'I made it quite clear that the scheme was Mr Mann's own, and Mr Mann
sent with it what I may say is a very beautiful description of his
theatre as it will be in being.'
'Theatres in the air,' said some one, and all, just a little ashamed,
though with a certain bravado of geniality to cover their shame, rose
to go.
As they came out of the room Clara darted up the stairs and heard their
remarks as they departed. 'Birds and fishes.' ... 'Extraordinary man.'
... 'Fairy tale.' ... 'Damned impudence.'
Charles, still unmindful of any change, moved among them thanking them
warmly for their support and explaining that if he had been somewhat
long in reading it was because he had wished to leave no room for
misunderstanding.
No one stayed but an Irish poet, who had been delighted with the words,
birds and fishes, emerging like a poem from the welter of so much
detail, and Verschoyle, a little uneasy, but entranced by Charles's
voice and what seemed to him his superb audacity. They three stood and
talked themselves into oblivion of the world and its narrow ways, and
Charles was soon riding the hobby-horse of his theory of Kingship and
urging Verschoyle to interest the Court of St James's in Art.
Clara joined them, listened for a while, and later detached his
lordship from the other two, who talked hard against each other,
neither listening, both hammering home points. She took Verschoyle
into a corner and said,--
'It was very unfair of Mr Griffenberg to catch Charles out on the birds
and fishes. They're very important to him.'
'That's what I like about him,' said Verschoyle. 'Things are important
to him. Nothing is important to the rest of us.'
'Some of them will resign from the committee,' said Clara. 'I hope you
won't. It is a great pity, because Charles does mean it so thoroughly.'
Verschoyle screwed in his eye-glass and held his knee and rocked it to
and fro. He was shrewd enough to see that if he resigned the whole
committee would break up, and he knew that this dreadful eventuality
was in Clara's mind also. He liked Charles's extravagance: it made him
feel wicked, but also he was kind and could not bring himself to hurt
Clara. He had never in his life felt that he was of the slightest
importance to any one. Clara felt that sense stirring in him and she
fed it; let him into the story of their struggles and the efforts she
had made to bring her idealist to London, and urged upon him the vital
importance of Charles's work.
'They're all jealous of him,' she said, 'all these people who have
never been heard of outside London. It was just like them to fasten on
a thing like that.'
Verschoyle laughed.
'I like the idea of birds and fishes in London,' he said. 'I think we
need them.... Now, if it were you, Mrs Mann'--for he had been so
introduced to her--'I would back you through everything.'
'It is me,' said Clara. 'It always is a woman. If it were not for me
we should not be in London now.'
'You must bring him to dinner with me.'
Clara accepted in her eagerness to save the situation without realising
that she had compromised herself.
'You will forgive my saying it,' added Verschoyle, 'but it hurts me to
hear you speak of yourself as a woman. You are only a child and I hate
women.'
'So do I,' said Clara, all her anxiety now allayed. With Verschoyle
for her friend she did not care how soon the committee was dissolved.
She had always hated the committee, for, as her grandfather used to
say, a committee is a device by which the incompetent check the
activities of the competent.... She liked Verschoyle. He was a lonely
little man and she thought whimsically that only lonely people could
swallow the birds and fishes which are so necessary as the finishing
touch to the artist's vision.
'I must be going now,' she said to her companion's surprise.
'Can't I take you in my car?' he asked, concealing his astonishment at
her speaking of a home elsewhere. She consented, and he took her back
to her rooms, leaving Charles and the Irish poet still rhapsodising in
a somewhat discordant duet.