IX

Nick Dormer found his friend Nash that evening at the place of their

tryst--smoking a cigar, in the warm bright night, on the terrace of the

cafe forming one of the angles of the Place de l'Opera. He sat down with

him, but at the end of five minutes uttered a protest against the crush

and confusion, the publicity and vulgarity of the place, the shuffling

procession of the crowd, the jostle of fellow-customers, the perpetual

brush of waiters. "Come away; I want to talk to you and I can't talk

here. I don't care where we go. It will be pleasant to walk; well stroll

away to the _quartiers serieux_. Each time I come to Paris I at the end

of three days take the Boulevard, with its conventional grimace, into

greater aversion. I hate even to cross it--I go half a mile round to

avoid it."

The young men took their course together down the Rue de la Paix to the

Rue de Rivoli, which they crossed, passing beside the gilded rails of

the Tuileries. The beauty of the night--the only defect of which was

that the immense illumination of Paris kept it from being quite night

enough, made it a sort of bedizened, rejuvenated day--gave a charm to

the quieter streets, drew our friends away to the right, to the river

and the bridges, the older, duskier city. The pale ghost of the palace

that had perished by fire hung over them a while, and, by the passage

now open at all times across the garden of the Tuileries, they came out

upon the Seine. They kept on and on, moving slowly, smoking, talking,

pausing, stopping to look, to emphasise, to compare. They fell into

discussion, into confidence, into inquiry, sympathetic or satiric, and

into explanations which needed in turn to be explained. The balmy night,

the time for talk, the amusement of Paris, the memory of younger

passages, gave a lift to the occasion. Nick had already forgotten his

little brush with Julia on his leaving Peter's tea-party at her side,

and that he had been almost disconcerted by the asperity with which she

denounced the odious man he had taken it into his head to force upon

her. Impertinent and fatuous she had called him; and when Nick began to

plead that he was really neither of these things, though he could

imagine his manner might sometimes suggest them, she had declared that

she didn't wish to argue about him or ever to hear of him again. Nick

hadn't counted on her liking Gabriel Nash, but had thought her not

liking him wouldn't perceptibly matter. He had given himself the

diversion, not cruel surely to any one concerned, of seeing what she

would make of a type she had never before met. She had made even less

than he expected, and her intimation that he had played her a trick had

been irritating enough to prevent his reflecting that the offence might

have been in some degree with Nash. But he had recovered from his

resentment sufficiently to ask this personage, with every possible

circumstance of implied consideration for the lady, what had been the

impression made by his charming cousin.

"Upon my word, my dear fellow, I don't regard that as a fair question,"

Gabriel said. "Besides, if you think Mrs. Dallow charming what on earth

need it matter to you what I think? The superiority of one man's

opinion over another's is never so great as when the opinion's about a

woman."

"It was to help me to find out what I think of yourself," Nick returned.

"Oh, that you'll never do. I shall bewilder you to the end. The lady

with whom you were so good as to make me acquainted is a beautiful

specimen of the English garden-flower, the product of high cultivation

and much tending; a tall, delicate stem with the head set upon it in a

manner which, as a thing seen and remembered, should doubtless count for

us as a gift of the gods. She's the perfect type of the object _raised_

or bred, and everything about her hangs together and conduces to the

effect, from the angle of her elbow to the way she drops that vague,

conventional, dry little 'Oh!' which dispenses with all further

performance. That degree of completeness is always satisfying. But I

didn't satisfy her, and she didn't understand me. I don't think they

usually understand."

"She's no worse than I then."

"Ah she didn't try."

"No, she doesn't try. But she probably thought you a monster of conceit,

and she would think so still more if she were to hear you talk about her

trying."

"Very likely--very likely," said Gabriel Nash. "I've an idea a good many

people think that. It strikes me as comic. I suppose it's a result of my

little system."

"What little system?"

"Oh nothing more wonderful than the idea of being just the same to every

one. People have so bemuddled themselves that the last thing they can

conceive is that one should be simple."

"Lord, do you call yourself simple?" Nick ejaculated.

"Absolutely; in the sense of having no interest of my own to push, no

nostrum to advertise, no power to conciliate, no axe to grind. I'm not a

savage--ah far from it!--but I really think I'm perfectly independent."

"Well, that's always provoking!" Nick knowingly returned.

"So it would appear, to the great majority of one's fellow-mortals; and

I well remember the pang with which I originally made that discovery. It

darkened my spirit at a time when I had no thought of evil. What we

like, when we're unregenerate, is that a new-comer should give us a

password, come over to our side, join our little camp or religion, get

into our little boat, in short, whatever it is, and help us to row it.

It's natural enough; we're mostly in different tubs and cockles,

paddling for life. Our opinions, our convictions and doctrines and

standards, are simply the particular thing that will make the boat

go--_our boat_, naturally, for they may very often be just the thing

that will sink another. If you won't get in people generally hate you."

"Your metaphor's very lame," said Nick. "It's the overcrowded boat that

goes to the bottom."

"Oh I'll give it another leg or two! Boats can be big, in the infinite

of space, and a doctrine's a raft that floats the better the more

passengers it carries. A passenger jumps over from time to time, not so

much from fear of sinking as from a want of interest in the course or

the company. He swims, he plunges, he dives, he dips down and visits the

fishes and the mermaids and the submarine caves; he goes from craft to

craft and splashes about, on his own account, in the blue, cool water.

The regenerate, as I call them, are the passengers who jump over in

search of better fun. I jumped over long ago."

"And now of course you're at the head of the regenerate; for, in your

turn"--Nick found the figure delightful--"you all form a select school

of porpoises."

"Not a bit, and I know nothing about heads--in the sense you mean. I've

grown a tail if you will; I'm the merman wandering free. It's the

jolliest of trades!"

Before they had gone many steps further Nick Dormer stopped short with a

question. "I say, my dear fellow, do you mind mentioning to me whether

you're the greatest humbug and charlatan on earth, or a genuine

intelligence, one that has sifted things for itself?"

"I do lead your poor British wit a dance--I'm so sorry," Nash replied

benignly. "But I'm very sincere. And I _have_ tried to straighten out

things a bit for myself."

"Then why do you give people such a handle?"

"Such a handle?"

"For thinking you're an--for thinking you're a mere _farceur_."

"I daresay it's my manner: they're so unused to any sort of candour."

"Well then why don't you try another?" Nick asked.

"One has the manner that one can, and mine moreover's a part of my

little system."

"Ah if you make so much of your little system you're no better than any

one else," Nick returned as they went on.

"I don't pretend to be better, for we're all miserable sinners; I only

pretend to be bad in a pleasanter, brighter way--by what I can see. It's

the simplest thing in the world; just take for granted our right to be

happy and brave. What's essentially kinder and more helpful than that,

what's more beneficent? But the tradition of dreariness, of stodginess,

of dull, dense, literal prose, has so sealed people's eyes that they've

ended by thinking the most natural of all things the most perverse. Why

so keep up the dreariness, in our poor little day? No one can tell me

why, and almost every one calls me names for simply asking the question.

But I go on, for I believe one can do a little good by it. I want so

much to do a little good," Gabriel Nash continued, taking his

companion's arm. "My persistence is systematic: don't you see what I

mean? I won't be dreary--no, no, no; and I won't recognise the

necessity, or even, if there be any way out of it, the accident, of

dreariness in the life that surrounds me. That's enough to make people

stare: they're so damned stupid!"

"They think you so damned impudent," Nick freely explained.

At this Nash stopped him short with a small cry, and, turning his eyes,

Nick saw under the lamps of the quay that he had brought a flush of pain

into his friend's face. "I don't strike you that way?"

"Oh 'me!' Wasn't it just admitted that I don't in the least make you

out?"

"That's the last thing!" Nash declared, as if he were thinking the idea

over, with an air of genuine distress. "But with a little patience we'll

clear it up together--if you care enough about it," he added more

cheerfully. Letting his companion proceed again he continued: "Heaven

help us all, what do people mean by impudence? There are many, I think,

who don't understand its nature or its limits; and upon my word I've

literally seen mere quickness of intelligence or of perception, the jump

of a step or two, a little whirr of the wings of talk, mistaken for it.

Yes, I've encountered men and women who thought you impudent if you

weren't simply so stupid as they. The only impudence is unprovoked, or

even mere dull, aggression, and I indignantly protest that I'm never

guilty of _that_ clumsiness. Ah for what do they take one, with _their_

beastly presumption? Even to defend myself sometimes I've to make

believe to myself that I care. I always feel as if I didn't successfully

make others think so. Perhaps they see impudence in that. But I daresay

the offence is in the things that I take, as I say, for granted; for if

one tries to be pleased one passes perhaps inevitably for being pleased

above all with one's self. That's really not my case--I find my capacity

for pleasure deplorably below the mark I've set. This is why, as I've

told you, I cultivate it, I try to bring it up. And I'm actuated by

positive benevolence; I've that impudent pretension. That's what I mean

by being the same to every one, by having only one manner. If one's

conscious and ingenious to that end what's the harm--when one's motives

are so pure? By never, _never_ making the concession, one may end by

becoming a perceptible force for good."

"What concession are you talking about, in God's name?" Nick demanded.

"Why, that we're here all for dreariness. It's impossible to grant it

sometimes if you wish to deny it ever."

"And what do you mean then by dreariness? That's modern slang and

terribly vague. Many good things are dreary--virtue and decency and

charity, and perseverance and courage and honour."

"Say at once that life's dreary, my dear fellow!" Gabriel Nash

exclaimed.

"That's on the whole my besetting impression."

"_Cest la que je vous attends!_ I'm precisely engaged in trying what can

be done in taking it the other way. It's my little personal experiment.

Life consists of the personal experiments of each of us, and the point

of an experiment is that it shall succeed. What we contribute is our

treatment of the material, our rendering of the text, our style. A sense

of the qualities of a style is so rare that many persons should

doubtless be forgiven for not being able to read, or at all events to

enjoy, us; but is that a reason for giving it up--for not being, in this

other sphere, if one possibly can, an Addison, a Ruskin, a Renan? Ah we

must write our best; it's the great thing we can do in the world, on the

right side. One has one's form, _que diable_, and a mighty good thing

that one has. I'm not afraid of putting all life into mine, and without

unduly squeezing it. I'm not afraid of putting in honour and courage and

charity--without spoiling them: on the contrary I shall only do them

good. People may not read you at sight, may not like you, but there's a

chance they'll come round; and the only way to court the chance is to

keep it up--always to keep it up. That's what I do, my dear man--if you

don't think I've perseverance. If some one's touched here and there, if

you give a little impression of truth and charm, that's your reward;

besides of course the pleasure for yourself."

"Don't you think your style's a trifle affected?" Nick asked for further

amusement.

"That's always the charge against a personal manner: if you've any at

all people think you've too much. Perhaps, perhaps--who can say? The

lurking unexpressed is infinite, and affectation must have begun, long

ago, with the first act of reflective expression--the substitution of

the few placed articulate words for the cry or the thump or the hug. Of

course one isn't perfect; but that's the delightful thing about art,

that there's always more to learn and more to do; it grows bigger the

more one uses it and meets more questions the more they come up. No

doubt I'm rough still, but I'm in the right direction: I make it my

business to testify for the fine."

"Ah the fine--there it stands, over there!" said Nick Dormer. "I'm not

so sure about yours--I don't know what I've got hold of. But Notre Dame

_is_ truth; Notre Dame _is_ charm; on Notre Dame the distracted mind can

rest. Come over with me and look at her!"

They had come abreast of the low island from which the great cathedral,

disengaged to-day from her old contacts and adhesions, rises high and

fair, with her front of beauty and her majestic mass, darkened at that

hour, or at least simplified, under the stars, but only more serene and

sublime for her happy union far aloft with the cool distance and the

night. Our young men, fantasticating as freely as I leave the reader to

estimate, crossed the wide, short bridge which made them face toward the

monuments of old Paris--the Palais de Justice, the Conciergerie, the

holy chapel of Saint Louis. They came out before the church, which looks

down on a square where the past, once so thick in the very heart of

Paris, has been made rather a blank, pervaded however by the everlasting

freshness of the vast cathedral-face. It greeted Nick Dormer and Gabriel

Nash with a kindness the long centuries had done nothing to dim. The

lamplight of the old city washed its foundations, but the towers and

buttresses, the arches, the galleries, the statues, the vast

rose-window, the large full composition, seemed to grow clearer while

they climbed higher, as if they had a conscious benevolent answer for

the upward gaze of men.

"How it straightens things out and blows away one's vapours--anything

that's _done_!" said Nick; while his companion exclaimed blandly and

affectionately:

"The dear old thing!"

"The great point's to do something, instead of muddling and questioning;

and, by Jove, it makes me want to!"

"Want to build a cathedral?" Nash inquired.

"Yes, just that."

"It's you who puzzle _me_ then, my dear fellow. You can't build them out

of words."

"What is it the great poets do?" asked Nick.

"_Their_ words are ideas--their words are images, enchanting

collocations and unforgettable signs. But the verbiage of parliamentary

speeches--!"

"Well," said Nick with a candid, reflective sigh, "you can rear a great

structure of many things--not only of stones and timbers and painted

glass." They walked round this example of one, pausing, criticising,

admiring, and discussing; mingling the grave with the gay and paradox

with contemplation. Behind and at the sides the huge, dusky vessel of

the church seemed to dip into the Seine or rise out of it, floating

expansively--a ship of stone with its flying buttresses thrown forth

like an array of mighty oars. Nick Dormer lingered near it in joy, in

soothing content, as if it had been the temple of a faith so dear to him

that there was peace and security in its precinct. And there was comfort

too and consolation of the same sort in the company at this moment of

Nash's equal appreciation, of his response, by his own signs, to the

great effect. He took it all in so and then so gave it all out that Nick

was reminded of the radiance his boyish admiration had found in him of

old, the easy grasp of everything of that kind. "Everything of that

kind" was to Nick's sense the description of a wide and bright domain.

They crossed to the farther side of the river, where the influence of

the Gothic monument threw a distinction even over the Parisian

smartnesses--the municipal rule and measure, the importunate

symmetries, the "handsomeness" of everything, the extravagance of

gaslight, the perpetual click on the neat bridges. In front of a quiet

little cafe on the left bank Gabriel Nash said, "Let's sit down"--he was

always ready to sit down. It was a friendly establishment and an

unfashionable quarter, far away from the caravan-series; there were the

usual little tables and chairs on the quay, the muslin curtains behind

the glazed front, the general sense of sawdust and of drippings of

watery beer. The place was subdued to stillness, but not extinguished,

by the lateness of the hour; no vehicles passed, only now and then a

light Parisian foot. Beyond the parapet they could hear the flow of the

Seine. Nick Dormer said it made him think of the old Paris, of the great

Revolution, of Madame Roland, _quoi_! Gabriel said they could have

watery beer but were not obliged to drink it. They sat a long time; they

talked a great deal, and the more they said the more the unsaid came up.

Presently Nash found occasion to throw out: "I go about my business like

any good citizen--that's all."

"And what is your business?"

"The spectacle of the world."