Not downstairs. I go to linger awhile on the broad terrace where
jessamine grows in Gargantuan tubs; there I pace up and down, admiring
the cupolas and towers of Rome that gleam orange-tawny against the blue
background of distant hills. How much of its peculiar flavour a town
will draw--not from artistic monuments but from the mere character of
building materials! How many variations on one theme! This mellow Roman
travertine, for instance.... I call to mind those disconsolate places in
Cornwall with their chill slate and primary rock, the robust and
dignified bunter-sandstone of the Vosges, the satanic cheerfulness of
lava, those marble-towns that blind you with their glare, Eastern cities
of brightly tinted stucco or mere clay, the brick-towns, granite-towns,
wood-towns--how they differ in mood from one another!... Here I pace up
and down, rejoicing in the spacious sunlit prospect, and endeavouring to
disentangle from one another the multitudinous street-cries that climb
to this hanging garden in confused waves of sound. Harsh at close
quarters, they weave themselves into a mirthful symphony up here.
From that studio, too, comes a lively din--the laughter has begun again.
Mrs. Nichol is having a good time. It will be followed, I daresay, by a
period of acute depression. I shall probably be consulted with masonic
frankness about some little tragedy of the emotions which is no concern
of mine. She can be wondrously engaging at such times--like a child that
has got into trouble and takes you into its confidence.
One of these days I must write a character-sketch of Mrs. Nichol. She
foreshadows a type--represents it, very possibly--a type which will grow
commoner from day to day. She dreams of a Republic of women, vestals or
otherwise, wherefrom all men are to be excluded unless they possess
qualifications of a rather unusual nature. I think she would like to
draft a set of rules and regulations for that community. She could be
trusted, I fancy, to make them sufficiently stringent.
I think I understand, now, why a certain line in her copy of Baudelaire
was marked with that derisive exclamation-point on the margin: "Fuyez
l'infini que vous portez en vous."
"Fuyez?" it seemed to say. "Why 'fuyez'?"
Fulfil it!