kindest and most affectionate mother, and--(Here a vision of Sir Brian
alone in his room, and nobody really caring for him so much as his valet,
who loves him to the extent of fifty pounds a year and perquisites; or,
perhaps, Miss Cann, who reads to him, and plays a good deal of evenings,
much to Sir Brian's liking--here this vision, we say, comes, and stops
Miss Ethel's sentence.)
Madame de F. Your father, in his infirmity--and yet he is five years
younger than Colonel Newcome--is happy to have such a wife and such
children. They comfort his age; they cheer his sickness; they confide
their griefs and pleasures to him--is it not so? His closing days are
soothed by their affection.
Ethel. Oh, no, no! And yet it is not his fault or ours that he is a
stranger to us. He used to be all day at the bank, or at night in the
House of Commons, or he and mamma went to parties, and we young ones
remained with the governess. Mamma is very kind. I have never, almost,
known her angry; never with us; about us, sometimes, with the servants.
As children, we used to see papa and mamma at breakfast; and then when
she was dressing to go out. Since he has been ill, she has given up all
parties. I wanted to do so too. I feel ashamed in the world, sometimes,
when I think of my poor father at home, alone. I wanted to stay, but my
mother and my grandmother forbade me. Grandmamma has a fortune, which she
says I am to have: since then they have insisted on my being with her.
She is very clever you know: she is kind too in her way; but she cannot
live out of society. And I, who pretend to revolt, I like it too; and I,
who rail and scorn flatterers--oh, I like admiration! I am pleased when
the women hate me, and the young men leave them for me. Though I despise
many of these, yet I can't help drawing them towards me. One or two of
them I have seen unhappy about me, and I like it; and if they are
indifferent I am angry, and never tire till they come back. I love
beautiful dresses; I love jewels; I love a great name and a fine house--
oh, I despise myself, when I think of these things! When I lie in bed and
say I have been heartless and a coquette, I cry with humiliation; and
then rebel and say, Why not?--and to-night--yes, to-night--after leaving
you, I shall be wicked, I know I shall.
Madame de F. (sadly). One will pray for thee, my child.
Ethel (sadly). I thought I might be good once. I used to say my own
prayers then. Now I speak them but by rote, and feel ashamed--yes,
ashamed to speak them. Is it not horrid to say them, and next morning to
be no better than you were last night? Often I revolt at these as at
other things, and am dumb. The Vicar comes to see us at Newcome, and eats
so much dinner, and pays us such court, and "Sir Brians" papa, and
"Your Ladyship's" mamma. With grandmamma I go to hear a fashionable
preacher--Clive's uncle, whose sister lets lodgings at Brighton; such a
queer, bustling, pompous, honest old lady. Do you know that Clive's aunt
lets lodgings at Brighton?
Madame de F. My father was an usher in a school. Monsieur de Florac gave
lessons in the emigration. Do you know in what?
Ethel. Oh, the old nobility! that is different, you know. That Mr.
Honeyman is so affected that I have no patience with him!
Madame de F. (with a sigh). I wish you could attend the services of a
better church. And when was it you thought you might be good, Ethel?
Ethel. When I was a girl. Before I came out. When I used to take long
rides with my dear Uncle Newcome; and he used to talk to me in his sweet
simple way; and he said I reminded him of some one he once knew.
Madame de F. Who--who was that, Ethel?
Ethel (looking up at Gerard's picture of the Countess de Florac). What
odd dresses you wore in the time of the Empire, Madame de Florac! How
could you ever have such high waists, and such wonderful fraises!
(MADAME DE FLORAC kisses ETHEL. Tableau.)
Enter SAINT JEAN, preceding a gentleman with a drawing-board under his
arm.
Saint Jean. Monsieur Claive! [Exit SAINT JEAN.
Clive. How do you do, Madame la Comtesse? Mademoiselle, j'ai l'honneur
de vous souhaiter le bon jour.
Madame de F. Do you come from the Louvre? Have you finished that
beautiful copy, mon ami?
Clive. I have brought it for you. It is not very good. There are always
so many petites demoiselles copying that Sasso Ferrato; and they chatter
about it so, and hop from one easel to another; and the young artists are
always coming to give them advice--so that there is no getting a good
look at the picture. But I have brought you the sketch; and am so pleased
that you asked for it.
Madame de F. (surveying the sketch). It is charming--charming! What
shall we give to our painter for his chef-d'oeuvre?
Clive (kisses her hand). There is my pay! And you will be glad to hear
that two of my portraits have been received at the Exhibition. My uncle,
the clergyman, and Mr. Butts, of the Life Guards.
Ethel. Mr. Butts--quel nom! Je ne connois aucun M. Butts!
Clive. He has a famous head to draw. They refused Crackthorpe and--and
one or two other heads I sent in.
Ethel (tossing up hers). Miss Mackenzie's, I suppose!
Clive. Yes, Miss Mackenzie's. It is a sweet little face; too delicate
for my hand, though.
Ethel. So is a wax-doll's a pretty face. Pink cheeks; china-blue eyes;
and hair the colour of old Madame Hempenfeld's--not her last hair--her
last but one. (She goes to a window that looks into the court.)
Clive (to the Countess). Miss Mackenzie speaks more respectfully of
other people's eyes and hair. She thinks there is nobody in the world to
compare to Miss Newcome.
Madame de F. (aside). And you, mon ami? This is the last time,
entendez-vous? You must never come here again. If M. le Comte knew it he
never would pardon me. Encore? (He kisses her ladyship's hand again.)
Clive. A good action gains to be repeated. Miss Newcome, does the view
of the courtyard please you? The old trees and the garden are better.
That dear old Faun without a nose! I must have a sketch of him: the
creepers round the base are beautiful.
Miss N. I was looking to see if the carriage had come for me. It is time
that I return home.
Clive. That is my brougham. May I carry you anywhere? I hire him by the
hour: and I will carry you to the end of the world.
Miss N. Where are you going, Madame de Floras?--to show that sketch to
M. le Comte? Dear me! I don't fancy that M. de Florac can care for such
things! I am sure I have seen many as pretty on the quays for twenty-five
sous. I wonder the carriage is not come for me.
Clive. You can take mine without my company, as that seems not to please
you.
Miss N. Your company is sometimes very pleasant--when you please.
Sometimes, as last night, for instance, when you particularly lively.
Clive. Last night, after moving heaven and earth to get an invitation to
Madame de Brie--I say, heaven and earth, that is a
French phrase--I
arrive there; I find Miss Newcome engaged for almost every dance,
waltzing with M. de Klingenspohr, galloping with Count de Capri,
galloping and waltzing with the most noble the Marquis of Farintosh. She
will scarce speak to me during the evening; and when I wait till
midnight, her grandmamma whisks her home, and I am left alone for my
pains. Lady Kew is in one of her high moods, and the only words she
condescends to say to me are, "Oh, I thought you had returned to London,"
with which she turns her venerable back upon me.
Miss N. A fortnight ago you said you were going to London. You said the
copies you were about here would not take you another week, and that was
three weeks since.
Clive. It were best I had gone.
Miss N. If you think so, I cannot but think so.
Clive. Why do I stay and hover about you, and follow you know--I follow
you? Can I live on a smile vouchsafed twice a week, and no brighter than
you give to all the world? What I do I get, but to hear your beauty
praised, and to see you, night after night, happy and smiling and
triumphant, the partner of other men? Does it add zest to your triumph,
to think that I behold it? I believe you would like a crowd of us to
pursue you.
Miss N. To pursue me; and if they find me alone, by chance to compliment
me with such speeches as you make? That would be pleasure indeed! Answer
me here in return, Clive. Have I ever disguised from any of my friends
the regard I have for you? Why should I? Have not I taken your part when
you were maligned? In former days, when--when Lord Kew asked me, as he
had a right to do then--I said it was as a brother I held you; and always
would. If I have been wrong, it has been for two or three times in seeing
you at all--or seeing you thus; in letting you speak to me as you do--
injure me as you do. Do you think I have not hard enough words said to me
about you, but that you must attack me too in turn? Last night only,
because you were at the ball,--it was very, very wrong of me to tell you
I was going there,--as we went home, Lady Kew--Go, sir. I never thought
you would have seen in me this humiliation.
Clive. Is it possible that I should have made Ethel Newcome shed tears?
Oh, dry them, dry them. Forgive me, Ethel, forgive me! I have no right to
jealousy, or to reproach you--I know that. If others admire you, surely I
ought to know that they--they do but as I do: I should be proud, not
angry, that they admire my Ethel--my sister, if you can be no more.
Ethel. I will be that always, whatever harsh things you think or say of
me. There, sir, I am not going to be so foolish as to cry again. Have you
been studying very hard? Are your pictures good at the Exhibition? I like
you with your mustachios best, and order you not to cut them off again.
The young men here wear them. I hardly knew Charles Beardmore when he
arrived from Berlin the other day, like a sapper and miner. His little
sisters cried out, and were quite frightened by his apparition. Why are
you not in diplomacy? That day, at Brighton, when Lord Farintosh asked
whether you were in the army, I thought to myself, why is he not?
Clive. A man in the army may pretend to anything, n'est-ce pas? He wears
a lovely uniform. He may be a General, a K.C.B., a Viscount, an Earl. He
may be valiant in arms, and wanting a leg, like the lover in the song. It
is peace-time, you say? so much the worse career for a soldier. My father
would not have me, he said, for ever dangling in barracks, or smoking in
country billiard-rooms. I have no taste for law: and as for diplomacy, I
have no relations in the Cabinet, and no uncles in the House of Peers.
Could my uncle, who is in Parliament, help me much, do you think? or
would he, if he could?--or Barnes, his noble son and heir, after him?
Ethel (musing). Barnes would not, perhaps, but papa might even still,
and you have friends who are fond of you.
Clive. No--no one can help me: and my art, Ethel, is not only my choice
and my love, but my honour too. I shall never distinguish myself in it: I
may take smart likenesses, but that is all. I am not fit to grind my
friend Ridley's colours for him. Nor would my father, who loves his own
profession so, make a good general probably. He always says so. I thought
better of myself when I began as a boy; and was a conceited youngster,
expecting to carry it all before me. But as I walked the Vatican, and
looked at Raphael, and at the great Michael--I knew I was but a poor
little creature; and in contemplating his genius, shrunk up till I felt
myself as small as a man looks under the dome of St. Peter's. Why should
I wish to have a great genius?--Yes, there is one reason why I should
like to have it.
Ethel. And that is?
Clive. To give it you, if it pleased you, Ethel. But I might wish for
the roc's egg: there is no way of robbing the bird. I must take a humble
place, and you want a brilliant one. A brilliant one! Oh, Ethel, what a
standard we folks measure fame by! To have your name in the Morning Post,
and to go to three balls every night. To have your dress described at the
Drawing-Room; and your arrival, from a round of visits in the country, at
your town-house; and the entertainment of the Marchioness of Farin----
Ethel. Sir, if you please, no calling names.
Clive. I wonder at it. For you are in the world, and you love the world,
whatever you may say. And I wonder that one of your strength of mind
should so care for it. I think my simple old father is much finer than
all your grandees: his single-mindedness more lofty than all their
bowing, and haughtiness, and scheeming. What are you thinking of, as you
stand in that pretty attitude--like Mnemosyne--with your finger on your
chin?
Ethel. Mnemosyne! who was she? I think I like you best when you are
quiet and gentle, and not when you are flaming out and sarcastic, sir.
And so you think you will never be a famous painter? They are quite in
society here. I was so pleased, because two of them dined at the
Tuileries when grandmamma was there; and she mistook one, who was covered
all over with crosses, for an ambassador, I believe, till the Queen call
him Monsieur Delaroche. She says there is no knowing people in this
country. And do you think you will never be able to paint as well as M.
Delaroche?
Clive. No--never.
Ethel. And--and--you will never give up painting?
Clive. No--never. That would be like leaving your friend who was poor;
or deserting your mistress because you were disappointed about her money.
They do those things in the great world, Ethel.
Ethel (with a sigh). Yes.
Clive. If it is so false, and base, and hollow, this great world--if its
aims are so mean, its successes so paltry, the sacrifices it asks of you
so degrading, the pleasures it gives you so wearisome, shameful even, why
does Ethel Newcome cling to it? Will you be fairer, dear, with any other
name than your own? Will you be happier, after a month, at bearing a
great title, with a ma
n whom you can't esteem, tied for ever to you, to
be the father of Ethel's children, and the lord and master of her life
and actions? The proudest woman in the world consents to bend herself to
this ignominy, and own that a coronet is a bribe sufficient for her
honour! What is the end of a Christian life, Ethel; a girl's pure
nurture?--it can't be this! Last week, as we walked in the garden here,
and heard the nuns singing in their chapel, you said how hard it was that
poor women should be imprisoned so, and were thankful that in England we
had abolished that slavery. Then you cast your eyes to the ground, and
mused as you paced the walk; and thought, I know, that perhaps their lot
was better than some others.
Ethel. Yes, I did. I was thinking that almost all women are made slaves
one way or other, and that these poor nuns perhaps were better off than
we are.
Clive. I never will quarrel with nun or matron for following her
vocation. But for our women, who are free, why should they rebel against
Nature, shut their hearts up, sell their lives for rank and money, and
forgo the most precious right of their liberty? Look, Ethel, dear. I love
you so, that if I thought another had your heart, an honest man, a loyal
gentleman, like--like him of last year even, I think I could go back with
a God bless you, and take to my pictures again, and work on in my own
humble way. You seem like a queen to me, somehow; and I am but a poor,
humble fellow, who might be happy, I think, if you were. In those balls,
where I have seen you surrounded by those brilliant young men, noble and
wealthy, admirers like me, I have often thought, "How could I aspire to
such a creature, and ask her to forgo a palace to share the crust of a
poor painter?"
Ethel. You spoke quite scornfully of palaces just now, Clive. I won't
say a word about the--the regard which you express for me. I think you
have it. Indeed, I do. But it were best not said, Clive; best for me,
perhaps, not to own that I know it. In your speeches, my poor boy--and
you will please not to make any more, or I never can see you or speak to
you again, never--you forgot one part of a girl's duty: obedience to her
parents. They would never agree to my marrying any one below--any one
whose union would not be advantageous in a worldly point of view. I never
would give such pain to the poor father, or to the kind soul who never
said a harsh word to me since I was born. My grandmamma is kind, too, in
her way. I came to her of my own free will. When she said she would leave
me her fortune, do you think it was for myself alone that I was glad? My
father's passion was to make an estate, and all my brothers and sisters
will be but slenderly portioned. Lady Kew said she would help them if I
came to her--and--it is the welfare of those little people that depends
upon me, Clive. Now, do you see, brother, why you must speak to me so no
more? There is the carriage. God bless you, dear Clive.
(Clive sees the carriage drive away after Miss Newcome has entered it
without once looking up to the window where he stands. When it is gone he
goes to the opposite windows of the salon, which are open, towards the
garden. The chapel music begins to play from the Convent, next door. As
he hears it he sinks down, his head in his hands.)
Enter Madame de Florac (She goes to him with anxious looks.). What hast
thou, my child? Hast thou spoken?
Clive (very steadily). Yes.
Madame de F. And she loves thee? I know she loves thee.
Clive. You hear the organ of the convent?
Madame de F. Qu'as tu?
Clive. I might as well hope to marry one of the sisters of yonder
convent, dear lady. (He sinks down again, and she kisses him.)