me feel important—though, of course, I don’t
count for anything, really. The painting is the thing, isn’t it!”
“The subject of the portrait counts for something, too,” said Elizabeth.
“I don’t see how anybody can make a picture of one of those cow-faced
people. Except a satirical one, of course. It’s the painter’s job to get
the personality on the canvas, but what is he to do if there is no
personality? Mr. Lathom . . .”
She looked at the portrait, and then at Mrs. Harrison, and something
seemed to strike her. It was the thing that had struck me, months
before, when I first saw what Lathom had made of it. She grew a little
confused, and Lathom struck in.
“Mrs. Harrison and you would agree about the importance of
subject-matter,” he said. “I can’t persuade her to admire Laura Knight.”
Mrs. Harrison blushed a little.
“I think they are very clever pictures,” she said, a trifle defiantly,
and with a side-glance at her husband, “but they are rather peculiar for
a woman to have painted, aren’t they? Not very refined. And I mean, they
are so unnatural. I’m sure people don’t walk about, even in their
bedrooms, like that, with nothing on. And I think pictures ought to make
one feel—uplifted, somehow.”
“Come, come, Margaret,” said Harrison, “you don’t know what you are
talking about.”
“But you said the same thing yourself,” she came back at him.
“Yes, but I don’t care about your discussing them here.”
“Oh!” said Marlowe, loudly, “you are afraid of the flesh. That is our
trouble—we are all afraid of it, and that is why we insist and
exaggerate. ‘_Hoc est corpus_,’ said God—but we turn it into
hocus-pocus. There’s no hope for this generation till we can see clean
flesh and ‘sweet blood’—Meredith’s phrase—without being shocked at its
fine troublesomeness. If one were to strip all these people now”—he
waved a hand at a fat man in a top-hat and an emaciated girl, who caught
his eye and stood paralysed—“you would think it indecent. But it’s not
as indecent as the portrait-painter who strips their souls for you. Some
men’s work would be publicly censored, if the powers knew how to
distinguish between flesh and spirit—which, thank God, they don’t.” He
clapped Lathom on the shoulder. “How about that other thing of yours, my
boy?”
Lathom laughed a little awkwardly.
“Is that the portrait of Miss Milsom?” I interrupted, hastily—for I saw
trouble coming up like a thunder-cloud over Harrison’s horizon. “We must
go and have a look at it. You’re doing pretty well to have two pictures
in such a crowded year. We mustn’t keep you too long. Which room is it
in, Lathom?”
He told us, and when we had said our farewells, pursued us into the next
room.
“I say, old man,” he whispered breathlessly, “I couldn’t really help
this. Couldn’t in decency get out of it, could I?”
“No,” said I, “I suppose you couldn’t. It’s not my funeral, anyhow.”
“It’s the first time we’ve met,” he went on, “and it will end here.”
“But for my damned interference it wouldn’t have begun here,” I
answered. “I’m not blaming you, Lathom. And I’ve really no right to make
conditions. I don’t think it’s wise—but I can’t set up to be a
dictator.”
“Oh, you admit that, do you?” said Lathom. “I’m rather glad to know it.”
He hesitated, and added abruptly, “Well, so long.”
I was thankful to see the end of the episode. From every point of view
it seemed advisable to drop all connection with Lathom and the
Harrisons, and I saw none of them again until the 19th of October.