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THE IMITATOR
A NOVEL
By
PERCIVAL POLLARD
SAINT LOUIS
WILLIAM MARION REEDY
1901
CHAPTER I.
"The thing is already on the wane," said young Orson Vane, making a wryface over the entree, and sniffing at his glass, "and, if you ask me, Ithink the general digestion of society will be the better for it."
"Yes, there is nothing, after all, so tedious as the sham variety of atable d'hote. Though it certainly wasn't the fare one came to this holefor."
Luke Moncreith turned his eyes, as he said that, over the place they satin, smiling at it with somewhat melancholy contempt. Its sanded floor,its boisterously exposed wine-barrels, the meaningless vivacity of itsHungarian orchestra, evidently stirred him no more.
"No; that was the last detail. It was the notion of dining below stairs,as the servants do. It had, for a time, the charm of an imitation.Nothing is so delightful as to imitate others; yet to be mistaken forthem is always dreadful. Of course, nobody would mistake us here forservants."
The company, motley as it was, could not logically have come under anysuch suspicion. Though it was dining in a cellar, on a sanded floor,amid externals that were illegitimate offsprings of a _Studenten Kneipe_and a crew of Christy minstrels, it still had, in the main, the air ofbeing recruited from the smart world. At every other table there werepeople whom not to know was to argue oneself unknown. These personsobviously treated the place, and their being there, as an elaborateeffort at gaiety; the others, the people who were plainly there for thefirst time, took it with the bewildered manner of those whom each newexperience leaves mentally exhausted. The touch of rusticity, here andthere, did not suffice to spoil the sartorial sparkle of the smartmajority. The champagne that the sophisticated were wise enough tooppose to the Magyar vintages sparkled into veins that ran beautifullyblue under skin that held curves the most aristocratic, tints the mostshell-like. Tinkling laughter, vocative of insincerity, rang between therestless passion of the violins.
"When it is not below stairs," continued Vane, "it is up on the roof.One might think we were a society without houses of our own. It is, Isuppose, the human craving for opposites. When we have stored oursideboards with the finest glass you can get in Vienna or Carlsbad, weturn our backs on it and go to drinking from pewter in a cellar. We payabominable wages to have servants who shall be noiseless, and then go toplaces where the service is as guttural as a wilderness of monkeys.Fortunately, these fancies do not last. Presently, I dare say, it willbe the fashion to dine at home. That will make us feel quite like theoriginal Puritans." He laughed, and took his glass of wine at a gulp."The fact of the matter is that variety has become the vice of life. Wehave not, as a society, any inner steadfastness of soul; we depend uponexternals, and the externals pall with fearful speed. Think of seeing inthe mirror the face of the same butler for more than thirty days!" Heshuddered and shook his head.
"We are a restless lot," sighed the other, "but why discompose yourselfabout it? Thank your stars you have nothing more important to worryover!"
"My dear Luke, there is nothing more important than the attitude ofsociety at large. It is the only thing one should allow oneself todiscuss. To consider one's individual life is to be guilty of as badform as to wear anything that is conspicuous. Society admires us chieflyonly as we sink ourselves in it. If we let the note of personality rise,our social position is sure to suffer. Imitation is the keynote ofsmartness. The rank and file imitate the leaders consciously, and theleaders unconsciously imitate the average. We frequent cellars, androofs, and such places, because in doing so we imagine we are imitatingthe days of the Hanging Gardens and the Catacombs. We abhor the bohemiantaint, but we are willing to give a champagne and chicken imitation ofit. We do not really care for music and musicians, but we give excellentimitations of doing so. At present we are giving the most lifelikeimitation of being passionately fond of outdoor life; I suppose Englandfeels flattered. I am afraid I have forgotten whose the firstfashionable divorce in our world was; it is far easier to remember thenames of the people who have never been divorced; at any rate thosepioneers ought to feel proud of the hugeness of their following. We haveadopted a vulgarity from Chicago and made it a fashionable institution;divorce used to be a shuttlecock for the comic papers, and now it makesthe bulk of the social register."
Moncreith tapped his friend on the arm. "Drop it, Orson, drop it!" hesaid. "I know this is a beastly bad dinner, but you shouldn't let itmake you maudlin. You know you don't really believe half you're saying.Drop it, I say. These infernal poses make me ill." He attacked themorsel of game on his plate with a zest that was beautiful to behold."If you go on in that biliously philosophic strain of yours, I shallcrunch this bird until I hear nothing but the grinding of bones. It isreally not a bad bit of quail. It is so small, and the casserole solarge, that you need an English setter to mark it, but once you've gotit,"--he wiped his lips with a flip of his napkin, "it's really worththe search. Try it, and cheer up. The woman in rose, over there, underthe pseudo-palm, looks at you every time she sips her champagne; I haveno doubt she is calculating how untrue you could be to her. I supposeyour gloom strikes her as poetic; it strikes me as very absurd. Youreally haven't a care in the world, and you sit here spoutinginsincerity at a wasteful rate. If there's anything really and truly thematter--tell me!"
Orson Vane dropped, as if it had been a mask, the ironical smile hislips had worn. "You want sincerity," he said, "well, then I shall besincere. Sincerity makes wrinkles, but it is the privilege of ourfriends to make us old before our time. Sincerely, then, Luke, I amvery, very tired."
"A fashionable imitation," mocked Moncreith.
"No; a personal aversion, to myself, to the world I live in. I wish thedear old governor hadn't been such a fine fellow; if he had been of thenewer generation of fathers I suppose I wouldn't have had an ideal tobless myself with."
Moncreith interrupted.
"Good Lord, Luke, did you say ideals? I swear I never knew it was as badas that." He beckoned to the waiter and ordered a Dominican. "It is soideal a liquor that when you have tasted it you crave only forbrutalities. Poor Orson! Ideals!" He sighed elaborately.
"If you imitate my manner of a while ago, I shall not say what I wasgoing to say. If I am to be sincere, so must you." He took the scarletdrink the man set before him, and let it gurgle gently down his throat."It smacks of sin and I scent lies in it. I wish I had not taken it. Itis hard to be sincere after a drink that stirs the imagination. But Ishall try. And you are not to interrupt any more than you can help. Ifwe both shed the outer skin we wear for society, I believe we areneither of us such bad sorts. That is just what I am getting at: I amnot quite bad enough to be blind to my own futility. Here I am, Luke,young, decently looking, with money, position, and bodily health, andyet I am cursed with thought of my own futility. When people have saidwho I am, they have said it all; I have done nothing: I merely am. Iknow others would sell their souls to be what I am; but it does notcontent me. I have spent years considering my way. The arts have calledto me, but they have not held me. All arts are imitative, except music,and music is not human enough for me; no people are so unhuman asmusical people, and no art is so entirely a creation of a self-centredinventor. There can be no such thing as realism in music; the voices ofNature can never be equalled on any humanly devised instruments ornotes. Painting and sculpture are mere imitations of what nature doesfar better. When you see a beautiful woman as God made her you do notcare whether the Greeks colored their statues or not. Any average sunsetstamps the painted imit
ation as absurd. These arts, in fact, can neverbe really great, since they are man's feeble efforts to copy God'sfinest creations; between them and the ideal there must always be thesame distance as between man and his Creator. Then there is the art ofliterature. It has the widest scope of them all. Whether it is imitativeor creative depends on the temperament of the individual; some men setdown what they see and hear, others invent a world of their own and busythemselves with it. I believe it is the most human of the arts. Itsdevotees not infrequently set themselves the task of discovering justhow their fellows think and live; they try to attune their souls toother souls; they strive for an understanding of the larger humanity.They--"
Moncreith interrupted with a gesture.
"Orson, you're not going to turn novelist? Don't tell me that! Yourenthusiasms fill me with melancholy forebodings."
"Not at all. But, as you know, I've seen much of this sort of thinglately. In the first place I had my own temperamental leanings; in thenext place, you'll remember, we've had a season or two lately whenclever people have been the rage. To invite painters and singers andwriters to one's house has been the smart thing to do. We have had thespectacle of a society, that goes through a flippant imitation ofliving, engaged in being polite to people who imitate at second hand, insong, and color, and story. Some smart people have even taken to thosearts, thus imitating the professional imitators. As far as the smartpoint of view goes, I couldn't do anything better than go in for thestudio, or novelistic business. The dull people whom smartness hasrubbed to a thin polish would conspire in calling me clever. Is thereanything more dreadful than being called clever?"
"Nothing. It is the most damning adjective in the language. Whenever Ihear that a person is clever I am sure he will never amount to much.There is only one word that approaches it in deadly significance. Thatis 'rising.' I have known men whom the puffs have referred to as 'arising man' for twenty years. Can you imagine anything more dismal thanbeing called constantly by the same epithet? The very amiability in thegeneral opinion, permitting 'clever' and 'rising' to remain unalterable,shows that the wearer of these terms is hopeless; a strong man wouldhave made enemies. I am glad you are wise enough to resist thetemptation of the Muses. Society's blessing would never console you foranything short of a triumph. The triumphs are fearfully few; the cleverpeople--well, this cellar's full of them. There's Abbott Moore, forinstance."
"You're right; there he is. He's a case in point. One of the best cases;a man who has really, in the worldly sense, succeeded tremendously. Hissystem of give and take is one of the most lovely schemes imaginable; weall know that. When a mining millionaire with marriageable daughterscomes to town his first hostage to the smart set is to order a palacenear Central Park and to give Abbott Moore the contract for thedecorations. In return Abbott Moore asks the millionaire's womenfolk toone of his studio carnivals. That section of the smart set which keepsitself constantly poised on the border between smart and tart is awfullykeen on Abbott Moore's studio affairs. It has never forgotten the famousepisode when he served a tart within a tart, and it is still expectinghim to outdo that feat. To be seen at one of these affairs, especiallyif you have millions, is to have got in the point of the wedge. I callit a fair exchange; the millionaire gets his foot just inside the magicportal; Moore gets a slice of the millions. All the world counts Moore asuccess from every point of view, the smart, the professional, thefinancial. Yet that isn't my notion of a full life. It's only a replicaof the very thing I'm tired of, my own life."
"Your life, my dear fellow, is generally considered a most enviablearticle."
"Of course. I suppose it does have a glamour for the unobserving. Yet,at the best, what am I?"
Moncreith laughed. "Another Dominican!" he said to the waiter. "Theliqueur," he said, "may enable me to rise to my subject." He smiled atVane over the glass, when it was brought to him, drained it under closedeyes, and then settled himself well back into his chair.