(From _The Dial_)
1921, 1922
She arranged herself there, on that divan, and I knew she'd come to
tell me all about it. It was wonderful, how, at forty-seven, she could
still give that effect of triumph and excess, of something rich and
ruinous and beautiful spread out on the brocades. The attitude showed
me that her affair with Norman Hippisley was prospering; otherwise she
couldn't have afforded the extravagance of it.
"I know what you want," I said. "You want me to congratulate you."
"Yes. I do."
"I congratulate you on your courage."
"Oh, you don't like him," she said placably.
"No, I don't like him at all."
"He likes you," she said. "He thinks no end of your painting."
"I'm not denying he's a judge of painting. I'm not even denying he can
paint a little himself."
"Better than you, Roly."
"If you allow for the singular, obscene ugliness of his imagination,
yes."
"It's beautiful enough when he gets it into paint," she said. "He makes
beauty. His own beauty."
"Oh, very much his own."
"Well, _you_ just go on imitating other people's--God's or somebody's."
She continued with her air of perfect reasonableness. "I know he isn't
good-looking. Not half so good-looking as you are. But I like him. I
like his slender little body and his clever, faded face. There's a
quality about him, a distinction. And look at his eyes. _Your_ mind
doesn't come rushing and blazing out of your eyes, my dear."
"No. No. I'm afraid it doesn't rush. And for all the blaze--"
"Well, that's what I'm in love with, the rush, Roly, and the blaze. And
I'm in love, _for the first time_" (she underlined it) "with a man."
"Come," I said, "come."
"Oh, _I_ know. I know you're thinking of Lawson Young and Dickey
Harper."