III.

For days Lucian lay in a swoon of pleasure, smiling when he was

addressed, sauntering happily in the sunlight, hugging recollection

warm to his heart. Annie had told him that she was going on a visit to

her married sister, and said, with a caress, that he must be patient.

He protested against her absence, but she fondled him, whispering her

charms in his ear till he gave in and then they said good-bye, Lucian

adoring on his knees. The parting was as strange as the meeting, and

that night when he laid his work aside, and let himself sink deep into

the joys of memory, all the encounter seemed as wonderful and

impossible as magic.

“And you really don’t mean to do anything about those rascals?” said

his father.

“Rascals? Which rascals? Oh, you mean Beit. I had forgotten all about

it.

No; I don’t think I shall trouble. They’re not worth powder and shot.”

And he returned to his dream, pacing slowly from the medlar to the

quince and back again. It seemed trivial to be interrupted by such

questions; he had not even time to think of the book he had recommenced

so eagerly, much less of this labour of long ago. He recollected

without interest that it cost him many pains, that it was pretty good

here and there, and that it had been stolen, and it seemed that there

was nothing more to be said on the matter. He wished to think of the

darkness in the lane, of the kind voice that spoke to him, of the kind

hand that sought his own, as he stumbled on the rough way. So far, it

was wonderful. Since he had left school and lost the company of the

worthy barbarians who had befriended him there, he had almost lost the

sense of kinship with humanity; he had come to dread the human form as

men dread the hood of the cobra. To Lucian a man or a woman meant

something that stung, that spoke words that rankled, and poisoned his

life with scorn. At first such malignity shocked him: he would ponder

over words and glances and wonder if he were not mistaken, and he still

sought now and then for sympathy. The poor boy had romantic ideas about

women; he believed they were merciful and pitiful, very kind to the

unlucky and helpless. Men perhaps had to be different; after all, the

duty of a man was to get on in the world, or, in plain language, to

make money, to be successful; to cheat rather than to be cheated, but

always to be successful; and he could understand that one who fell

below this high standard must expect to be severely judged by his

fellows. For example, there was young Bennett, Miss Spurry’s nephew.

Lucian had met him once or twice when he was spending his holidays with

Miss Spurry, and the two young fellows compared literary notes

together. Bennett showed some beautiful things he had written, over

which Lucian had grown both sad and enthusiastic. It was such exquisite

magic verse, and so much better than anything he ever hoped to write,

that there was a touch of anguish in his congratulations. But when

Bennett, after many vain prayers to his aunt, threw up a safe position

in the bank, and betook himself to a London garret, Lucian was not

surprised at the general verdict.

Mr. Dixon, as a clergyman, viewed the question from a high standpoint

and found it all deplorable, but the general opinion was that Bennett

was a hopeless young lunatic. Old Mr. Gervase went purple when his name

was mentioned, and the young Dixons sneered very merrily over the

adventure.

“I always thought he was a beastly young ass,” said Edward Dixon, “but

I didn’t think he’d chuck away his chances like that. Said he couldn’t

stand a bank! I hope he’ll be able to stand bread and water. That’s all

those littery fellows get, I believe, except Tennyson and Mark Twain

and those sort of people.”

Lucian of course sympathized with the unfortunate Bennett, but such

judgments were after all only natural. The young man might have stayed

in the bank and succeeded to his aunt’s thousand a year, and everybody

would have called him a very nice young fellow—“clever, too.” But he

had deliberately chosen, as Edward Dixon had said, to chuck his chances

away for the sake of literature; piety and a sense of the main chance

had alike pointed the way to a delicate course of wheedling, to a

little harmless practicing on Miss Spurry’s infirmities, to frequent

compliances of a soothing nature, and the “young ass” had been blind to

the direction of one and the other. It seemed almost right that the

vicar should moralize, that Edward Dixon should sneer, and that Mr.

Gervase should grow purple with contempt. Men, Lucian thought, were

like judges, who may pity the criminal in their hearts, but are forced

to vindicate the outraged majesty of the law by a severe sentence. He

felt the same considerations applied to his own case; he knew that his

father should have had more money, that his clothes should be newer and

of a better cut, that he should have gone to the university and made

good friends. If such had been his fortune he could have looked his

fellow-men proudly in the face, upright and unashamed. Having put on

the whole armor of a first-rate West End tailor, with money in his

purse, having taken anxious thought for the morrow, and having some

useful friends and good prospects; in such a case he might have held

his head high in a gentlemanly and Christian community. As it was he

had usually avoided the reproachful glance of his fellows, feeling that

he deserved their condemnation. But he had cherished for a long time

his romantic sentimentalities about women; literary conventions

borrowed from the minor poets and pseudo-medievalists, or so he thought

afterwards. But, fresh from school, wearied a little with the perpetual

society of barbarian though worthy boys, he had in his soul a charming

image of womanhood, before which he worshipped with mingled passion and

devotion. It was a nude figure, perhaps, but the shining arms were to

be wound about the neck of a vanquished knight; there was rest for the

head of a wounded lover; the hands were stretched forth to do works of

pity, and the smiling lips were to murmur not love alone, but

consolation in defeat. Here was the refuge for a broken heart; here the

scorn of men would but make tenderness increase; here was all pity and

all charity with loving-kindness. It was a delightful picture,

conceived in the “come rest on this bosom,” and “a ministering angel

thou” manner, with touches of allurement that made devotion all the

sweeter. He soon found that he had idealized a little; in the affair of

young Bennett, while the men were contemptuous the women were virulent.

He had been rather fond of Agatha Gervase, and she, so other ladies

said, had “set her cap” at him. Now, when he rebelled, and lost the

goodwill of his aunt, dear Miss Spurry, Agatha insulted him with all

conceivable rapidity. “After all, Mr. Bennett,” she said, “you will be

nothing better than a beggar; now, will you? You mustn’t think me

cruel, but I can’t help speaking the truth. _Write books!_” Her

expression filled up the incomplete sentence; she waggled with

indignant emotion. These passages came to Lucian’s ears, and indeed the

Gervases boasted of “how well poor Agatha had behaved.”

“Never mind, Gathy,” old Gervase had observed. “If the impudent young

puppy comes here again, we’ll see what Thomas can do with the

horse-whip.”

“Poor dear child,” Mrs. Gervase added in telling the tale, “and she was

so fond of him too. But of course it couldn’t go on after his shameful

behavior.”

But Lucian was troubled; he sought vainly for the ideal womanly, the

tender note of “come rest on this bosom.” Ministering angels, he felt

convinced, do not rub red pepper and sulfuric acid into the wounds of

suffering mortals.

Then there was the case of Mr. Vaughan, a squire in the neighborhood,

at whose board all the aristocracy of Caermaen had feasted for years.

Mr. Vaughan had a first-rate cook, and his cellar was rare, and he was

never so happy as when he shared his good things with his friends. His

mother kept his house, and they delighted all the girls with frequent

dances, while the men sighed over the amazing champagne. Investments

proved disastrous, and Mr. Vaughan had to sell the grey manor-house by

the river. He and his mother took a little modern stucco villa in

Caermaen, wishing to be near their dear friends. But the men were “very

sorry; rough on you, Vaughan. Always thought those Patagonians were

risky, but you wouldn’t hear of it. Hope we shall see you before very

long; you and Mrs. Vaughan must come to tea some day after Christmas.”

“Of course we are all very sorry for them,” said Henrietta Dixon. “No,

we haven’t called on Mrs. Vaughan yet. They have no regular servant,

you know; only a woman in the morning. I hear old mother Vaughan, as

Edward will call her, does nearly everything. And their house is

absurdly small; it’s little more than a cottage. One really can’t call

it a gentleman’s house.”

Then Mr. Vaughan, his heart in the dust, went to the Gervases and tried

to borrow five pounds of Mr. Gervase. He had to be ordered out of the

house, and, as Edith Gervase said, it was all very painful; “he went

out in such a funny way,” she added, “just like the dog when he’s had a

whipping. Of course it’s sad, even if it is all his own fault, as

everybody says, but he looked so ridiculous as he was going down the

steps that I couldn’t help laughing.” Mr. Vaughan heard the ringing,

youthful laughter as he crossed the lawn.

Young girls like Henrietta Dixon and Edith Gervase naturally viewed the

Vaughans’ comical position with all the high spirits of their age, but

the elder ladies could not look at matters in this frivolous light.

“Hush, dear, hush,” said Mrs. Gervase, “it’s all too shocking to be a

laughing matter. Don’t you agree with me, Mrs. Dixon? The sinful

extravagance that went on at Pentre always _frightened_ me. You

remember that ball they gave last year? Mr. Gervase assured me that the

champagne must have cost _at least_ a hundred and fifty shillings the

dozen.”

“It’s dreadful, isn’t it,” said Mrs. Dixon, “when one thinks of how

many poor people there are who would be thankful for a crust of bread?”

“Yes, Mrs. Dixon,” Agatha joined in, “and you know how absurdly the

Vaughans spoilt the cottagers. Oh, it was really wicked; one would

think Mr. Vaughan wished to make them above their station. Edith and I

went for a walk one day nearly as far as Pentre, and we begged a glass

of water of old Mrs. Jones who lives in that pretty cottage near the

brook. She began praising the Vaughans in the most fulsome manner, and

showed us some flannel things they had given her at Christmas. I assure

you, my dear Mrs. Dixon, the flannel was the very best quality; no lady

could wish for better. It couldn’t have cost less than half-a-crown a

yard.”

“I know, my dear, I know. Mr. Dixon always said it couldn’t last. How

often I have heard him say that the Vaughans were pauperizing all the

common people about Pentre, and putting every one else in a most

unpleasant position. Even from a worldly point of view it was very poor

taste on their part. So different from the _true_ charity that Paul

speaks of.”

“I only wish they had given away nothing worse than flannel,” said Miss

Colley, a young lady of very strict views. “But I assure you there was

a perfect orgy, I can call it nothing else, every Christmas. Great

joints of prime beef, and barrels of strong beer, and snuff and tobacco

distributed wholesale; as if the poor wanted to be encouraged in their

disgusting habits. It was really impossible to go through the village

for weeks after; the whole place was poisoned with the fumes of horrid

tobacco pipes.”

“Well, we see how that sort of thing ends,” said Mrs. Dixon, summing up

judicially. “We had intended to call, but I really think it would be

impossible after what Mrs. Gervase has told us. The idea of Mr. Vaughan

trying to sponge on poor Mr. Gervase in that shabby way! I think

meanness of that kind is so hateful.”

It was the practical side of all this that astonished Lucian. He saw

that in reality there was no high-flown quixotism in a woman’s nature;

the smooth arms, made he had thought for caressing, seemed muscular;

the hands meant for the doing of works of pity in his system, appeared

dexterous in the giving of “stingers,” as Barnes might say, and the

smiling lips could sneer with great ease. Nor was he more fortunate in

his personal experiences. As has been told, Mrs. Dixon spoke of him in

connection with “judgments,” and the younger ladies did not exactly

cultivate his acquaintance. Theoretically they “adored” books and

thought poetry “too sweet,” but in practice they preferred talking

about mares and fox-terriers and their neighbors.

They were nice girls enough, very like other young ladies in other

country towns, content with the teaching of their parents, reading the

Bible every morning in their bedrooms, and sitting every Sunday in

church amongst the well-dressed “sheep” on the right hand. It was not

their fault if they failed to satisfy the ideal of an enthusiastic

dreamy boy, and indeed, they would have thought his feigned woman

immodest, absurdly sentimental, a fright (“never wears stays, my dear”)

and _horrid_.

At first he was a good deal grieved at the loss of that charming tender

woman, the work of his brain. When the Miss Dixons went haughtily by

with a scornful waggle, when the Miss Gervases passed in the wagonette

laughing as the mud splashed him, the poor fellow would look up with a

face of grief that must have been very comic; “like a dying duck,” as

Edith Gervase said. Edith was really very pretty, and he would have

liked to talk to her, even about fox-terriers, if she would have

listened. One afternoon at the Dixons’ he really forced himself upon

her, and with all the obtuseness of an enthusiastic boy tried to

discuss the _Lotus Eaters_ of Tennyson. It was too absurd. Captain

Kempton was making signals to Edith all the time, and Lieutenant

Gatwick had gone off in disgust, and he had promised to bring her a

puppy “by Vick out of Wasp.” At last the poor girl could bear it no

longer:

“Yes, it’s very sweet,” she said at last. “When did you say you were

going to London, Mr. Taylor?”

It was about the time that his disappointment became known to

everybody, and the shot told. He gave her a piteous look and slunk off,

“just like the dog when he’s had a whipping,” to use Edith’s own

expression. Two or three lessons of this description produced their due

effect; and when he saw a male Dixon or Gervase approaching him he bit

his lip and summoned up his courage. But when he descried a

“ministering angel” he made haste and hid behind a hedge or took to the

woods. In course of time the desire to escape became an instinct, to be

followed as a matter of course; in the same way he avoided the adders

on the mountain. His old ideals were almost if not quite forgotten; he

knew that the female of the _bête humaine_, like the adder, would in

all probability sting, and he therefore shrank from its trail, but

without any feeling of special resentment. The one had a poisoned

tongue as the other had a poisoned fang, and it was well to leave them

both alone. Then had come that sudden fury of rage against all

humanity, as he went out of Caermaen carrying the book that had been

stolen from him by the enterprising Beit. He shuddered as he thought of

how nearly he had approached the verge of madness, when his eyes filled

with blood and the earth seemed to burn with fire. He remembered how he

had looked up to the horizon and the sky was blotched with scarlet; and

the earth was deep red, with red woods and red fields. There was

something of horror in the memory, and in the vision of that wild night

walk through dim country, when every shadow seemed a symbol of some

terrible impending doom. The murmur of the brook, the wind shrilling

through the wood, the pale light flowing from the mouldered trunks, and

the picture of his own figure fleeing and fleeting through the shades;

all these seemed unhappy things that told a story in fatal

hieroglyphics. And then the life and laws of the sunlight had passed

away, and the resurrection and kingdom of the dead began. Though his

limbs were weary, he had felt his muscles grow strong as steel; a

woman, one of the hated race, was beside him in the darkness, and the

wild beast woke within him, ravening for blood and brutal lust; all the

raging desires of the dim race from which he came assailed his heart.

The ghosts issued out from the weird wood and from the caves in the

hills, besieging him, as he had imagined the spiritual legion besieging

Caermaen, beckoning him to a hideous battle and a victory that he had

never imagined in his wildest dreams. And then out of the darkness the

kind voice spoke again, and the kind hand was stretched out to draw him

up from the pit. It was sweet to think of that which he had found at

last; the boy’s picture incarnate, all the passion and compassion of

his longing, all the pity and love and consolation. She, that beautiful

passionate woman offering up her beauty in sacrifice to him, she was

worthy indeed of his worship. He remembered how his tears had fallen

upon her breast, and how tenderly she had soothed him, whispering those

wonderful unknown words that sang to his heart. And she had made

herself defenseless before him, caressing and fondling the body that

had been so despised. He exulted in the happy thought that he had knelt

down on the ground before her, and had embraced her knees and

worshipped. The woman’s body had become his religion; he lay awake at

night looking into the darkness with hungry eyes; wishing for a

miracle, that the appearance of the so-desired form might be shaped

before him. And when he was alone in quiet places in the wood, he fell

down again on his knees, and even on his face, stretching out vain

hands in the air, as if they would feel her flesh. His father noticed

in those days that the inner pocket of his coat was stuffed with

papers; he would see Lucian walking up and down in a secret shady place

at the bottom of the orchard, reading from his sheaf of manuscript,

replacing the leaves, and again drawing them out. He would walk a few

quick steps, and pause as if enraptured, gazing in the air as if he

looked through the shadows of the world into some sphere of glory,

feigned by his thought. Mr. Taylor was almost alarmed at the sight; he

concluded of course that Lucian was writing a book. In the first place,

there seemed something immodest in seeing the operation performed under

one’s eyes; it was as if the “make-up” of a beautiful actress were done

on the stage, in full audience; as if one saw the rounded calves fixed

in position, the fleshings drawn on, the voluptuous outlines of the

figure produced by means purely mechanical, blushes mantling from the

paint-pot, and the golden tresses well secured by the wigmaker. Books,

Mr. Taylor thought, should swim into one’s ken mysteriously; they

should appear all printed and bound, without apparent genesis; just as

children are suddenly told that they have a little sister, found by

mamma in the garden. But Lucian was not only engaged in composition; he

was plainly rapturous, enthusiastic; Mr. Taylor saw him throw up his

hands, and bow his head with strange gesture. The parson began to fear

that his son was like some of those mad Frenchmen of whom he had read,

young fellows who had a sort of fury of literature, and gave their

whole lives to it, spending days over a page, and years over a book,

pursuing art as Englishmen pursue money, building up a romance as if it

were a business. Now Mr. Taylor held firmly by the “walking-stick”

theory; he believed that a man of letters should have a real

profession, some solid employment in life. “Get something to do,” he

would have liked to say, “and then you can write as much as you please.

Look at Scott, look at Dickens and Trollope.” And then there was the

social point of view; it might be right, or it might be wrong, but

there could be no doubt that the literary man, as such, was not thought

much of in English society. Mr. Taylor knew his Thackeray, and he

remembered that old Major Pendennis, society personified, did not

exactly boast of his nephew’s occupation. Even Warrington was rather

ashamed to own his connection with journalism, and Pendennis himself

laughed openly at his novel-writing as an agreeable way of making

money, a useful appendage to the cultivation of dukes, his true

business in life. This was the plain English view, and Mr. Taylor was

no doubt right enough in thinking it good, practical common sense.

Therefore when he saw Lucian loitering and sauntering, musing amorously

over his manuscript, exhibiting manifest signs of that fine fury which

Britons have ever found absurd, he felt grieved at heart, and more than

ever sorry that he had not been able to send the boy to Oxford.

“B.N.C. would have knocked all this nonsense out of him,” he thought.

“He would have taken a double First like my poor father and made

something of a figure in the world. However, it can’t be helped.” The

poor man sighed, and lit his pipe, and walked in another part of the

garden.

But he was mistaken in his diagnosis of the symptoms. The book that

Lucian had begun lay unheeded in the drawer; it was a secret work that

he was engaged on, and the manuscripts that he took out of that inner

pocket never left him day or night. He slept with them next to his

heart, and he would kiss them when he was quite alone, and pay them

such devotion as he would have paid to her whom they symbolized. He

wrote on these leaves a wonderful ritual of praise and devotion; it was

the liturgy of his religion. Again and again he copied and recopied

this madness of a lover; dallying all days over the choice of a word,

searching for more exquisite phrases. No common words, no such phrases

as he might use in a tale would suffice; the sentences of worship must

stir and be quickened, they must glow and burn, and be decked out as

with rare work of jewelry. Every part of that holy and beautiful body

must be adored; he sought for terms of extravagant praise, he bent his

soul and mind low before her, licking the dust under her feet, abased

and yet rejoicing as a Templar before the image of Baphomet. He exulted

more especially in the knowledge that there was nothing of the

conventional or common in his ecstasy; he was not the fervent, adoring

lover of Tennyson’s poems, who loves with passion and yet with a proud

respect, with the love always of a gentleman for a lady. Annie was not

a lady; the Morgans had farmed their land for hundreds of years; they

were what Miss Gervase and Miss Colley and the rest of them called

common people. Tennyson’s noble gentlemen thought of their ladies with

something of reticence: they imagined them dressed in flowing and

courtly robes, walking with slow dignity; they dreamed of them as

always stately, the future mistresses of their houses, mothers of their

heirs. Such lovers bowed, but not too low, remembering their own honor,

before those who were to be equal companions and friends as well as

wives. It was not such conceptions as these that he embodied in the

amazing emblems of his ritual; he was not, he told himself, a young

officer, “something in the city,” or a rising barrister engaged to a

Miss Dixon or a Miss Gervase. He had not thought of looking out for a

nice little house in a good residential suburb where they would have

pleasant society; there were to be no consultations about wall-papers,

or jocose whispers from friends as to the necessity of having a room

that would do for a nursery. No glad young thing had leant on his arm

while they chose the suite in white enamel, and china for “our

bedroom,” the modest salesman doing his best to spare their blushes.

When Edith Gervase married she would get mamma to look out for two

really good servants, “as we must begin quietly,” and mamma would make

sure that the drains and everything were right. Then her “girl friends”

would come on a certain solemn day to see all her “lovely things.” “Two

dozen of everything!” “Look, Ethel, did you ever see such ducky

frills?” “And that insertion, isn’t it quite too sweet?” “My dear

Edith, you _are_ a lucky girl.” “All the underlinen specially made by

Madame Lulu!” “What delicious things!” “I hope he knows what a prize he

is winning.” “Oh! do look at those lovely ribbon-bows!” “You darling,

how happy you must be.” “Real Valenciennes!” Then a whisper in the

lady’s ear, and her reply, “Oh, _don’t_, Nelly!” So they would chirp

over their treasures, as in Rabelais they chirped over their cups; and

every thing would be done in due order till the wedding-day, when

mamma, who had strained her sinews and the commandments to bring the

match about, would weep and look indignantly at the unhappy bridegroom.

“I _hope_ you’ll be kind to her, Robert.” Then in a rapid whisper to

the bride: “Mind, you _insist_ on Wyman’s flushing the drains when you

come back; servants are so careless and dirty too. Don’t let him go

about by himself in Paris. Men are so _queer_, one never knows. You

_have_ got the pills?” And aloud, after these _secreta_, “God bless

you, my dear; good-bye! _cluck_, _cluck_, good-bye!”

There were stranger things written in the manuscript pages that Lucian

cherished, sentences that burnt and glowed like “coals of fire which

hath a most vehement flame.” There were phrases that stung and tingled

as he wrote them, and sonorous words poured out in ecstasy and rapture,

as in some of the old litanies. He hugged the thought that a great part

of what he had invented was in the true sense of the word occult: page

after page might have been read aloud to the uninitiated without

betraying the inner meaning. He dreamed night and day over these

symbols, he copied and recopied the manuscript nine times before he

wrote it out fairly in a little book which he made himself of a skin of

creamy vellum. In his mania for acquirements that should be entirely

useless he had gained some skill in illumination, or limning as he

preferred to call it, always choosing the obscurer word as the obscurer

arts. First he set himself to the severe practice of the text; he spent

many hours and days of toil in struggling to fashion the serried

columns of black letter, writing and rewriting till he could shape the

massive character with firm true hand. He cut his quills with the

patience of a monk in the scriptorium, shaving and altering the nib,

lightening and increasing the pressure and flexibility of the points,

till the pen satisfied him, and gave a stroke both broad and even. Then

he made experiments in inks, searching for some medium that would rival

the glossy black letter of the old manuscripts; and not till he could

produce a fair page of text did he turn to the more entrancing labour

of the capitals and borders and ornaments. He mused long over the

Lombardic letters, as glorious in their way as a cathedral, and trained

his hand to execute the bold and flowing lines; and then there was the

art of the border, blossoming in fretted splendor all about the page.

His cousin, Miss Deacon, called it all a great waste of time, and his

father thought he would have done much better in trying to improve his

ordinary handwriting, which was both ugly and illegible. Indeed, there

seemed but a poor demand for the limner’s art. He sent some specimens

of his skill to an “artistic firm” in London; a verse of the “Maud,”

curiously emblazoned, and a Latin hymn with the notes pricked on a red

stave. The firm wrote civilly, telling him that his work, though good,

was not what they wanted, and enclosing an illuminated text. “We have

great demand for this sort of thing,” they concluded, “and if you care

to attempt something in this style we should be pleased to look at it.”

The said text was “Thou, God, seest me.” The letter was of a degraded

form, bearing much the same relation to the true character as a

“churchwarden gothic” building does to Canterbury Cathedral; the

colours were varied. The initial was pale gold, the _h_ pink, the _o_

black, the _u_ blue, and the first letter was somehow connected with a

bird’s nest containing the young of the pigeon, who were waited on by

the female bird.

“What a pretty text,” said Miss Deacon. “I should like to nail it up in

my room. Why don’t you try to do something like that, Lucian? You might

make something by it.”

“I sent them these,” said Lucian, “but they don’t like them much.”

“My dear boy! I should think not! Like them! What were you thinking of

to draw those queer stiff flowers all round the border? Roses? They

don’t look like roses at all events. Where do you get such ideas from?”

“But the design is appropriate; look at the words.”

“My dear Lucian, I can’t read the words; it’s such a queer

old-fashioned writing. Look how plain that text is; one can see what

it’s about. And this other one; I can’t make it out at all.”

“It’s a Latin hymn.”

“A Latin hymn? Is it a Protestant hymn? I may be old-fashioned, but

_Hymns Ancient and Modern_ is quite good enough for me. This is the

music, I suppose? But, my dear boy, there are only four lines, and who

ever heard of notes shaped like that: you have made some square and

some diamond-shape? Why didn’t you look in your poor mother’s old

music? It’s in the ottoman in the drawing-room. I could have shown you

how to make the notes; there are crotchets, you know, and quavers.”

Miss Deacon laid down the illuminated _Urbs Beata_ in despair; she felt

convinced that her cousin was “next door to an idiot.”

And he went out into the garden and raged behind a hedge. He broke two

flower-pots and hit an apple-tree very hard with his stick, and then,

feeling more calm, wondered what was the use in trying to do anything.

He would not have put the thought into words, but in his heart he was

aggrieved that his cousin liked the pigeons and the text, and did not

like his emblematical roses and the Latin hymn. He knew he had taken

great pains over the work, and that it was well done, and being still a

young man he expected praise. He found that in this hard world there

was a lack of appreciation; a critical spirit seemed abroad. If he

could have been scientifically observed as he writhed and smarted under

the strictures of “the old fool,” as he rudely called his cousin, the

spectacle would have been extremely diverting. Little boys sometimes

enjoy a very similar entertainment; either with their tiny fingers or

with mamma’s nail scissors they gradually deprive a fly of its wings

and legs. The odd gyrations and queer thin buzzings of the creature as

it spins comically round and round never fail to provide a fund of

harmless amusement. Lucian, indeed, fancied himself a very ill-used

individual; but he should have tried to imitate the nervous

organization of the flies, which, as mamma says, “can’t really feel.”

But now, as he prepared the vellum leaves, he remembered his art with

joy; he had not laboured to do beautiful work in vain. He read over his

manuscript once more, and thought of the designing of the pages. He

made sketches on furtive sheets of paper, and hunted up books in his

father’s library for suggestions. There were books about architecture,

and medieval iron work, and brasses which contributed hints for

adornment; and not content with mere pictures he sought in the woods

and hedges, scanning the strange forms of trees, and the poisonous

growth of great water-plants, and the parasite twining of honeysuckle

and briony. In one of these rambles he discovered a red earth which he

made into a pigment, and he found in the unctuous juice of a certain

fern an ingredient which he thought made his black ink still more

glossy. His book was written all in symbols, and in the same spirit of

symbolism he decorated it, causing wonderful foliage to creep about the

text, and showing the blossom of certain mystical flowers, with emblems

of strange creatures, caught and bound in rose thickets. All was

dedicated to love and a lover’s madness, and there were songs in it

which haunted him with their lilt and refrain. When the book was

finished it replaced the loose leaves as his constant companion by day

and night. Three times a day he repeated his ritual to himself, seeking

out the loneliest places in the woods, or going up to his room; and

from the fixed intentness and rapture of his gaze, the father thought

him still severely employed in the questionable process of composition.

At night he contrived to wake for his strange courtship; and he had a

peculiar ceremony when he got up in the dark and lit his candle. From a

steep and wild hillside, not far from the house, he had cut from time

to time five large boughs of spiked and prickly gorse. He had brought

them into the house, one by one, and had hidden them in the big box

that stood beside his bed. Often he woke up weeping and murmuring to

himself the words of one of his songs, and then when he had lit the

candle, he would draw out the gorse-boughs, and place them on the

floor, and taking off his nightgown, gently lay himself down on the bed

of thorns and spines. Lying on his face, with the candle and the book

before him, he would softly and tenderly repeat the praises of his

dear, dear Annie, and as he turned over page after page, and saw the

raised gold of the majuscules glow and flame in the candle-light, he

pressed the thorns into his flesh. At such moments he tasted in all its

acute savour the joy of physical pain; and after two or three

experiences of such delights he altered his book, making a curious sign

in vermilion on the margin of the passages where he was to inflict on

himself this sweet torture. Never did he fail to wake at the appointed

hour, a strong effort of will broke through all the heaviness of sleep,

and he would rise up, joyful though weeping, and reverently set his

thorny bed upon the floor, offering his pain with his praise. When he

had whispered the last word, and had risen from the ground, his body

would be all freckled with drops of blood; he used to view the marks

with pride. Here and there a spine would be left deep in the flesh, and

he would pull these out roughly, tearing through the skin. On some

nights when he had pressed with more fervor on the thorns his thighs

would stream with blood, red beads standing out on the flesh, and

trickling down to his feet. He had some difficulty in washing away the

bloodstains so as not to leave any traces to attract the attention of

the servant; and after a time he returned no more to his bed when his

duty had been accomplished. For a coverlet he had a dark rug, a good

deal worn, and in this he would wrap his naked bleeding body, and lie

down on the hard floor, well content to add an aching rest to the

account of his pleasures. He was covered with scars, and those that

healed during the day were torn open afresh at night; the pale olive

skin was red with the angry marks of blood, and the graceful form of

the young man appeared like the body of a tortured martyr. He grew

thinner and thinner every day, for he ate but little; the skin was

stretched on the bones of his face, and the black eyes burnt in dark

purple hollows. His relations noticed that he was not looking well.

“Now, Lucian, it’s perfect madness of you to go on like this,” said

Miss Deacon, one morning at breakfast. “Look how your hand shakes; some

people would say that you have been taking brandy. And all that you

want is a little medicine, and yet you won’t be advised. You know it’s

not my fault; I have asked you to try Dr. Jelly’s Cooling Powders again

and again.”

He remembered the forcible exhibition of the powders when he was a boy,

and felt thankful that those days were over. He only grinned at his

cousin and swallowed a great cup of strong tea to steady his nerves,

which were shaky enough. Mrs. Dixon saw him one day in Caermaen; it was

very hot, and he had been walking rather fast. The scars on his body

burnt and tingled, and he tottered as he raised his hat to the vicar’s

wife. She decided without further investigation that he must have been

drinking in public-houses.

“It seems a mercy that poor Mrs. Taylor was taken,” she said to her

husband. “She has certainly been spared a great deal. That wretched

young man passed me this afternoon; he was quite intoxicated.”

“How very said,” said Mr. Dixon. “A little port, my dear?”

“Thank you, Merivale, I will have another glass of sherry. Dr. Burrows

is always scolding me and saying I _must_ take something to keep up my

energy, and this sherry is so weak.”

The Dixons were not teetotalers. They regretted it deeply, and blamed

the doctor, who “insisted on some stimulant.” However, there was some

consolation in trying to convert the parish to total abstinence, or, as

they curiously called it, temperance. Old women were warned of the sin

of taking a glass of beer for supper; aged labourers were urged to try

Cork-ho, the new temperance drink; an uncouth beverage, styled coffee,

was dispensed at the reading-room. Mr. Dixon preached an eloquent

“temperance” sermon, soon after the above conversation, taking as his

text: _Beware of the leaven of the Pharisees_. In his discourse he

showed that fermented liquor and leaven had much in common, that beer

was at the present day “put away” during Passover by the strict Jews;

and in a moving peroration he urged his dear brethren, “and more

especially those amongst us who are poor in this world’s goods,” to

beware indeed of that evil leaven which was sapping the manhood of our

nation. Mrs. Dixon cried after church:

“Oh, Merivale, what a beautiful sermon! How earnest you were. I hope it

will do good.”

Mr. Dixon swallowed his port with great decorum, but his wife fuddled

herself every evening with cheap sherry. She was quite unaware of the

fact, and sometimes wondered in a dim way why she always had to scold

the children after dinner. And so strange things sometimes happened in

the nursery, and now and then the children looked queerly at one

another after a red-faced woman had gone out, panting.

Lucian knew nothing of his accuser’s trials, but he was not long in

hearing of his own intoxication. The next time he went down to Caermaen

he was hailed by the doctor.

“Been drinking again today?”

“No,” said Lucian in a puzzled voice. “What do you mean?”

“Oh, well, if you haven’t, that’s all right, as you’ll be able to take

a drop with me. Come along in?”

Over the whisky and pipes Lucian heard of the evil rumors affecting his

character.

“Mrs. Dixon assured me you were staggering from one side of the street

to the other. You quite frightened her, she said. Then she asked me if

I recommended her to take one or two ounces of spirit at bedtime for

the palpitation; and of course I told her two would be better. I have

my living to make here, you know. And upon my word, I think she wants

it; she’s always gurgling inside like a waterworks. I wonder how old

Dixon can stand it.”

“I like ‘ounces of spirit,’” said Lucian. “That’s taking it

medicinally, I suppose. I’ve often heard of ladies who have to ‘take it

medicinally’; and that’s how it’s done?”

“That’s it. ‘Dr Burrows won’t _listen_ to me’: ‘I tell him how I

dislike the taste of spirits, but he says they are absolutely

_necessary_ for my constitution’: ‘my medical man _insists_ on

something at bedtime’; that’s the style.”

Lucian laughed gently; all these people had become indifferent to him;

he could no longer feel savage indignation at their little hypocrisies

and malignancies. Their voices uttering calumny, and morality, and

futility had become like the thin shrill angry note of a gnat on a

summer evening; he had his own thoughts and his own life, and he passed

on without heeding.

“You come down to Caermaen pretty often, don’t you?” said the doctor.

“I’ve seen you two or three times in the last fortnight.”

“Yes, I enjoy the walk.”

“Well, look me up whenever you like, you know. I am often in just at

this time, and a chat with a human being isn’t bad, now and then. It’s

a change for me; I’m often afraid I shall lose my patients.”

The doctor had the weakness of these terrible puns, dragged headlong

into the conversation. He sometimes exhibited them before Mrs. Gervase,

who would smile in a faint and dignified manner, and say:

“Ah, I see. Very amusing indeed. We had an old coachmen once who was

very clever, I believe, at that sort of thing, but Mr. Gervase was

obliged to send him away, the laughter of the other domestics was so

very boisterous.”

Lucian laughed, not boisterously, but good-humouredly, at the doctor’s

joke. He liked Burrows, feeling that he was a man and not an automatic

gabbling machine.

“You look a little pulled down,” said the doctor, when Lucian rose to

go. “No, you don’t want my medicine. Plenty of beef and beer will do

you more good than drugs. I daresay it’s the hot weather that has

thinned you a bit. Oh, you’ll be all right again in a month.”

As Lucian strolled out of the town on his way home, he passed a small

crowd of urchins assembled at the corner of an orchard. They were

enjoying themselves immensely. The “healthy” boy, the same whom he had

seen some weeks ago operating on a cat, seemed to have recognized his

selfishness in keeping his amusements to himself. He had found a poor

lost puppy, a little creature with bright pitiful eyes, almost human in

their fond, friendly gaze. It was not a well-bred little dog; it was

certainly not that famous puppy “by Vick out of Wasp”; it had rough

hair and a foolish long tail which it wagged beseechingly, at once

deprecating severity and asking kindness. The poor animal had evidently

been used to gentle treatment; it would look up in a boy’s face, and

give a leap, fawning on him, and then bark in a small doubtful voice,

and cower a moment on the ground, astonished perhaps at the

strangeness, the bustle and animation. The boys were beside themselves

with eagerness; there was quite a babble of voices, arguing,

discussing, suggesting. Each one had a plan of his own which he brought

before the leader, a stout and sturdy youth.

“Drown him! What be you thinkin’ of, mun?” he was saying. “’Tain’t no

sport at all. You shut your mouth, gwaes. Be you goin’ to ask your

mother for the boiling-water? Is, Bob Williams, I do know all that: but

where be you a-going to get the fire from? Be quiet, mun, can’t you?

Thomas Trevor, be this dog yourn or mine? Now, look you, if you don’t

all of you shut your bloody mouths, I’ll take the dog ’ome and keep

him. There now!”

He was a born leader of men. A singular depression and lowness of

spirit showed itself on the boys’ faces. They recognized that the

threat might very possibly be executed, and their countenances were at

once composed to humble attention. The puppy was still cowering on the

ground in the midst of them: one or two tried to relieve the tension of

their feelings by kicking him in the belly with their hobnail boots. It

cried out with the pain and writhed a little, but the poor little beast

did not attempt to bite or even snarl. It looked up with those

beseeching friendly eyes at its persecutors, and fawned on them again,

and tried to wag its tail and be merry, pretending to play with a straw

on the road, hoping perhaps to win a little favor in that way.

The leader saw the moment for his master-stroke. He slowly drew a piece

of rope from his pocket.

“What do you say to that, mun? Now, Thomas Trevor! We’ll hang him over

that there bough. Will that suit you, Bobby Williams?”

There was a great shriek of approval and delight. All was again bustle

and animation. “I’ll tie it round his neck?” “Get out, mun, you don’t

know how it be done.” “Is, I do, Charley.” “Now, let me, gwaes, now do

let me.” “You be sure he won’t bite?” “He bain’t mad, be he?” “Suppose

we were to tie up his mouth first?”

The puppy still fawned and curried favor, and wagged that sorry tail,

and lay down crouching on one side on the ground, sad and sorry in his

heart, but still with a little gleam of hope; for now and again he

tried to play, and put up his face, praying with those fond, friendly

eyes. And then at last his gambols and poor efforts for mercy ceased,

and he lifted up his wretched voice in one long dismal whine of

despair. But he licked the hand of the boy that tied the noose.

He was slowly and gently swung into the air as Lucian went by unheeded;

he struggled, and his legs twisted and writhed. The “healthy” boy

pulled the rope, and his friends danced and shouted with glee. As

Lucian turned the corner, the poor dangling body was swinging to and

fro, the puppy was dying, but he still kicked a little.

Lucian went on his way hastily, and shuddering with disgust. The young

of the human creature were really too horrible; they defiled the earth,

and made existence unpleasant, as the pulpy growth of a noxious and

obscene fungus spoils an agreeable walk. The sight of those malignant

little animals with mouths that uttered cruelty and filth, with hands

dexterous in torture, and feet swift to run all evil errands, had given

him a shock and broken up the world of strange thoughts in which he had

been dwelling. Yet it was no good being angry with them: it was their

nature to be very loathsome. Only he wished they would go about their

hideous amusements in their own back gardens where nobody could see

them at work; it was too bad that he should be interrupted and offended

in a quiet country road. He tried to put the incident out of his mind,

as if the whole thing had been a disagreeable story, and the visions

amongst which he wished to move were beginning to return, when he was

again rudely disturbed. A little girl, a pretty child of eight or nine,

was coming along the lane to meet him. She was crying bitterly and

looking to left and right, and calling out some word all the time.

“Jack, Jack, Jack! Little Jackie! Jack!”

Then she burst into tears afresh, and peered into the hedge, and tried

to peep through a gate into a field.

“Jackie, Jackie, Jackie!”

She came up to Lucian, sobbing as if her heart would break, and dropped

him an old-fashioned curtsy.

“Oh, please sir, have you seen my little Jackie?”

“What do you mean?” said Lucian. “What is it you’ve lost?”

“A little dog, please sir. A little terrier dog with white hair. Father

gave me him a month ago, and said I might keep him. Someone did leave

the garden gate open this afternoon, and he must ’a got away, sir, and

I was so fond of him sir, he was so playful and loving, and I be afraid

he be lost.”

She began to call again, without waiting for an answer.

“Jack, Jack, Jack!”

“I’m afraid some boys have got your little dog,” said Lucian. “They’ve

killed him. You’d better go back home.”

He went on, walking as fast as he could in his endeavor to get beyond

the noise of the child’s crying. It distressed him, and he wished to

think of other things. He stamped his foot angrily on the ground as he

recalled the annoyances of the afternoon, and longed for some hermitage

on the mountains, far above the stench and the sound of humanity.

A little farther, and he came to Croeswen, where the road branched off

to right and left. There was a triangular plot of grass between the two

roads; there the cross had once stood, “the goodly and famous roode” of

the old local chronicle. The words echoed in Lucian’s ears as he went

by on the right hand. “There were five steps that did go up to the

first pace, and seven steps to the second pace, all of clene hewn

ashler. And all above it was most curiously and gloriously wrought with

thorowgh carved work; in the highest place was the Holy Roode with

Christ upon the Cross having Marie on the one syde and John on the

other. And below were six splendent and glisteringe archaungels that

bore up the roode, and beneath them in their stories were the most fair

and noble images of the xii Apostles and of divers other Saints and

Martirs. And in the lowest storie there was a marvelous imagerie of

divers Beasts, such as oxen and horses and swine, and little dogs and

peacocks, all done in the finest and most curious wise, so that they

all seemed as they were caught in a Wood of Thorns, the which is their

torment of this life. And here once in the year was a marvelous solemn

service, when the parson of Caermaen came out with the singers and all

the people, singing the psalm _Benedicite omnia opera_ as they passed

along the road in their procession. And when they stood at the roode

the priest did there his service, making certain prayers for the

beasts, and then he went up to the first pace and preached a sermon to

the people, shewing them that as our lord Jhu dyed upon the Tree of his

deare mercy for us, so we too owe mercy to the beasts his Creatures,

for that they are all his poor lieges and silly servants. And that like

as the Holy Aungells do their suit to him on high, and the Blessed xii

Apostles and the Martirs, and all the Blissful Saints served him

aforetime on earth and now praise him in heaven, so also do the beasts

serve him, though they be in torment of life and below men. For their

spirit goeth downward, as Holy Writ teacheth us.”

It was a quaint old record, a curious relic of what the modern

inhabitants of Caermaen called the Dark Ages. A few of the stones that

had formed the base of the cross still remained in position, grey with

age, blotched with black lichen and green moss. The remainder of the

famous rood had been used to mend the roads, to build pigsties and

domestic offices; it had turned Protestant, in fact. Indeed, if it had

remained, the parson of Caermaen would have had no time for the

service; the coffee-stall, the Portuguese Missions, the Society for the

Conversion of the Jews, and important social duties took up all his

leisure. Besides, he thought the whole ceremony unscriptural.

Lucian passed on his way, wondering at the strange contrasts of the

Middle Ages. How was it that people who could devise so beautiful a

service believed in witchcraft, demoniacal possession and obsession, in

the incubus and succubus, and in the Sabbath and in many other horrible

absurdities? It seemed astonishing that anybody could even pretend to

credit such monstrous tales, but there could be no doubt that the dread

of old women who rode on broomsticks and liked black cats was once a

very genuine terror.

A cold wind blew up from the river at sunset, and the scars on his body

began to burn and tingle. The pain recalled his ritual to him, and he

began to recite it as he walked along. He had cut a branch of thorn

from the hedge and placed it next to his skin, pressing the spikes into

the flesh with his hand till the warm blood ran down. He felt it was an

exquisite and sweet observance for her sake; and then he thought of the

secret golden palace he was building for her, the rare and wonderful

city rising in his imagination. As the solemn night began to close

about the earth, and the last glimmer of the sun faded from the hills,

he gave himself anew to the woman, his body and his mind, all that he

was, and all that he had.