'He loves me--he does really! Poor boy!'
The speaker was Elise Delaunay. She was sitting alone on the divan
in her _atelier_, trying on a pair of old Pompadour shoes,
with large faded rosettes and pink heels, which she had that moment
routed out of a broker's shop in the Rue de Seine, on her way back
from the Luxembourg with David. They made her feet look
enchantingly small, and she was holding back her skirts that she
might get a good look at them.
Her conviction of David's passion did not for some time lessen her
interest in the shoes, but at last she kicked them off, and flung
herself back on the divan, to think out the situation a little.
Yes, the English youth's adoration could no longer be ignored. It
had become evident, even to her own acquaintances and comrades in
the various galleries she was now haunting in this bye-time of the
artistic year. Whenever she and he appeared together now, there
were sly looks and smiles.
The scandal of it did not affect her in the least. She belonged to
Bohemia, so apparently did he. She had been perfectly honest till
now; but she had never let any convention stand in her way. All her
conceptions of the relations between men and women were of an
extremely free kind. Her mother's blood in her accounted both for a
certain coldness and a certain personal refinement which both
divided and protected her from a great many of her acquaintance,
but through her father she had been acquainted for years with the
type of life and _menage_ which prevails among a certain
section of the French artist class, and if the occasion were but
strong enough she had no instincts inherited or acquired which
would stand in the way of the gratification of passion.
On the contrary, her reasoned opinions so far as she had any
were all in favour of _l'union libre_--that curious type of
association which held the artist Theodore Rousseau for life to the
woman who passed as his wife, and which obtains to a remarkable
extent, with all those accompaniments of permanence, fidelity, and
mutual service, which are commonly held to belong only to
_l'union légale_, in one or two strata of French society. She
was capable of sentiment; she had hidden veins of womanish
weakness; but at the same time the little creature's prevailing
temper was one of remarkable coolness and audacity. She judged for
herself; she had read for herself, observed for herself. Such a
temper had hitherto preserved her from adventures; but, upon
occasion, it might as easily land her in one. She was at once a
daughter of art and a daughter of the people, with a cross strain
of gentle breeding and intellectual versatility thrown in, which
made her more interesting and more individual than the rest of her
class.
'We are a pair of Romantics out of date, you and I,' she had said
once to David, half mocking, half in earnest, and the phrase fitted
the relation and position of the pair very nearly. In spite of the
enormous difference of their habits and training they had at bottom
similar tastes--the same capacity for the excitements of art and
imagination, the same shrinking from the coarse and ugly sides of
the life amid which they moved, the same cravings for novelty and
experience.
David went no more to the 'Trois Rats,' and when, in obedience to
Lenain's recommendation, he had bought and begun to read a novel of
the Goncourts, he threw it from him in a disgust beyond expression.
_Her_ talk, meanwhile, was in some respects of the freest; she
would discuss subjects impossible to the English girl of the same
class; she asked very few questions as to the people she mixed
with; and he was, by now, perfectly acquainted with her view, that
on the whole marriage was for the _bourgeois_, and had few
attractions for people who were capable of penetrating deeper into
the rich growths of life. But there was no _personal_ taint or
license in what she said; and she herself could be always happily
divided from her topics. Their Bohemia was canopied with illusions,
but the illusions on the whole were those of poetry.
Were all David's illusions hers, however? _Love!_ She thought
of it, half laughing, as she lay on the divan. She knew nothing
about it--she was for _art_. Yet what a brow, what eyes, what
a gait--like a young Achilles!
She sprang up to look at a sketch of him, dashed off the day
before, which was on the easel. Yes, it was like. There was the
quick ardent air, the southern colour, the clustering black hair,
the young parting of the lips. The invitation of the eyes was
irresistible--she smiled into them--the little pale face flushing.
But at the same moment her attention was caught by a sketch pinned
against the wall just behind the easel.
'Ah! my cousin, my good cousin!' she said, with a little mocking
twist of the mouth; 'how strange that you have not been here all
this time--never once! There was something said, I remember, about
a visit to Bordeaux about now. Ah! well--_tant mieux_--for you
would be rather jealous, my cousin!'
Then she sat down with her hands on her knees, very serious. How
long since they met? A week. How long till the temporary closing of
the Salon and the voting of the rewards? A fortnight. Well, should
it go on till then? Yes or no? As soon as she knew her fate--or at
any rate if she got her _mention_--she would go back to work.
She had two subjects in her mind; she would work at home, and
Taranne had promised to come and advise her. Then she would have no
time for handsome English boys. But till then?
She took an anemone from a bunch David had brought her, and began
to pluck off the petals, alternating 'yes' and 'no.' The last petal
fell to 'yes.'
'I should have done just the same if it had been "no,"' she said,
laughing. '_Allons_, he amuses me, and I do him no harm. When
I go back to work he can do his business. He has done none yet. He
will forget me and make some money.'
She paced up and down the studio thinking again. She was conscious
of some remorse for her part in sending the Englishman's sister to
the Cervins. The matter had never been mentioned again between her
and David; yet she knew instinctively that he was often ill at
ease. The girl was perpetually in Montjoie's studio, and surrounded
in public places by a crew of his friends. Madame Cervin was
constantly in attendance no doubt, but if it came to a struggle she
would have no power with the English girl, whose obstinacy was in
proportion to her ignorance.
Elise had herself once stopped Madame Cervin on the stairs, and
said some frank things of the sculptor, in order to quiet an
uncomfortable conscience.
'Ah! you do not like Monsieur Montjoie?' said the other, looking
hard at her.
Elise coloured, then she recovered herself.
'All the world knows that Monsieur Montjoie has no scruples,
madame,' she cried angrily. 'You know it yourself. It is a shame.
That girl understands nothing.'
Madame Cervin laughed.
'Certainly she understands everything that she pleases,
mademoiselle. But if there is any anxiety, let her brother come and
look after her. He can take her where she wants to go. I should be
glad indeed. I am as tired as a dog. Since she came it is one
_tapage_ from morning till night.'
And Elise retired, discomfited before those small malicious eyes.
Since David's adoration for the girl artist in No. 27 had become
more or less public property, Madame Cervin, who had seen from the
beginning that Louie was a burden on her brother, had decidedly the
best of the situation.
'Has she lent Montjoie money?'
Elise meditated. The little _bourgeoise_ had a curious
weakness for posing as the patron of the various artists in the
house. 'Very possible! and she looks on the Maenad as the only way
of getting it back? She would sell her soul for a napoleon--I
always knew that. _Canaille_, all of them!'
And the meditation ended in the impatient conclusion that neither
she nor the brother had any responsibility. After all, any decent
girl, French or English, could soon see for herself what manner of
man was Jules Montjoie! And now for the 'private view' of a certain
artistic club to which she had promised to take her English
acquaintance. All the members of the club were young--of the new
rebellious school of '_plein air_'--the afternoon promised to
be amusing.
So the companionship of these two went on, and David passed from
one golden day to another. How she lectured him, the little, vain,
imperious thing; and how meek he was with her, how different from
his Manchester self! The woman's cleverness filled the field. The
man, wholly preoccupied with other things, did not care to produce
himself, and in the first ardour of his new devotion kept all the
self-assertive elements of his own nature in the background, caring
for nothing but to watch her eyes as she talked, to have her voice
in his ears, to keep her happy and content in his company.
Yet she was not taken in. With other people he must be proud,
argumentative, self-willed--that she was sure of; but her
conviction only made her realise her power over him with the more
pleasure. His naive respect for her own fragmentary knowledge, his
unbounded admiration for her talent, his quick sympathy for all she
did and was, these things, little by little, tended to excite, to
preoccupy her.
Especially was she bent upon his artistic education. She carried
him hither and thither, to the Louvre, the Luxembourg, the Salon,
insisting with a feverish eloquence and invention that he should
worship all that she worshipped--no matter if he did not
understand!--let him worship all the same--till he had learnt his
new alphabet with a smiling docility, and caught her very tricks of
phrase. Especially were they haunters of the sculptures in the
Louvre, where, because of the difficulty of it, she piqued herself
most especially on knowledge, and could convict him most
triumphantly of a barbarian ignorance. Up and down they wandered,
and she gave him eyes, whether for Artemis, or Aphrodite, or
Apollo, or still more for the significant and troubling art of the
Renaissance, French and Italian. She would flit before him,
perching here and there like a bird, and quivering through and
through with a voluble enjoyment.
Then from these lingerings amid a world charged at every point with
the elements of passion and feeling, they would turn into the open
air, into the May sunshine, which seemed to David's northern eyes
so lavish and inexhaustible, carrying with it inevitably the
kindness of the gods! They would sit out of doors either in the
greenwood paths of the Bois, where he could lie at her feet, and
see nothing but her face and the thick young wood all round them,
or in some corner of the Champs-Elysées, or the sun-beaten Quai de
la Conference, where the hurrying life of the town brushed past
them incessantly, yet without disturbing for a moment their
absorption in or entertainment of each other.
Yet all through she maintained her mastery of the situation. She
was a riddle to him often, poor boy! One moment she would lend
herself in bewildering unexpected ways to his passion, the next she
would allow him hardly the privileges of the barest acquaintance,
hardly the carrying of her cloak, the touch of her hand. But she
had no qualms. It was but to last another fortnight; the friendship
soothed and beguiled for her these days of excited waiting; and a
woman, when she is an artist and a Romantic, may at least sit,
smoke, and chat with whomsoever she likes, provided it be a time of
holiday, and she is not betraying her art.
Meanwhile the real vulgarity of her nature--its insatiable vanity,
its reckless ambition--was masked from David mainly by the very
jealousy and terror which her artist's life soon produced in him.
He saw no sign of other lovers; she had many acquaintances but no
intimates; and the sketch in her room had been carelessly explained
to him as the portrait of her cousin. But the _atelier_, and
the rivalries it represented:--after three days with her he had
learnt that what had seemed to him the extravagance, the pose of
her first talk with him, was in truth the earnest, the reality of
her existence. She told him that since she was a tiny child she had
dreamed of _fame_--dreamed of people turning in the streets
when she passed--of a glory that should lift her above all the
commonplaces of existence, and all the disadvantages of her own
start in life.
'I am neither beautiful, nor rich, nor well-born; but if I have
talent, what matter? Everyone will be at my feet. And if I have no
talent--_grand Dieu!_--what is there left for me but to kill
myself?'
And she would clasp her hands round her knees, and look at him with
fierce, drawn brows, as though defying him to say a single syllable
in favour of any meaner compromise with fate.
This fever of the artist and the _concurrent_--in a woman
above all--how it bewildered him! He soon understood enough of it,
however, to be desperately jealous of it, to realise something of
the preliminary bar it placed between any lover and the girl's
heart and life.
Above all was he jealous of her teachers. Taranne clearly could
beat her down with a word, reduce her to tears with an unfavourable
criticism; then he had but to hold up a finger, to say,
'Mademoiselle, you have worked well this week, your drawing shows
improvement, I have hopes of you,' to bring her to his feet with
delight and gratitude. It was a _monstrous_ power, this power
of the master with his pupil! How could women submit to it?
Yet his lover's instincts led him safely through many perils. He
was infinitely complaisant towards all her artistic talk, all her
gossip of the _atelier_. It seemed to him--but then his
apprehension of this strange new world was naturally a somewhat
confused one--that Elise was not normally on terms with any of her
fellow students.
'If I don't get my _mention_,' she would say passionately, 'I
tell you again it will be intrigue; it will be those creatures in
the _atelier_ who want to get rid of me--to finish with me.
Ah! I will _crush_ them all yet. And I have been good to them
all--every one--I vow I have--even to that animal of a Breal, who
is always robbing me of my place at the _concours_, and taking
mean advantages. _Miserables!_'
And the tears would stand in her angry eyes; her whole delicate
frame would throb with fierce feeling.
Gradually he learnt how to deal with these fits, even when they
chilled him with a dread, a conviction he dared not analyse. He
would so soothe and listen to her, so ply her with the praises of
her gift, which came floated to him on the talk of those
acquaintances of hers to whom she had introduced him, that her most
deep-rooted irritations would give way for a time. The woman would
reappear; she would yield to the charm of his admiring eyes, his
stammered flatteries; her whole mood would break up, dissolve into
eager softness, and she would fall into a childish plaintiveness,
saying wild generous things even of her rivals, now there seemed to
be no one under heaven to take their part, and at last, even,
letting her little hand fall into those eager brown ones which lay
in wait for it, letting it linger there--forgotten.
Especially was she touched in his favour by the way in which
Regnault had singled him out. After he had given her the history of
that midnight walk, he saw clearly that he had risen to a higher
plane in her esteem. She had no heroes exactly; but she had certain
artistic passions, certain romantic fancies, which seemed to touch
deep fibres in her. Her admiration for Regnault was one of these;
but David soon understood that he had no cause whatever to be
jealous of it. It was a matter purely of the mind and the
imagination.
So the days passed--the hot lengthening days. Sometimes in the long
afternoons they pushed far afield into the neighbourhood of Paris.
The green wooded hills of Sevres and St. Cloud, the blue curves and
reaches of the Seine, the flashing lights and figures, the
pleasures of companionship, self-revelation, independence--the day
was soon lost in these quick impressions, and at night they would
come back in a fragrant moonlight, descending from their train into
the noise and glitter of the streets, only to draw closer
together--for surely on these crowded pavements David might claim
her little arm in his for safety's sake--till at last they stood in
the dark passage between his door and hers, and she would suddenly
pelt him with a flower, spring up her small stairway, and lock her
door behind her, before, in his emotion, he could find his voice or
a farewell. Then he would make his way into his own den, and sit
there in the dark, lost in a thronging host of thoughts and
memories,--feeling life one vibrating delight.
At last one morning he awoke to the fact that only four days more
remained before the date on which, according to their original
plan, they were to go back to Manchester. He laughed aloud when the
recollection first crossed his mind; then, having a moment to
himself, he sat down and scrawled a few hasty words to John.
Business detained him yet a while--would detain him a few
weeks--let John manage as he pleased, his employer trusted
everything to him--and money was enclosed. Then he wrote another
hurried note to the bank where he had placed his six hundred
pounds. Let them send him twenty pounds at once, in Bank of England
notes. He felt himself a young king as he gave the order--king of
this mean world and of its dross. All his business projects had
vanished from his mind. He could barely have recalled them if he
had tried. During the first days of his acquaintance with Elise he
had spent a few spare hours in turning over the boxes on the quays,
in talks with booksellers in the Rue de Seine or the Rue de Lille,
in preliminary inquiries respecting some commissions he had
undertaken. But now, every hour, every thought were hers. What did
money matter, in the name of Heaven? Yet when his twenty pounds
came, he changed his notes and pocketed his napoleons with a vast
satisfaction. For they meant power, they meant opportunity; every
one should be paid away against so many hours by her side, at her
feet.
Meanwhile day after day he had reminded himself of Louie, and day
after day he had forgotten her again, absolutely, altogether. Once
or twice he met her on the stairs, started, remembered, and tried
to question her as to what she was doing. But she was still angry
with him for his interference on the day of the pose; and he could
get very little out of her. Let him only leave her alone; she was
not a school-child to be meddled with; that he would find out. As
to Madame Cervin, she was a little fool, and her meanness in money
matters was disgraceful; but she, Louie, could put up with her. One
of these meetings took place on the day of his letters to the bank
and to John. Louie asked him abruptly when he thought of returning.
He flushed deeply, stammered, said he was inclined to stay longer,
but of course she could be sent home. An escort could be found for
her. She stared at him; then suddenly her black eyes sparkled, and
she laughed so that the sound echoed up the dark stairs. David
hotly inquired what she meant; but she ran up still laughing
loudly, and he was left to digest her scornful amusement as best he
could.
Not long after he found the Cervins' door open as he passed, and in
the passage saw a group of people, mostly men; Montjoie in front,
just lighting a cigar; Louie's black hat in the background. David
hurried past; he loathed the sculptor's battered look, his insolent
eye, his slow ambiguous manner; he still burnt with the anger and
humiliation of his ineffectual descent on the man's domain. But
Madame Cervin, catching sight of him from the back of the party,
pursued him panting and breathless to his own door. Would monsieur
please attend to her; he was so hard to get hold of; never, in
fact, at home! Would he settle her little bill, and give her
more money for current expenses? Mademoiselle Louie required to
be kept amused--_mon Dieu!_--from morning to night! She had no
objection, provided it were made worth her while. And how much
longer did monsieur think of remaining in Paris?
David answered recklessly that he did not know, paid her bill for
Louie's board and extras without looking at it, and gave her a
napoleon in hand, wherewith she departed, her covetous eyes aglow,
her mouth full of excited civilities.
She even hesitated a moment at the door and then came back to
assure him that she was really all discretion with regard to his
sister; no doubt monsieur had heard some unpleasant stories, for
instance, of M. Montjoie; she could understand perfectly, that
coming from such a quarter, they had affected monsieur's mind; but
he would see that she could not make a sudden quarrel with one of
her husband's old friends; Mademoiselle Louie (who was already her
_cherie_) had taken a fancy to pose for this statue; it was
surely better to indulge her than to rouse her self-will, but she
could assure monsieur that she had looked after her as though it
had been her own daughter.
David stood impatiently listening. In a few minutes he was to be
with Elise at the corner of the Rue Lafitte. Of course it was all
right!--and if it were not, he could not mend it. The woman was
vulgar and grasping, but what reason was there to think anything
else that was evil of her? Probably she had put up with Louie more
easily than a woman of a higher type would have done. At any rate
she was doing her best, and what more could be asked of him than he
had done? Louie behaved outrageously in Manchester; he could not
help it, either there or here. He had interfered again and again,
and had always been a fool for his pains. Let her choose for
herself. A number of old and long-hidden exasperations seemed now
to emerge whenever he thought of his sister.
Five minutes later he was in the Rue Lafitte.
It was Elise's caprice that they should always meet in this way,
out of doors; at the corner of their own street; on the steps of
the Madeleine; beneath the Vendome Column; in front of a particular
bonbon shop; or beside the third tree from the Place de la Concorde
in the northern alley of the Tuileries Gardens. He had been only
once inside her studio since the first evening of their
acquaintance.
His mind was full of excitement, for the Salon had been closed
since the day before; and the awards of the jury would be
informally known, at least in some cases, by the evening. Elise's
excitement since the critical hours began had been pitiful to see.
As he stood waiting he gave his whole heart to her and her
ambitions, flinging away from him with a passionate impatience
every other interest, every other thought.
When she came she looked tired and white. 'I can't go to galleries,
and I can't paint,' she said, shortly. 'What shall we do?'
Her little black hat was drawn forward, but through the dainty veil
he could see the red spot on either cheek. Her hands were pushed
deep into the pockets of her light grey jacket, recalling the
energetic attitude in which she had stood over Louie on the
occasion of their first meeting. He guessed at once that she had
not slept, and that she was beside herself with anxiety. How to
manage her?--how to console her? He felt himself so young and raw;
yet already his passion had awakened in him a hundred new and
delicate perceptions.
'Look at the weather!' he said to her. 'Come out of town! let us
make for the Gare St. Lazare, and spend the day at St. Germain.'
She hesitated.
'Taranne will write to me directly he knows--directly! He might
write any time this evening. No, no!--I can't go! I must be on the
spot.'
'He can't write _before_ the evening. You said yourself before
seven nothing could be known. We will get back in ample time, I
swear.'
They were standing in the shade of a shop awning, and he was
looking down at her, eagerly, persuasively. She had a debate with
herself, then with a despairing gesture of the hands, she turned
abruptly--
'Well then--to the station!'
When they had started, she lay back in the empty carriage he had
found for her, and shut her eyes. The air was oppressive, for the
day before had been showery, and the heat this morning was a damp
heat which relaxed the whole being. But before the train moved, she
felt a current of coolness, and hastily looking up she saw that
David had possessed himself of the cheap fan which had been lying
on her lap, and was fanning her with his gaze fixed upon her, a
gaze which haunted her as her eyelids fell again.
Suddenly she fell into an inward perplexity, an inward impatience
on the subject of her companion, and her relation to him. It had
been all very well till yesterday! But now the artistic and
professional situation had become so strained, so intense, she
could hardly give him a thought. His presence there, and its tacit
demands upon her, tried her nerves. Her mind was full of a hundred
_miseres d'atelier_, of imaginary enemies and intrigues; one
minute she was all hope, the next all fear; and she turned sick
when she thought of Taranne's letter.
What had she been entangling herself for? she whose whole life and
soul belonged to art and ambition! This comradeship, begun as a
caprice, an adventure, was becoming too serious. It must end!--end
probably to-day, as she had all along determined. Then, as she
framed the thought, she became conscious of a shrinking, a
difficulty, which enraged and frightened her.
She sat up abruptly and threw back her veil.
David made a little exclamation as he dropped the fan.
'Yes!' she said, looking at him with a little frown, 'yes--what did
you say?'
Then she saw that his whole face was working with emotion.
'I wish you would have stayed like that,' he said, in a voice which
trembled.
'Why?'
'Because--because it was so sweet!'
She gave a little start, and a sudden red sprang into her cheek.
His heart leapt. He had never seen her blush for any word of his
before.
'I prefer the air itself,' she said, bending forward and looking
away from him out of the open window at the villas they were
passing.
Yet, all the while, as the country houses succeeded each other and
her eyes followed them, she saw not their fragrant, flowery
gardens, but the dark face and tall young form opposite. He was
handsomer even than when she had seen him first--handsomer far than
her portrait of him. Was it the daily commerce with new forms of
art and intelligence which Paris and her companionship had brought
him?--or simply the added care which a man in love instinctively
takes of the little details of his dress and social conduct?--which
had given him this look of greater maturity, greater distinction?
Her heart fluttered a little--then she fell back on the thought of
Taranne's letter.
They emerged from the station at St. Germain into a fierce blaze of
sun, which burned on the square red mass of the old chateau, and
threw a blinding glare on the white roads.
'Quick! for the trees!' she said, and they both hurried over the
open space which lay between them and the superb chestnut grove
which borders the famous terrace. Once there all was well, and they
could wander from alley to alley in a green shade, the white
blossom-spikes shining in the sun overhead, and to their right the
blue and purple plain, with the Seine winding and dimpling, the
river polders with their cattle, and far away the dim heights of
Montmartre just emerging behind the great mass of Mont Valerien,
which blocked the way to Paris. Such lights and shades, such spring
leaves, such dancing airs!
Elise drew a long breath, slipped off her jacket which he made a
joy of carrying, and loosened the black lace at her throat which
fell so prettily over the little pink cotton underneath.
Then she looked at her companion unsteadily. There was excitement
in this light wind, this summer sun. Her great resolve to 'end it'
began to look less clear to her. Nay, she stood still and smiled up
into his face, a very siren of provocation and wild charm--the wind
blowing a loose lock about her eyes.
'Is this better than England--than your Manchester?' she asked him
scornfully, and he--traitor!--flinging out of his mind all the
bounties of an English May, all his memories of the whitethorn and
waving fern and foaming streams set in the deep purple breast of
the Scout--vowed to her that nowhere else could there be spring or
beauty or sunshine, but only here in France and at St. Germain.
At this she smiled and blushed--no woman could have helped the
blush. In truth, his will, steadily bent on one end, while hers was
distracted by half a dozen different impulses, was beginning to
affect her in a troubling, paralysing way. For all her parade of a
mature and cynical enlightenment, she was just twenty; it was such
a May day as never was; and when once she had let herself relax
towards him again, the inward ache of jealous ambition made this
passionate worship beside her, irrelevant as it was, all the more
soothing, all the more luring.
Still she felt that something must be done to stem the tide, and
again she fell back upon luncheon. They had bought some provisions
on their way to the station in Paris. He might subsist on scenery
and aesthetics if he pleased--as for her, she was a common person
with common needs, and must eat.
'Oh, not here!' he cried, 'why, this is all in public. Look at the
nursemaids, and the boys playing, and the carriages on the terrace.
Come on a little farther. You remember that open place with the
thorns and the stream?--there we should be in peace.'
She did not know that she wanted to be in peace; but she gave way.
So they wandered on past the chestnuts into the tangled depths of
the old forest. A path sunk in brambles and fern took them through
beech wood to the little clearing David had in his mind. A tiny
stream much choked by grass and last year's leaves ran along one
side of it. A fallen log made a seat, and the beech trees spread
their new green fans overhead, or flung them out to right and left
around the little space, and for some distance in front, till the
green sprays and the straight grey stems were lost on all sides in
a brownish pinkish mist which betrayed a girdle of oaks not yet
conquered by the summer.
She took her seat on the log, and he flung himself beside her. Out
came the stores in his pockets, and once more they made themselves
childishly merry over a scanty meal, which left them still hungry.
Then for an hour or two they sat lounging and chattering in the
warm shade, while the gentle wind brought them every spring scent,
every twitter of the birds, every swaying murmur of the forest.
David lay on his back against the log, his eyes now plunging into
the forest, now watching the curls of smoke from his pipe mounting
against the background of green, or the moist fleecy clouds which
seemed to be actually tangled in the tree-tops, now fixed as long
as they dared on his companion's face. She was not beautiful? Let
her say it! For she had the softest mouth which drooped like a
child with a grievance when she was silent, and melted into the
subtlest curves when she talked. She had, as a rule, no colour, but
her clear paleness, as contrasted with the waves of her light-gold
hair, seemed to him an exquisite beauty. The eyebrows had an
oriental trick of mounting at the corners, but the effect, taken
with the droop of the mouth, was to give the face in repose a
certain charming look of delicate and plaintive surprise. Above all
it was her smallness which entranced him; her feet and hands, her
tiny waist, the _finesse_ of her dress and movements. All the
women he had ever seen, Lucy and Dora among them, served at this
moment only to make a foil in his mind for this little Parisian
beside him.
How she talked this afternoon! In her quick reaction towards him
she was after all more the woman than she had ever been. She
chattered of her forlorn childhood, of her mother's woes and her
father's iniquities, using the frankest language about these last;
then of herself and her troubles. He listened and laughed; his look
as she poured herself out to him was in itself a caress. Moreover,
unconsciously to both, their relation had changed somewhat. The
edge of his first ignorance and shyness had rubbed off. He was no
longer a mere slave at her feet. Rather a new and sweet equality
seemed at last after all these days to have arisen between them; a
bond more simple, more natural. Every now and then he caught his
breath under the sense of a coming crisis; meanwhile the May day
was a dream of joy, and life an intoxication.
But he controlled himself long, being indeed in desperate fear of
breaking the spell which held her to him this heavenly afternoon.
The hours slipped by; the air grew stiller and sultrier. Presently,
just as the sun was sinking into the western wood, a woman,
carrying a bundle and with a couple of children, crossed the glade.
One child was on her arm; the other, whimpering with heat and
fatigue, dragged wearily behind her, a dead weight on its mother's
skirts. The woman looked worn out, and was scolding the crying
child in a thin exasperated voice. When she came to the stream, she
put down her bundle, and finding a seat by the water, she threw
back her cotton bonnet and began to wipe her brow, with long
breaths which were very near to groans. Then the child on her lap
set up a shout of hunger, while the child behind her began to cry
louder than before. The woman hastily raised the baby, unfastened
her dress, and gave it the breast, so stifling its cries; then,
first slapping the other child with angry vehemence, she groped in
the bundle for a piece of sausage roll, and by dint of alternately
shaking the culprit and stuffing the food into its poor open mouth,
succeeded in reducing it to a chewing and sobbing silence. The
mother herself was clearly at the last gasp, and when at length the
children were quiet, as she turned her harshly outlined head so as
to see who the other occupants of the glade might be, her look had
in it the dull hostility of the hunted creature whose powers of
self-defence are almost gone.
But she could not rest long. After ten minutes, at longest, she
dragged herself up from the grass with another groan, and they all
disappeared into the trees, one of the children crying again--a
pitiable trio.
Elise had watched the group closely, and the sight seemed in some
unexplained way to chill and irritate the girl.
'There is one of the drudges that men make,' she said bitterly,
looking after the woman.
'Men?' he demurred; 'I suspect the husband is a drudge too.'
'Not he!' she cried. 'At least he has liberty, choice, comrades. He
is not battered out of all pleasure, all individuality, that other
human beings may have their way and be cooked for, and this
wretched human race may last. The woman is always the victim, say
what you like. But for _some_ of us at least there is a way
out!'
She looked at him defiantly.
A tremor swept through him under the suddenness of this jarring
note. Then a delicious boldness did away with the tremor. He met
her eyes straight.
'Yes--_love_ can always find it,' he said under his
breath--'or make it.'
She wavered an instant, then she made a rally.
'I know nothing about that,' she said scornfully; 'I was thinking of
art. _Art_ breaks all chains, or accepts none. The woman that
has art is free, and she alone; for she has scaled the men's heaven
and stolen their sacred fire.'
She clasped her hands tightly on her knee; her face was full of
aggression.
David sat looking at her, trying to smile, but his heart sank
within him.
He threw away his pipe, and laid his hand down against the log, not
far from her, trying to smile, but his heart sank within him.
He threw away his pipe and laid his head down against the log, not
far from her, drawing his hat over his eyes. So they sat in silence
a little while, till he looked up and said, in a bright beseeching
tone:
'Finish me that scene in _Hernani!_'
The day before, after a _matinee_ of _Andromaque_ at the
Theatre-Francais, in a moment of rebellion and reaction against
all things classical, they had both thrown themselves upon
_Hernani_. She had read it aloud to him in a green corner of
the Bois, having a faculty that way, and bidding him take it as a
French lesson. He took it, of course, as a lesson in nothing but
the art of making wild speeches to the woman one loves.
But now she demurred.
'It is not here.'
He produced it out of his pocket.
She shrugged her shoulders.
'I am not in the vein.'
'You said last week you were not in the vein,' he said, laughing
tremulously, 'and you read me that scene from _Ruy Blas_, so
that when we went to see Sarah Bernhardt in the evening I was
disappointed!'
She smiled, not being able to help it, for all flattery was sweet
to her.
'We must catch our train. I would never speak to you again if we
were late!'
He held up his watch to her.
'An hour--it is, at the most, half an hour's walk.'
'Ah, _mon Dieu!_' she cried, clasping her hands. 'It is all
over, the vote is given. Perhaps Taranne is writing to me now, at
this moment!'
'Read--read! and forget it half an hour more.'
She caught up the book in a frenzy, and began to read, first
carelessly and with unintelligible haste; but before a page was
over, the artist had recaptured her, she had slackened, she had
begun to interpret.
It was the scene in the third act where Hernani the outlaw, who has
himself bidden his love, Dona Sol, marry her kinsman the old Duke,
rather than link her fortunes to those of a ruined chief of
banditti, comes in upon the marriage he has sanctioned, nay
commanded. The bridegroom's wedding gifts are there on the table.
He and Dona Sol are alone.
The scene begins with a speech of bitter irony from Hernani. His
friends have been defeated and dispersed. He is alone in the world;
a price is on his head; his lot is more black and hopeless than
before. Yet his heart is bursting within him. He had bidden her,
indeed, but how could she have obeyed! Traitress! false love! false
heart!
He takes up the jewels one by one.
'_This necklace is brave work,--and the bracelet is rare--though
not so rare as the woman who beneath a brow so pure can bear about
with her a heart so vile! And what in exchange? A little love?
Bah!--a mere trifle!... Great God! that one can betray like
this--and feel no shame--and live!_'
For answer, Dona Sol goes proudly up to the wedding casket and,
with a gesture matching his own, takes out the dagger from its
lowest depth. 'You stop halfway!' she says to him calmly, and he
understands. In an instant he is at her feet, tortured with remorse
and passion, and the magical love scene of the act develops. What
ingenuity of tenderness, yet what truth!
'She has pardoned me, and loves me! Ah, who will make it possible
that I too, after such words, should love Hernani and forgive him?
Tears!--thou weepest, and again it is my fault! And who will punish
me? for thou wilt but forgive again! Ah, my friends are dead!--and
it is a madman speaks to thee. Forgive! I would fain love--I know
not how. And yet, what deeper love could there be than this? Oh!
Weep not, but die with me! If I had but a world, and could give it
to thee!'
The voice of the reader quivered. A hand came upon the book and
caught her hand. She looked up and found herself face to face with
David, kneeling beside her. They stared at each other. Then he
said, half choked:
'I can't bear it any more! I love you with all my heart--oh, you
know--you know I do!'
She was stupefied for a moment, and then with a sudden gesture she
drew herself away, and pushed him from her.
'Leave me alone--leave me free--this moment!' she said
passionately.
'Why do you persecute and pursue me? What right have you? I have
been kind to you, and you lay shares for me. I will have nothing
more to do with you. Let me go home, and let us part.'
She got up, and with feverish haste tied her veil over her hat. He
had fallen with his arms across the log, and his face hidden upon
them. She paused irresolutely. 'Monsieur David!'
He made no answer.
She bent down and touched him.
He shook his head.
'No, no!--go!' he said thickly. She bit her lip. The breath under
her little lace tippet rose and fell with furious haste. Then she
sat down beside him, and with her hands clasped on her knee began
to please with him in tremulous light tones, as though they were a
pair of children. Why was he so foolish? Why had he tried to spoil
their beautiful afternoon? She must go. The train would not wait
for them. But he must come too. He must. After a little he rose
without a word, gathered up the book and her wrap, and off they set
along the forest path.
She stole a glance at him. It seemed to her that he walked as if he
did not know where he was or who was beside him. Her heart smote
her. When they were deep in a hazel thicket, she stole out a small
impulsive hand, and slipped it into his, which hung beside him. He
started. Presently she felt a slight pressure, but it relaxed
instantly, and she took back her hand, feeling ashamed of herself,
and aggrieved besides. She shot on in front of him and he followed.
So they walked through the chestnuts and across the white road to
the station in the red glow of the evening sun. He followed her
into the railway carriage, did her every little service with
perfect gentleness; then when they started he took the opposite
corner, and turning away from her, stared, with eyes that evidently
saw nothing, at the villas beside the line, at the children in the
streets, at the boats on the dazzling river.
She in her corner tried to be angry, to harden her heart, to
possess herself only with the thought of Taranne's letter. But the
evening was not as the morning. That dark teasing figure at the
other end, outlined against the light of the window, intruded, took
up a share in her reverie she resented but could not prevent nay,
presently absorbed it altogether. Absurd! she had had love made to
her before, and had known how to deal with it. The artist must have
comrades, and the comrades may play false; well, then the artist
must take care of herself.
She had done no harm; she was not to blame; she had let him know
from the beginning that she only lived for art. What folly, and
what treacherous, inconsiderate folly, it had all been!
So she lashed herself up. But her look stole incessantly to that
opposite corner, and every now and then she felt her lips trembling
and her eyes growing hot in a way which annoyed her.
When they reached Paris she said to him imperiously as he helped
her out of the carriage, 'A cab, please!'
He found one for her, and would have closed the door upon her.
'No, come in!' she said to him with the same accent.
His look in return was like a blow to her, there was such an
inarticulate misery in it. But he got in, and they drove on in
silence.
When they reached the Rue Chantal she sprang out, snatched her key
from the concierge, and ran up the stairs. But when she reached the
point on that top passage where their ways diverged, she stopped
and looked back for him.
'Come and see my letter,' she said to him, hesitating.
He stood quite still, his arms hanging beside him, and drew a long
breath that stabbed her.
'I think not.'
And he turned away to his own door.
But she ran back to him and laid her hand on his arm. Her eyes were
full of tears.
'Please, Monsieur David. We were good friends this morning. Be now
and always my good friend!'
He shook his head again, but he let himself be led by her. Still
holding him--torn between her quick remorse and her eagerness for
Taranne's letter, she unlocked her door. One dart for the table.
Yes! there it lay. She took it up; then her face blanched suddenly,
and she came piteously up to David, who was standing just inside
the closed door.
'Wish me luck, Monsieur David, wish me luck, as you did before!'
But he was silent, and she tore open the letter. '_Dieu!--mon
Dieu!_'
It was a sound of ecstasy. Then she flung down the letter, and
running up to David, she caught his arm again with both hands.
'_Triomphe! Triomphe!_ I have got my _mention_, and the
picture they skied is to be brought down to the line, and Taranne
says I have done better than any other pupil of his of the same
standing--that I have an extraordinary gift--that I must succeed,
all the world says so--and two other members of the jury send me
their compliments. Ah! Monsieur David'--in a tone of reproach--'be
kind--be nice--congratulate me.'
And she drew back an arm's-length that she might look at him, her
own face overflowing with exultant colour and life. Then she
approached again, her mood changing.
'It is too _detestable_ of you to stand there like a statue!
ah! that it is! For I never deceived you, no, never. I said to
you the first night--there is nothing else for me in the world
but art--nothing! Do you hear? This falling in love spoils
everything--_everything!_ Be friends with me. You will be
going back to England soon. Perhaps--perhaps'--her voice
faltered--'I will take a week's more holiday--Taranne says I ought.
But then I must go to work--and we will part friends--always
friends--and respect and understand each other all our lives,
_n'est-ce pas!_'
'Oh! let me go!' cried David fiercely, his loud strained voice
startling them both, and flinging her hand away from him, he made
for the door. But impulsively she threw herself against it,
dismayed to find herself so near crying, and shaken with emotion
from head to foot.
They stood absorbed in each other; she with her hands behind her on
the door, and her hat tumbling back from her masses of loosened
hair. And as she gazed she was fascinated; for there was a grand
look about him in his misery--a look which was strange to her, and
which was in fact the emergence of his rugged and Puritan race. But
whatever it was it seized her, as all aspects of his personal
beauty had done from the beginning. She held out her little white
hands to him appealing.
'No! no!' he said roughly, trying to put her away,'
_never--never_--friends! You may kill me--you shan't make a
child of me any more. Oh! my God!' It was a cry of agony. 'A man
can't go about with a girl in this way, if--if she is like you, and
not--' His voice broke--he lost the thread of what he was saying,
and drew his hand across his eyes before he broke out again.
'What--you thought I was just a raw cub, to be played with. Oh, I
am too dull, I suppose, to understand! But I have grown under your
hands anyway. I don't know myself--I should do you or myself a
mischief if this went on, Let me go--and go home to-night!'
And again he made a threatening step forward. But when he came
close to her he broke down.
'I would have worked for you so,' he said thickly. 'For your sake I
would have given up my country. I would have made myself French
altogether. It should have been marriage or no marriage as you
pleased. You should have been free to go or stay. Only I would have
laid myself down for you to walk over. I have some money. I would
have settled here. I would have protected you. It is not right for
a woman to be alone--anyone so young and so pretty. I thought you
understood--that you must understand--that your heart was melting
to me. I should have done your work no harm--I should have been
your slave--you know that. That _cursed, cursed_ art!'
He spoke with a low intense emphasis; then turning away he buried
his face in his hands.
'David!'
He looked up startled. She was stepping towards him, a smile of
ineffable charm floating as it were upon her tears.
'I don't know what is the matter with me!' she said tremulously.
'There is trouble in it, I know.' It is the broken glass coming
true. _Mais, Voyons! c'est plus fort que moi!_ Do you care so
much--would it break your heart--would you let me work--and never,
_never_ get in the way? Would you be content that art should
come first and you second? I can promise you no more than that--not
one little inch! _Would_ you be content? Say!'
He ran to her with a cry. She let him put his arms round her, and a
shiver of excitement ran through her.
'What does it mean?' she said breathlessly. 'One is so strong one
moment--and the next--like this! Oh, why did you ever come?'
Then she burst into tears, hiding her eyes upon his breast.
'Oh! I have been so much alone! but I have got a heart somewhere
all the same. If you will have it, you must take the consequences.'
Awed by the mingling of his silence with that painful throbbing
beneath her cheek, she looked up. He stooped--and their young faces
met.