THE OTHER STUDIO
The Failure was at work in his own studio. Not the large and lofty
chamber fitted and furnished as if for Michael Angelo himself, which
served for the Fraud. Not at all. The Failure did his work in a simple
second-floor back, a chamber in a commonplace lodging-house of Keppel
Street, Bloomsbury. Nowhere in the realms of Art was there a more
dismal studio. The walls were bare, save for one picture which was
turned round and showed its artistic back. The floor had no carpet:
there was no other furniture than a table, strewn and littered with
sketches, paints, palettes, brushes: there were canvases leaning
against the wall: there was a portfolio also leaning against the wall:
there was an easel and the man standing before it: and there was a
single chair.
For three years Roland Lee had withdrawn from his former haunts and
companions. No one knew now where he lived: he had not exhibited: he had
resigned his membership at the club: he had gone out of sight. Many
London men every year go out of sight. It is quite easy. You have only
to leave off going to the well-known places of resort: very soon--so
soon that it is humiliating only to think of it--men cease asking where
you are: then they cease speaking of you: you are clean gone out of
their memory--you and your works--it is as if the sea had closed over
you. There is not left a trace or a sign of your existence. Perhaps, now
and then, something may revive your name: some little adventure may be
remembered: some frolic of youth--for the rest--nothing: Silence:
Oblivion. It does, indeed, humiliate those who look on. When such an
accident revived the memory of Roland Lee, one would ask another what
had become of him. And no one knew. But, of course, he had gone
down--down--down. When a man disappears it means that he sinks. He had
gone out of sight: therefore he had gone under. Yet, when you climb, you
can never get so high as to be invisible. Even the President, R.A., is
not invisible. Again, the higher that a balloon soars, the smaller does
it grow; but the higher a man climbs up the Hill of Fame the bigger does
he show. It is quite certain that when a man has disappeared he has
sunk. The only question--and this can never be answered--is, what
becomes of the men who sink? One man I heard of--also, like Roland, an
artist--who has been traced to a certain tavern, where he fuddles
himself every evening, and where you may treat with him for the purchase
of his pictures at ten shillings--ay, or even five shillings--apiece.
And two scholars--scholars gone under--I heard of the other day. They
now reside in the same lodging-house. It is close to the Gray's Inn
Road. One lives in the garret, and the other occupies the cellar. In the
evening they get drunk together and dispute on points of the finer
scholarship. But this only accounts for three. And where are all the
rest?
Of Roland Lee nobody knew anything. There was no story or scandal
attached to him: he was no drinker: he was no gambler: he was no
profligate. But he had vanished.
Yet he had not gone far--only to Keppel Street, which is really a
central place. Here he occupied a second floor, and lived alone.
Nobody ever called upon him: he had no friends. Sometimes he sat all
day long in his studio doing nothing: sometimes he went forth, and
wandered about the streets: in the evening he dined at restaurants
where he was certain to meet none of his old friends. He lived quite
alone. As to that rumour concerning opium, it was an invention of his
employer and proprietor. He did not take opium. Day after day,
however, he grew more moody. What developments might have followed in
this lonely life I know not. Opium, perhaps: whisky, perhaps:
melancholia, perhaps. And from melancholia--Good Lord deliver us!
One thing saved him. The work which filled his soul with rage also
kept his soul from madness. When the spirit of his Art seized him and
held him he forgot everything. He worked as if he was a free man: he
forgot everything, until the time came when he had to lay down his
palette and to come back to the reality of his life. Some men would
have accepted the position: there were, as we have seen, compensations
of a solid and comfortable kind: had he chosen to work his hardest,
these golden compensations might have run into four figures. Some men
might have sat and laughed among their friends, forgetting the
ignominy of their slavery. Not so Roland. His chains jangled as he
walked; they cut his wrists and galled his ankles: they filled him
with so much shame that he was fain to go away and hide himself. And
in this manner he enjoyed the great success which his employer had
achieved for his pictures. To arrive at the success for which you have
always longed and prayed--and to enjoy it in such a fashion. Oh!
mockery of fate!
This morning he was at work contentedly--with ardour. He was beginning
a picture from one of his sketches: it was to be another study of
rocks and sea: as yet there was little to show: it was growing in his
brain, and he was so fully wrapped in his invention that he did not
hear the door open, and was not conscious that for the first time
within three years he had a visitor.
She opened the door and stood for a moment looking about her. The bare
and dingy walls, the scanty furniture, the meanness of the place, made
her very soul sink within her. For they cried aloud the story of the
painter.
For five long years she had thought of him. He was successful: he was
rising to the top of the tree: he was conquering the world--so brave,
so strong, so clever! There was no height to which he could not rise.
She should find him splendid, triumphant, and yet modest--her old
friend the same, but glorified. And she found him thus, in this dingy
den--so low, so shabby! Consider, if she had risen while he was
sinking, how great was now the gulf between them! Then she stepped
into the room and stood beside the artist at his easel.
'Roland Lee,' she whispered.
He started, looked up, and recognised her. 'Armorel!' he cried.
Then, strange to say, instead of hastening to meet and greet her, and
to hold out hands of welcome, he stood gazing at her stupidly, his
face changing colour from crimson to white. His hair was unkempt, she
saw; his cheeks worn; his eyes haggard, with deep lines round them;
and his dress was shabby and uncared for.
'You have not forgotten me, then?' she said.
'Forgotten you? No. How could I forget you?'
'Then are you pleased to see me? Shake hands with me, Roland Lee.'
He complied, but with restraint. 'Have you dropped from the clouds?'
he asked. 'How did you find me here?'
'I met your old friend Dick Stephenson. He told me that you lived
here. You are no longer friends: but he has seen you going in and
coming out. That is how I found you. Are you well, Roland?'
'Yes, I am well.'
'Does all go well with you, my old friend?'
'Why not? You see--I have got a magnificent studio: there is every
outward sign of wealth and prosperity: and if you look into any
art-criticisms you will find the papers ringing with my name.'
'You are changed.' Armorel passed over the bitterness of this speech.
'You are a little older, perhaps.' She did not tell him how haggard
and worn he looked, how unkempt and unhappy.
'Let me see some of your work,' she said. The picture on the easel was
only in its very first stage. She looked about the room. Nothing on
the walls but one picture with its face turned round. 'May I look at
this?' She turned it round. It was the picture of herself, 'The
Princess of Lyonesse,' the sketch of which he had finished on the last
day of his holiday. 'Oh!' she cried, 'I remember this. And you have
kept it, Roland--you have kept it. I am glad.'
'Yes, I have kept the only picture which I can call my own.'
'Was I like that in those days?'
'You are like that now. Only, the little Princess has become a tall
Queen.'
'Yes, yes; I remember. You said, then, that if I should ever look like
this, you would be proved to be a painter indeed. Roland, you are a
painter indeed.'
'No, no,' he said; 'I am nothing--nothing at all.'
'We were talking--when you made this sketch--of how one can grow to
his highest and noblest.'
'I have grown to my lowest,' he replied. 'But you--you----'
'What has happened, my friend? You told me so much once about
yourself--you taught me so much--you put so many new things into my
head--you must tell me more! What has happened?'
'Nothing.'
'Why are you here in this poor room? I have been to studios in Rome
and Florence, and Paris and Vienna: they are lovely rooms, fit for a
man whose mind is always full of lovely images and sweet thoughts. But
this--this room is not a studio. It is an ugly little prison. How can
light and colour visit such a place?'
'It explains itself. It proclaims aloud--Failure--Failure--Failure!'
'This picture is not Failure.'
'My name is unknown. I work on like a mole under ground. I am a
Failure. You have seen Dick Stephenson. What did he say of me?'
'He said that you must have left off working. But you have not.'
'What does it matter how much or how long a Failure goes on working?'
'Have you lost heart, Roland?'
'Heart, and hope, and faith. Everything is lost, Armorel!'
'You have lost your courage because you have failed. But many men have
failed at first--great men. Robert Browning failed for years. You were
brave once, Roland. You were able to say that if you knew you were
doing good work you cared nothing for the critics.'
'You see, Dick was right. I no longer do any work. I never send
anything to the exhibitions.'
'But why--why--why?'
'Ask me no more questions, Armorel. Go away and leave me. How
beautiful and glorious you have grown, child! But I knew you would.
And I have gone down so low, and--and--well, you see! Yes. I remember
how we talked of growing to our full height. We did not think, you
see, of the depths to which we might also drop. There are awful
depths, which you could never guess.'
He sank into the chair, and his head dropped.
Armorel stood over him, the tears gathering into her eyes.
'Roland,' she laid her hand upon his shoulder--there is no action more
sisterly--'since I have found you I shall not let you go again. It is
five years since you went away. You will tell me about yourself, when
you please. I have a great deal to tell you. Don't you remember how
sympathetic you used to be in the old days? I want a great deal more
sympathy now, because I am five years older, and I am trying so much.
I want you to hear me play--you were the first who ever praised my
playing, you know. And you must see my drawings. I have worked every
day, as I promised you I would. I have remembered all your
instructions. Come and see your pupil's work, my master.'
He made no reply.
'You live too much alone,' she went on. 'Dick Stephenson told me that
you have given up your club, and that you go nowhere, and that no one
knows how you live. You have dropped quite away from your old friends.
Why did you do that? You live in this dismal room by yourself--alone
with your thoughts: no wonder you lose courage and faith.' She opened
the portfolio and drew out a number of the sketches. 'Why,' she said,
'here are some of those you made with me. Here is Castle Bryher--you
in the boat, and I on the ledge among the sea-weed under the great
rock--and the shags in a row on the top: and here is Porth
Cressa--and here Peninnis--and here Round Island. Oh! we have so many
things to talk about. Will you come to see me?'
'You had better leave me alone, Armorel,' he said. 'Even you can do no
good to me now.'
'When will you come? See--I will write down my address. I have a flat,
and it is ever so much better furnished than this, Sir. Will you come
to-night? I shall be at home. There will be no one but Effie Wilmot.
Oh! I am not going to talk about you, but about myself. I want your
praise, Roland, and your sympathy. Both were so ready--once. Will you
come to-night?'
'You will drive me mad, I think, Armorel!'
'Will you come?'
He shook his head.
'I have got to tell you how I became rich, if you will listen. You
must come and hear my news. Why, there is no one but you in all London
who knew me when I lived on Samson alone with those old people. You
will come to-night, Roland?' Again she laid her hand upon his
shoulder. 'I will ask no questions about you--none at all. You will
tell me what you please about yourself. But you must let me talk to
you about myself, as frankly as in the old days. If you have got any
kindly memory left of me at all, Roland, you will come.'
He rose and lifted his shameful eyes to hers, so full of pity and of
tears.
'Yes,' he said; 'I will do whatever you tell me.'