By Katherine Cecil Thurston.
Grasp and constructive ability are the two attributes of genius or of
talent absolutely necessary to a novelist. When Katherine Cecil Thurston
grasped the results that bound together those two incidents of January
twenty-third, incidents so widely different in character, she created
novelistic material. To this material she applied the same constructive
ability, but maturer, that she evidenced in “The Circle.” And from the
first statement in her book, that these incidents were bound by results,
the reader’s interest does not flag till the last phase of the
complicated result is clearly given, as it is in the final statement of
the final chapter. Nor then, for it is a book to hold after it is
closed, while the mind reverts to its scenes and its interest in
pleasant retrospect.
Self-accusation may follow analysis of the book, for, after all, nothing
is actually acquired in the reading. The aggressive, acquisitive
attitude of Russia, which is the one historical episode of the novel,
has been made so much clearer and so much more forcible in the last
twelve months than a mere statement or even a masterful speech can make
it that the book is not worth reading for this episode.
To repeat, it is the situation that grew out of the chance meeting in
the fog, the interchanging of identities, that holds the interest so
absorbingly. This contrast of similarity, if the paradoxical phrase is
pardonable, is dramatic in intensity that grows, and when Eve, the
alienated wife of Chilcote tentatively accepts Loder, the substitute,
the masquerader, this intensity presents a new aspect that quite absorbs
all others—political, social, even practical. From that moment the
interest centers in the final outcome when she will discover or be told
of the substitution. And because of this interest, which lasts even
after the book is read, the inconsistency of the situation is forgiven
and the impossible accepted as possible.
Reason rejects the position but charm is a matter of the emotions and
the charm of “The Masquerader” is such as to put the emotions in the
ascendency. It is sufficient to have carried the book to almost twice
the popularity of any other recent book and to have kept it there for
two months—quite a period in the life of an ephemeral novel. It is
sufficient to have kept men at the library lamp late at night and to
force itself in upon business through the next and succeeding days. And
it has made women break the silence of bridge and whist, even where it
has not kept them from the classes altogether.
The inconsistency of the situation is the only inconsistency of the
book. The characters are convincing and stand out in flesh and blood.
The palest of these is Lillian, Lady Astrupp, but the paleness is not
one of portrayal. It is the paleness of individuality shown in terms to
suit the character, just as Fraide’s power and ruggedness is shown in
blunt, abrupt allusions and dismissals.
For Chilcote there is only sympathy that deepens into pity mixed with
disgust, the sympathy and pity begotten by the spectacle of a man under
the power of a habit that has come to be his master.
There is resentment towards Loder for assuming another man’s name rather
than for doing another man’s work, which was his only opportunity. To
create is to prove one’s kinship to God, and the instinctive feeling is
that no strong man would create for another man’s credit. Respect for
Loder would have been aroused had he finally made public the masquerade,
at all costs; but had he done this the climax of the situation would
have been ruined.
Neither is Eve’s attitude in the climax inconsistent. Pride is the
dominating characteristic of this woman, who excites admiration in every
situation where circumstances place her. If it governed her through
years of unhappiness it would be inconsistent to expect her to yield it
and happiness together for a convention, though it were the divinest
convention of life.