WHAT THEIR FRIENDS THOUGHT.
Geoffrey Ludlow had married and settled himself in a not-too-accessible
suburb, but he had not given up such of his old companions as were on
a footing of undeniable intimacy with him. These were few in number;
for although Geoff was a general favourite from his urbanity and the
absence of any thing like pretentiousness in his disposition, he was
considered slow by most of the bolder spirits among the artist-band.
He was older than many of them certainly, but that was scarcely the
reason; for there were jolly old dogs whose presence never caused the
smallest reticence of song or story--gray and bald-headed old boys,
who held their own in scurrility and slang, and were among the latest
sitters and the deepest drinkers of the set. It is needless to say that
in all their popularity--and they were popular after a fashion--there
was not mingled one single grain of respect; while Geoffrey was
respected as much as he was liked. But his shyness, his quiet domestic
habits, and his perpetual hard work gave him little time for the
cultivation of acquaintance, and he had only two really intimate
friends, who were Charley Potts and William Bowker.
Charley Potts had been "best man" at the marriage, and Geoffrey had
caught a glimpse of old Bowker in hiding behind a pillar of the church.
It was meet, then, that they--old companions of his former life--should
see him under his altered circumstances, should know and be received
by his wife, and should have the opportunity, if they wished for it,
of keeping up at least a portion of the _camaraderie_ of old days.
Therefore after his return to London, and when he and his wife were
settled down in Elm Lodge, Geoffrey wrote to each of his old friends,
and said how glad he would be to see them in his new house.
This note found Mr. Charles Potts intent upon a representation of
Mr. Tennyson's "Dora," sitting with the child in the cornfield, a
commission which he had received from Mr. Caniche, and which was to
be paid for by no less a sum than a hundred and fifty pounds. The
"Gil Bias" had proved a great success in the Academy, and had been
purchased by a country rector, who had won a hundred-pound prize in
the Art-Union; so that Charley was altogether in very high feather and
pecuniary triumph. He had not made much alteration in the style of his
living or in the furniture of his apartment; but he had cleared off a
long score for beer and grog standing against him in the books kept
by Caroline of signal fame; he had presented Caroline herself with a
cheap black-lace shawl, which had produced something like an effect at
Rosherville Gardens! and he had sent a ten-pound note to the old aunt
who had taken care of him after his mother's death, and who wept tears
of gratified joy on its receipt, and told all Sevenoaks of the talent
and the goodness of her nephew. He had paid off some other debts also,
and lent a pound or two here and there among his friends, and was even
after that a capitalist to the extent of having some twenty pounds in
the stomach of a china sailor, originally intended as a receptacle for
tobacco. His success had taken effect on Charley. He had begun to think
that there was really something in him, after all; that life was, as
the working-man observed, "not all beer and skittles;" and that if he
worked honestly on, he might yet be able to realise a vision which had
occasionally loomed through clouds of tobacco-smoke curling round his
head; a vision of a pleasant cottage out at Kilburn, or better still
at Cricklewood; with a bit of green lawn and a little conservatory,
and two or three healthy children tumbling about; while their mother,
uncommonly like Matilda Ludlow, looked on from the ivy-covered porch;
and their father, uncommonly like himself, was finishing in the studio
that great work which was to necessitate his election into the Academy.
This vision had a peculiar charm for him; he worked away like a horse;
the telegraphic signals to Caroline and the consequent supply of beer
became far less frequent; he began to eschew late nights, which he
found led to late mornings; and the "Dora" was growing under his hand
day by day.
He was hard at work and had apparently worked himself into a knot, for
he was standing a little distance from his easel, gazing vacantly at
the picture and twirling his moustache with great vigour,--a sure sign
of worry with him,--when the "tugging, of the trotter" was heard, and
on his opening the door, Mr. Bowker presented himself and walked in.
"'Tis I! Bowker the undaunted! Ha, Ha!" and Mr. Bowker gave two short
stamps, and lunged with his walking-stick at his friend. "Give your
William drink; he is athirst. What! nothing of a damp nature about?
Potts, virtue and industry are good things; and your William has been
glad to observe that of late you have been endeavouring to practise
both; but industry is not incompatible with pale ale, and nimble
fingers are oft allied to a dry palate. That sounds like one of the
headings of the pages from Maunders' _Treasury of Knowledge_.--Send for
some beer!"
The usual pantomime was gone through by Mr. Potts, and while it was in
process, Bowker filled a pipe and walked towards the easel. "Very good,
Charley; very good indeed. Nice fresh look in that gal--not the usual
burnt-umber rusticity; but something--not quite--like the real ruddy
peasant bronze. Child not bad either; looks as if it had got its feet
in boxing-gloves, though; you must alter that; and don't make its eyes
quite so much like willow-pattern saucers. What's that on the child's
head?"
"Hair, of course."
"And what stuff's that the girl's sitting in?"
"Corn! cornfield--wheat, you know, and that kind of stuff. What do you
mean? why do you ask?"
"Only because it seems to your William that both substances are exactly
alike. If it's hair, then the girl is sitting in a hair-field; if it's
corn, then the child has got corn growing on its head."
"It'll have it growing on its feet some day, I suppose," growled Mr.
Potts, with a grin. "You're quite right, though, old man; we'll alter
that at once.--Well, what's new with you?"
"New? Nothing! I hear nothing, see nothing, and know nobody. I might be
a hermit-crab, only I shall never creep into any body else's shell; my
own--five feet ten by two feet six--will be ready quite soon enough for
me. Stop! what stuff I'm talking! I very nearly forgot the object of my
coming round to you this morning. Your William is asked into society!
Look; here's a letter I received last night from our Geoff, asking me
to come up to see his new house and be introduced to his wife."
"I had a similar one this morning."
"I thought that was on the cards, so I came round to see what you were
going to do."
"Do? I shall go, of course. So will you, won't you?"
"Well, Charley, I don't know. I'm a queer old skittle, that has been
knocked about in all manner of ways, and that has had no women's
society for many years. So much the better, perhaps. I'm not pretty to
look at; and I couldn't talk the stuff women like to have talked to
them, and I should be horribly bored if I had to listen to it. So--and
yet--God forgive me for growling so!--there are times when I'd give
any thing for a word of counsel and comfort in a woman's voice, for
the knowledge that there was any woman--good woman, mind!--no matter
what--mother, sister, wife--who had an interest in what I did. There!
never mind that."
Mr. Bowker stopped abruptly. Charley Potts waited for a minute; then
putting his hand affectionately on his friend's shoulder, said: "But
our William will make an exception for our Geoff. You've known him so
long, and you're so fond of him."
"Fond of him! God bless him! No one could know Geoff without loving
him, at least no one whose love was worth having. But you see there's
the wife to be taken into account now."
"You surely wouldn't doubt your reception by her? The mere fact of your
being an old friend of her husband's would be sufficient to make you
welcome."
"O, Mr. Potts, Mr. Potts! you are as innocent as a sucking-dove, dear
Mr. Potts, though you have painted a decent picture! To have known
a man before his marriage is to be the natural enemy of his wife.
However, I'll chance that, and go and see our Geoff."
"So shall I," said Potts, "though I'm rather doubtful about _my_
reception. You see I was with Geoff that night,--you know, when we met
the--his wife, you know."
"So you were. Haven't you seen her since?"
"Only at the wedding, and that all in a hurry--just an introduction;
that was all."
"Did she seem at all confused when she recognised you?"
"She couldn't have recognised me, because when we found her she was
senseless, and hadn't come-to when we left. But of course Geoff had
told her who I was, and she didn't seem in the least confused."
"Not she, if there's any truth in physiognomy," muttered old Bowker;
"well, if she showed no annoyance at first meeting you, she's not
likely to do so now, and you'll be received sweetly enough, no doubt.
We may as well go together, eh?"
To this proposition Mr. Potts consented with great alacrity, for though
a leader of men in his own set, he was marvellously timid, silent,
and ill at ease in the society of ladies. The mere notion of having
to spend a portion of time, however short, in company with members of
the other sex above the rank of Caroline, and with whom he could not
exchange that free and pleasant _badinage_ of which he was so great a
master, inflicted torture on him sufficient to render him an object of
compassion. So on a day agreed upon, the artistic pair set out to pay
their visit to Mrs. Geoffrey Ludlow.
Their visit took place at about the time when public opinion in Lowbar
was unsettled as to the propriety of knowing the Ludlows; and the
dilatoriness of some of the inhabitants in accepting the position of
the newcomers may probably be ascribed to the fact of the visitors
having been encountered in the village. It is undeniable that the
appearance of Mr. Potts and of Mr. Bowker was not calculated to impress
the beholder with a feeling of respect, or a sense of their position
in society. Holding this to be a gala-day, Mr. Potts had extracted a
bank-note from the stomach of the china sailor, and expended it at
the "emporium" of an outfitter in Oxford Street, in the purchase of a
striking, but particularly ill-fitting, suit of checked clothes--coat,
waistcoat, and trousers to match. His boots, of an unyielding leather,
had very thick clump soles, which emitted curious wheezings and
groanings as he walked; and his puce-coloured gloves were baggy at all
the fingers' ends, and utterly impenetrable as regarded the thumbs. His
white hat was a little on one side, and his moustaches were twisted
with a ferocity which, however fascinating to the maid-servants at the
kitchen-windows, failed to please the ruralising cits and citizenesses,
who were accustomed to regard a white hat as the distinctive badge
of card-sharpers, and a moustache as the outward and visible sign
of swindling. Mr. Bowker had made little difference in his ordinary
attire. He wore a loose shapeless brown garment which was more like a
cloth dressing-gown than a paletot; a black waistcoat frayed at the
pockets from constant contact with his pipe-stem, and so much too short
that the ends of his white-cotton braces were in full view; also a
pair of gray trousers of the cut which had been in fashion when their
owner was in fashion--made very full over the boot, and having broad
leather straps. Mr. Bowker also wore a soft black wideawake hat, and
perfumed the fragrant air with strong cavendish tobacco, fragments of
which decorated his beard. The two created a sensation as they strode
up the quiet High Street; and when they rang at Elm Lodge Geoffrey's
pretty servant-maid was ready to drop between admiration at Mr. Potts's
appearance and a sudden apprehension that Mr. Bowker had come after the
plate.
She had, however, little time for the indulgence of either feeling;
for Geoffrey, who had been expecting the arrival of hi friends, with a
degree of nervousness unintelligible to himself, no sooner heard the
bell than he rushed out from his studio and received his old comrades
with great cordiality. He shook hands heartily with Charley Potts; but
a certain hesitation mingled with the warmth of his greeting of Bowker;
and his talk rattled on from broken sentence to broken sentence, as
though he were desirous of preventing his friend from speaking until he
himself had had his say.
"How d'ye do, Charley? so glad to see you; and you, Bowker, my good
old friend: it is thoroughly kind of you to come out here; and--long
way, you know, and out of your usual beat, I know. Well, so you see
Ive joined the noble army of martyrs,--not that I mean that of course;
but--eh, you didn't expect I would do it, did you? I couldn't say, like
the girl in the Scotch song, 'I'm owre young to marry yet,' could I?
However, thank God, I think you'll say my wife is--what a fellow I am!
keeping you fellows out here in this broiling sun; and you haven't--at
least you, Bowker, haven't been introduced to her. Come along--come in!"
He preceded them to the drawing-room, where Margaret was waiting to
receive them. It was a hot staring day in the middle of a hot staring
summer. The turf was burnt brown; the fields spreading between Elm
Lodge and Hampstead, usually so cool and verdant, were now arid wastes;
the outside blinds of the house were closed to exclude the scorching
light, and there was no sound save the loud chirping of grasshoppers.
A great weariness was on Margaret that day; she had tried to rouse
herself, but found it impossible, so had sat all through the morning
staring vacantly before her, busy with old memories. Between her past
and her present life there was so little in common, that these memories
were seldom roused by associations. The dull never-changing domestic
day, and the pretty respectability of Elm Lodge, did not recal the wild
Parisian revels, the rough pleasant Bohemianism of garrison-lodgings,
the sumptuous luxury of the Florentine villa. But there was something
in the weather to-day--in the bright fierce glare of the sun, in the
solemn utterly-unbroken stillness--which brought back to her mind one
when she and Leonard and some others were cruising off the Devonshire
coast in Tom Marshall's yacht; a day on which, with scarcely a breath
of air to be felt, they lay becalmed in Babbicombe Bay; under an
awning, of course, over which the men from time to time worked the
fire-hose; and how absurdly funny Tom Marshall was when the ice ran
short. Leonard said--The gate-bell rang, and her husband's voice was
heard in hearty welcome of his friends.
In welcome of his friends! Yes, there at least she could do her duty;
there she could give pleasure to her husband. She could not give him
her love; she had tried, and found it utterly impossible; but equally
impossible was it to withhold from him her respect. Day by day she
honoured him more and more; as she watched his patient honesty, his
indomitable energy, his thorough helplessness; as she learned--in spite
of herself as it were--more of himself; for Geoff had always thought
one of the chiefest pleasures of matrimony must be to have some one
capable of receiving all one's confidences. As she, with a certain
love of psychological analysis possessed by some women went through
his character, and discovered loyalty and truth in every thought and
every deed, she felt half angry with herself for her inability to
regard him with that love which his qualities ought to have inspired.
She had been accustomed to tell herself, and half-believed, that she
had no conscience; but this theory, which she had maintained during
nearly all the earlier portion of her life vanished as she learned to
know and to appreciate her husband. She had a conscience, and she felt
it; under its influence she made some struggles, ineffectual indeed,
but greater than she at one time would have attempted. What was it
that prevented her from giving this man his due, her heart's love? His
appearance? No he was not a "girl's man" certainly, not the delicious
military vision which sets throbbing the hearts of sweet seventeen:
by no means romantic-looking, but a thoroughly manly gentleman--big,
strong, and well-mannered. Had he been dwarfed or deformed, vulgar,
dirty--and even in the present days of tubbing and Turkish baths,
there are men who possess genius and are afraid it may come off in hot
water,--had he been "common," an expressive word meaning something
almost as bad as dirt and vulgarity,--Margaret could have satisfied her
newly-found conscience, or at least accounted for her feelings. But he
was none of these, and she admitted it; and so at the conclusion of her
self-examination fell back, not without a feeling of semi-complacency,
to the conviction that it was not he, but she herself who was in fault;
that she did not give him her heart simply because she had no heart to
give; that she had lived and loved, but that, however long she might
yet live, she could never love again.
These thoughts passed rapidly through her mind, not for the first, nor
even for the hundredth time, as she sat down upon the sofa and took
up the first book which came to hand, not even making a pretence of
reading it, but allowing it to lie listlessly on her lap. Geoffrey came
first, closely followed by Charley Potts, who advanced in a sheepish
way, holding out his hand. Margaret smiled slightly and gave him her
hand with no particular expression, a little dignified perhaps, but
even that scarcely noticeable. Then Bowker, who had kept his keen eyes
upon her from the moment he entered the room, and whom she had seen and
examined while exchanging civilities with Potts, was brought forward
by Geoffrey, and introduced as "one of my oldest and dearest friends."
Margaret advanced as Bowker approached, her face flushed a little, and
her eyes wore their most earnest expression, as she said, "I am very
glad to see you, Mr. Bowker. I have heard of you from Geoffrey. I am
sure we shall be very good friends." She gripped his hand and looked
him straight in the face as she said this, and in that instant William
Bowker divined that Margaret had heard of, and knew and sympathised
with, the story of his life.
She seemed tacitly to acknowledge that there was a bond of union
between them. She was as polite as could be expected of her to
Charley Potts; but she addressed herself especially to Bowker when
any point for discussion arose. These were not very frequent, for the
conversation carried on was of a very ordinary kind. How they liked
their new house, and whether they had seen much of the people of
the neighbourhood; how they had enjoyed their honeymoon in the Isle
of Wight; and trivialities of a similar character. Charley Potts,
prevented by force of circumstances from indulging in his peculiar
humour, and incapable from sheer ignorance of bearing his share of
general conversation when a lady was present, had several times
attempted to introduce the one subject, which, in any society, he could
discuss at his ease, art--"shop;" but on each occasion had found his
proposition rigorously ignored both by Margaret and Bowker, who seemed
to consider it out of place, and who were sufficiently interested
in their own talk. So Charley fell back Upon Geoff, who, although
delighted at seeing how well his wife was getting on with his friend,
yet had sufficient kindness of heart to step in to Charley's rescue,
and to discuss with him the impossibility of accounting for the high
price obtained by Smudge; the certainty that Scumble's popularity
would be merely evanescent; the disgraceful favouritism displayed by
certain men "on the council;" in short, all that kind of talk which
is so popular and so unfailing in the simple kindly members of the
art-world. So on throughout lunch; and, indeed, until the mention of
Geoffrey's pictures then in progress necessitated the generalising
of the conversation, and they went away (Margaret with them) to the
studio. Arrived within those walls, Mr. Potts, temporarily oblivious
of the presence of a lady, became himself again. The mingled smell of
turpentine and tobacco, the sight of the pictures on the easels, and
Of Geoff's pipe-rack on the wall, a general air of carelessness and
discomfort, all came gratefully to Mr. Potts who opened his chest,
spread out his arms, shook himself as does a dog just emerged from
the water--probably in his case to get rid of any clinging vestige of
respectability--and said in a very hungry tone:
"Now, Geoff, let's have a smoke, old boy."
"You might as well wait until you knew whether Mrs. Ludlow made any
objection, Charley," said Bowker, in a low tone.
"I beg Mrs. Ludlow's pardon," said Potts, scarlet all over; "I had no
notion that she--"
"Pray don't apologise, Mr. Potts; I am thoroughly accustomed to smoke;
have been for--"
"Yes, of course; ever since you married Geoff you have been thoroughly
smoke-dried," interrupted Bowker, at whom Margaret shot a short quick
glance, half of interrogation, half of gratitude.
They said no more on the smoke subject just then, but proceeded to a
thorough examination of the picture which Charley Potts pronounced
"regularly stunning," and which Mr. Bowker criticised in a much less
explosive manner. He praised the drawing, the painting, the general
arrangement; he allowed that Geoffrey was doing every thing requisite
to obtain for himself name, fame, and wealth in the present day; but
he very much doubted whether that was all that was needed. With the
French judge he would very much have doubted the necessity of living,
if to live implied the abnegation of the first grand principles of art,
its humanising and elevated influence. Bowker saw no trace of these
in the undeniable cleverness of the Brighton Esplanade; and though
he was by no means sparing of his praise, his lack of enthusiasm, as
compared with the full-flavoured ecstasy of Charley Potts, struck upon
Margaret's ear. Shortly afterwards, while Geoffrey and Potts were deep
in a discussion on colour, she turned to Mr. Bowker, and said abruptly:
"You are not satisfied with Geoffrey's picture?"
He smiled somewhat grimly as he said, "Satisfied is a very strong word,
Mrs. Ludlow. There are some of us in the world who have sufficient good
sense not to be satisfied with what we do ourselves--"
"That's true, Heaven knows," she interrupted involuntarily.
"And are consequently not particularly likely to be content with what's
done by other people. I think Geoff's picture good, very good of its
sort; but I don't--I candidly confess--like its sort. He is a man full
of appreciation of nature, character, and sentiment; a min who, in the
expression of his own art, is as capable of rendering poetic feeling
as--By Jove, now why didn't he think of that subject that Charley Potts
has got under weigh just now? That would have suited Geoff exactly."
"What is it?"
"Dora--Tennyson's Dora, you know." Margaret bowed in acquiescence.
"There's a fine subject, if you like. Charley's painting it very well,
so far as it goes; but he doesn't feel it. Now Geoff would. A man must
have something more than facile manipulation; he must have the soul of
a poet before he could depict the expression which must necessarily be
on such a face. There are few who could understand, fewer still who
could interpret to others, such heart-feelings of that most beautiful
of Tennyson's creations as would undoubtedly show themselves in her
face; the patient endurance of unrequited love, which 'loves on through
all ills, and loves on till she dies;' which neither the contempt nor
the death of its object can extinguish, but which then flows, in as
pure, if not as strong, a current towards his widow and his child."
Margaret had spoken at first, partly for the sake of saying something,
partly because her feeling for her husband admitted of great pride in
his talent, which she thought Bowker had somewhat slighted. But now
she was thoroughly roused, her eyes bright, her hair pushed back off
her face, listening intently to him. When he ceased, she looked up
strangely, and said:
"Do you believe in the existence of such love?"
"O yes," he replied; "it's rare, of course. Especially rare is the
faculty of loving hopelessly without the least chance of return--loving
stedfastly and honestly as Dora did, I mean. With most people
unrequited love turns into particularly bitter hatred, or into that
sentimental maudlin state of 'broken heart,' which is so comforting
to its possessor and so wearying to his friends. But there _are_
exceptional cases where such love exists, and in these, no matter how
fought against, it can never be extinguished."
"I suppose you are right," said Margaret; "there must be such
instances."
Bowker looked hard at her, but she had risen from her seat and was
rejoining the others.
"What's your opinion of Mrs. Ludlow, William?" asked Charley Potts,
as they walked away puffing their pipes in the calm summer night air.
"Handsome woman, isn't she?"
"Very handsome!" replied Bowker; "wondrously handsome!" Then
reflectively--"It's a long time since your William has seen any thing
like that. All in all--face, figure, manner--wondrously perfect! She
walks like a Spaniard, and--"
"Yes, Geoff's in luck; at least I suppose he is. There's something
about her which is not quite to my taste. I think I like a British
element, which is not to be found in her. I don't know what it is--only
something--well, something less of the duchess about her. I don't think
she's quite in our line--is she, Bowker, old boy?"
"That's because you're very young in the world's ways, Charley,
and also because Geoff's wife is not very like Geoff's sister, I'm
thinking." Whereat Mr. Potts grew very red, told his friend to "shut
up!" and changed the subject.
"That night Mr. Bowker sat on the edge of his truckle-bed in his garret
in Hart Street, Bloomsbury, holding in his left hand a faded portrait
in a worn morocco case. He looked at it long and earnestly, while his
right hand wafted aside the thick clouds of tobacco-smoke pouring over
it from his pipe. He knew every line of it, every touch of colour in
it; but he sat gazing at it this night as though it were an entire
novelty, studying it with a new interest.
"Yes," said he at length, "she's very like you, my darling, very like
you,--hair, eyes, shape, all alike; and she seems to have that same
clinging, undying love which you had, my darling--that same resistless,
unquenchable, undying love. But that love is not for Geoff; God help
him, dear fellow! that love is not for Geoff!"