Mr. Aiken's sequel. Pimlico Studios. Mr. Hughes's Idea.
Aspects of Nature. Mr. Hughes's foot. What had
Mr. Aiken been at? _Not_ Fanny Smith. It was Sairah!!
Who misunderstood and turned vermilion? Her malice.
The Regent's Canal. Mr. Aiken's advice from his friends.
Woman and her sex. How Mr. Hughes visited Mr. Aiken
one evening, and the Post came, with something too big
for the box, while Mrs. Parples slept. Mr. Aiken's very
sincerely Madeline Upwell. Her transparency. How the
picture's photo stood on the table. Interesting lucubrations
of Mr. Hughes. What was that? But it was nothing--only
an effect of something. The Vernacular Mind. Negative
Juries. How Mr. Aiken stopped an echo, so it was
Mr. Hughes's fancy.
The story's brief reference to Mr. Aiken's life after
his good lady forsook him, may be sufficient for
its purposes, but the author is in a certain sense
bound to communicate to the reader any details
that have come to his knowledge.
Mr. Aiken's first step was to take an intimate
friend or two into his confidence. But his intimate
friend or two had a quality in common with the
Pickwickian bottle or two. An intimate friend or
six would be nearer the mark--or even twelve.
He did not tell his story separately to each; there
was no need. If the mention of a private affair
within the hearing of cat or mouse leads to its
being shouted at once from the top of the
house--and that was the experience of Maud's young man
who went to the Crimea--how much more public
will your confidences become if you make them to
a tenant of a Studio that is one of a congeries.
Pimlico Studios was a congeries, built to
accommodate the Artists of a great age of Art, now
pending, as though to meet the needs of locusts. For
there can be no doubt that such an age is at hand,
if we are to judge by the workshop accommodation
that appears to be anticipating it.
An ingenious friend of the author--you must have
noticed how many authors have ingenious friends?--has
been able to determine by a system of averages
of a most convincing nature, that the cubic area
of the Studios in Chelsea and Kensington alone
exceeds that of the Lunatic Asylums of the Metropolis
by nearly seven and a quarter per cent. This
gentleman's researches on the subject are
consequent upon his singular conviction that the output
of the Fine Arts, broadly speaking, is small in
proportion to the amount of energy and capital
devoted to them. We have reasoned with him in
vain on the subject, pointing out that the Fine Arts
have nothing in common with the economics of
Manufacture, least of all in any proportions between
the labour expended and the results attained.
Were it otherwise, the estimation of a painter's
merit would rise or fall with his colourman's bill
and the rent of his studio. This gentleman--although
he is a friend of the author--has no Soul.
If he had, the spectacle of the life-struggle which
is often the lot of Genius would appeal to him, and
cause him to suspend his opinion. It is always,
we understand, desirable to suspend one's opinion.
He would do so, for instance, in the case of an
Artist, a common acquaintance of ours, whom at
present he condemns freely, calling him names.
This Artist has five Studios, each of them full of
easels and thrones. The number of his half-used
colour tubes that won't squeeze out is as the sands
of the sea, while his bundles of brushes that only
want washing to be as good as new, may be likened
to corn-sheaves, in so far as their stems go--a mere
affair of numeration. But their business ends are
another pair of shoes altogether; for the hairs of the
brushes have become a coagulum as hard as agate,
calling aloud for Benzine Collas to disintegrate
them--to the tune, this Artist admits, of threepence
each--whereas the ear of corn yields to less drastic
treatment. Contrivances of a specious nature in
japanned tin and celluloid abound, somewhat as
spray abounds on oceans during equinoxes, and
each of these has at one time fondly imagined it
was destined to become that Artist's great resource
and stand-by, the balustrade his genius would not
scorn to be indebted to. But he has never drawn
a profile with the copying-machine that has legs,
nor availed himself of the powers of the
graphoscope--if that is its name--that does perspective,
nor done anything with the countless wooden
figures except dislocate their universal joints; nor,
we fear, for a long time paid anything on account
of the quarterly statements that flutter about, with
palette-knives full of colour wiped off on them, that
are not safe to sit down upon for months. But no
impartial person could glance at any of the
inaugurations of pictures on the thousand canvases
in these five Studios without at once exclaiming,
"This is Genius!" The Power of the Man is everywhere
visible, and no true lover of Art ever regrets
that so few of them have been carried into that
doubtful second stage where one spoils all the
moddlin' and the colour won't hold up, and somehow
you lose the first spirit of the Idear and don't
get any forwarder. It never occurs to any mature
Critic to question the value of this Artist's results,
even of his least elaborated ones. And, indeed, an
opinion is current among his friends that restriction
of materials and of the area of his Studios might
have cramped and limited the free development of
a great mind. They are all unanimous that a
feller like Tomkins must have room to turn round,
or where are you! And, if, as we must all hope, the
growth of genius such as his is to be fostered as it
deserves, no one should look with an ungenerous
eye upon such agglomerations of Art-workshops as
the Pimlico Studios, or sneer at them as uncalled
for, merely because a Philistine Plutocracy refuses
to buy their produce, and has no walls to hang it on
if it did. We for our part can only note with
regret that any Studios should be so badly adapted
to their purpose, and constructed with so little
consideration for the comfort of their occupants, as
these same Pimlico Studios.
We have, however, been tempted away from our
subject, which at present is the community of
Artists that occupied them; and must return to it
to say that these very drawbacks were not altogether
without their compensations. For though these
Studios were, like the arguments of Dissent,
unsound--being constructed to admit rainwater and
retain products of combustion, each of its own
stove and the Studio beneath it--these structural
shortcomings were really advantages, in so far as
they promoted interchange of social amenities
between the resident victims of the speculative
builder who ran up the congeries. Sympathy
against their common enemy, the landlord, brought
all the occupants of Pimlico Studios into a hotchpot
of brotherly affection, and if the choruses of
execration in which they found comfort have reached the
ears for which they were intended, that builder will
catch it hot, one of these odd-come-shortlies. This
expression is not our own.
When Mr. Reginald Aiken, with his domestic
perplexity burning his tongue's end and crying
aloud for utterance, called upon the Artist from
whom we have borrowed it, that gentleman, Mr. Hughes,
one of his most intimate friends, was
thinking. He had been thinking since breakfast--thinking
about some new Aspects of Nature, which
had been the subject of discussion with some friends
the evening before. They were those new Aspects
of Nature which have been presented so forcibly by
Van Schronk and Le Neutre; and of which, in this
Artist's opinion, more than a hint is to be found
in Hawkins. He was thinking deeply when Mr. Aiken
came in, and not one stroke of work had he
done, would that gentleman believe him, since he
set out his palette. Mr. Aiken's credulity was not
overtaxed.
Mr. Hughes wanted to talk about himself, and
said absently, "You all right, Crocky?" addressing
Mr. Aiken by a familiar name in use among his
intimate friends. He was not well disposed towards
a negative answer when Mr. Aiken gave one; an
equivocal one certainly, but not one to whose
meaning it was possible to affect blindness. The
words were "Middlin'--considerin'!" But Mr. Hughes
was not going to be too coming.
"Wife well?" said he remotely.
Mr. Aiken sprang at his inattentive throat, and
nailed him. "Ah, that's it," said he. "That's
the point."
Mr. Hughes was forced to inquire further, and
stand his Idea over, for later discussion. But he
might just as well have let it alone--better, if you
come to that. He really was a stupid feller, Hughes,
don't you know? "I say," said he, "don't you
run away and say I didn't tell you what would
happen." For he had interpreted his friend's
agitated demeanour and equivocal speech as the
result of a recent insight into futurity, showing him
in the position of a detected and convicted parent,
without the means of providing for an increasing
family. For they do that, families do.
"Don't be an ass, Stumpy," said he, using a
familiar name no fact in real life warranted. "It's
not that sort of thing, thank God! No--I'll tell
you what it is, only you mustn't on any account
mention it."
"All right, Crocky! I never mention things.
Honest Injun! Go ahead easy." Mr. Hughes was
greatly relieved that his surmise had been wrong.
Good job for Mr. Aiken, as also for his wife!
Mr. Hughes desired his congratulations to this lady, but
withdrew them on second thoughts. Because, you
see, her escape from the anxieties of maternity was
entirely constructive. Mr. Hughes felt that he had
put his foot in it, and that his wisest course would
be to take it out. He did so. But Mr. Aiken had
something to say about his wife, and made it a
corollary to her disappearance from the conversation.
"She's bolted!" said he lugubriously. "Went
away Thursday, and wrote to say she wasn't coming
back, Friday. It's a fact."
Mr. Hughes put back his foot in it. "Who's she
bolted with? Who's the feller?"
Mr. Aiken flushed up quite red, like any
turkey-cock. "Damn it, Stump!" said he, "you really
ought to take care what you're saying. I should
like to see any fellow presume to run away with
Euphemia. Draw it mild!" He became calmer,
and it is to be hoped was ashamed of his irritability.
But really it was Mr. Hughes's fault--talking just
like as if it was in a novel, and Euphemia a character.
"I beg your pardon," said that offender humbly.
"It was the way you put it. Besides, they are
generally supposed to."
Mr. Aiken responded, correctively and loftily:
"Yes, my dear fellow, on the stage and in novels." He
added, with something of insular pride, "Chiefly
French and American."
"What's her little game, then?" asked Mr. Hughes.
"If it's not some other beggar, _what_ is
it she's run away with?"
"She has not run away with anybody," said
Mr. Aiken with dignity. "Nor anything. Perhaps
I should explain myself better by saying that she
has refused to return from her Aunt's."
"Any reason?" said Mr. Hughes, who wanted to
get back to his Idea.
"I'm sorry to say it was my fault, Stumpy,"
came very penitently from the catechumen.
Interest was roused. "I say, young man," said
Mr. Hughes, with a tendency of one eye to close,
"what have you been at?"
"Absolutely nothing whatever!"
"Yes, of course! But along of who? Who's
the young woman you _haven't_ been making love to?
Tell up and have done with it."
"You are under a complete misconception,
Stump. Really _nobody_!"
Mr. Hughes thought a moment, as though he
were at work on a conundrum. Then he pointed
suddenly. "Fanny Smith!" said he convictingly.
Mr. Aiken quite lost his temper, and got
demonstrative. "Fanny Smith--Fanny grandmother!"
he exclaimed meaninglessly! "How can you talk
such infernal rot, Stumpy. Do be reasonable!"
"Then it was _somebody_," said his tormentor, and
Mr. Aiken felt very awkward and humiliated.
However, he saw inevitable confession ahead, and
braced himself to the task. "Really, Stump,"
said he, "it would make you cry with laughing to
know who it was that was at the bottom of it. I
said 'Fanny grandmother,' just now, but at any
rate Fanny Smith's a tailor's wife with no legs to
speak of, who sits on the counter, and a very nice
girl if you know her. I mean there's no
fundamental absurdity in Fanny Smith. This
was." Which wasn't good speechwork, but, oh dear, how
little use accuracy is!
"Who was it then?" Mr. Hughes left one eye
shut, under an implied contract to reopen it as soon
as the answer came to his question.
"Well!" said Mr. Aiken reluctantly. "If you
_must_ have it, it was Sairah!" He was really
relieved when his friend looked honestly puzzled,
repeating after him "Sairah! What!--the gurl!"
in genuine astonishment. It was now evident that
the Idea would have to stand over.
Mr. Hughes said farewell to it, almost audibly;
then said "Stop a minute!" and lit a pipe; then
settled down in a rocking chair to listen, saying,
"Now, my boy!--off you go." He was a long and
loose-limbed person who picked his knees up
alternately with both hands, as though to hold his
legs on. Whenever he did this, the slipper in that
connexion came off, with the effect of bringing its
owner's sock into what is called keeping with the
rest of the Studio, one which many persons would
have considered untidy.
After which Mr. Aiken went off, or on--whichever
you prefer. "Of course I don't expect you
fellers to do anything but chaff, you know. But
it's jolly unpleasant, for all that. It was like this,
don't you see? A young female swell had brought
her sweetheart--I suppose, unless he was her cousin--to
see a picture I'm cleaning for her parent, who's
a Bart. In Worcestershire. Know him? Sir
Stopleigh Upwell."
Mr. Hughes didn't, that he could call to mind,
after a mental search which seemed to imply great
resources in Barts.
"Well--she was an awfully jolly girl, but quite
that sort." Mr. Aiken tried to indicate by gesture,
a fashionably dressed young lady with a stylish
figure, and failed. But Mr. Hughes, an Impressionist
Artist, could understand, and nodded prompt
appreciation. So Mr. Aiken continued:
"When they cleared out, Euphemia said the
young woman was 'up-to-date.' And I suppose
she was...."
"Oh certainly--quite up to date--not a doubt of it!"
"Well--I made believe not to know the meaning
of the expression, just to take a rise out of Euphemia.
And you know she has just _one_ fault--she's so
matter-of-fact! She said everyone knew the
meaning of 'up-to-date,' that knew anything. Ask
anybody! Ask her Aunt Priscilla--and I certainly
wasn't going to run the risk--like bearding
a tigress in her den with impertinent questions!--or
Mrs. Verity the landlady. Or, for that matter,
ask the gurl, Sairah! That's where _she_ came in,
Stump." Mr. Aiken seemed to hang fire.
"But," said Mr. Hughes, "she only comes in as
an abstraction, so far. I can't see her carcass in
it." From which we may learn that Mr. Hughes
thought that abstract meant incorporeal; or, at
least, imponderable. It is a common error. "What
did _you_ say?" he asked.
"I said 'Suppose I ask Sairah!' and rang for
her, for a lark. Euphemia was in an awful rage
and pretended to go, but stopped outside to listen." The
speaker's hesitation appeared to increase.
"Well--and when she came?..."
"Why, the stupid idiot altogether misunderstood
me. Damn fool! What the dooce she thought
I meant, I don't know...."
"What did you say? Out with it, old chap!" Mr. Hughes
seemed to be holding intense amusement
back, with a knowledge that it would get the
bit in its teeth in the end.
Mr. Aiken, seeing this, intensified and enlarged
his manner. "I _merely_ said--no, really it's the
simple honest truth, every word--I _merely_ said,
'Your mistress says you know the meaning of
"up-to-date," Sairah.' And what does the beast
of a girl do but turn vermilion and stand staring
like a stuck pig!"
Mr. Hughes began shaking his head slowly from
side to side. But he did not get to the direction
_accelerando_, for he stopped short, and said abruptly,
"Well--what next?"
Mr. Aiken assumed a responsible and mature
manner, rather like that of a paterfamilias on his
beat. "I reasoned with the girl. Pointed out that
her mistress wouldn't say things to turn vermilion
about. I tried to soothe her suspicions...."
Mr. Hughes interrupted, saying dubiously: "I
see. No tong-dresses, of course?"
Mr. Aiken explained that that was just where the
misapprehension had come in. If his wife had
been inside the room instead of on the _stairs_, she
would have seen that there was absolutely _nothing_.
Mr. Hughes looked incredulous.
"There must have been somethin', old chap, to
set your missis off. Don't tell me!"
But Mr. Aiken _would_ tell Mr. Hughes--would
insist on doing so. "It was the horrible, shameless
brute's diabolical malice!" he shouted. "Nothing
more nor less! What does she do but say out loud
just as my wife was coming into the room, 'You
keep your 'ands off of me, Mr. Aching!' and of
course, when Euphemia came in, she thought I had
just jumped half a mile off. And it was rough on
me, Stump, because really my motive was to save
my wife having to get another house-and-parlourmaid."
"Motive for what?" said Mr. Hughes shrewdly.
He had touched the weak point of the story. "Did
you, or did you not, young man, take this young
person round the waist or chuck her under the
chin?"
"My dear Hughes," said Mr. Aiken, with
undisguised impatience, "I wouldn't chuck that
odious girl under the chin with the end of a
barge-pole. Nor," he added after reflection, "take her
round the waist with one of the drags in readiness
at the Lodge." The barge-pole had conducted his
imagination to the Regent's Canal, and left it there.
Mr. Aiken had had no intention when he called
on his friend Hughes to take the whole of Pimlico
Studios into his confidence. But what was he to
do when another Artist dropped in and Mr. Hughes
said, "You won't mind Triggs? The most
discreet beggar _I_ ever came across!" What could
he say that would arrest the entry of Mr. Triggs
into the discussion of his family jar that would not
appear to imply that that gentleman was an
indiscreet beggar? And what course was open to
him when Mr. Hughes told yet another artist, whose
name was Dolly, that he might come in, but he
wasn't to listen? And yet another, whose name
was Doddles?
Even if there had been no other chance visitors
to the Studio during the conclave on Mr. Aiken's
private affairs, there would have been every
likelihood of complete publicity for them in the course of
a day or two at most. For nothing stimulates
Rumour like affidavits of secrecy. It's such fun
telling what is on no account to go any farther. But
as a matter of fact more than one gentleman who
would have resented being called a _flâneur_, looked
in at Mr. Hughes's Studio casually that morning
to talk over that gentleman's Idea, mooted yesterday
at The Club, and found himself outside a circle
whose voices subsided down to inaudible exchanges
of postscripts to finish up. As each newcomer acted
upon this in the sweet and candid manner of this
community, saying unaffectedly, "What's the fun?"
and some friend of his within the circle usually said
to him, "Shut up! Tell you after!" and as moreover
it was invariably felt that a single exclusion
only embarrassed counsel, no opportunity was
really lost of making Europe acquainted with the
disruption of Mr. Aiken's household. And it was
a pity, because so much gossip doesn't do any good.
Besides, the time might have been profitably
employed ventilating Mr. Hughes's Idea, and getting
a sort of provisional insight into the best means of
carrying it out. As it was, when, some time after
midday, someone said, "I say, Stump, my boy,
how about that Idea of yours we were talking about
at The Club yesterday?" everyone else looked at
his watch, and said it was too late to get on to that
now; we must have lunch, and have a real serious
talk about it another time. Then we went to lunch
at Machiavelli's, and it was plenty early enough if
we were back by three.
Mr. Aiken received a good deal of very sound
advice from his friends as to how he might best deal
with his emergency. He turned this over in his
mind as he turned himself over on his couch when
he got home about three in the morning, and was
rather at a loss to select from it any samples from
different Mentors which agreed upon a course. In
fact, the only one thing they had in common was
the claim made by their respective promulgators
to a wider and deeper knowledge of that mysterious
creature Woman than Mr. Aiken's inexperience
could boast. One said to him--speaking as from
long observation of a Sex you couldn't make head
or tail of--that, depend upon it, she would come
round, you see if she didn't. They always did.
Another, that this said Sex was obstinacy itself,
and you might depend upon it she would stick out.
They always did. Another, that a lot the best
thing for a husband in like case to do was to go
and cosset the offended lady over with appropriate
caresses, before which she would be sure to soften.
They always did. Another, that if you could
convince her by some subtle machinations that
you didn't care a twopenny damn how long she
stayed away, back she would come on the nail.
They always did. In the multitude of counsellors
there is Wisdom, no doubt, but when the multitude
is large enough to advise every possible course, it is
just as easy to run through all the courses open to
adoption by oneself, and choose one on the strength
of its visible recommendations. More particularly
because so many advisers insist on your taking their
advice, and go on giving it, cataballatively, if you
don't. Mr. Aiken felt, when he retired for the
night, like the sheet Aunt Sally hangs up behind
her when she folds it up at the end of a busy day
on Epsom Downs.
It was a great pity that Mr. Aiken's domestic
upset did not occur a few days later, because then
Mr. Hughes's Idea would have had such a much
clearer stage for its _début_. As it was, what with one
thing and what with another, the mature discussion
of this subject was delayed a full week. Next day
Triggs had to go to Paris, and of course it was
nonsense to attempt anything without him--for
look at the clearness of that man's head! Then,
when Triggs came back, a day later than expected,
his aunt must needs invite her nephew down to
Suddington Park, which is her place in Shropshire,
which had earned for Mr. Triggs the name of The
Pobble--you remember Aunt Jopiska's Park, if
you read your Lear in youth--and which was an
expectation of his, if he kept in favour with the old
lady. Of course, the Idea didn't depend on Triggs,
or any one man. No, thank you! But Triggs
had a good business head on his shoulders, and was
particularly sound on the subject of Premises. It
is a singular and noticeable thing that whenever
any great motive or scheme germinates in the
human brain, that brain, before it has formulated
the conditions thereof, or fully defined its objects,
will begin to look at Premises, and while it is
examining some very much beyond its means--in
Piccadilly, for instance, or Old Bond Street--will feel
that the project is assuming form, and that now
we shall get on to really _doing_ something, and come
to the end of this everlasting talk, talk, talk, that
leads to nothing, and only sets people against us.
So really very little could be done till The Pobble
came back from Aunt Jopiska. When he did come
back there was some other delay, but it's always
well to be beforehand. The enthusiasts of this
Idea could look at Premises; and did so.
All this has little or nothing to do with the story.
But it serves to individualize Mr. Hughes, who, but
for it, would be merely a long artist with a goatee
beard, who not infrequently looked in to smoke a
pipe on the split wild boar whose head endangered
the safety of self-warmers on Mr. Aiken's floor in
the Studio near the stove where he found the Vestas
that were all stuck together.
Mr. Hughes was standing there, a good many
weeks after our last date, chatting with Mr. Aiken,
who was becoming quite slovenly and dirty with
nobody to look after him--because, of course,
Mrs. Parples, who came in by the day, hadn't the sense to
see to anything; and, moreover, he was that snappy
at every turn, there wasn't, according to
Mrs. Parples, many would abear him.
He had been hoping that the first of his advisers
whom we cited was right, and that if he waited a
reasonable time he would see if his wife wouldn't
come round. If they always did, she would. But
he was beginning to be afraid they sometimes
didn't. He had even impatiently expressed a
view equivalent to that which identified her with
obstinacy itself, the quality. But this was only
temper, though no doubt she might stick out.
They might sometimes, those curious examples of
a perfectly unique Sex. He really wanted to go
to her with persuasive arts and procure a
reconciliation. But he was too proud.
Besides, if that was possible now, it would be
equally so three months hence. As to the fourth
alternative, that of showing he didn't care, that
would be capital on the stage, but he wasn't going
to burn his fingers with it in real life. So he passed
his days working, in his own conceit; and smoking
in a chair opposite to his work, in Mrs. Parples'.
Perhaps neither conception was quite correct. His
evenings he mostly passed seeing bad plays well
acted, or good plays ill acted--these are the only
sorts you can get free paper for. It was ridiculous
for him, knowing such a lot of actors, to pay at the
door. Now and again, however, he stayed at
home, and a friend came in for a quiet smoke.
Even so Mr. Hughes, this evening.
"Things improvin' at all, Crocky?" said he, not
exactly as if he thought he wasn't inquisitive.
Mr. Aiken kept an answer, which was coming,
back for consideration. He appeared to reject it,
going off at a tangent by preference. He had made
up his mind, he said, not to fret his kidneys any
more over his wife's absence. She would come
round before long, and eat humble-pie for having
made such a fool of herself. He preferred the
expression "damn fool," but chivalry limited its
utterance to a semi-_sotto voce_. "I might get a
letter from her any minute," said he. "Why,
when the post came just now, I fully expected it
was a letter from her." He appeared to confuse
between expectation's maximum and its realization.
"There he is again. I shouldn't be the
least surprised if this one _was_."
He left the room with a transparent parade of
deliberation. But before he had reached the
staircase the postman knocked again, and Mr. Aiken
came back saying: "It isn't her. It's something
that won't go in the box." This was slack language
and slack reasoning--confusion confounded. But
Mr. Aiken retired on it with dignity, saying:
"Mrs. Parples attends to the door."
The something continued to refuse, audibly, to
go in the box, and Mrs. Parples didn't attend to the
door. The postman put all his soul into a final
knock, which seemed to say, "I am leaving,
half-out, what may be only an advertisement, or may
be vital to your hereafter, or somebody's;" and
then washed his hands of it and took up Next
Door's case. Mr. Aiken listened for Mrs. Parples,
who remained in abeyance, and then went out again
and returned with a very ill-made-up consignment
indeed, and a normal square envelope with a
bespoken "M" embossed on its flap, directed in
an upright hand, partly robust, partly æsthetic,
an expression applied nowadays to anything
with a charm about it. This handwriting had one.
"Parples is sleeping peacefully," said Mr. Aiken.
"It would be a shame to disturb Parples. I know
who this is." He opened the envelope with
difficulty, but looked stroked and gratified. The
latter was from his very sincerely Madeline Upwell.
Just you notice any male friend of yours next time
you have a chance of seeing one open a letter from
youth and beauty which remains--however
theoretically--his very sincerely, and see if he doesn't
look stroked and gratified.
Mr. Hughes picked up the delivery that had given
the letter-box so much trouble, and looked through
it at each end. Mr. Aiken was busy reading his
letter over and over; so he could only throw out
a sideways carte-blanche to Mr. Hughes to unpack
the inner secret of the roll. This was what he was
reading:
"DEAR MR. AIKEN,
"I think you may like a copy of the photo
Captain Calverley (who perhaps you will remember
came with me to your Studio) made of this beautiful
picture, which I am never tired of looking at. I
think it so good. Please accept it from us if you
care to have it. Believe me, dear Mr. Aiken, with
kind regards to yourself and Mrs. Aiken, in which
my mother joins,
"Yours very sincerely,
"MADELINE UPWELL.
"P.S.--I know you will be sorry to hear that
Captain Calverley's regiment is ordered out to
South Africa. Of course, it makes us very anxious."
"Transparent sort of gurl!" said Mr. Hughes,
when Mr. Aiken read the letter aloud to him. "Of
course, Captain Carmichael's her sweetheart.
Anybody can see that with half an eye."
"Calverley," said Mr. Aiken. "Yes--they get
like that when it's like that." And both pondered
a little, smoking, over the peculiarities of humanity,
especially that inexplicable female half of it.
"Chuck it over here and let's have a look at it," he
added, and Mr. Hughes chucked him over the
photograph. He contemplated it for a moment in
silence; then said: "I expect she wasn't far out,
after all. Euphemia, I mean."
"Chuck it back again and let's have another
look," said Mr. Hughes. Mr. Aiken did so, and let
him have the other look. "Yes," said he. "They
went it in Italy about that time, don't you know!
Fifteenth or sixteenth century. That sort of
thing!" For Mr. Hughes knew a lot about Italy,
and could quote Browning. He uncrickled a result
of the shape of that letter-box, or tried to, and then
stood the photograph so that they could both see
it, while they talked of something else, against the
gres-de-Flandres straight-up pot that was so handy
to stand brushes in, like umbrellas.
They had plenty to talk about, because at this
time the Idea of Mr. Hughes that was destined to
fill so important an horizon in the History of Modern
Art, and was also pregnant with incalculable
consequences to several things or persons, besides
having an indirect bearing on several others, and
challenging the bedrock of Modern Art Criticism--for
it had the courage of its convictions, and stuck
at nothing--this Idea was taking form slowly but
surely, and was already making itself felt in more
ways than one. It was easy to laugh at it--this
was indisputable--but he who lived longest would
see most. It had a future before it, and if you
would only just wait twenty years, you would see
if it hadn't. You mark the words of its disciple,
whoever he was you were talking to--that was all
he said--and see if he wasn't right! He was a
little indignant--some samples of him--with
audiences who decided to wait, his own enthusiasm
believing that the results might be safely anticipated.
However, the Idea prospered, there is no doubt of
that, and the circle of enthusiasts who had leagued
themselves together to foster it and promote a true
understanding of it had already taken premises,
and their telephone number was 692,423 Western.
"It's true," said Mr. Hughes, "that the light in
the galleries is bad, and the hot-air system of
warming will destroy any ordinary oil-picture in
a month. But altering all that is the merest
question of money--comes off the guarantee fund,
in fact. And one thing nobody but a fool can help
seein', at the first go off, is that the Galleries are
rum. Rumness is half the battle." This expressed
so deep and indisputable a truth that Mr. Aiken
could not assent strongly enough in mere words.
He nodded rapidly and most expressively, without
speech. However, when he had reached the natural
limits of a nod's assenting power, he added, "Right
you are, Stumpy, my boy. Gee up!" and Mr. Hughes
resumed:
"I ain't sayin', mind you, Crocky, that any
sort of hocus-pocus is justifiable in any case. When
I use the expression 'rum,' I am keepin' in view the
absolute necessity for a receptive attitude of mind
in the visitor to the Galleries. Tell me such an
attitude of mind is possible without a measure of
rumness as a stimulant, and I say 'Humbug!'"
Mr. Aiken said again, "Right you are, Stumpy." But
he did not rise to enthusiasm--seemed low and
depressed.
"It all connects with the fundamental root of
the Idea," Mr. Hughes continued. "No one would
be more repugnant than myself to any ramification
in the direction of Wardour Street ... you
understand me?..."
"Rather!" said Mr. Aiken. And he seemed to
do so. It is not necessary for the purposes of this
story to prove that either of these gentlemen
understood what they were talking about, or
anything else, but their conversation has a bearing on
their respective characters and their preoccupations
at this moment, which are part of it.
Mr. Hughes had mounted a rhetorical hobby, and
wished to have his ride. He rigged up three fingers
of his left hand, holding them in front of him to
check off three heads on, as soon as he should come
to that inevitable stage. He did not know what
they would be, but his instinctive faith made
nothing of that. They would be needed, all in
good time.
"I am not saying," he pursued, "that Wardour
Street, in its widest sense, has nothing to
recommend it. I am not saying that it makes no appeal.
I am not disputing its historical and ethical
standpoints ... you see what I mean?"
This was a concession to the difficulties that
await the orator who expects to round up his
sentences. Mr. Aiken interjected, to help this one
out of an embarrassment: "Couldn't be better put!
Let it go at that;" and knocked some ashes out of
his pipe.
Mr. Hughes was grateful, because he had had no
idea what to say next. His indebtedness, however,
had to be ignored; else, what became of Dignity?
An enlarged manner accepted a laurel or two due
to lucidity, as he continued: "But I do say this,
that, considered as a basis--perhaps I should say
a fulcrum--or shall I say as a working hypothesis of
the substratum or framework of the Idea?..." The
speaker hesitated.
"That's the safest way to put it," said Mr. Aiken,
but rather gloomily. He was re-lighting
his pipe.
"I think so," said Mr. Hughes judicially.
"Considered as ... what I said just now ... Wardour
Street is, to my thinkin', played out. Quite
distinctly played out.... What's that?"
"What's what?" The questions seemed to
refer to something heard and unheard, by each
speaker respectively. Mr. Aiken did not press for
an answer, but went to the door, persuading his
pipe to draw by the way. "Want anything,
Mrs. Parples?" said he, looking out. But no answer
came. "Mrs. P. is sleeping happily in the kitchen,"
said he, returning. "It wasn't her. It was an
effect of something."
"I suppose it was. Thought I heard it, too!"
Perhaps, if you ever chanced to hear a conversation
about nobody could exactly say what, you
noticed that nobody did say anything very exactly,
and everybody talked like these two gentlemen,
who certainly had heard something, but who
decided that they hadn't, because they couldn't
find out what it was. It was too slight to discuss.
They each said "Rum!" and settled down to
chat again, after turning down the gas, which made
a beastly glare. Mr. Hughes had forgotten about
the three heads, though, and taken his fingers down.
He did, however, pursue the topic which claimed
his attention, having embarked upon it, and feeling
bound to conduct it to a close. He said something
to this effect, and we hope our report is fairly
accurate. He certainly appeared to say that
something, which could hardly have been anything,
grammatically, but the close to which he conducted
the topic, embodied the point which underlay the
whole of the extensive area which the Idea opened up
for development, and turned upon the indisputable
truth that the Highest Art--sculpture, music,
painting, poetry--is never intelligible to the
Vernacular Mind. How could any inference be more
incontestable than that no Art could rise above
mediocrity until a quorum of commonplace persons
should be found honestly incapable of attaching
any meaning to it? By making unintelligibility to
the banal mind a criterion of superiority in Art, we
established a Standard of Criticism, and eliminated
from consideration a wilderness of insipidity which
Mr. Hughes did not hesitate to call a nightmare.
For his part, he was so confident that the system
of Negative Juries, as they had been called, was
sounder than any appeal to popular applause that
he was quite willing that his own work should stand
or fall by the decision of the Commonplace
Intelligence as to which side up the picture should be
looked at. He would go that length, and take the
consequences. Let the Selection Committee of
their proposed Annual Exhibition consist entirely
of such Intelligences, and let the Hanging
Committee hang all the pictures they were unable to
make head or tail of, and such a galaxy of
productions of Genius would be accumulated every
year on their walls as the World had never before seen.
"Not work in practice?" said Mr. Hughes,
replying to a morose doubt of Mr. Aiken's. "Just
you redooce it to practice. Take the case that
your Jury guesses the subject of a picture. Out
it goes! Did you ever know that class able to
make head or tail of the subject of a work of Genius?
Gradual and infallible elimination, my boy--that's
the ticket!" The speaker, who, though perhaps
rather an idiot--only, mind you, he was subject
now and then to something almost like Inspiration--threw
himself back in his chair as though he had
exhausted the subject, and might rest.
"Don't b'lieve it would work," said Mr. Aiken,
sucking at his pipe. But he was evidently in a
temper this evening, and Mr. Hughes paid no
attention to his nonsense. However, it was no use
talking about the Idea to him until he was more
sympathetic. He would come right presently.
To cajole him into a better frame of mind,
Mr. Hughes began talking of something else. "Queer
sort of Studio, this of yours, Crocky," said he.
"What do you make out's queer about it,
Stumpy?" said Mr. Aiken.
"Such peculiar echoes!"
"I don't hear any echoes."
"Well, when you went to the door--you heard that?"
"Oh, that wasn't an echo: that was somebody
spoke outside."
"Somebody spoke outside? What did she say?
What was it you heard?"
"Couldn't say. What did you?"
"Well, what I heard sounded like a sort of bastard
Italian." Mr. Hughes said this to sound grand.
"You shut up and listen a minute." Mr. Aiken
shut up, and the two sat listening in the half-dark.
Now, whenever sounds are listened for, they show
a most obliging spirit, becoming audible where
you thought silence was going on peacefully alone.
The first sound that made Mr. Hughes say "There
now!--what's that?" turned out to be the gas,
which, at a carefully chosen point, rippled. The
next proved to be an intermittent spring fizzing on
the hot stove from a water-jar placed upon it.
The third was a spontaneous insect unknown to
Entomology, which had faced the difficulties of
self-making, behind the skirting, and evidently was
not going to remain a mere cipher. The fourth
was something or other that squeaked on the table,
and if one changed the places of things, noises like
that always stopped. So Mr. Aiken shifted the
things about, and said Mr. Hughes would see that
would stop it. He faced the responsibilities of the
Investigator by quenching the phenomenon, a
time-honoured method. He wrapped up the photograph,
and put it away in a drawer to show to
Euphemia. It would be interestin' to see if she
recognized it.... Oh yes! she would be back in
the next few days--sure to!
And Mr. Hughes saw that the shifting about of
the things on the table _had_ stopped the noise he
called an echo, and what more could he or anybody
want? So he sat down again and had some toddy,
and talked about the Idea. And towards one in
the morning he got the opportunity of checking off
three heads on his three fingers, and feeling that
he ought to have been in Parliament. He had felt
previously rather like a Seneschal with three spears
vacant over his portcullis, longing for a healthy
decapitation to give them employment.
The foregoing chapter, apart from the way in
which it emphasizes Mr. Aiken's loneliness and
discontent as a bachelor, would be just as well left
out of the story, but for the seemingly insignificant
incident of the echo, or whatever it was, which
might have been unintelligible if referred to
hereafter, without its surroundings.