De Gollyer’s coming changed everything. Each day other men
returned out of the past, fragments of the life which had gone
before; brother artists arriving prepared to praise and staying
to contemplate in amazement the rise of a master talent. Under De
Gollyer’s expert guidance other types arrived, dealers with keen
business instincts, vying for the honor of the first exhibition;
men about town, celebrities of the hour, of that lighter complex
cosmopolitan world of amusement which New York recruits from the
four quarters of the globe, on curiosity bent, fulsome in their
eulogies, studying Inga with undisguised curiosity, with that look
which she now understood so well, that calculating glance which De
Gollyer had sent her on the night of their first encounter, the
look of trying to appraise her, to decide just what the situation
called for. They came, welcome or unwelcome, as formerly the summer
hordes had invaded the privacy of their life by the lake and driven
them into flight--only this time there was no retreat possible.
Day and night were crowded with the business of art. Rarely now
were they able to slip away for a quiet meal by themselves.
The door was always open to the arrival of some new enthusiast
and until midnight and after, the studio was alive with eager
voluble groups rallying around the restored leader. In this new
pervading excitement of the return there was no time for work.
Occasionally Dangerfield made an attempt to paint but the mood
was not on him. Something else obsessed his imagination, the
exhilaration that came to him in this flocking back of brilliant
acquaintances; in this eager preparation for the exhibition which
would bring him the one great moment apart from all other hours of
triumph, which would remain supreme in the memory of the artist.
This exhibition, carefully prepared for by a brilliant article
of De Gollyer’s, caught the fancy of the New York public with
the shock of a dramatic surprise in which the personal history
of Dangerfield himself, his strange ups and downs, counted
for much. The newspapers, grateful for this surprising climax
in the drama of a life which they had so faithfully recorded,
devoted columns to the purely personal side of this astonishing
renaissance, retelling old anecdotes, detailing intimacies of his
stormy and picturesque career. Fortunately the danger of a too
theatric success was averted by an immediate conflict among the
super-critics. Dangerfield had the inestimable fortune of being
viciously and scathingly attacked by the intrenched conservatives
and as violently defended by the young and the radicals. Overnight
he found himself at the head of a party, claimed as a pioneer who
had revealed the significance and vitality of the neglected fields
of American art.
He exhibited in the Spring exhibitions and everywhere was honored
with gold medals and special prizes. A month after his first
appearance before the public his prices had trebled and even at
these figures his canvases were eagerly snatched up.
In all this flurry of success Inga remained a little bewildered.
She had gone to the private view and to the opening day but from
then on she had returned into her shell and slowly eliminated
herself. Before these brilliant crowds of an alien world she found
herself ill at ease, keenly sensitive of the storm of whispered
comments of which she felt herself the center, embarrassed by the
curious glances which played over her as she moved silently, a
little frightened, by the shoulder of her husband. Invitations
poured in upon him from those eager to exploit a new personality.
He refused them all, ready to meet those who came with their
enthusiasms to his studio, declining to venture forth. She thought
she understood the reasons of these refusals in his loyalty to her.
She watched him covertly, with the perplexity of a mother bird who
sees its nestling take wing and soar away. In the discussions which
raged over the supper table and in the quiet of the studio nights
she remained always in the distance. They spoke of things which she
did not understand but she did understand how eagerly the mind of
Dangerfield craved this exhilaration of the imagination and as she
had learned to read his innermost thoughts, the passing expression
in his eyes, she comprehended that despite his determined exile
there were cravings in him, even necessities, for the stimulus of
the more public triumphs which he refused. She felt the happiness
which would come to him in a complete return to the world of
celebrities, among those favored few whose presence is greeted by a
stir in the crowd.
De Gollyer, Quinny, and Steingall had urged him to return to the
club as a sort of first step back into the world which eagerly
awaited him. Despite his persistent refusal, in which lay perhaps
a temperamental shrinking before the publicity of the test, Inga
comprehended how deeply inlaid was this new longing. To her there
was a sort of finality about the decision, a final surrender of
the last hold which she had over his life. Yet as always this
very realization drove her to urge the thing she feared. When her
mind was made up she met the situation without equivocation, with
characteristic frankness.
“There is one thing you really ought to do,” she said to him one
night when the last late guests had departed and they remained
alone in the studio.
“What’s that?” he asked without particular attention to her remark.
He was still keyed up by the excitement of the discussion which had
ended, a discussion in which he had dominated by a boldness and
justness of opinion.
“Go back.”
“Go back?” he said, startled, and looking at her with a puzzled
frown.
She nodded. “Yes, it is time.”
“Why do you say that? It’s very strange that you should say that,”
he said evasively and turning from her he flung down in an easy
chair outside the circle of light, so that his face was concealed
in the shadow.
“Because it is time,” she said quietly, “and--because you want to
go.”
“The idea!” he said laughing nervously. “Haven’t I refused again
and again?”
“Yes, that’s so.” She hesitated a moment, then added: “Mr. Dan,
won’t you tell me, honestly, just why you have refused?”
He began instantly, a little too hurriedly.
“Why, Inga, it’s very simple. I should think you’d understand.
It’s just the very thing I shouldn’t do. I should think you of all
people would realize--you’ve heard me say it often enough, that the
one thing an artist should do is to keep to himself. Why should I
go out to amuse them? They’ve only a curiosity to see a new animal.
Heavens, you don’t mean to say that _you_ want to take up society!
Inga, that would be amazing!”
“No, that’s not what I want but it’s no reason why you shouldn’t
go.”
“Here, I say,” he said angrily “none of that! Let’s understand each
other once for all. I’m not that kind. Wherever I go you go.”
“I wish you would go back to your club,” she said after a moment
without answering his last remark. “That is different, that would
mean a lot to you. Oh yes, it would mean a lot, I know it.”
“Just why do you say that?”
“Because such things mean a lot to you.”
“What things?”
“Why, the feeling of being admired and petted after you’ve done
something big,” she said, smiling a little. “You’re very much of a
boy. Then you need to be with men who wake you up. It’s good for
you. I can see that--you need a little play.”
“Well, I’m not going,” he said abruptly and with a sudden gesture
of irritation he cut her short and refused to discuss the matter
further.
But despite his protestations he longed to do the very thing he had
refused. Yet he hesitated. It seemed disloyalty to her. Just why he
should feel so he could not quite explain to himself, yet he felt
despite all that she had said it would send her further from him
than she was now, with the feeling of encompassing loneliness.
It was not until a week after, late in the afternoon, after a
renewed urging by De Gollyer that he yielded far enough to glance
undecidedly at Inga.
“Come now, Mrs. Dangerfield,” said De Gollyer, “Dan always was an
unsociable brute. He ought to drop in, you know, he really ought
to. Every one at the club is waiting to see him--can’t understand
why he doesn’t come around.”
Inga sprang up lightly and taking up Dangerfield’s coat brought it
over to him with a determined air.
“Of course he must go--besides, he’s just dying to,” she said
laughing.
Dangerfield hesitated, resisting a little, still looking down at
her.
“Are you sure you want me to go?”
“Very sure.”
He looked into her eyes, a little guilty weakening in his heart.
Yet he was unable to detect any modifying seriousness beneath the
lightness of her expression. He allowed her to slip his arms into
the coat.
“There,” she cried; “you know you’re just crazy to do it.”
He couldn’t repress a telltale smile.
“Well, yes,” he said, feeling a sudden excitement in his voice. “It
will mean a lot to go back to see the boys once more.” De Gollyer
had gone ahead down the hall. He turned again, still uneasy, still
a little conscience smitten. “I’ll just run in for a look around.
Back by seven.” Then he caught her in his arms and held her close
to him in one of the old impulsive moods. “How do you know so well
what I want to do, young lady?”
“I do,” she said defiantly.
She began to laugh as though the triumph were all hers and she
continued laughing until he had gone out and closed the door.