HILARY, PEGGY, AND HER BOARDERS
When Leslie and Peter went to Venice to pick up Berovieri goblets and
other things, Leslie stayed at the Hotel Europa and Peter in the Palazzo
Amadeo. The Palazzo Amadeo is a dilapidated palace looking onto the Rio
delle Beccarie; it is let in flats to the poor; and in the sea-story
suite of the great, bare, dingy, gilded rooms lived Hilary and Peggy
Margerison, and three disreputable infants who insisted on bathing in the
canals, and the boarders. The boarders were at the moment six in number;
Peter made seven. The great difficulty with the boarders, Peggy told him,
was to make them pay. They had so little money, and such a constitutional
reluctance to spend that little on their board.
"The poor things," said Peggy, who had a sympathetic heart. "I'm sure I'm
sorry for them, and I hate to ask them for it. But one's got to try and
live."
She was drying Illuminato (baptized in that name by his father's
desire, but by his mother called Micky) before the stove in the great
dining-room. Illuminato had just tumbled off the bottom step into the
water, and had been fished out by his uncle Peter; he was three, and had
humorous, screwed-up eyes and a wide mouth like a frog's, so that Hilary,
who detested ugliness, could really hardly be fond of him. Peggy was; but
then Peggy always had more sense of humour than Hilary.
A boarder looked in to see if lunch was ready. It was not, but Peggy
began preparations by screaming melodiously for Teresina. They heard the
boarder sigh. He was a tall young man with inspired eyes and oily hair.
Peter had observed him the night before, with some interest.
"That's Guy Vyvian," Peggy told him, looking for Illuminato's dryer suit
in the china cupboard.
"Fancy," said Peter.
"Yes," said Peggy, pulling out a garment and dropping a plate out of its
folds on the polished marble floor. "There now! Micky, you're a tiresome
little ape and I don't love you. Guy Vyvian's an ape, too, entirely; his
one merit is that he writes for 'The Gem,' so that Hilary can take the
rent he won't pay out of the money he gives him for his articles. It
works out pretty well, on the whole, I fancy; they're neither of them
good at paying, so it saves them both bother. ("È pronto, Teresina?"
"Subito, subito," cried Teresina from the kitchen.) "I can't abide
Vyvian," Peggy resumed. "The babies hate him, and he makes himself horrid
to everyone, and lets Rhoda Johnson grovel to him, and stares at the
stains on the table-cloth, as if his own nails weren't worse, and turns up
his nose at the food. Poor little Rhoda! You saw her? The little thin
girl with a cough, who hangs on Vyvian's words and blushes when her
mother speaks. She's English governess to the Marchesa Azzareto's
children. Mrs. Johnson's a jolly old soul; I'm fond of her; she's the
best of the boarders, by a lot. Now, precious, if you tumble in again
this morning, you shall sit next to Mr. Vyvian at dinner. You go and tell
the others that from me. It isn't respectable, the way you all go on.
Here's the minestra at last."
Teresina, clattering about the marble floor with the minestra, screamed
"Pronto," very loud, and the boarders trailed in one by one. First came
Mr. Guy Vyvian, sauntering with resignedly lifted brows, and looking as
if it ought to have been ready a long time ago; he was followed by Mrs.
Johnson, a stout and pleasant lady, who looked as if she was only too
delighted that it was ready now, and the more the better; her young
daughter, Rhoda, wearing a floppy smocked frock and no collar but a bead
necklace, coughed behind her; she looked pale and fatigued, and as if it
didn't matter in the least if it was never ready at all. She was being
talked to by a round-faced, fluffy-haired lady in a green dress and
pince-nez, who took an interest in the development of her deplorably
uncultured young mind--a Miss Barnett, who was painting pictures to
illustrate a book to be called "Venice, Her Spirit." The great hope for
young Rhoda, both Miss Barnett and Mr. Vyvian felt, was to widen the gulf
between her and her unspeakable mother. They, who quarrelled about
everything else, were united in this enterprise. The method adopted
was to snub Mrs. Johnson whenever she spoke. That was no doubt why, as
Peggy had told Peter, Rhoda blushed on those frequent occasions.
The party was completed by a very young curate, and an elderly spinster
with mittens and many ailments, the symptoms of which she lucidly
specified in a refined undertone to any lady who would listen; with
gentlemen, however, she was most discreet, except with the curate, who
complained that his cloth was no protection. Finally Hilary came in and
took the head of the table, and Peggy and the children took the other
end. Peter found himself between Mrs. Johnson and Miss Barnett, and
opposite Mr. Vyvian and Rhoda.
Mrs. Johnson began to be nice to him at once, in her cheery way.
"Know Venice?" and when Peter said, "Not yet," she told him, "Ah, you'll
like it, I know. So pleasant as it is. Particlerly for young people. It
gives me rheumatics, so much damp about. But my gel Rhoder is that fond
of it. Spends all her spare time--not as she's got much, poor gel--in the
gall'ries and that. Art, you know. She goes in for it, Rhoder does. I
don't, now. I'm a stupid old thing, as they'll all tell you." She nodded
cheerfully and inclusively at Mr. Vyvian and Rhoda and Miss Barnett. They
did not notice. Vyvian, toying disgustedly with his burnt minestra, was
saying in his contemptuous voice, "Of course, if you like _that_, you may
as well like the Frari monuments at once and have done."
Rhoda was crimson; she had made another mistake. Miss Barnett, who
disputed the office of mentor with Vyvian, whom she jealously disliked,
broke in, in her cheery chirp, "I don't agree with you, Mr. Vyvian. I
consider it a very fine example of Carpaccio's later style; I think you
will find that some good critics are with me." She addressed Peter,
ignoring the intervening solidity of Mrs. Johnson. "Do you support me,
Mr. Margerison?"
"I've not seen it yet," Peter said rather timidly. "It sounds very nice."
Miss Barnett gave him a rather contemptuous look through her pince-nez
and turned to Hilary.
"Lor!" whispered Mrs. Johnson to Peter. "They do get so excited about
pictures. Just like that they go on all day, squabblin' and peckin' each
other. Always at Rhoder they are too, tellin' her she must think this and
mustn't think that, till the poor gel don't know if she's on her head or
her heels. She don't like _me_ to interfere, or it's all I can do
sometimes not to put in my word and say, 'You stick to it, Rhoder my
dear; you stand up to 'em and your mother'll back you.' But Rhoder don't
like that. 'Mother,' she says, quite sharp, 'Mother, you don't know a
thing about Art, and they do. You let be, and don't put me to shame
before my friends.' That's what she'd like to say, anyhow, if she's too
good a gel to say it. Rhoder's ashamed of my ignorance, that's what it
is." This was a furtive whisper, for Peter's ear alone. Having thus
unburdened herself Mrs. Johnson cleared her throat noisily and said very
loud, "An' what do you think of St. Mark's?" That was a sensible and
intelligent question, and she hoped Rhoda heard.
Peter said he thought it was very nice. That Rhoda certainly heard, and
she looked at him with a curious expression, in which hope predominated.
Was this brother of the Margerisons another fool, worse than her? Would
he perhaps make her folly shine almost like wisdom by comparison? She
exchanged a glance with Vyvian; it was extraordinarily sweet to be able
to do that; so many glances had been exchanged àpropos of _her_ remarks
between Vyvian and Miss Barnett. But here was a young man who thought St.
Mark's was very nice. "The dear Duomo!" Miss Barnett murmured, protecting
it from Tourist Insolence.
Mrs. Johnson agreed enthusiastically with Peter.
"I call it just sweet. You should see it on a Sunday, Mr. Margerison--Mr.
Peter, as I should say, shouldn't I?--all the flags flying, and the sun
shining on the gilt front an' all, and the band playing in the square;
an' inside half a dozen services all at once, and the incense floatin'
everywhere. Not as I'm partial to incense; it makes me feel a bit
squeamish--and Miss Gould there tells me it affects her similarly, don't
it, Miss Gould? Incense, I say--don't it give you funny feelin's within?
Seem to upset you, as it were?"
Miss Gould, disturbed in her intimate conversation with the curate, held
up mittened hands in deprecating horror, either at the delicacy of the
question called across the table with gentlemen present, or at the memory
it called up in her of the funny feelings within.
Mrs. Johnson took it as that, and nodded. "Just like me, she is, in that
way. But I like to see the worship goin' on, all the same. Popish, you
know, of course," she added, and then, bethinking herself, "But perhaps
you're a Roman, Mr. Peter, like your dear brother and sister? Well, Roman
or no Roman, I always say as how Mrs. Margerison is one of the best. A
dear, cheery soul, as has hardships to contend with; and if she finds the
comforts of religion in graven images an' a bead necklace, who am I to
say her no?"
"Peggy," said Hilary wearily across the table, "Illuminato is making a
little beast of himself. Put him out."
Peggy scrubbed Illuminato's bullet head dry with her handkerchief (it had
been lying in his minestra bowl), slapped him lightly on the hands, and
said absently, "Don't worry poor Daddy, who's so tired." She was wishing
that the _risotto_ had been boiled a little; one gathered from the
hardness of the rice that that process had been omitted. Vyvian, who
was talking shop with Hilary, sighed deeply and laid down his fork. He
wondered why he ever came in to lunch. One could get a much better one
nearly as cheap at a restaurant.
Miss Barnett, with an air of wishing to find out how bad a fool Peter
was, leaned across Mrs. Johnson and said, "What are you to Venice, Mr.
Margerison, and Venice to you? What, I mean, are you going to get out
of her? Which of her aspects do you especially approach? She has so
infinitely many, you know. What, in fact, is your connecting link?" She
waited with some interest for what Peter would say. She had not yet
"placed" him.
Peter said, "Oh, well ... I look at things, you know ... much the same
as anyone else, I expect. And I go in gondolas; and then there are the
things one would like to buy."
Mrs. Johnson approved this. "Lovely, ain't they! Only one never has the
money to spend."
"I watch other people spending theirs," said Peter, "which is the next
best thing, I suppose ... I'm sorry I'm stupid, Miss Barnett--but it's
all so jolly that I don't like to be invidious."
"Do you write?" she enquired.
"Sometimes," he admitted. "You're illustrating a book about Venice,
aren't you? That must be awfully interesting."
"I am trying," she said, "to catch the most elusive thing in the
world--the Spirit of Venice. It breaks my heart, the pursuit. Just
round the corner, always; you know Browning's 'Love in a Life'?
Heart, fear nothing, for heart, thou shalt find her,
Next time herself!--not the trouble behind her ...
Still the same chance! she goes out as I enter.
Spend my whole day in the quest;--who cares? ...
It's like that with me and my Venice. It hurts rather--but I have to go
on."
"You shouldn't, my dear," Mrs. Johnson murmured soothingly. "I'm sure you
should be careful. We mustn't play tricks with our constitutions."
Rhoda kicked Peter under the table in mistake for her mother, and never
discovered the error.
"Can you tell me," Miss Barnett added abruptly, in her cheerful voice,
"where it hides?"
Peter looked helpful and intelligent, and endeared himself to her
thereby. She thought him a sympathetic young man, with possibilities,
probably undeveloped.
Vyvian, who regarded Miss Barnett and "Venice, Her Spirit," with
contemptuous jealousy, thought that Rhoda was paying them too much
attention, and effectually called her away by saying, "If you care to
come with me to the Schiavoni, I can better explain to you what I mean."
Rhoda kindled and flushed and looked suddenly pretty. Peter heard a
smothered sigh on his left.
"I don't like it," Mrs. Johnson murmured to him. "No, I don't. If it was
you, now, as offered to take her--But there, I daresay you wouldn't be
clever enough to suit Rhoder; she's so partic'lar. You and me, now--we
get on very well; seems as if we liked to talk on the same subjects, as
it were; but Rhoder's different. When we go about together, it's always,
'Mother, not so loud! Oh, mother, you mustn't! Mother, that ain't really
beautiful at all, and you're givin' of us away. Mother, folks are
listening.' Let 'em listen is what I say. They won't hear anything that
could hurt 'em from me. But Rhoder's so quiet; she hates a bit of notice.
Not that she minds when she's with _him_; he talks away at the top of his
voice, and folks do turn an' listen--I've seen 'em. But I suppose that's
clever talk, so Rhoder don't mind."
She raised her voice from the thick and cautious whisper which she
thought suitable for these remarks, and addressed Peggy.
"Well, we've had a good dinner, my dear--plenty of it, if the rice _was_
a bit underdone."
"A grain," Miss Gould was murmuring to the curate, "a single grain would
have had unspeakable effects...."
Peggy was endeavouring to comb Caterina's exceedingly tangled locks with
the fingers of one hand, while with the other she slapped Silvio's
(Larry's) bare and muddy feet to make him take them off the table-cloth.
Not that they made much difference to the condition of the table-cloth;
but still, there are conventions.
"It is a disgrace," Hilary remarked mechanically, "that my children can't
behave like civilised beings at a meal ... Peter, what are you going to
do this afternoon?"
The boarders rose. Mrs. Johnson patted Peter approvingly on the arm, and
said, "I'm glad to of had the pleasure. One day we'll go out together,
you and me. Seem as if we look at things from the same point of view, as
it were. You mayn't be so clever as some, but you suit me. Now, my dear,
I'm goin' to help you about the house a bit. The saloon wants dustin', I
noticed."
Peggy sighed and said she was sure it did, and Teresina was hopeless, and
Mrs. Johnson was really too kind, but it was a shame to bother her, and
the saloon could go another while yet. She was struggling with the
children's bibs and rather preoccupied.
The boarders went out to pursue their several avocations; Rhoda and Mr.
Vyvian to the church of San Giorgio degli Schiavoni, that Mr. Vyvian
might the better explain what he meant; Miss Barnett, round-about and
cheerful, sketch-book in hand, to hunt for "Venice, Her Spirit," in the
Pescaria; Miss Gould to lie down on her bed and recover from lunch; the
curate to take the air and photographs for his magic lantern lectures
to be delivered in the parish-room at home; and Mrs. Johnson to find a
feather broom.
Hilary sat down and lit a cigar, and Illuminato crawled about his legs.
"I'm going out with Leslie," said Peter. "We're going to call on the
prince and see the goblet and begin the haggling. We must haggle, though
as a matter of fact Leslie means to have it at any price. It must be a
perfectly ripping thing.... Now let me have a number of 'The Gem' to
read. I've not seen it yet, you know."
"It's very dull, my dear," Peggy murmured, rinsing water over the place
on the table-cloth where Silvio's feet had been.
Hilary was gazing into the frog-like countenance of his youngest son. It
gave him a disappointment ever new, that Illuminato should be so plain.
"But your mother's handsome, frog," he murmured, "and I'm not worse than
my neighbours to look at." (But he knew he was better than most of them).
"Let's hope you have intellect to make up. Now crawl to your uncle Peter,
since you want to."
Illuminato did want to. He adored his uncle Peter.
"The Gem, Peter?" said Hilary. "Bother the Gem. As Peggy remarks, it's
very dull, and you won't like it. I don't know that I want you to read
it, to say the truth."
Peter was in the act of doing so. He had found three torn pages of it on
the floor. He was reading an article called "Osele." Hilary glanced at
it, with the slight nervous frown frequent with him.
"What have you got hold of?... Oh, that." His frown seemed to relax
a little. "I really don't recommend the thing for your entertainment,
Peter. It'll bore you. I have to provide two things--food for the
interested visitor, and guidance for Lord Evelyn's mania for purchasing."
"So I am gathering," Peter said. "I'm reading about _osele_, marked with
the Mocenigo rose. Signor Antonio Sardi seems to be a man worth a visit.
I must take Leslie there. That's just the sort of thing he likes. And
sixteenth-century visiting cards. Yes, he'd like those too. By all means
we'll go to your friend Sardi. You wrote this, I suppose?"
Hilary nodded. His white nervous fingers played on the arm of his chair.
It seemed to be something of an ordeal to him, this first introduction of
Peter to the Gem.
Peggy, assisting Teresina to bundle the crockery off the table, shot a
swift glance at the group--at Hilary lying back smoking, with slightly
knitted forehead, one unsteady hand playing on his chair; at Peter
sitting on the marble floor with the torn fragments of paper in his hands
and Illuminato astride on his knee. Peggy's grey, Irish eyes were at the
moment a little speculative, touched with a dispassionate curiosity and a
good deal of sisterly and wifely and maternal and slightly compassionate
affection. She was so fond of them all, the dear babes.
Peter had gone on from _osele_ to ivory plaques. He was not quite so much
interested in reading about them because he knew more about them for
himself, but he took down the name of a dealer who had, according to
the Gem, some good specimens, and said he should take Leslie there too.
Hilary got up rather suddenly, and jerked his cigar away into a corner
(marble floors are useful in some ways) and said, "Is Leslie going to buy
the whole place up? I'm sick of these wealthy Jews. They're ruining
Venice. Buying all the palaces, you know. I suppose Leslie'll be wanting
to do that next. There's altogether too much buying in this forsaken
world. Why can't people admire without wanting to acquire? Lord Evelyn
can't. The squandering old fool; he's ruining himself over things he's
too blind even to look at properly. And this Leslie of yours, who can't
even appreciate, still must get and have, of course; and the more he gets
the more he wants. Can't you stop him, Peter? It's such a monstrous
exhibition of the vice of the age."
"It's not my profession to stop him," Peter said. "And, after all, why
shouldn't they? If it makes them happy--well--" His finality conveyed his
creed; if it makes them happy, what else is there? To be happy is to have
reached the goal. Peter was a little sad about Hilary, who seemed as far
as ever from that goal. Why? Peter wondered. Couldn't one be happy in
this lovable water-city, which had, after all, green ways of shadow and
gloom between the peeling brick walls of ancient houses, and, beyond, the
broad spaces of the sea? Couldn't one be happy here even if the babies
did poise muddy feet on a table-cloth, not, after all, otherwise clean;
and even if the poor boarders wouldn't pay their rent and the rich Jews
would buy palaces and plaques? Bother the vice of the age, thought Peter,
as he crossed the sun-bathed piazza and suddenly smelt the sea. There
surely never was such a jolly world made as this, which had Venice in it
for laughter and breathless wonder and delight, and her Duomo shining
like a jewel.
"An' the sun shinin' on the gilt front an' all," murmured Peter. "I call
it just sweet."
He went in (he was to meet Leslie there), and the soft dusk rippled about
him, and beyond the great pillars stretched the limitless, hazy horizons
of a dream.
Presently Leslie came. He had an open "Stones of Venice" in his hand, and
said, "Now for those mosaics." Leslie was a business-like person, who
wasted no time. So they started on the mosaics, and did them for an hour.
Leslie said, "Good. Capital," with the sober, painstaking, conscientious
appreciation he was wont to bestow on unpurchasable excellence; and Peter
said, "How jolly," and felt glad that there were some excellences
unpurchasable even by rich Jews.
They then went to the Accademia and looked at pictures. There Leslie had
a clue to merit. "Anything on hinges, I presume," he remarked, "is worth
inspection. Only why don't they hinge _more_ of the good ones? They ought
to give us a hint; they really ought. How's a man to be sure he's on the
right tack?"
After an hour of that they went to see the prince who had the goblet.
Half an hour's conversation with him, and the goblet belonged to Leslie.
It was a glorious thing of deep blue glass and translucent enamel and
silver, with the Berovieri signature cut on it. Peter looked at it much
as he had seen a woman in the Duomo look up at her Lady's shrine, much
as Rodney had looked on the illumined reality behind the dreaming silver
world.
Peter said, "My word, suppose it broke!" It was natural that he should
think of that; things so often broke. Only that morning his gold watch
had broken, in Illuminato's active hands. Only that afternoon his
bootlace had broken, and he had had none to replace it because Caterina
had been sailing his other boots in the canal. Peter sighed over the
lovely and brittle world.
Then he and Leslie visited Signor Sardi's shop and looked at _osele_ and
sixteenth-century visiting cards. Peter said he knew nothing about either
personally, but quoted Hilary in the Gem, to Leslie's satisfaction.
"Your brother's a good man," said Leslie. "Knows what's what, doesn't he?
If he says these are good _osele_, we may take it that they _are_ good
_osele_, though we don't know one _osele_ from another. That's right,
isn't it?"
Peter said he supposed it was, if one wanted _osele_ at all, which
personally he didn't care about; but one never knew, of course, what
might come in useful. Anyhow Leslie bought some, and a visiting card
belonging to the Count Amadeo Vasari, which gave him much satisfaction.
Then they visited the person who, the Gem had said, had good plaques, and
inspected them critically. Then they had tea at Sant' Ortes' tearoom, and
then Peter went home.
Hilary, who was looking worried, said, "Lord Evelyn wants us to dine with
him to-night," and passed Peter a note in delicate, shaky handwriting.
"Good," said Peter. Hilary wore a bored look and said, "I suppose we must
go," and then proceeded to question Peter concerning Leslie's shopping
adventures. He seemed on the whole more interested in the purchase of
_osele_ than of the Berovieri goblet.
"But," said Peter presently, "your plaque friend wasn't in form to-day.
He had only shams. Rather bright shams, but still--So we didn't get any,
which, I suppose, will please you to hear. Leslie was disappointed. I
told your friend we would look in on a better day, when he had some of
the real thing. He wasn't pleased. I expect he passes off numbers of
those things on people as antiques. You ought to qualify your remarks
in the Gem, Hilary--add that Signor Leroni has to be cautiously dealt
with--or you'll be letting the uncritical plaque-buyer through rather
badly."
"I daresay they can look after themselves," Hilary said, easily; and
Peggy added:
"After all, so long as they _are_ uncritical, it can't matter to them
what sort of a plaque they get!" which of course, was one point of view.