George had arranged his career in a quite exceptional way. It is true
that chance had served him; but then he had known how to make use of
chance to the highest advantage. The chance that had served him lay in
the facts that Mary Peel had fallen gravely in love with him, that her
sole surviving relative was a rich uncle, and that George's surname was
the same as hers and her uncle's. He had met niece and uncle in Bursley
in the Five Towns, where old Samuel Peel was a personage, and, timidly,
a patron of the arts. Having regard to his golden hair and
affection-compelling appearance, it was not surprising that Mary,
accustomed to the monotony of her uncle's house, had surrendered her
heart to him. And it was not surprising that old Peel had at once
consented to the match, and made a will in favour of Mary and her
offspring. What was surprising was that old Peel should have begun to
part with his money at once, and in large quantities, for he was not of
a very open-handed disposition.
The explanation of old Samuel Peel's generosity was due to his being a
cousin of the Peels of Bursley, the great eighteenth-century family of
earthenware manufacturers. The main branch had died out, the notorious
Carlotta Peel having expired shockingly in Paris, and another young
descendant, Matthew, having been forced under a will to alter his name
to Peel-Swynnerton. So that only the distant cousin, Samuel Peel, was
left, and he was a bachelor with no prospect of ever being anything
else. Now Samuel had made a fortune of his own, and he considered that
all the honour and all the historical splendours of the Peel family were
concentrated in himself. And he tried to be worthy of them. He tried to
restore the family traditions. For this he became a benefactor to his
native town, a patron of the arts, and a candidate for the Staffordshire
County Council. And when Mary set her young mind on a young man of parts
and of ambition, and bearing by hazard the very same name of Peel, old
Samuel Peel said to himself: "The old family name will not die out. It
ought to be more magnificent than ever." He said this also to George
Peel.
Whereupon George Peel talked to him persuasively and sensibly about the
risks and the prizes of the sculptor's career. He explained just how
extremely ambitious he was, and all that he had already done, and all
that he intended to do. And he convinced his uncle-in-law that young
sculptors were tremendously handicapped in an expensive and difficult
profession by poverty or at least narrowness of means. He convinced his
uncle-in-law that the best manner of succeeding was to begin at the top,
to try for only the highest things, to sell nothing cheaply, to be
haughty with dealers and connoisseurs, and to cut a figure in the very
centre of the art-world of London. George was a good talker, and all
that he said was perfectly true. And his uncle was dazzled by the
immediate prospect of new fame for the ancient family of Peel. And in
the end old Samuel promised to give George and Mary five hundred a year,
so that George, as a sculptor, might begin at the top and "succeed like
success." And George went off with his bride to London, whence he had
come. And the old man thought he had done a very noble and a very
wonderful thing, which, indeed, he had.
This had occurred when George was twenty-five.
Matters fell out rather as George had predicted. The youth almost at
once obtained a commission for three hundred pounds' worth of symbolic
statues for the front of the central offices of the Order of Rechabites,
which particularly pleased his uncle, because Samuel Peel was a strong
temperance man. And George got one or two other commissions.
Being extravagant was to George Peel the same thing as "putting all the
profits into the business" is to a manufacturer. He was extravagant and
ostentatious on principle, and by far-sighted policy--or, at least, he
thought that he was.
And thus the world's rumours multiplied his success, and many persons
said and believed that he was making quite two thousand a year, and
would be an A.R.A. before he was grey-haired. But George always related
the true facts to his uncle-in-law; he even made them out to be much
less satisfactory than they really were. His favourite phrase in letters
to his uncle was that he was "building," "building"--not houses, but his
future reputation and success.
Then commissions fell off or grew intermittent, or were refused as being
unworthy of George's dignity. And then young Georgie arrived, with his
insatiable appetites and his vociferous need of doctors, nurses,
perambulators, nurseries, and lacy garments. And all the time young
George's father kept his head high and continued to be extravagant by
far-sighted policy. And the five hundred a year kept coming in regularly
by quarterly instalments. Many a tight morning George nearly decided
that Mary must write to her uncle and ask for a little supplementary
estimate. But he never did decide, partly because he was afraid, and
partly from sheer pride. (According to his original statements to his
uncle-in-law, seven years earlier, he ought at this epoch to have been
in an assured position with a genuine income of thousands.)
But the state of trade worsened, and he had a cheque dishonoured. And
then he won the Triennial Gold Medal. And then at length he did arrange
with Mary that she should write to old Samuel and roundly ask him for an
extra couple of hundred. They composed the letter together; and they
stated the reasons so well, and convinced themselves so completely of
the righteousness of their cause, that for a few moments they looked on
the two hundred as already in hand. Hence the Heidsieck night. But on
the morrow of the Heidsieck night they thought differently. And George
was gloomy. He felt humiliated by the necessity of the application to
his uncle--the first he had ever made. And he feared the result.
His fears were justified.