_From the Lady_ HELEN POLE _to the Countess of_ EDGE _and_ ROSS.
_Boulder Lake_,
July 10th
Do not imagine, Polly, that I have given up my solitary ramblings in
the forest. I enjoy them more than ever; and their _soundlessness_
after the eternal babble which pervades the lake--I am afraid I am not
grateful for all the kind attentions I receive--is simply delicious.
Leaves, green leaves everywhere, rioting to my knees and hanging in the
air. You never notice the slender branches, only the delicate fairy
curtain they hang between the dark stems of the trees. And the ferns,
and the ground pine, and the green stars of that moss that covers
ground and rock, and the rich velvet moss, shading from a dark green
to one that is almost white, that covers the fallen trees, and the
incomparable solitude. Best of all I have discovered a gorge, sloping
gently on one side, the other a huge boulder covered with moss; in
the bottom of the gorge a brook pushing its tortuous way over rocks;
and alders and ferns close to the banks. Overhead there is a rift of
sky, and the sunlight flickers about generously, and the woods I have
come through look so dark and impenetrable. There is a fine dry rock
with the alders meeting like an arbour above it, and I sit there by
the hour and wonder why the forest ever made me feel over-civilised.
Beside these people I feel a pure child of Nature. They have reached a
pitch of correctness I never can hope to attain. They never use slang,
they punctuate their sentences so beautifully, they would not drop a
final g in our careless fashion for worlds; they pronounce all their
syllables so distinctly! Oh, this is “culture,” Polly mine. If poor
dear Matthew Arnold could only come back and live among them! Perhaps
he does in spirit and that is his idea of Heaven. (It would be mine
of Hell). And we have so misjudged the Americans, believing them to
be crass and exaggerated. I assure you there is nothing exaggerated
about the true aristocrats except their virtues; those are superlative,
but in all other things they aim at simple perfection only, and from
their enunciation to their boots--they have the dearest little feet--I
can tell you, Polly, they have attained it. I feel so crude--and so
happy. I come out here to my brook--I am writing to you with its baby
roar and lap in my ears--and I say all sorts of dreadful things quite
loud. I forget that I ever have sizzled in London drawing-rooms, proud
and happy in my court and interested in nothing in life but gowns and
conquests. I forget the whole atmosphere of flirtation and intrigue
and gay recklessness and heartbreak. I can tell you, Polly, that when
you have stood as close to death as I have done during the last two
years, with your heart-strings on the rack and the tears never far from
your eyes, you are well prepared to retreat into the arms of Nature
and cower there. I have no desire left to return to the world, and if
Bertie can live comfortably here I should be glad and happy to remain
for an indefinite number of years. My prince can find me here as well
as anywhere. He is not Mr. Rogers, charming as he is. He never could
stir up my great emotions--and I have them! I wonder if these people
ever have suffered as I have, or if they ever have loved passionately?
I cannot imagine it. They are too well-regulated, and that discontent
which gently agitates them is merely the result of living in a country
where nothing is unattainable, and, consequently, where ambition never
sleeps, even when it takes no form.
I have met most of the men now and like some of them rather well.
At least they talk less than the women and do not seem to fancy
themselves so much. They are quite content to be just men and do the
sensible things every-day men usually do without bothering about it.
They say much prettier things to one than our men do, and I like it,
but how much they mean I am not prepared to say. They are not in the
least exaggerated or silly in their admiration, like a Frenchman or a
Spaniard--will you ever forget that experience in Madrid?--for their
common sense and their sense of humour never fail them. And they are
all clever--no doubt of that!--but somehow their cleverness does not
annoy one as the women’s does. Perhaps it is because they have not
had time for the excessive “culture” of the women. Mr. Hammond, for
instance, has not attempted to read everything in every language ever
written, but he can talk sensibly about most things, particularly the
affairs of the world. Mr. Chenoweth leaves Mrs. Chenoweth to blow his
horn, and never mentions “shop;” but he does look so dyspeptic, poor
man, and he has not Mr. Hammond’s pleasant air of repose. He likes to
play with his children, however, and I love him for that.
Then there is an “author” who writes the poorest short stories I ever
read--I have only a magazine knowledge of his work--but he belongs to
the “set.” Mr. Chenoweth is his intimate friend and his wealth enables
him to give his chosen circle such entertainment as quite reconciles
them to the poverty of his literary dower. Still, I cannot quite see
why the public should be inflicted with him. He is quite bright to
talk to, a very agreeable dinner companion, I fancy. I should like him
rather if he were more honest with himself--and did not make epigrams.
Take them all in all they are as distinguished-looking--or should I
have said “refined?”--as they feel it their duty to be, and quite as
agreeable as I would have them--which is more to the point.
There is a Mr. Nugent, a guest, at the Club House, of Mr. Rogers, who
rather interests me the most. I think on the whole I must tell you a
little experience. He is about forty and a “brilliantly successful”
lawyer. He has argued famous cases before the Supreme Court, amassed a
fortune, and his admirers--not this set--want him to go into politics.
He is very striking in appearance, tall, thin, nervous, with a lean,
clever, hard, mobile face, an eye that burns and penetrates, a mouth
that looks as if it had conquered everything but his passions, and a
quick nervous grip of the hand which suggests that what he does he does
quickly and wastes no time arguing about. Next to Mr. Rogers Bertie
likes him better than any one up here, and I must confess he rather
fascinates me. I am wicked enough to want to see a man like that go
off his head about me. But I fancy I’d have my hands full if he ever
did let go. Mr. Rogers--he is getting rather devoted, my dear--I
always could manage, because he would be so afraid of making himself
ridiculous that he hardly would allow his voice to tremble unless I
almost proposed to him. He burst out one day: “You white English
rose!” I fear I used my eyelashes rather wickedly, and my upper lip,
for he drew a step nearer and the colour came into his grey face. Then
I felt my eyes twinkle and he recovered himself in a manner that would
have done credit to a woman of the world in her fourteenth flirtation;
men are usually so clumsy about these things; he smiled quickly and
added in the light tone of any man complimenting any woman: “You are
really unique here, you know, Lady Helen. Perhaps lily is rather your
prototype in the floral world than rose. You make my countrywomen seem
like hot-house flowers--if there were a floral heaven they would all be
beautiful orchids in the next world.”
But to return to Mr. Nugent. One warm evening when he was calling on
us and we were sitting on the piazza I asked him if he intended to
go into politics. It is very difficult to make him talk of anything
consecutively, by the way, and that makes him resemble us in one
particular, at least. There are no semi-colons in _his_ conversation,
mostly dashes.
“I have not made up my mind, Lady Helen. It is an alluring prospect
in one way, but I should be obliged to give up--those are wonderful
clouds.”
They were, Polly. Above the mountain behind the Club House were two
enormous masses of cloud that looked like colossal blue dishes piled to
the heavens with whipped cream. They were almost alike and you cannot
imagine anything more perfect than that cream whipped into form by a
giant hand. I thought out loud and Mr. Nugent said hastily:
“Oh, call it sea foam, not cream.”
“But sea foam looks like yeast,” I objected. “I don’t think you are a
bit more poetical than I am.”
He laughed heartily (these Americans can flatter so with their laugh).
“I am quite discomfited,” he said, “and I can only add that I have far
more reason to be poetical than yourself.”
“Very neat,” said Bertie. I can imagine my beloved brother thinking it
worth while to say the charming things these men do.
“Now tell me some more of your politics,” I persisted. “Mr. Rogers
thinks politics are not respectable, but if the stables can be cleaned
in one country they can in another.”
“Exactly, but if I went in for cleaning, in other words for reform--I
should sacrifice a great deal. I am lawyer for one of the greatest
Trusts in the United States, and as I could not consistently as a
reformer--in the present exaggerated state of public opinion--remain in
such a position,--that would mean the sacrifice of a large slice of my
income.”
“I must say I admire your frankness, but _how_ can you be counsel for a
Trust?”
“Why not?--so long as I have not taken a stand.”
“How can an honest lawyer work for dishonest men?”
“The word dishonest, dear Lady Helen, is usually applied to Trusts
by men who are not in them. Trusts are an evolution, nothing more, a
combination effected that some may live rather than that all shall die.
I am not going into sordid details, but I will add that the question
never arose that did not have two sides, and that one side is as
entitled to able legal counsel as the other. There is no reason in the
world why this particular Trust, which is open and above board, should
not have the best it can pay for, and as it has done me the honour to
select me, I in return have given it the very best of my ability--which
should salve any conscience. I feel the same way when defending a man
against the combined prejudices of the community. He is entitled to the
best defence he can command, and being a human being, is as worthy of
it as his more approved opponent.”
This was the longest speech I had ever heard him make, and I understood
it as a defence of himself out of deference to me. So, I smiled at him
in appreciation of the compliment, but replied:
“Still, I don’t see why you value the money more than the public honour
you might win.”
“Money is a very good thing, Lady Helen, to a man with expensive
tastes and a passion for travelling. If I went into politics I should
not touch its money bags, for political money is invariably dirty;
moreover, I should be obliged to sacrifice more or less of my general
practice--and the result would be that I should be a comparatively poor
man once more.”
“Are you self-made?” I asked eagerly.
Once more he laughed heartily, and his remarkable eyes expressed that I
might say anything I chose.
“In a way, yes, in another, no. My father was a prominent lawyer, but
given to speculation in Wall Street.--He left little or nothing--I went
into his office as soon as I left college--and although I was helped
in the beginning I have made my own way--Ah! we are going to have a
thunder-storm. Not in our whipped cream. That has been eaten by the
gods. This cloud is full of energy and would interfere with the most
immortal digestion. May I sit it out, or must I run?”
“Stay,” said Bertie quickly, “I can’t sleep in that infernal racket.
Have some Scotch whiskey? Do you take it neat, or with soda? Nell, ring
the bell, that’s a good girl.”
They refreshed themselves, and then we concluded to watch the storm
till the rain came. The great cloud was a long time approaching and the
thunder only a distant angry rumble. But the lightning? It never seemed
to play on the surface, but leapt constantly from the deep caverns
of the purple cloud, flashing into relief tortuous convolutions that
looked heavy and flat when the fire played elsewhere. Sometimes it was
only that volcanic flame, at other times the cloud seemed torn asunder,
and down the rift ran the zig-zag thunder bolt. Now and again the
forked lightning assumed strange shapes, like the fiery skeleton of a
man’s hand or of a gigantic leaf. Sometimes it leaped from peak to peak
of that moving mountain, then suddenly darted hissing down a gorge as
if in search of prey. What nervous impatient terrible energy, and what
a tyrannical perversion of beauty!
I suddenly became aware that Mr. Nugent was watching me instead of the
storm, and as I felt embarrassed I told him hurriedly what I had been
thinking. Bertie had gone inside, as the lightning hurt his eyes.
“In a way that thunder cloud reminds me of you,” I added, rather
naughtily. “I don’t mean that you are beautiful, but you seem full
of that same nervous energy and you suggest that you might direct it
rather cruelly.”
“I don’t think I should strike at random,” he replied, still with his
eyes on my face. “And at present I am in far more danger of being hit
first.”
It seemed to me that I felt something vibrate. Perhaps it was only the
electricity in the air. At all events, I replied as placidly as if my
breath had not shortened. “One of the rules of prize-fighting is to
strike first, and the weaker should always keep that in mind, don’t you
think so?”
“Will you kindly tell me whom you consider the weaker?”
“Well--the woman--naturally.”
“I should sleep much easier if I thought you did not know your power.”
“Oh, sometimes my sex----”
“I am not talking of your sex but yourself.”
The lightning flashed just then and I saw more than his eyes. His
whole face was eager and set. I could not help going a little further.
“I used to fancy I had some power over men--at least a good many seemed
to love me--but during the last two years I have got out of practice
rather. Positively I have not had the tiniest flirtation.”
“No wonder you are so distractingly complete--I am afraid your
life has been a sad one these two years,” he added hurriedly, and,
actually, his nervous peremptory voice softened. “Tell me something
of it--But--pardon me--let me lift your shawl. The wind is coming and
it will be very strong.” He folded the shawl about me, and at the
same time I heard Agatha reading to Bertie so I felt off duty for the
present. And, Polly, I actually talked to him as I never talked to any
but the oldest and dearest friend before. But he drew it out of me. I
could no more resist that determined concentrated force beside me in
the dark than I could push the electric carnival over the mountain. The
man seemed magnetism incarnate, and every time the lightning flashed
across his face I could see that sympathy which comes not from a soft
heart but an intense personal interest. But perhaps that interest is
the most highly prized of all by women, and whatever the mainspring,
it was sweet to me, after all these months of terrible anxiety and
suffering. I never talk things over with Agatha; I have avoided
exchanging a glance of alarm with her; that would be too dreadful;
and until now I never have felt sufficiently free from care to become
interested enough in any one for confidences. But--and I am not the
least bit in love with him, Polly--I felt that I could talk to this man
all night. The thunder cloud moved down the lake, carrying its rain
with it, and I sat there for an hour and talked to him, while Bertie
slept on a sofa just beyond the open window and Agatha read on.
“I don’t think you like listening,” I said breaking off abruptly. “I
don’t believe you ever listened so long to any one before.”
“That is quite true. I am not a patient man and I am usually thinking
about several things at once--But--I am not going to pay you any idle
compliments. I will only say that I have great powers of realisation
and that I have absolutely understood all you have felt and suffered
during the last two years. I have felt it all so keenly that I wish I
could do something to help you. I _am_ going to be your friend,” he
added in his quick peremptory tones. “I will be your best friend in
this country which must be so strange to you. I don’t care a hang about
Rogers’ rights of priority. He isn’t capable of understanding you as I
do.”
He took my hand suddenly in his warm magnetic clasp, and I had an odd
feeling that he never intended to let it go. “This is only by way of
pledging friendship,” he said. “I am not going to disturb you by making
love to you--not yet. I make no promises for the future. You have
roused and bewildered and enthralled me. Whether it is love or not I
don’t know. Nor do I know what I can rouse in you. There is heaven and
madness for some man. I am sure of that--but I--well, let all that go
for the present. In the mean time I am your friend, remember that, and
Rogers is to take a back seat.”
I will admit, Polly, that I lay awake a long time that night thinking
of him and reliving that peculiar sense of being encircled with warm
magnetism. After all, I suppose that what we women want more than
anything else is sympathy and a feeling of belonging to some one
exclusively. And when a man has the passion to stir and warm and blind
us how easily we can persuade ourselves that we are in love. But the
_grande passion_--that is another thing. Of course you are in the
throes of that and I rather envy you. Good night.