PARTED OUR FELLOWSHIP.
Othello; ii.--1.
The news of the collapse of Princeton Platinum stock, which Dr. Wilson
had given Arthur on Saturday night, proved to be somewhat premature. On
Sunday it was decided at the club, where the matter was discussed in a
cold-blooded and leisurely fashion, that the whole scheme had gone to
pieces; and of course this decision was accompanied by the statement,
in various forms, that everybody knew that there was nothing
substantial behind the certificates. On Monday, however, the stock took
an unexpected rise, and for two or three days held its own with a
firmness which greatly encouraged its holders.
Fenton had bought the bulk of his shares at two and seven-eights, and
still held them, notwithstanding the rumors of disaster in the air.
With a folly that would be incredible were it not one of the most
common things in amateur stock transactions, the artist had by this
time put the bulk of his little fortune into this wild-cat stock, which
he now held with a desperate determination not to sell below the figure
at which he had purchased. He could so little afford the least loss,
that, with the genuine instinct of the gambler, he trusted to luck, and
ran the risk of utter ruin for the sake of the chance of making a
brilliant stroke, or at least of coming out even. Having made up his
mind to hold on, he clung to the position with his customary obstinacy,
even dismissing the matter, as far as was possible, from his thoughts.
He was very busy preparing an exhibition of pictures at the St. Filipe
club. The matter had been left in his hands by the other members of the
Art Committee, of which he was chairman; but his attitude toward the
club had prevented his taking any steps until after the meeting on
Saturday night. Now, he was particularly anxious to make the exhibition
a brilliant success, to give a signal instance of the value of his
services.
He had gone to his studio on Sunday afternoon and sketched in a head of
Ninitta, and upon this he worked, now and then, with a desperate energy
born of the feeling that it substantiated his story to Edith. He had
been seized with grave doubts as to the advisability of exhibiting the
_Fatima_ just now; but he did not see his way clear to spare so large
and important a picture from the collection, and he comforted himself
with the thought that the face was different, and that if the model
were recognized he would be supposed to have worked up old sketches
taken when Ninitta had posed for him before her marriage.
He worked with all his marvellous energy, collecting pictures,
directing their hanging, soothing artists whose canvases were not
placed to their liking, making out the catalogue, and arranging all the
details which in such a connection are fatiguing and well-nigh
innumerable.
The exhibition was opened on Wednesday evening with a reception to
ladies, and by nine o'clock the gallery began to fill. Fenton had
decorated the rooms a little, chiefly with live pampas grass and palms
and India-rubber trees. It is difficult to see how mankind in the
nineteenth century could exist without the India-rubber tree. If that
plant were destroyed, civilization would be left gasping, helpless and
crippled; and of late years, not content with making it serviceable in
every department of practical life, men have brought the shrub into the
domain of aesthetics by using it for decorative purposes.
The collection of paintings was an interesting one, made up of the work
of the best artists in town. Fenton had spared no pains either in
procuring what he wanted, or in arranging the gallery. The _Fatima_
hung in a position of honor opposite the main entrance. The selection
of so prominent a place for his own work offended Fenton's taste, and
annoyed him with an uncomfortable sense of how strongly the picture was
in evidence. The exigencies of hanging, and the fact that the canvas
was the most important one in the room forced him to place it as he
did; and Bently, whom he called to his assistance, laughed at his
scruples. None of the artists had seen the picture, and Bently was
quite carried away by his admiration of it.
"By Jove! Fenton," he said, "I didn't know you had it in you. It's
perfectly stunning. But it's beastly wicked," he added. "Perhaps that's
the reason it's so good."
"Come," Fenton said with a laugh, "that sounds quite like the old Pagan
days."
"But how in the dickens," Tom went on, "did you get Mrs. Herman to pose
for you?"
"Great Heavens!" ejaculated Fenton, "don't say that to anybody else. I
had no end of studies of her, made long ago; but I didn't suppose I had
followed them closely enough for it to be recognized."
"You don't mean," Tom returned, "that that side and arm are done from
old studies!"
Fenton had a delicate dislike to literal falsehood. It was not a
question of morality directly, but one of taste. Albeit, since taste is
simply morality remote from the springs of action, it perhaps came to
much the same thing in the end. He felt now, however, that the time for
the selfish indulgence of his individual whims was past, and that he
owed to Ninitta the grace of a downright and hearty falsehood.
"Why, of course," he said, "I had one or two models to help me out; but
the inspiration came from the old studies."
"And she didn't pose for you?" Tom persisted incredulously.
"Pose for me?" echoed Fenton, impatiently. "Why, man alive, think what
you're saying! Of course, she didn't pose for me. She never has posed
for anybody since she was married."
"And a devilish shame it is, too," responded Tom.
This conversation, which took place Wednesday afternoon, made Fenton
extremely uneasy. Fate seemed to have worked against him. He had
painted the picture to go to the New York Exhibition, where he hoped it
would be sold without ever coming under the eye of Herman at all. He
reflected now that Ninitta had posed for Helen and for several of his
brother painters, while it was scarcely credible that the likeness
which Bently had perceived at a glance should escape the trained
artist's eye of her husband; and it seemed to him now, little less than
madness to have brought the picture here at all.
Upon second thought, however, he reflected that even were the picture
recognized, no great harm would probably come of it. No one would be
likely to speak on the subject to Herman, and, least of all, was there
a probability that the latter would confess that he was aware of what
his wife had done. Herman's condemnation, Fenton said to himself with a
shrug, he must, if worst came to worst, endure; this was to be set down
with other unpleasantnesses which belong to the unpleasant conditions
of life as they exist in these days. As long as there was no open
scandal, he could ignore whatever lay beneath the surface, and he
assured himself that in any event it were wisest, as he had long ago
learned, to carry things off with a high hand.
It was about half past nine when Fenton brought Edith into the gallery.
The crowd had by this time become pretty dense, and just inside the
door they halted, exchanging greeting with the acquaintances who
appeared on every side. The St. Filipe was an old club, and for more
than a quarter of a century had maintained the reputation of leading in
matters of art and literature. Its influence had, on the whole, been
remarkably even and intelligent; but of late it began to be felt, among
those who were radical in their views, that the club was coming under
Philistine influence. Half a dozen years before, when Fenton had
proposed Peter Calvin for membership, even the social influence of the
candidate did not save him from a rejection so marked that Arthur had
threatened to resign his own membership. Now, however, Peter Calvin was
not only a member of the St. Filipe, but he was on the Election
Committee. The club was held in favor in the circles over which his
influence extended, and although workers in all branches of art were
still included among the members, they were pretty closely pushed by
the more fashionable element of the town. Fenton was not far from right
in asserting, as he did one day to Mrs. Greyson, after her return from
Europe, that the change in his own attitude toward art was pretty
exactly paralleled by the alteration which had taken place in that of
Boston.
The character of the membership of the club was indicated to-night by
the brilliancy of the company present. It was one of those occasions
when everybody is there, and the scene, as the new-comers looked over
the gallery, was most bright and animated. Although the ladies had
evidently labored under the usual uncertainty in regard to the proper
dress which seems inseparable from an art exhibition in Boston, and
were in all varieties of costume from street attire to full evening
toilette, there were enough handsome gowns to supply the necessary
color. There was also abundance of pretty and of striking faces, and
the crowd had that pleasant look of familiarity which one gets from
recognizing acquaintances all through it.
One of the first persons the Fentons saw was Ethel Mott, who, under the
chaperonage of Mrs. Frostwinch, was making the tour of the gallery with
Kent, and paying far more attention to her companion than to the
pictures.
"Oh, Arthur," Edith whispered, "I saw Mrs. Staggchase in the
dressing-room, and she told me that Ethel's engagement is out to-day."
Arthur smiled, remembering his perspicacity when Ethel had driven away
from his dinner with Kent in her carriage.
"Isn't the crowd dreadful?" the voice of Mrs. Bodewin Ranger said, at
Edith's elbow. "I'm really getting too old to trust myself in such a
crush."
While Edith chatted with her, the steward called Fenton away, in
connection with some question about the catalogues, and when Mrs.
Ranger moved on, Edith found herself for an instant alone. The mention
of her husband's name behind her caught her ear and her attention.
"Fenton's cheeky enough for anything!" said an unknown voice. "But he
makes a point of his good taste, and I think it's beastly poor form for
him to show that picture here."
"Bently says," returned another voice, also strange to Edith, "that
Fenton says she didn't pose for him, but that he worked it up from old
studies."
"I don't care if he did," was the response. "All the fellows know it,
and Herman must feel like the deuce."
"But you can't suppress every picture that has a study of her in it."
"Hush," said the other voice, "there comes Herman himself."
It seemed to Edith that this brief dialogue had been shouted out so
that it could not be inaudible to any one in the room. She looked about
for her husband. Her ears rang with the meaningless babble of voices,
the jargon of human sounds conveying far less impression of
intelligence than the noise of water on the shore, or the sound of the
wind in the tree-tops. All about her were faces wreathed in
conventional smiles, the inevitable laughter, the usual absence of
earnestness, and in the midst of all, with a shock hardly less painful
than that of the discovery she had just made, she heard the voice of
Herman bidding her good evening.
She held out her hand to him with a hasty, excited gesture. She was
painfully conscious that he had but to lift his eyes to see the
_Fatima_ hanging on the opposite wall of the gallery, and she
instinctively felt that she must draw his attention away.
"How do you do, Mr. Herman," she said, with eager warmth. "Is Mrs.
Herman with you?"
She moved half around him as she spoke, as if compelled by the shifting
of the crowd to change her position; and while she shook hands managed
to bring herself almost face to the picture, so that his back was
toward it.
"No," he answered, "she never comes to these things if she can possibly
help it. I hear your husband has outdone himself on this exhibition."
Edith looked about despairingly for Arthur. She felt herself unequal to
the emergency, and longed for his clever wits to contrive some means of
escape from the cruel dilemma in which his act had placed her and his
friend. Indignation, shame, and sorrow filled her heart. She recognized
that Arthur had not told her the truth in regard to Ninitta. The dread
and the suspicion which she had felt on the night of the dinner
returned to her with tenfold force. But the greatest triumph of modern
civilization is the power it has bestowed upon women of concealing
their feelings. The pressing need of the moment was to show to Herman a
smiling and untroubled face, and to avoid arousing his suspicion that
anything was wrong.
"The truth is," she returned, "that I haven't seen the exhibition. It's
impossible to see pictures in such a crowd, don't you think? I know
Arthur has worked very hard. I've hardly seen him this week."
"He has a most tremendous power of accomplishing what he undertakes,"
Herman said heartily. "But tell me about yourself. You're looking
tired."
"It is the time of year to look tired. I believe I am feeling a little
anxious that spring should arrive."
She was struggling in her thoughts for a means of preventing the
discovery, which it seemed to her must be inevitable the moment she
ceased to engage Herman in conversation and he turned away. Over his
shoulder she could see the beautiful, sensuous _Fatima_ lying with long
sleek limbs amid bright-hued cushions. Now that she knew the truth, she
could see Ninitta in every line, and her whole soul rose in indignant
protest. It was her friend, the wife of this man she honored, who was
delivered up on the wall yonder to the curious eyes of all these
people. The stinging blush of shame burned in Edith's cheeks, and, as
at this instant she turned to find her husband beside her, the glance
which darted from her eyes to his was one of righteous scorn and
indignation.
His wife's burning look showed Arthur that she knew; and, reflecting
quickly, he decided that Herman did not. It was characteristic of him
that he instantly chose the boldest policy.
"Come," he said to Herman as soon as they had greeted each other, "I
know you haven't seen my _Fatima_. The boys say its the best thing I've
done, but I couldn't get a decent model, and had to depend so much on
old studies, that, for the life of me, I can't tell whether it's good
or not."
Like two blows at once came to Edith a sense of shame that she could
even involuntarily have wished for her husband's aid, and an
overwhelming consciousness of the readiness and boldness of his
falsity. She saw the face of Grant Herman, nobly instinct with truth in
every line, and, as he turned at her husband's word, everything blurred
before her vision. She believed she was going to faint, and she rallied
all her self-command to hold herself steady. The lights danced, and the
sound of voices faded as into the distance. Then, with a supreme effort
of will, she rallied, and the voices rolled back upon her ear with a
noise like the roar of an incoming wave.
A sphere of silence seemed to envelop Herman and Arthur and herself in
the very midst of the crowd, as for an instant which seemed to her
cruelly long she stood waiting for what the sculptor should say.
"Your friends are right, Fenton," Herman said, at length, in a voice so
changed from its previous cordiality that it was idle to suppose the
likeness had escaped him. "You have never painted anything better."
"Thank you," Fenton responded, brightly. "I am awfully glad you like
it. I fancy," he added, with a laugh, "that the tabby-cats will be
shocked."
His companion made no reply, and the approach of Rangely afforded
Arthur a chance to change the conversation.
"I say, Fred," he demanded, "have you congratulated Thayer Kent yet?"
"Congratulated him?" echoed Rangely.
"Yes. Didn't you know his engagement is out?"
Rangely might have been said to take a page out of Fenton's own book,
as he answered,--
"But what's the etiquette of precedence?" "Of precedence?" echoed
Arthur, in his turn.
"Yes," Rangely returned. "Which of us should congratulate the other
first? Only," he added, hitting to his own delight upon a position
which might save him from some awkwardness in the future, "of course my
engagement can't be announced until Miss Merrivale gets home to her
mother."
"Well," Arthur said, "marriage is that ceremony by which man lays aside
the pleasures of life and takes up its duties. I congratulate you on
your determination to do anything so virtuous."
"Sardonic, as usual," retorted Fred, laughing; and then he went to find
Miss Merrivale, convinced that under the circumstances the sooner he
proposed to her the better.