It was the second week in February, Parliament had just met, and
Ethelberta appeared for the first time before an audience in London.
There was some novelty in the species of entertainment that the active
young woman had proposed to herself, and this doubtless had due effect in
collecting the body of strangers that greeted her entry, over and above
those friends who came to listen to her as a matter of course. Men and
women who had become totally indifferent to new actresses, new readers,
and new singers, once more felt the freshness of curiosity as they
considered the promise of the announcement. But the chief inducement to
attend lay in the fact that here was to be seen in the flesh a woman with
whom the tongue of rumour had been busy in many romantic ways--a woman
who, whatever else might be doubted, had certainly produced a volume of
verses which had been the talk of the many who had read them, and of the
many more who had not, for several consecutive weeks.
What was her story to be? Persons interested in the inquiry--a small
proportion, it may be owned, of the whole London public, and chiefly
young men--answered this question for themselves by assuming that it
would take the form of some pungent and gratifying revelation of the
innermost events of her own life, from which her gushing lines had sprung
as an inevitable consequence, and which being once known, would cause
such musical poesy to appear no longer wonderful.
The front part of the room was well filled, rows of listeners showing
themselves like a drilled-in crop of which not a seed has failed. They
were listeners of the right sort, a majority having noses of the
prominent and dignified type, which when viewed in oblique perspective
ranged as regularly as bow-windows at a watering place. Ethelberta's
plan was to tell her pretended history and adventures while sitting in a
chair--as if she were at her own fireside, surrounded by a circle of
friends. By this touch of domesticity a great appearance of truth and
naturalness was given, though really the attitude was at first more
difficult to maintain satisfactorily than any one wherein stricter
formality should be observed. She gently began her subject, as if
scarcely knowing whether a throng were near her or not, and, in her fear
of seeming artificial, spoke too low. This defect, however, she soon
corrected, and ultimately went on in a charmingly colloquial manner. What
Ethelberta relied upon soon became evident. It was not upon the
intrinsic merits of her story as a piece of construction, but upon her
method of telling it. Whatever defects the tale possessed--and they were
not a few--it had, as delivered by her, the one pre-eminent merit of
seeming like truth. A modern critic has well observed of De Foe that he
had the most amazing talent on record for telling lies; and Ethelberta,
in wishing her fiction to appear like a real narrative of personal
adventure, did wisely to make De Foe her model. His is a style even
better adapted for speaking than for writing, and the peculiarities of
diction which he adopts to give verisimilitude to his narratives acquired
enormous additional force when exhibited as viva-voce mannerisms. And
although these artifices were not, perhaps, slavishly copied from that
master of feigning, they would undoubtedly have reminded her hearers of
him, had they not mostly been drawn from an easeful section in society
which is especially characterized by the mental condition of knowing
nothing about any author a week after they have read him. The few there
who did remember De Foe were impressed by a fancy that his words greeted
them anew in a winged auricular form, instead of by the weaker channels
of print and eyesight. The reader may imagine what an effect this well-
studied method must have produced when intensified by a clear, living
voice, animated action, and the brilliant and expressive eye of a
handsome woman--attributes which of themselves almost compelled belief.
When she reached the most telling passages, instead of adding exaggerated
action and sound, Ethelberta would lapse to a whisper and a sustained
stillness, which were more striking than gesticulation. All that could
be done by art was there, and if inspiration was wanting nobody missed
it.
It was in performing this feat that Ethelberta seemed first to discover
in herself the full power of that self-command which further onward in
her career more and more impressed her as a singular possession, until at
last she was tempted to make of it many fantastic uses, leading to
results that affected more households than her own. A talent for
demureness under difficulties without the cold-bloodedness which renders
such a bearing natural and easy, a face and hand reigning unmoved outside
a heart by nature turbulent as a wave, is a constitutional arrangement
much to be desired by people in general; yet, had Ethelberta been framed
with less of that gift in her, her life might have been more comfortable
as an experience, and brighter as an example, though perhaps duller as a
story.
'Ladywell, how came this Mrs. Petherwin to think of such a queer trick as
telling romances, after doing so well as a poet?' said a man in the
stalls to his friend, who had been gazing at the Story-teller with a rapt
face.
'What--don't you know?--everybody did, I thought,' said the painter.
'A mistake. Indeed, I should not have come here at all had I not heard
the subject mentioned by accident yesterday at Grey's; and then I
remembered her to be the same woman I had met at some place--Belmaine's I
think it was--last year, when I thought her just getting on for handsome
and clever, not to put it too strongly.'
'Ah! naturally you would not know much,' replied Ladywell, in an eager
whisper. 'Perhaps I am judging others by myself a little more than--but,
as you have heard, she is an acquaintance of mine. I know her very well,
and, in fact, I originally suggested the scheme to her as a pleasant way
of adding to her fame. "Depend upon it, dear Mrs. Petherwin," I said,
during a pause in one of our dances together some time ago, "any public
appearance of yours would be successful beyond description."'
'O, I had no idea that you knew her so well! Then it is quite through
you that she has adopted this course?'
'Well, not entirely--I could not say entirely. She said that some day,
perhaps, she might do such a thing; and, in short, I reduced her vague
ideas to form.'
'I should not mind knowing her better--I must get you to throw us
together in some way,' said Neigh, with some interest. 'I had no idea
that you were such an old friend. You could do it, I suppose?'
'Really, I am afraid--hah-hah--may not have the opportunity of obliging
you. I met her at Wyndway, you know, where she was visiting with Lady
Petherwin. It was some time ago, and I cannot say that I have ever met
her since.'
'Or before?' said Neigh.
'Well--no; I never did.'
'Ladywell, if I had half your power of going to your imagination for
facts, I would be the greatest painter in England.'
'Now Neigh--that's too bad--but with regard to this matter, I do speak
with some interest,' said Ladywell, with a pleased sense of himself.
'In love with her?--Smitten down?--Done for?'
'Now, now! However, several other fellows chaff me about her. It was
only yesterday that Jones said--'
'Do you know why she cares to do this sort of thing?'
'Merely a desire for fame, I suppose.'
'I should think she has fame enough already.'
'That I can express no opinion upon. I am thinking of getting her
permission to use her face in a subject I am preparing. It is a fine
face for canvas. Glorious contour--glorious. Ah, here she is again, for
the second part.'
'Dream on, young fellow. You'll make a rare couple!' said Neigh, with a
flavour of superciliousness unheeded by his occupied companion.
Further back in the room were a pair of faces whose keen interest in the
performance contrasted much with the languidly permissive air of those in
front. When the ten minutes' break occurred, Christopher was the first
of the two to speak. 'Well, what do you think of her, Faith?' he said,
shifting restlessly on his seat.
'I like the quiet parts of the tale best, I think,' replied the sister;
'but, of course, I am not a good judge of these things. How still the
people are at times! I continually take my eyes from her to look at the
listeners. Did you notice the fat old lady in the second row, with her
cloak a little thrown back? She was absolutely unconscious, and stayed
with her face up and lips parted like a little child of six.'
'She well may! the thing is a triumph. That fellow Ladywell is here, I
believe--yes, it is he, busily talking to the man on his right. If I
were a woman I would rather go donkey-driving than stick myself up there,
for gaping fops to quiz and say what they like about! But she had no
choice, poor thing; for it was that or nothing with her.'
Faith, who had secret doubts about the absolute necessity of Ethelberta's
appearance in public, said, with remote meanings, 'Perhaps it is not
altogether a severe punishment to her to be looked at by well-dressed
men. Suppose she feels it as a blessing, instead of an affliction?'
'She is a different sort of woman, Faith, and so you would say if you
knew her. Of course, it is natural for you to criticize her severely
just now, and I don't wish to defend her.'
'I think you do a little, Kit.'
'No; I am indifferent about it all. Perhaps it would have been better
for me if I had never seen her; and possibly it might have been better
for her if she had never seen me. She has a heart, and the heart is a
troublesome encumbrance when great things have to be done. I wish you
knew her: I am sure you would like each other.'
'O yes,' said Faith, in a voice of rather weak conviction. 'But, as we
live in such a plain way, it would be hardly desirable at present.'
* * * * *
Ethelberta being regarded, in common with the latest conjurer, spirit-
medium, aeronaut, giant, dwarf or monarch, as a new sensation, she was
duly criticized in the morning papers, and even obtained a notice in some
of the weekly reviews.
'A handsome woman,' said one of these, 'may have her own reasons for
causing the flesh of the London public to creep upon its bones by her
undoubtedly remarkable narrative powers; but we question if much good can
result from such a form of entertainment. Nevertheless, some praise is
due. We have had the novel-writer among us for some time, and the novel-
reader has occasionally appeared on our platforms; but we believe that
this is the first instance on record of a Novel-teller--one, that is to
say, who relates professedly as fiction a romantic tale which has never
been printed--the whole owing its chief interest to the method whereby
the teller identifies herself with the leading character in the story.'
Another observed: 'When once we get away from the magic influence of the
story-teller's eye and tongue, we perceive how improbable, even
impossible, is the tissue of events to which we have been listening with
so great a sense of reality, and we feel almost angry with ourselves at
having been the victims of such utter illusion.'
'Mrs. Petherwin's personal appearance is decidedly in her favour,' said
another. 'She affects no unconsciousness of the fact that form and
feature are no mean vehicles of persuasion, and she uses the powers of
each to the utmost. There spreads upon her face when in repose an air of
innocence which is charmingly belied by the subtlety we discover beneath
it when she begins her tale; and this amusing discrepancy between her
physical presentment and the inner woman is further illustrated by the
misgiving, which seizes us on her entrance, that so impressionable a lady
will never bear up in the face of so trying an audience. . . . The
combinations of incident which Mrs. Petherwin persuades her hearers that
she has passed through are not a little marvellous; and if what is
rumoured be true, that the tales are to a great extent based upon her own
experiences, she has proved herself to be no less daring in adventure
than facile in her power of describing it.'