Ideala's notions of propriety were altogether unconventional. She never
could be made to understand that it was not the proper thing to talk
familiarly to any one she met, and discuss any subject they were equal
to with them.
"It is good for people to talk, and natural, and therefore proper," she
said. "If I can give pleasure to a stranger by doing so, or he can give
pleasure to me, it would not be right to keep silent."
She carried this idea of her duty to her neighbour rather far
sometimes.
I remember her telling me once about two old gentlemen she had
travelled with the day before.
"The sun came in and bothered me, and one of them offered to draw the
blind," she said, "and he remarked it was rather a treat to see the
sun, we have so little of it now; and I said that was true, and told
him how I pitied the farmers. I had to stay in my room the other day
with a bad cold, and I amused myself watching one of them at work in
some fields opposite. The state of his mind was expressed by his
boots. On Monday the sun was shining, the air was mild, and it seemed
as if we were going to have a continuance of fine weather, and the
farmer appeared of a cheerful countenance, and his boots were polished
and laced. On Tuesday there was an east wind, veering south, with
showers, and his boots were laced, but not polished. On Wednesday
there was frost, fog, and gloom, and they were neither laced nor
polished. On Thursday there was a snowstorm, and he had no boots at
all on; and after that I did not see him, and I wondered if he had
committed suicide--in which case I thought the jury might almost have
brought in a verdict of 'justifiable _felo-de-se_.' And when I told
that story the other old gentleman shut his book, and began to talk
too. And I said I thought the weather was much colder than it used to
be, for I could remember wearing muslin dresses in May, and I could
not wear them at all now; but I did not know if the change were in the
climate or in myself--perhaps a little of both--though, indeed, I knew
that, to a certain extent, it was in the climate, which had been very
much altered in different districts by drainage, and cutting, or
planting--altered for the better, however, as a rule. And one old
gentleman had heard that before, but did not understand it exactly, so
I explained it to him; and then I talked about changes of climate in
general, and the formation of beds of coal, and the ice period, and
sun-spots, and the theory of comets, and about my husband getting up
to see the last one, and going out in a felt hat and dressing-gown
with a bed-candle to look for it--and about that dream of mine, did I
tell you? I dreamt the comet came into our drawing-room, and the leg
of a Chinese table turned into a snake and snorted at it, and the
comet looked so taken aback that I woke myself with a shout of
laughter. And then we talked of popular superstitions about comets,
and dreams, and ghosts-- particularly ghosts, and I told a number of
creepy stories, and one old gentleman pretended he didn't believe in
them, but he did, and so did the other without any pretence; and we
talked about Darwinism, and the nature of the soul, and Nihilism, and
the state of society--and--and a few other things. And they were such
dear delightful old gentlemen, and they knew such a lot, and were so
clever; and one of them was a Railway Director, and the other couldn't
let his farms, and was bothered about his pheasants, and wanted to
have the trains altered to suit him. I should so like to meet them
both again."
"And how long did all this take, Ideala?"
"Oh, some hours. I fancy their dreams would be rather confused last
night," she added, naively.
"Poor old gentlemen!" said I.
This sociability and inclination to talk the matter out, and, I may
say, a certain amount of innocence and lack of worldly wisdom into the
bargain, betrayed her occasionally into small improprieties of conduct
that were not to be excused, and would possibly not have been forgiven
in any one but Ideala. But such things were allowed in her as certain
things are allowed in certain people--not because the things are right
in themselves, but because the people who do them see no harm in them.
There are people, too, who seem to enjoy the privilege of making wrong
right by doing it. Society, however, only accords this privilege to a
limited and distinguished few.
When Ideala saw for herself that she had done an unjustifiable thing
she was very ready to confess it. I always fancied she had some latent
idea of making atonement in that way. It never mattered how much a
story told against herself, nor how much malicious people might make of
it to her discredit; she told all, inimitably, and with scrupulous
fidelity to fact.
One day she was standing waiting for a train at the station at York,
and in her absent way she fixed her eyes on a gentleman who was walking
about the platform.
Presently he went up to her, and, without any apology or show of
respect, remarked: "I am sure I have seen you before."
"Probably," Ideala rejoined, as if the occurrence were the most natural
thing in the world, "but I do not remember you. Perhaps if I heard your
name----?"
"Oh, I don't suppose you ever heard my name," he said.
"In that case I can never have known you," she answered, calmly. "I
never know any one except by name. I suppose you are an Englishman?"
"Yes," he said, eagerly; "I am in the 5th----"
"Ah, I thought so," she interrupted, placidly. "Englishmen in the 5th,
and some other regiments, are apt to have but the one idea----"
"And that is?"
"And that is a bad one."
He looked at her for a moment, and then, hat in hand, he made her a low
bow, and left her without another word.
"I think he felt ill, and went to have some refreshment," she added,
when she told me.
From what happened afterwards I am sure that at the time she had no
idea of the real significance of the position in which she found
herself placed on this occasion. But, as a rule, if she did or said the
wrong thing, she became painfully conscious of the fact immediately
afterwards--indeed, it was generally _afterwards_ that she grasped
the full meaning of most things. She was ready with repartee without
being in the least quick of understanding; she had to think things
over, and even then she was not sure to do the right thing next time.
"Mr. Graves is ten years younger than his wife," she told me once, "and
only fancy what I said one day. It was in his studio, and she was
there. I declared a woman could have no sense of propriety at all who
married a man younger than herself--that no good could possibly come of
such marriages--and a lot more. Then I suddenly remembered, and you can
imagine my feelings! But what do you think I did? I went there the next
year, and said the same thing again exactly!"