Phyllis of Philistia
by Frank Frankfort Moore · English · Gutenberg #2155 · 498,347 chars · public domain (US)
The Project Gutenberg eBook of Phyllis of Philistia
This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and
most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions
whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms
of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online
at www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States,
you will have to check the laws of the country where you are located
before using this eBook.
Title: Phyllis of Philistia
Author: Frank Frankfort Moore
Release date: March 26, 2006 [eBook #2155]
Most recently updated: November 15, 2016
Language: English
Other information and formats: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/2155
Credits: Produced by Dagny; John Bickers and David Widger
*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK PHYLLIS OF PHILISTIA ***
Produced by Dagny and John Bickers
PHYLLIS OF PHILISTIA
By Frank Frankfort Moore
CHAPTER I.
AN ASTRONOMER WITHOUT A TELESCOPE.
“After all,” said Mr. Ayrton, “what is marriage?”
“Ah!” sighed Phyllis. She knew that her father had become possessed of
a phrase, and that he was anxious to flutter it before her to see how it
went. He was a connoisseur in the bric-a-brac of phrases.
“Marriage means all your eggs in one basket,” said he.
“Ah!” sighed Phyllis once more. She wondered if her father really
thought that she would be comforted in her great grief by a phrase. She
did not want to know how marriage might be defined. She knew that
all definitions are indefinite. She knew that in the case of marriage
everything depends upon the definer and the occasion.
“So you see there is no immediate cause to grieve, my dear,” resumed her
father.
She did not quite see that this was the logical conclusion of the whole
matter; but that was possibly because she was born a woman, and felt
that marriage is to a woman what a keel is to a ship.
“I think there is a very good cause to grieve when we find a man like
George Holland turning deliberately round from truth to falsehood,” said
Phyllis sternly.
“And what’s worse, running a very good chance of losing his living,”
remarked the father. “Of course it will have to be proved that Moses and
Abraham and David and the rest of them were not what he says they
were; and it strikes me that all the bench of bishops, and a royal
commissioner or two thrown in, would have considerable difficulty in
doing that nowadays.”
“What! You take his part, papa?” she cried, starting up. “You take his
part? You think I was wrong to tell him--what I did tell him?”
“I don’t take his part, my dear,” said Mr. Ayrton. “I think that he’s a
bit of a fool to run his head into a hornet’s nest because he has come
to the conclusion that Abraham’s code of morality was a trifle shaky,
and that Samson was a shameless libertine. Great Heavens! has the man
got no notion of the perspective of history?”
“Perspective? History? It’s the Bible, papa!”
Indignation was in Phyllis’ eyes, but there was a reverential tone in
her voice. Her father looked at her--listened to her. In the pause he
thought:
“Good Heavens! What sort of a man is George Holland, who is ready to
relinquish the love and loveliness of that girl, simply because he
thinks poorly of the patriarchs?”
“He attacks the Bible, papa,” resumed Phyllis gravely. “What horrible
things he said about Ruth!”
“Ah, yes, Ruth--the heroine of the harvest festival,” said her father.
“Ah, he might have left us our Ruth. Besides, she was a woman. Heavens
above! is there no chivalry remaining among men?”
“Ah, if it was only chivalry! But--the Bible!”
“Quite so--the--yes, to be sure. But don’t you think you may take the
Bible too seriously, Phyllis?”
“Oh, papa! too seriously?”
“Why not? That’s George Holland’s mistake, I fear. Why should he work
himself to a fury over the peccadillos of the patriarchs? The principle
of the statute of limitations should be applied to such cases. If the
world, and the colleges of theology, have dealt lightly with Samson and
David and Abraham and Jacob and the rest of them for some thousands of
years, why should George Holland rake up things against them, and that,
too, on very doubtful evidence? But I should be the last person in the
world to complain of the course which he has seen fit to adopt, since
it has left you with me a little longer, my dearest child. I did not,
of course, oppose your engagement, but I have often asked myself what I
should do without you? How should I ever work up my facts, or, what
is more important, my quotations, in your absence, Phyllis? On some
questions, my dear, you are a veritable Blue-book--yes, an _edition de
luxe_ of a Blue-book.”
“And I meant to be so useful to him as well,” said Phyllis, taking her
father’s praises more demurely than she had taken his phrases. “I meant
to help him in his work.”
“Ah, what a fool the man is! How could any man in his senses give up a
thing of flesh and blood like you, for the sake of proving or trying
to prove, that some people who lived five or six thousand years ago--if
they ever lived at all--would have rendered themselves liable to
imprisonment, without the option of a fine, if they lived in England
since the passing of certain laws--recent laws, too, we must remember!”
“Papa!”
“Anyhow, you have done with him, my dear. A man who can’t see that crime
is really a question of temperament, and sin invariably a question of
geography--well, we’ll say no more about it. At what hour did you say he
was coming?”
“Four. I don’t think I shall break down.”
“Break down? Why on earth should you break down? You have a mind to
know, and you know your own mind. That’s everything. But of course
you’ve had no experience of matters of this sort. He was your first real
lover?”
Phyllis’ face became crimson. She retained sufficient presence of mind,
however, to make a little fuss with the window-blind before letting it
down. Her father stared at her for a moment, and there was rather a long
pause before he laughed.
“I said ‘real lover,’ my dear,” he remarked. “The real lover is the one
who talks definitely about dates and the house agent’s commission. As a
rule the real lover does not make love. True love is born, not made. But
you--Heavens above! perhaps I did an injustice to you--to you and to the
men. Maybe you’re not such a tyro after all, Phyllis.”
Phyllis gave a very pretty little laugh--such a laugh as would have
convinced any man but a father--perhaps, indeed, some fathers--that she
was not without experience. Suddenly she became grave. Her father never
loved her so dearly as when that little laugh was flying over her
face, leaving its living footprints at the corners of her eyes, at the
exquisite curve of her mouth. It relieved her from the suspicion of
priggishness to which, now and again, her grave moods and appropriate
words laid her open. She was not so proper, after all, her father now
felt; she was a girl with the experiences of a girl who has tempted men
and seen what came of it.
She spoke:
“It is a very serious thing, giving a man your promise and then----”
“Then finding that your duty to him--to him, mind--forces you to tell
him that you cannot carry out that promise,” said her father. “Yes, it
is a very serious thing, but not so serious as carrying out that promise
would be if you had even the least little feeling that at the end of
three months he was not a better man than you suspected he was at the
beginning. There’s a bright side to everything, even a honeymoon; but
the reason that a honeymoon is so frequently a failure is because the
man is bound to be found out by his wife inside the month. It is better
that you found out now, than later on, that you could not possibly
be happy with a man who spoke slightingly of the patriarchs and their
wives. Now I’ll leave you, with confidence that you will be able to
explain matters to Mr. Holland.”
“What! you won’t be here?”
Dismay was in the girl’s face as she spoke. She had clearly looked for
the moral support of her father’s presence while she would be making her
explanation to the man whom she had, a few months before, promised to
marry, but whom she had found it necessary to dismiss by letter, owing
to her want of sympathy in some of his recent utterances.
“You won’t be here?”
“No; I have unfortunately an engagement just at that hour, Phyllis,”
replied Mr. Ayrton. “But do you really think there is any need for me
to be here? Personally, I fancy that my presence would only tend to
complicate matters. Your own feeling, your own woman’s instinct, will
enable you to explain--well, all that needs explanation. I have more
confidence in your capacity to explain since you gave that pretty little
laugh just now. Experience--ah, the experience of a girl such as you
are, suggests an astronomer without a telescope. Still, there were
astronomers before there were telescopes; and so I leave you, my beloved
child--ah, my own child once again! No cold hand of a lover is now
between us.”
It was not until he was some distance down Piccadilly that it occurred
to him that he should have pictured the lover with a warm hand; and
that omission on his part caused him a greater amount of irritation than
anyone who was unaware of his skill in phrase-making could have thought
possible to arise from a lapse apparently so trifling.
It was not until he had reached the Acropolis and had referred, in the
hearing of the most eminently dull of the many distinguished members
of that club, to the possibility of a girl’s experiences of man being
likened to an astronomer without a telescope, that he felt himself
again.
The dull distinguished man had smiled.
CHAPTER II.
HE KNEW THAT IT WAS A TROUBLESOME PROCESS, BECOMING A GOOD CLERGYMAN, SO
HE DETERMINED TO BECOME A GOOD PREACHER INSTEAD.
Phyllis sat alone in one of the drawing rooms, waiting until the hour of
four should arrive and bring into her presence the Rev. George Holland,
to plead his cause to her--to plead to be returned to her favor. He had
written to her to say that he would make such an attempt.
She had looked on him with favor for several months--with especial
favor for three months, for three months had just passed since she had
promised to marry him, believing that to be the wife of a clergyman
who, though still young, had two curates to do the rough work for
him--clerical charwomen, so to speak--would make her the happiest of
womankind. Mr. Holland was rector of St. Chad’s, Battenberg Square, and
he was thought very highly of even by his own curates, who intoned all
the commonplace, everyday prayers in the liturgy for him, leaving him
to do all the high-class ones, and to repeat the Commandments. (A
rector cannot be expected to do journeyman’s work, as it were; and it
is understood that a bishop will only be asked to intone three short
prayers, those from behind a barrier, too; an archbishop refuses to do
more than pronounce the benediction.)
The Rev. George Holland was a good-looking man of perhaps a year or
two over thirty. He did not come of a very good family--a fact which
probably accounted for his cleverness at Oxford and in the world. He was
a Fellow of his college, though he had not been appointed rector of
St. Chad’s for this reason. The appointment, as is well known (in the
Church, at any rate), is the gift of the Earl of Earlscourt, and it so
happened that, when at college together, George Holland had saved the
young man who a year or two afterward became Earl of Earlscourt from
a very great misfortune. The facts of the case were these: Tommy
Trebovoir, as he was then, had made up his mind to marry a lady whose
piquant style of beauty made the tobacconist’s shop where she served the
most popular in town. By the exercise of a great deal of diplomacy and
the expenditure of a little money, Mr. Holland brought about a
match between her and quite another man--a man who was not even on
a subsidiary path to a peerage, and whose only connection with the
university was due to his hiring out horses to those whom he called the
“young gents.” Tommy was so indignant with his friend for the part he
had played in this transaction he ceased to speak to him, and went the
length of openly insulting him. Six years afterward, when he had become
Earl of Earlscourt, and had espoused the daughter of a duke,--a lady who
was greatly interested in the advance of temperance,--he had presented
George Holland with the living at St. Chad’s.
People then said that Lord Earlscourt was a lesser fool than some of his
acts suggested. Others said that the Rev. George Holland had never been
a fool, though he had been a Fellow of his college.
They were right. George Holland knew that it was a troublesome process
becoming a good clergyman, so he determined to become a good preacher
instead. In the course of a year he had become probably the best-known
preacher (legitimate, not Dissenting) in London, and that, too,
without annoying the church-wardens of St. Chad’s by drawing crowds of
undesirable listeners to crush their way into the proprietary sittings,
and to join in the singing and responses, and to do other undesirable
acts. No, he only drew to the church the friends of the said holders,
whose contributions to the offertory were exemplary.
His popularity within a certain circle was great; but, as Lord
Earlscourt was heard to say, “He never played to the pit.”
He was invited to speak to a resolution at a Mansion House meeting to
express indignation at the maintenance of the opium traffic in China.
He was also invited by the Countess of Earlscourt to appear on the
platform to meet the deputation of Chinese who represented the city
meeting held at Pekin in favor of local option in England; for the
great national voice of China had pronounced in favor of local option in
England.
Shortly afterward he met Phyllis Ayrton, and had asked her to marry him,
and she had consented.
And now Phyllis was awaiting his coming to her, in order that he might
learn from her own lips what he had already learned from the letter
which he had received from her the day before; namely, that she found
it necessary for her own peace of mind to break off her engagement with
him.
Phyllis Ayrton had felt for some months that it would be a great
privilege for any woman to become the wife of a clergyman. Like many
other girls who have a good deal of time for thought,--thought about
themselves, their surroundings, and the world in general,--she had
certain yearnings after a career. But she had lived all her life in
Philistia, and considered it to be very well adapted as a place of abode
for a proper-minded young woman; in fact, she could not imagine any
proper-minded young woman living under any other form of government than
that which found acceptance in Philistia. She had no yearning to
startle her neighbors. With a large number of young women, the idea that
startling one’s neighbors is a career by itself seems to prevail just at
present; but Phyllis had no taste in this direction. Writing a book
and riding a bicycle were alike outside her calculations of a scheme of
life. Hospital nursing was nothing that she would shrink from; at the
same time, it did not attract her; she felt that she could dress quite
as becomingly as a hospital nurse in another way.
She wondered, if it should come to the knowledge of the heads of the
government of Philistia that she had a yearning to become the wife of
a clergyman, would they regard her as worthy to be conducted across the
frontier, and doomed to perpetual expatriation. When she began to think
out this point, she could not but feel that if she were deserving of
punishment,--she looked on expulsion from Philistia as the severest
punishment that could be dealt out to her, for she was extremely
patriotic,--there were a good many other young women, and women who were
no longer young, who were equally culpable. She had watched the faces of
quite a number of the women who crowded St. Chad’s at every service, and
she had long ago come to the conclusion that the desire to become the
wife of a clergyman was an aspiration which was universally distributed
among the unmarried women of the congregation.
She knew so much, but she was not clever enough to know that it was her
observance of this fact that confirmed her in her belief that it would
be a blessed privilege for such a woman as she to become the wife of
such a clergyman as George Holland. She was not wise enough to be able
to perceive that a woman marries a man not so much because she things
highly of marriage--although she does think highly of it; not so much
because she thinks highly of the man--though she may think highly of
him, but simply because she sees that other women want to marry him.
In three months she considered herself blessed among women. She was the
one chosen out of all the flock. She did not look around her in church
in pride of conquest; but she looked demurely down to her sacred books,
feeling that all the other women were gazing at her in envy; and she
felt that there was no pride in the thought that the humility of her
attitude--downcast eyes, with long lashes shading half her cheeks,
meekly folded hands--was the right one to adopt under the circumstances.
And then she saw several of the young women who had been wearing sober
shades of dresses for some years,--though in their hearts (and she knew
it) they were passionately attached to colors,--appearing like poppies
once more, and looking very much the better for the change, too; and
she felt that it was truly sad for young women to--well, to show
their hands, so to speak. They might have waited for some weeks before
returning to the colors of the secular.
She did not know that they felt that they had wasted too much time
in sober shades already. The days are precious in a world in which no
really trustworthy hair dye may be bought for money.
And then there came to her a month of coldly inquisitive doubt. (This
was when people had ceased to congratulate her and to talk, the nice
ones, of the great cleverness of George Holland; the nasty ones, of the
great pity that so delightful a man did not come of a better family.)
Why should she begin to ask herself if she really loved George Holland;
if the feeling she had for him should be called by the name of love, or
by some other name that did not mean just the same thing? Of course she
had thought a good deal--though her father did not know it--of love. She
had seen upon other people the effect of the possession of this gift of
love, how it had caused them to forget pain and poverty, and shame, and
infamy, and God, and death, and hell. Ah! that was love--that was love!
and she had hoped that one day such a gift of love would be given to
her; for it was surely the thing that was best worth having in the
world! Once or twice she had fancied that it was at the point of being
given to her. There had been certain thrilling passages between herself
and two men,--an interval of a year between each,--and there had also
been a kiss in an alcove designed by her dearest friend, Ella Linton,
for the undoing of mankind, a place of softened lights and shadowy
palms. It was her recollection of these incidents that had caused her
to fumble with the blind cord when her father had been suggesting to
her the disadvantages of inexperience in matters of the heart. But the
incidents had led to nothing, except, perhaps, a week or two of remorse.
But she could not help feeling, when that month of curious doubt was
upon her, that the little thrill which she had felt when one man had
put his arm around her for an instant, when another man--he was very
young--had put his lips upon her mouth--it was a straightforward
kiss--suggested a nearer approach to love than she had yet been
conscious of in the presence of George Holland. (He had never done more
than kiss her hand. Is it on record that any man did more when dressed
with the severity of the cleric?)
This was a terrible impression for a young woman to retain before her
engagement to a man has passed into its third month. Then she began to
wonder if all her previous ideas--all her previous aspirations--were
mistaken. She began to wonder if this was the reality of love--this
conviction that there was nothing in the whole world that she would
welcome with more enthusiasm than an announcement on the part of her
father that he was going on a voyage to Australia, and that he meant to
take her with him.
And then----
Well, then she threw herself upon her bed and wept for an hour one
evening, and for two hours (at intervals) another evening; and then
looked up the old published speeches made by a certain cabinet
minister in his irresponsible days, on a question which he had recently
introduced. Her father was bitterly opposed to the most recent views of
the minister, and was particularly anxious to confront him with his own
phrases of thirty years back. She spent four hours copying out the words
which were now meant by Mr. Ayrton to confound the utterer.
CHAPTER III.
THE BISHOP KNEW SOMETHING OF MAN, AND HE KNEW SOMETHING OF THE CHURCH;
HE EVEN KNEW SOMETHING OF THE BIBLE.
Her father when he came in commended her diligence. He read over those
damning extracts, punctuating them with chuckles; he would make an
example of that minister who had found it convenient to adopt a course
diametrically opposed to the principle involved in his early speeches.
He chuckled, reading the extracts while he paced the room, drawing upon
his stock of telling phrases, which were calculated to turn the derision
of the whole House of Commons upon his opponent.
Thus, being very well satisfied with himself, he was satisfied with her,
and kissed her, with a sigh.
“What a treasure you are to me, dearest one!” he said. There was a pause
before he added, in a contemplative tone:
“I suppose a clergyman has no need ever to hunt up the past deliverances
of another clergyman in order to confound him out of his own mouth. Ah,
no; I should fancy not.”
Regret was in his voice. He seemed to suggest to her that he believed
her powers would be wasted as the wife of a man who, of course, being a
clergyman, could have no enemies.
“Dearest papa!” she cried, throwing herself into his arms, and sobbing
on his shirt front, “dearest papa, I will not leave you. I don’t want to
be anyone’s wife. I want to be your daughter--only to be your daughter.”
He comforted her with kisses and soothing smoothings of the hair. No,
no, he said; he would not be selfish. He would remember that a father
was the trustee of his child’s happiness.
“But I know I can only be happy with you, my father!” she cried; but
it was of no avail. He, being a father and not a mother, was unable to
perceive what was in the girl’s heart. He considered it quite natural
that she should be a trifle hysterical in anticipating her new
life--that strange untraveled country! Ah, is there anything more
pathetic, he thought, than a girl’s anticipations of wifehood? But he
would do his duty, and he fancied that he was doing his duty when he
put aside her earnest, almost passionate protestations, and told her
how happy she would be with the man who was lucky enough to have won the
pure treasure of her love.
What could she do? The terrible doubts of that month of doubting
broadened into certainties. She knew that she did not love George
Holland; but she had not the courage to face Philistia as the girl who
did not know her own mind. Philistia was very solid on such points as
the sacredness of an engagement between a man and a woman. It was a
contract practically as abiding as marriage, in the eyes of Philistia;
and, indeed, Phyllis herself had held this belief, and had never
hesitated to express it. So nothing was left to her but to marry George
Holland. After all, he was a brilliant and distinguished man, and had
not a score of other girls wanted to marry him? Oh, she would marry him
and give up her life to the splendid duties which devolve upon the wife
of a clergyman.
But just as she had made up her mind to face her fate, Mr. Holland’s
fate induced him to publish the book at which he had been working for
some time. It came out just when the girl was becoming resigned to her
future by his side, and it attracted even more attention than the author
had hoped it would achieve.
The book was titled “Revised Versions,” and it was strikingly modern
in design and in tone. It purported to deal with several personages and
numerous episodes of the Old Testament, not from the standpoint of the
comparative philologist; not from the standpoint of the comparative
mythologist, but from the standpoint of the modern man of common sense
and average power of discrimination; and the result was that the breath
of a good many people, especially clergymen, was taken from them, and
that the Rev. George Holland became the best-known clergyman in England.
He dealt with the patriarchs in succession, and they fared very badly at
his hands. He showed that Abraham had not one good act recorded to his
credit, and contrasted his duplicity with the magnanimity of the ruler
of Egypt whom he visited. He dwelt upon the Hagar episode, showing that
the adulterer was also a murderer by intention, and so forth; while no
words could be too strong to apply to Sara, his wife. Isaac did not call
for elaborate notice. He could not be accused of any actual crime, but
if he was a man of strong personality, he was singularly unfortunate in
having failed to impart to his wife any of that integrity which he may
have practiced through life. Her methods of dealing with him after they
had lived together for a good many years were criminal, considering the
largeness of the issue at stake as the result of his blessing. As for
Jacob, not a single praiseworthy act of his long life was available to
his biographer. His career was that of the most sordid of hucksters. Of
eleven of his sons nothing good is told, but Joseph was undoubtedly an
able and exemplary man; the only thing to his discredit being his utter
callousness regarding the fate of his father, after he had attained to a
high position in Egypt.
The chapter on the patriarchs was followed by one that dealt with the
incidents of the Exodus. The writer said that he feared that even the
most indulgent critic must allow that the whole scheme of Moses was a
shocking one; but he was probably the greatest man that ever lived on
the face of the earth, if he was the leader and organizer of a band of
depredators who for bloodthirst and rapacity had no parallel in history.
How could it be expected that a kingdom founded upon the massacre of men
and cemented by the blood of women and children should survive? It
had survived only as example to the world of the impossibility of a
permanent success being founded upon the atrocious methods pursued by
the worst of the robber states of the East. While civilization had been
spreading on all sides of them, the people of Israel had remained the
worst of barbarians, murdering the men who had from time to time arisen
to try and rescue them from the abysses of criminality into which they
had fallen,--abysses of criminality and superstition,--until they
had filled their cup of crime by the murder of the One whom the world
worships to-day.
Incidentally, of course, the character of Samson was dealt with. Delilah
was shown to be one of the most heroic of womankind, making greater
sacrifices through her splendid patriotism than Joan of Arc. But
Samson----
Ruth was also dealt with incidentally. She was the woman who expresses
her willingness to give up her God at the bidding of another woman, and
who had entered into a plot with that same woman to entrap a man whom
they looked to support them.
Then there was David. It was not the Bath-sheba episode, but the
Abishag, that the author treated at length--one of the most revolting
transactions in history, especially as there is some reason to believe
that the unfortunate girl was, when it was perpetrated, already attached
to one of the sons of the loathsome, senile sensualist.
Perhaps, on the whole, it was not surprising that after the publication
of this book the Rev. George Holland became the best-known clergyman
in England, or that the breath of bishops should be taken from them. So
soon as some of them recovered from the first brunt of the shock, they
met together and held up their hands, saying that they awaited the
taking of immediate action by the prelate within whose see St. Chad’s
was situated. But that particular prelate was a man who had never been
known to err on the side of rapidity of action. Nearly a week had passed
before he made any move in the matter, and then the move he made was
in the direction of the Engadine. He crossed the Channel with the
book under his arm. He determined to read it at his leisure. Being a
clergyman, he could not, of course, be expected to have examined, from
any standpoint but that of the clergyman, the characters of the persons
dealt with in the book, and he was naturally shocked at the freedom
shown by the rector of St. Chad’s in criticising men whose names have
been held in the highest esteem for some thousands of years. He at once
perceived that the rector of St. Chad’s had been very narrow-minded
in his views regarding the conduct of the men whom he had attacked. It
occurred to him, as it had to Mr. Ayrton, that the writer had drawn his
picture without any regard for perspective. That was very foolish on the
part of a man who was a Fellow of his college, the bishop thought; and
besides, there was no need for the book--its tendency was not to
help the weaker brethren. But to assume that the book would, as some
newspaper articles said it would, furnish the most powerful argument
that had yet been brought forward in favor of the Disestablishment of
Church, was, he thought, to assume a great deal too much. The Church
that had survived Wesley, Whitefield, Colenso, Darwin, and Renan would
not succumb to George Holland. The bishop recollected how the Church had
bitterly opposed all the teaching of the men of wisdom whose names came
back to him; and how it had ended by making their teaching its own.
Would anyone venture to assert that the progress of Christianity was
dependent upon what people thought of the acceptance by David of the
therapeutic course prescribed for him? Was the morality which the Church
preached likely to be jeopardized because Ruth was a tricky young woman?
The bishop knew something of man, and he knew something of the Church,
he even knew something of the Bible; and when he came to the chapter
in “Revised Versions” that dealt with the episode of Ruth and Boaz, he
flung the book into a corner of his bedroom, exclaiming, “Puppy!”
And then there came before his eyes a vision of a field of yellow corn,
ripe for the harvest. The golden sunlight gleamed upon the golden
grain through which the half-naked brown-skinned men walked with their
sickles. The half-naked brown-skinned women followed the binders,
gleaning the ears, and among the women was the one who had said,
“Entreat me not to leave thee.” He had read that old pastoral when
he was a child at the knee of his mother. It was surely the loveliest
pastoral of the East, and its charm would be in no wise impaired because
a man who failed to appreciate the beauty of its simplicity, had almost
called Ruth by the worst name that can be applied to a woman.
The bishop did not mind what George Holland called Abraham, or Isaac, or
Jacob, or Samson, but Ruth--to say that Ruth----
The bishop said “Puppy!” once again. (He had trained himself only to
think the adjectives which laymen find appropriate to use in such a case
as was under his consideration.)
But he made up his mind to take no action whatever against the Rev.
George Holland on account of the book. If the Rev. George Holland
fancied that he was to be persecuted into popularity, the Rev. George
Holland was greatly mistaken, and the bishop had a shrewd idea that the
rector of St. Chad’s was greatly mistaken.
(It may be mentioned that he came to this determination when he had read
the book through, and found it was so cleverly written that it included
no heretical phrase in all its pages.)
But so soon as Phyllis Ayrton had read the first review of the book that
fell into her hands, she felt inexpressibly shocked. Great Heavens! Was
it possible that she was actually at that moment engaged to marry
the man who had written such a book--a book that held up Delilah to
admiration, and that abased Ruth? (It was singular how everyone settled
upon Ruth in this connection.)
She did not pause to analyze her feelings--to try and find out if she
was really so fond of Ruth as to make Ruth’s insult her own; but without
a moment’s delay, without a word of consultation with her father, she
sat down at her desk and wrote a letter to George Holland, asking him to
release her from her promise to marry him; and adding that if he should
decline to do so it would make no difference to her; she would consider
the engagement between them at an end all the same.
She felt, when that letter was posted, as if a great weight were lifted
from her mind--from her heart. Then a copy of “Revised Versions” arrived
for her from the author, and with the ink still wet upon the pen with
which she had written that letter to him, she caught up the book and
covered it with kisses.
Had he seen that action her lover would have been thoroughly satisfied.
A young woman must be very deeply in love with a man when she kisses the
cover of a book which he has just published. That is what George Holland
would have thought, having but a superficial acquaintance with the
motives that sway young women.
Later in the day he had replied to her letter, and had appointed four
o’clock on the following afternoon as the hour when he trusted she would
find it convenient to see him, in order to give him an opportunity of
making an explanation which he trusted would enable her to see that
“Revised Versions,” so far from being the dreadful book she seemed to
imagine it to be, was in reality written with a high purpose.
She had not shrunk from an interview with him. She had sent him a line
to let him know that she would be at home at four o’clock; and now she
sat in her drawing room and observed, without emotion, that in five
minutes that hour would strike.
The clock struck, and before the last tone had died away, the footman
announced the Rev. George Holland.
CHAPTER IV.
SHE HAD NO RIGHT TO ACCUSE HIM OF READING THE BIBLE DAILY.
Phyllis shook hands with her visitor. He sought to retain her hand, as
he had been in the habit of doing, as he stood beside her with something
of a proprietary air. He relinquished her hand with a little look of
surprise--a sort of pained surprise. She was inexorable. She would not
even allow him to maintain his proprietary air.
“Do sit down, Mr. Holland,” she said.
“What! ‘Mr. Holland’ already? Oh, Phyllis!”
He had a good voice, full of expression--something beyond mere musical
expression. People (they were mostly women) said that his voice had soul
in it, whatever they meant by that.
She made no reply. What reply could she make? She only waited for him to
sit down.
“Your letter came as a great shock to me, Phyllis,” said he, when he had
seated himself, not too close to her. He did not wish her to fancy that
he was desirous of having a subtle influence of propinquity as an ally.
“A great shock to me.”
“A shock?” said she. “A shock, after you had written that book?”
“I fancied you would understand it, Phyllis--you, at least. Of course
I expected to be misrepresented by the world--the critics--the
clerics--what you will--but you----You had not read it when you wrote
that letter to me--that terrible letter. You could not have read it.”
“I had only read one notice of it--that was enough.”
“And you could write that letter to me solely as the evidence of one
wretched print? Oh, Phyllis!”
Pain was in his voice. It may have been in his face as well, but she did
not see it; his face was averted from her.
“Yes,” she said quietly; “I wrote that letter, Mr. Holland. You see, the
paper gave large extracts from the book. I did not come to my conclusion
from what the newspaper article said, but from what you had said in your
book--from the quoted passages.”
“They did not do me justice. I did not look for justice at their hands.
But you, Phyllis----”
“I have read your book now, Mr. Holland----”
“Ah, let me plead with you, Phyllis--not ‘Mr. Holland,’ I entreat of
you.”
“And my first thought on reading it was that I had not written to you so
strongly as I should have done.”
“My dear Phyllis, do not say that, I beg of you. You cannot know how you
pain me.”
“To be misunderstood by you--_you_.”
She got upon her feet so quickly that it might almost be said she sprang
up.
“_You_ must have misunderstood _me_ greatly, Mr. Holland, if you fancied
that you could write such a book as you wrote and not get such a letter
from me. The Bible--Ruth--and you a clergyman--reading it daily in the
church----Oh! I cannot tell you all that I thought--all that I still
think.”
He did not correct the mistake she had made. She had no right to accuse
him of reading the Bible daily in his church. He was not in the habit of
doing that--it was his curates who did it. He watched her as she stood
at a window with her back turned to him. Her hands were behind her. Her
breath came audibly, for she had spoken excitedly.
Then he also rose and came beside her.
“I wrote that book, as I believed you would perceive when you had read
it, in order to remove from the minds of the people--those people
who have not given the matter a thought--the impression--I know it
prevails--that our faith--the truth of our religion--is dependent upon
the acceptance as good of such persons as our very religion itself
enables us to pronounce evil. My aim was to show that our faith is not
built upon such a foundation of impurity--of imperfection. The spirit
which prevails nowadays--the modern spirit--it is the result of
the development of science. This scientific spirit necessitates the
consideration of all the elements of our faith from the standpoint of
reason.”
“Faith--reason?”
“If the Church is to appeal to all men, its method must be scientific.
It is sad to think of all that the Church has lost in the past through
the want of wisdom of those who had its best interests at heart,
and believed they were doing it good service by opposing scientific
research. They fancied that the faith would not survive the light of
truth. They professed to believe that the faith was strong enough to
work miracles--to change the heart of man, and yet that it would be
jeopardized by the calculations of astronomers. The astronomers were
prohibited from calculating; the geologists were forbidden to unearth
the mysteries of their science, lest the discovery of the truth should
be detrimental to the faith. They believed that the truth was opposed to
the faith. Warning after warning the Church received that the two were
one; that man would only accept the truth, whether it came from the lips
of the churchman or from the investigations of science. Grudgingly the
Church became tolerant of the seekers after truth--men who were not
greatly concerned in the preservation of the mummy dust of dogma. But
how many thousand persons are there not, to-day, who think that the
Church is on one side, and the truth on the other? The intolerant
attitude of the Church, still maintained in these days, when the spirit
of science pervades every form of thought, has been productive of
probably the largest body that ever existed in the country, of sensible
men and women, who never enter a church door. They want to know
whatsoever things are true; they do not want to be dredged with the
mummy dust of dogma.”
“But the Bible--the Bible!”
“It is necessary for me to tell you all that I feel on this subject; all
that I have felt for several years past--ever since I left the divinity
school behind me, and went into the world of thinking men and women. It
is necessary to tell these men and women in unmistakable language that
our faith aims at a perfect type of manhood--at the perfection of
truth. It is necessary to tell them that we do not regard, except with
abhorrence, such types of men as have for centuries been held up to
admiration simply because they have for centuries been the objects of
admiration, of imitation, of veneration, on the part of the debased
people who gave us the earlier books of the Bible. The memory of
Jacob became the dominant influence among the Hebrew nation; hence the
continuous curse that rested upon them, the curse that rests upon the
cheat, the defrauder of his own household, his brother, his father,
his uncle. It is necessary to say that the world should know that our
religion is founded upon truth, purity, self-sacrifice--that it abhors
the cheat and the sensualist. It is necessary to proclaim to the world
our abhorrence of the cult whose highest development was the Pharisee.
The aim of the religion of Christ is to produce the perfect man, and to
root out the Pharisee. When the Church ceases to connive at falsehood
and sensualism; when it openly professes its abhorrence of the religion
of the Hebrews; then, and then only, will it become the power in the
earth which the exponent of Christianity should become. Humanity had
been crying out for the religion of humanity, that is, Christianity, for
centuries, but the Church tells it that true religion is an amalgamation
of the loveliness of Christianity and the barbarity of Judaism--an
impossible amalgamation, and one which millions of poor souls have
perished in a vain attempt to accomplish. Humanity wants Christ, and
Christ only, and that the Church has hitherto refused to give; hence the
millions of thinking men and women, believers in the religion of Christ,
who remain forever outside the walls of the Church; hence, also, that
terrible record of murder and massacre, perpetrated through long ages
with the sanction of the Church. Where, in the religion of Christ, can
one find the sanction for massacre? It is nowhere to be found except
in the Psalms of the senile sensualist--in the commands of Moses, the
leader of the marauders of the desert. Christ swept away the barbarities
of the teaching of Moses. He perceived how miserably it had failed; how
it had retarded all that was good in man, and sanctioned all that
was evil. He perceived how it had kept the nation in a condition of
barbarity; how it had made it the prey of the civilized nations around
it; how it had made the Hebrew nations the contempt of civilization; and
yet the Church that calls itself the Church of Christ has not yet had
the courage to offer humanity anything but that impossible task--the
amalgamation of the law that came by Moses and the grace and truth that
came by Jesus Christ.”
He spoke with all the fervor of the preacher, with pale face, brilliant
eyes, and clenched hands; but in a voice adapted to a drawing room.
Phyllis of Philistia could not but admit that, in the phrase of
Philistia he had spoken in perfect taste. He had not alluded definitely
to the boldness of Ruth or to the calorific course accepted by the aged
David. He had spoken in those general terms which are adopted by the
clergymen who never err against good taste as defined by the matrons of
Philistia.
She did not know whether she admired him or detested him. But she was
certain that she did not love him. He might be right in all that he had
said, but she had freed herself from him. He might be destined to become
one of the most prominent men of the last ten years of the century, but
she would never marry him.
She stood face to face with him when he had spoken.
There was a long silence.
A gleam, a very faint gleam of triumph came to his eyes.
“Good-bye,” said she, flashing out her hand to him, and with her eyes
still fixed upon his face.
CHAPTER V.
IN LOVE THERE ARE NO GOOD-BYES.
He was so startled that he took a step backward. She remained with her
hand outstretched.
Was that only the result of the eloquent expression of his views--that
outstretched hand which was offered to him for an instant only as a
symbol of its withdrawal from him forever?
“You cannot mean----”
“Good-by,” said she.
“Have I not explained all that seemed to you to stand in need of
explanation?” he asked.
“The book--the book remains. I asked for no explanation,” said she.
“But you are too good, too reasonable, to dismiss me in this fashion,
Phyllis. Why, even the bishop--_would sit upon a fence to see how the
book would be received by the public before taking action against the
author_,” was what was in his mind, but he stopped short, and then added
a phrase that had no reference to the bishop. “Can you ever have loved
me?” was the phrase which he thought should appeal to her more forcibly
than any reference to the bishop’s sense of what was opportune.
She took back her hand, and her eyes fell at the same moment that her
face flushed.
He felt that he had not been astray in his estimate of the controversial
value--in the eyes of a girl, of course--of the appeal which he made
to her. A girl understands nothing of the soundness of an argument on
a Biblical question (or any other), he thought; but she understands an
appeal made to her by a man whom she had loved, and whom she therefore
loves still, though something may have occurred to make her think
otherwise.
“Can you ever have loved me?” he said again, and his voice was now more
reproachful.
There was a pause before she said:
“That is the question which I have been asking myself for some
time--ever since I read about that book. Oh, please, Mr. Holland, do
not stay any longer! Cannot you see that if, after you have made an
explanation that should satisfy any reasonable person, I still remain
in my original way of thinking, I am not the woman who should be your
wife?”
“You would see with my eyes if you were my wife,” he said, and he
believed that she would, so large an amount of confidence had he in his
own power to dominate a woman.
“Ah!” she said, “you have provided me with the strongest reason why I
should never become your wife, Mr. Holland.”
“Do not say that, Phyllis!” he cried, in a low voice, almost a piteous
voice. “I must have you with me in this great work which I feel has
been given me to accomplish. I am prepared to make any sacrifice for
the cause which I have at heart--the cause to which I mean to devote the
rest of my life; but you--you--I must have you with me, Phyllis. Don’t
give me an answer now. All I ask of you is to think over the whole
matter from the standpoint of one who loves the truth, and who does
not fear the result of those who are investigators. A few years ago
the geologists were regarded as the enemies of the faith. Later the
evolutionists were looked on with abhorrence. Had any clergyman ventured
to assent to that doctrine which we now know to be the everlasting truth
of the scheme of earthly life propounded by the Creator, he would have
been compelled to leave the Church. I do not know what will happen to
me, my Phyllis. No, no! do not say anything to me now. All that I ask of
you is to think--think--think.”
“That is it--that is your modern scientific spirit!” she cried. “You,
and such as you, say ‘think--think--think’ to us--to poor women and
men who are asking for comfort, for protection against the evil of
the world. You say ‘think--think--think,’ when you should say
pray--pray--pray.’ Where are you going to end? you have begun by taking
from us our Bible. What do you propose to give us in exchange for it?
No--no, don’t answer me. I did not mean to enter into the question with
you--to enter into any question with you. I have no right to do so.”
“You have every right, Phyllis. If I should cause offence to the least
of the little ones of the flock with which I have been intrusted, it
would be better that a millstone were hanged round my neck and that I
were cast into the sea. You have a right to ask and it is laid on me to
answer.”
“Then I decline to avail myself of the privilege; I will ask you
nothing, except to say good-by.”
“I will not say it, Phyllis, and I will not hear you say it. Three
months ago you told me that you loved me.”
“And I fancied that I did, but now----”
“Ah! you think that you have the power to cease loving at a moment’s
notice? You will find out your mistake, my child. In love there are no
good-bys. I take your hand now, but not to say good-by; I feel that
you are still mine--that you will be mine more than ever when you
think--think--and pray.”
“Ah! You ask me to pray?”
“Pray--pray for me, child. I need the prayers of such as you, for I feel
that my hour of deepest trial is drawing nigh. Do you fancy that I am
the man to take back anything that I have written? Look at me, Phyllis;
I tell you here that I will stand by everything that I have written.
Whatever comes of it, the book remains. Even if I lose all that I have
worked for,--even if I lose you,--I will still say ‘the book remains.’ I
am ready to suffer for it. I say in all humility that I believe God will
give me grace to die for it.”
She had given him her hand. He was still holding it when he spoke his
final sentence, looking, not into her face, but into a space beyond it.
His eyes more than suggested the eyes of a martyr waiting undaunted for
the lighting of the fagots. Suddenly he dropped her hand. He looked for
a moment into her face. He saw that the tears were upon it. He turned
and walked out of the room without a word.
No word came from her.
He knew that he had left her at exactly the right moment. She was
undoubtedly annoyed by the publication of the book; but that was
because she had read some reviews of it, and was, girl-like, under the
impression that the murmur of the reviewers was the mighty voice that
echoes round the world. He felt that she would think differently when
his real persecution began. He looked forward with great hope to the
result of his real persecution. She would never hold out against that.
If the bishop would only take action at once and attempt to deprive him
of his pastorate, there was nothing that he might not look for.
And then he reflected that on the following Sunday the church would be
crowded to the doors. She would see that. She would see the thousands
of the fashionable women--he hoped even for men--who would fill every
available seat, every available standing place in the church, and who
would all be anxious to hear his defense. That would show her that
the publication of this book had raised him far above the heads of the
ordinary clergyman who droned away, Sunday after Sunday, in half empty
churches to congregations that never became interested. Yes, for many
Sundays St. Chad’s would be crowded to the doors. And then he trusted
that the bishop would take action against him, and in proportion to the
severity of his persecution on the one hand would be his popularity on
the other hand.
All this would, he felt, advance the cause which he had at heart; for he
was thoroughly sincere in his belief that the views which he advocated
in “Revised Versions” were calculated to place the Church on a firmer
basis, and to cause it to appeal to those persons who, having been
inculcated with the spirit of modern scientific inquiry, never entered a
church porch.
He had not been guilty of an empty boast when he had expressed to her
his readiness to die for the principles which he had enunciated with
considerable clearness in his book; but, at the same time, when he was
walking down Piccadilly he could not avoid the feeling that if he were
only subjected to a vigorous persecution--a high-class persecution, of
course, with the bishop at the head of it, he would be almost certain
to win back Phyllis. Her desertion of him was undoubtedly a blow to him;
but he thought that, after all, it was not unnatural that such as girl
as she should be somewhat frightened at the boldness of the book which
he had published. He had seen the day, not so very long ago, when he
would have been frightened at it himself. At any rate he felt sure that
Phyllis would be able to differentiate between the case of the author of
“Revised Versions” and the case of the mediocre clergyman who defied his
bishop on a question of--what was the question?--something concerning
the twirling of his thumbs from east to west, instead of from west to
east; yes, or an equally trivial matter. He trusted that she was too
discriminating a girl to bracket him with that wretched, shallow-minded
person who endeavored to pose as a martyr, because he would not be
permitted to do whatever he tried to insist on doing. Mr. Holland
thought it had something to say to the twirling of his thumbs at a
certain part of the service for the day, but if anyone had said that his
memory was at fault--that the contumacious curate only wanted to make
some gestures at the psychological, or, perhaps, the spiritual, moment,
he would not have been surprised. He had always thought that curate a
very silly person. He thanked his God that he was not such a man, and he
thought that he might trust Phyllis to understand the difference between
the position which he assumed and the posturing of the silly curate.
His knowledge of her powers of discrimination was not at fault. Phyllis
never for a moment thought of him as posturing. She did him more than
justice. She regarded him as terribly in earnest; no man unless one who
was terribly in earnest could have written that book--a book which she
felt was bound to alienate from him all the people who had previously
honored him and delighted to listen to his preaching. Someone had said
in her hearing that the preaching of George Holland was, compared to
the preaching of the average clergyman, as the electric light is to the
gas--the gas of a street lamp. She had flushed with pleasure,--that had
been six months ago,--when it first occurred to her that to be the wife
of a distinguished clergyman, who was also a scholar, was the highest
vocation to which a woman could aspire. She had told her father of this
testimony to the ability of the rector of St. Chad’s--pride had been in
her voice and eyes.
“The man who said that was a true critic,” her father had remarked.
“Electric light? Quite so. In the absence of sunlight the electric light
does extremely well for the requirements of the average man and woman.
Your critic said nothing about volts?”
That was how her father became irritating to her occasionally--leading
up to some phrase which he had in his collection of bric-a-brac.
“Volts!”
Yes, she felt that the sincerity of George Holland would alienate from
him all the people who had previously held him in high esteem. Although
she was a daughter of Philistia, it had never occurred to her that there
is such a thing as a _succes scandale_, and that the effect of such an
incident in connection with the rector of a fashionable church rarely
leads to his isolation.
She did George Holland more than justice, for she could not conceive his
looking forward to a crowded and interested attendance at his church on
the following Sunday and perhaps many successive Sundays. She could not
conceive his thinking what effect the noticing of such an attendance
would have upon her. To her, as to most girls, the heroic man is all
heroic. The picture of the Duke of Marlborough taking a list of the
linen to be sent to the wash while his troops were getting into position
for a great battle is one from which they turn away. She could not think
of George Holland’s calculating upon the effect of a crowded church,
with newspaper reporters scattered throughout the building, taking down
every word that might fall from his lips. She regarded him as a man
who had been compelled, by the insidious influence of what he called
scientific thought, to write a shocking book; but one that he certainly
believed was destined to effect a great reform in the world. Her eyes
had filled with tears as he stood before her with the gleam of martyrdom
in his eyes, and for an instant she felt a woman’s impulse--that was a
factor which George Holland had taken into consideration before he had
spoken--to give both her hands to him and to promise to stand by his
side in his hour of trial. But she thought of Ruth and restrained
herself. Before he had reached the door she thought of him as the man
from whom she had managed to escape before it was too late.
She wondered if any of those young women of the church, who had gone
back to their butterfly garments on hearing that Mr. Holland had asked
her to marry him, would hunt out the sober garments which they had
discarded and wear them when they would hear that she was not going to
marry Mr. Holland.
She rather thought that they would get new dresses and hats of the right
degree of sobriety. Fashions change so quickly between February and May.
And then there was the question of sleeves!
Anyhow they would, she felt, regard themselves as having another chance.
That was how they would put it.
Only for an instant did she become thoughtful. Then she sprang to her
feet from the sofa on which she had thrown herself when her tears were
threatening, and cried:
“Let them have him--let them all have him--all--all!”
That would have been absurd.
CHAPTER VI.
IF A GIRL REALLY LOVES A MAN SHE WILL MARRY HIM, EVEN THOUGH HE SHOULD
WRITE A BOOK.
Phyllis meant the half hour which would elapse before her tea was
brought to her to be a very grateful space. She meant to dwell upon the
achievement of her freedom, for the feeling that she was free was very
sweet to her. The fetters that had bound her had been flung away, and
she now only had a splendid sense of freedom. So sweet was this sense
that she made up her mind that in future it would never do for her to
run any such risk as that to which she had just subjected herself.
How could she ever have been such a fool as to promise to marry George
Holland? That was what she was asking herself as she lay back on the
pillows of the French sofa, and listened to the soft sound of the
carriage wheels of the callers at the other houses in the square.
What a singular wish that was of hers--to become the wife of a
clergyman! It seemed very singular to her just now. Just now she did not
want to become the wife of anyone, and she hoped that no one would ask
her. She did not want the worry of it. Ah, she would be very careful in
the future: she would take very good care that the fact of other girls
wanting to marry one particular man would not make her anxious to have
him all to herself.
Before her resolutions on this very important point had been fully
considered in all their bearings, her maid entered to ask if she was
at home. The butler had sent a footman to her to make that inquiry, the
fact being that her particular friend, Mrs. Linton, had called to see
her.
Phyllis jumped up, saying:
“Of course I am home to Mrs. Linton. She will have tea with me.”
She went to a glass to see if the tears which had been in her eyes--they
had not fallen--had left any traces that the acuteness of Ella Linton
might detect. The result of her observation was satisfactory; she would
not even need to sit with her back to the light.
Then Mrs. Linton was announced, and flowed into the arms of her friend
Phyllis, crying:
“Of course I knew that you would be at home to me, my beloved, even
though you might be in the midst of one of those brilliant speeches
which you write out for your father to deliver in the House and cause
people to fancy that he is the wittiest man in place--so unlike that
dreadful teetotal man who grins through the horse collar and thinks that
people are imposed on. Now let me look at you, you lucky girl! You are a
lucky girl, you know.”
“Yes,” said Phyllis, “you have called on me. We shall have tea in a
minute. How good of you to come to me the first day you arrived in town!
How well you are looking, my Ella!”
“So glad you think so,” said Ella. “I haven’t aged much during the eight
months we have been apart. I have had a very good time on the whole,
and so had Stephen, though he was with me for close upon a month, poor
little man! But it is you, Phyllis, it is you who are the girl of the
hour. Heavens! you were farsighted! Who could have imagined that he
would become so famous all in a moment? I must confess that when you
wrote to me that letter telling me of your engagement, and how happy you
were, I was a little cross. I could not clearly see you the wife of a
parson, even so presentable a parson as Mr. Holland. Oh, of course I
wrote you the usual exuberant letter--what would be the good of doing
anything else? But now that he has become famous--Oh, I want you to
bring him with you to my first At Home--Tuesday week. It’s very short
notice, I know, but you must come, and bring him. You are both certain
to be in great demand. Why do you shake your head that way? You need not
say that you are engaged for Tuesday week.”
“I will not say that I am engaged at all, in any sense,” said Phyllis,
with a very shallow laugh, at laugh that sounded like a ripple among
pebbles; her usual laugh was like a ripple upon a silver sand.
“In any sense--for Tuesday week?”
Ella raised her eyebrows to the extent of the eighth of an inch. She
lowered them in a moment, however, for the tea was being brought in.
It required two able-bodied men (in plush) to carry in a dainty
little silver tray, with a little silver tea-pot of a pattern that
silversmiths, for reasons which have never been fully explained, call
“Queen Anne.” One of the men, however, devoted himself to the care of
the hot cakes of various subtle types which were inclosed in silver
covered dishes.
With the lowering of her eyebrows Mrs. Linton’s voice lost its previous
inflection.
“I have been fortunate enough to hit upon something distinctly new in
that way”--she indicated the muffin dishes. “A cake that may be eaten
hot without removing one’s gloves.”
“What a boon!” cried Phyllis. “You got it at Vienna, of course.”
“Of course. You will learn all about it when you come.”
The able-bodied men withdrew, and before the door was quite closed
behind them, Ella was gazing at her friend, her face alight with
inquiry.
“Now pray explain yourself,” she whispered. “Not engaged in any
sense--those were your words. What do they mean?”
“Take them literally, my Ella,” said Phyllis.
“Literally? But you wrote to me that you had engaged yourself to marry
Mr. Holland?”
“And now I tell you by word of mouth that I have disengaged myself.”
“Good Heavens! You, I fancied, would be the last girl in the world to
promise to marry a man and then back out of it.”
“That was what I myself fancied up till Monday last.”
“But how can you have changed your mind? Isn’t it very unfortunate--just
when the man has become famous?”
“How could it be otherwise, Ella, when the man wrote so horrible a book
as that?”
“Horrible? Is it horrible? I had no idea. I’m no judge of what is
horrible in theology, or metaphysics, or whatever it is. But I do
profess to know when a man has made a hit, whether in theology or
anything else; and I perceive quite clearly that your Mr. Holland--well,
not your Mr. Holland, has made a distinct hit. What sort of face is that
you’re making at me? Oh, I see. It’s the face of the orthodox at the
mention of something not quite orthodox. Pshut! don’t be a goose,
Phyllis.”
“I don’t intend. Have I not told you that I’m not going to marry Mr.
Holland?”
“That is like one of the phrases which you give to your father, so that
the people might think him clever. Orthodox! Who cares nowadays for what
is dully orthodox? Who ever heard of a hero in orthodoxy nowadays? The
thing is impossible. There may be, of course, thousands of orthodox
heroes, but one never hears anything of them. The planets Jupiter and
Saturn and Mercury and Mars and the rest of them come and go at their
appointed seasons, and no one ever gives them a second thought, poor old
respectable things! but the moment a comet appears in the sky everyone
rushes out to gaze at it, and the newspapers deal with it from day to
day, and the illustrated papers give its portrait. Nothing could be more
unorthodox than your comet. Oh, Phyllis, my child, don’t talk nowadays
of orthodoxy or the other--what do they call it?--heterodoxy. Mr.
Holland’s name will be in everyone’s mouth for the next year at least,
and if his bishop or a friendly church warden prosecutes him, and the
thing is worked up properly, he ought to be before the public for the
next five years.”
“Oh, Ella!”
“I’m not overstating the case, I assure you, my dear. A man was telling
me about one Colenso--he was, so far as I could gather, a first-class
man at algebra and heresy and things like that. He was Bishop
of Zanzibar or Uganda or some place, and he wrote a book about
Moses--showing that Moses couldn’t have written something or other.
Well, he took a bit of prosecuting, five or six years, I believe, and
he didn’t go nearly so far as Mr. Holland does in that book of his. All
this time people talked about little else but Colenso, and his books
made him a fortune. That was before our time, dear--when the newspapers
weren’t worked as they are now. Block printing has made more heroes than
the longest campaign on record. Yes, Mr. Courtland said so two days
ago. I think I’ll try some more of that lovely cake: it’s like warm
ice, isn’t it? Oh, you’ll not be so foolish as to throw over your Mr.
Holland.”
“It is already done,” said Phyllis. “I’m so glad that you like the cake.
It is very subtle. What a delightful idea--warm ice!”
“Never mind the cake. I want to hear more of this matter of Mr.
Holland,” said Ella. “Do you mean to tell me plainly that you threw
over Mr. Holland because he wrote a book that will bring him fame and
fortune?”
“I have thrown over Mr. Holland because he has written a book to make
people have contempt for the Bible,” said Phyllis.
“Then all I can say is that you were never in love with the man,” cried
Ella.
“You may say that if you please.”
“I do say it. If a girl really loves a man, she will marry him even
though he should write a book against Darwin. If a girl really loves a
man she will stand by him all the closer when he is undergoing a course
of honorable persecution, with his portrait in every paper that one
picks up.”
“I dare say that is true enough,” assented Phyllis. “Perhaps I never did
really love Mr. Holland. Perhaps I only fancied I cared for him because
I saw that so many other girls--took to wearing chocolates and grays and
kept their sleeves down just when sleeves were highest.”
“Of course it was only natural that you should wish to--well,
colloquially, to wipe the eyes of the other girls. How many girls, I
should like to know, begin to think of a man as a possible husband
until they perceive that the thoughts of other girls are turned in his
direction?”
“At any rate, whatever I may have done long ago--”
“Three months ago.”
“Three months ago. Whatever I may have done then, I know that I don’t
love him now.”
“Don’t be too sure, my dear Phyllis. If there is one thing more than
another about which a woman should never be positive, it is whether or
not she loves a particular man. What mistakes they make! No, I’ll never
believe that you turned him adrift simply because he wrote something
disparagingly about Solomon, or was it David? And I did so want you and
him for my next day; I meant it to be such a _coup_, to have returned to
town only a week and yet to have the most outrageously unorthodox parson
at my house. Ah, that would indeed have been a _coup_! Never mind, I can
at least have the beautiful girl who, though devoted to the unorthodox
parson, threw him over on account of his unorthodoxy.”
“Yes, you are certain of me--that is, if you think I should--if it
wouldn’t seem a little----”
“What nonsense, Phyllis! Where have you been living for the past
twenty-three years that you should get such a funny notion into your
head? Do you think that girls nowadays absent themselves from felicity
awhile when they find it necessary to become--well, disengaged--yes, or
divorced, for that matter?”
“I really can’t recollect any case of--”
“Of course you can’t. They don’t exist. The proper thing for a women to
do when she gets a divorce is to take a box at a theatre and give
the audience a chance of recognizing her from her portraits that have
already appeared in the illustrated papers. The block printing has done
that too. There’s not a theatre manager in London who wouldn’t give his
best box to a woman who has come straight from the divorce court. The
managers recognize the fact that she is in the same line as themselves.
But for you, my dear Phyllis--oh, you will never do him the injustice to
keep your throwing over of him a secret.”
“Injustice? Oh, Ella!”
“I say injustice. Good gracious, child! cannot you see that if it
becomes known that the girl who had promised to marry him has broken
off her engagement to him simply because he has written that book, the
interest that attaches to him on account of his unorthodoxy will be
immeasurably increased?”
“I will not do him the injustice of fancying for a moment that he would
be gratified on this account. Whatever he may be, Ella, he is at least
sincere and single-minded in his aims.”
“I have no doubt of it, my only joy. But however sincere a man may be in
his aims, he still cannot reasonably object to the distinction that is
thrust upon him when he has done something out of the common. The men
who make books know that that sort of thing pays. Someone told me the
other day--I believe it was Herbert Courtland--that it is the men
who write books embodying a great and noble aim who make the closest
bargains with their publishers. I heard of a great and good clergyman
the other day who wrote a Life of Christ, and then complained in the
papers of his publishers having only given him a miserable percentage on
the profits. That is how they talk nowadays; the profit resulting from
the Life of Christ is to be measured in pounds, shillings, and pence.”
“Mr. Holland is not a man of this stamp, Ella.”
“I’m sure he is not. At the same time if he isn’t prosecuted for
heterodoxy no one will be more disappointed than Mr. Holland, unless,
indeed, it be Mr. Holland’s publisher. Who would begrudge the martyr his
halo, dear? Even the most sincere and single-minded martyr has an eye
on that halo. The halo of the up-to-date martyr is made up of afternoon
teas provided by fair women, and full-page portraits in the illustrated
papers.”
“And all this leads to--what?”
“It leads to--let me see--oh, yes, it leads to your appearance at my
little gathering. Of course, you’ll come. Believe me, you’ll not feel
the least uncomfortable. You will be The Girl who Sacrificed her Love
for Conscience’ Sake. That’s a good enough qualification for distinction
on the part of any girl in these hard times. But I might have known long
ago that you would play this part. That sweetly pathetic voice, with
that firm mouth and those lovely soft gray eyes that would seem to a
casual observer to neutralize the firmness of the mouth. Oh, yes, my
Phyllis, you have undoubtedly _la physionomie du role_.”
“What _role_?”
“The _role_ of the girl who is on the side of the Bible.”
“I am certainly on the side of the Bible.”
“And so am I. So I will look for you to be by my side on Tuesday
week, and as often as you please in the meantime. By the way, you will
probably meet Herbert Courtland at our house. He is the New Guinea man,
you know.”
“Of course I know. You talk of wanting heroes in orthodoxy at your
house, while you have Mr. Courtland, the New Guinea explorer, drinking
his tea at your elbow? Oh, go away!”
“I hope you will like him. We saw a good deal of him in Italy, and will
probably see a good deal of him here.”
“I’m certain to like him: you like him.”
“Ah, that’s what you said to the young women who put off their colors
and took to sackcloth in the presence of Mr. Holland. Don’t be too sure
that you will like any man because other women like him. Now, I have,
as usual, remained too long with you. I’m greatly impressed with the
situation of the moment. I don’t say that I think you are wrong, mind
you. Girls should always be on the side of the Bible. At any rate you
have, I repeat, _la physionomie du role_, and you can’t be far astray if
you act up to it. Good-bye, my dearest.”
CHAPTER VII.
THE DEFENSE OF HOLLAND.
Ella Linton drove to a certain shop not far from Piccadilly,--the only
shop where the arranging of feathers is treated as a science independent
of the freaks of fashion,--and at the door she met a tall man with the
complexion of mahogany but with fair hair and mustache. People nudged
one another and whispered his name as they walked past him before
standing at the shop window, pretending to admire the feathers, but in
reality to glance furtively round at the man.
The name that they whispered to one another after the nudge was Herbert
Courtland.
He took off his hat--it was a tall silk one, but no one who knew
anything could avoid feeling that it should have been a solar
toupee--when Mrs. Linton stepped from her victoria.
“Oh, you here!” said she. “Who on earth would expect to see you here?”
“You,” said he.
“What?”
“You asked me a question. I answered it.”
She laughed as they walked together to the door of the feather shop.
“It appears to me that you have a very good opinion of yourself and a
very bad one of me,” she remarked, smiling up to his face.
“That’s just where you make a mistake,” said he.
“How?”
“If I did not think well of you I should not have ordered Parkinson to
make you a fan of the tail of the meteor.”
“Oh, Bertie, you have done that?”
“Why should I not do it?”
“But it is the only one in the world.”
“Ah, that’s just it. You are the only one in the world.”
She laughed again, looking up to his face.
“Well, we’ll have a look at it, anyway,” said she.
They went into the shop to see the tail feathers of that wonderful
meteor-bird which Herbert Courtland had just brought back from New
Guinea with him--the most glorious thing that nature had produced and a
great explorer had risked his life to acquire, in order that Mrs. Linton
might have a unique feathered fan.
About the same time the Rev. George Holland met in the same thoroughfare
his friend and patron, the Earl of Earlscourt.
“By the Lord Harry, you’ve done for yourself now, my hearty!” cried the
earl. “What the blazes do you mean by attacking the Word of God in that
fashion?”
“Tommy,” said the Rev. George Holland, smiling a patronizing smile at
his patron, “Tommy, my friend, if you take my advice you’ll not meddle
with what doesn’t concern you. You’re a peer; better leave the Word of
God to me. I’m not a peer, but a parson.”
“I’ll not leave it with you; it isn’t safe,” said the peer. “Anything
more damnably atheistical than that book of yours I never read.”
“And you didn’t read it, Thomas; you know you only read a screeching
review of it, and you didn’t even read that through,” said the parson.
“Who told you that?” asked the patron. “Well, at any rate I read what
you said about Ruth. It was quite scandalous! Ruth! Good Lord! what
character is safe nowadays? One of the loveliest of the women of the
Bible--my wife says so. She knows all about them. And the best painters
in the world have shown her standing among the field of oats. By the
Lord, sir, it’s sheer blasphemy! and worse than that, it’s making
people--good, religious people, mind, not the ruck--it’s making them ask
why the blazes I gave you the living. It’s a fact.”
“I’m sorry for you, Tommy--very sorry. I’m also sorry for your good
religious people, and particularly sorry for the phraseology of their
earnest inquiries on what I am sure is a matter of life and death to
them--spiritually. That’s my last word, Thomas.”
“And you were doing so well at the Joss-house, too.” Lord Earlscourt was
shaking his head sorrowfully, as he spoke. “We were all getting on so
comfortably. That was what people said to me--they said----”
“Pardon me, I’m a parson, therefore I’m not particular; but I can’t
stand the way your good religious people express themselves.”
“They said, ‘It’s so d---- pleasant to get hold of a parson who can be
trusted in the pulpit--sermons with a good healthy moral tone, and
so forth. You might bring your youngest daughter to St. Chad’s in
the certainty that she would hear nothing that would make her ask
uncomfortable questions when she got home.’ It’s a fact, they said that;
and now you go and spoil all. The bishop will have a word to say to you
some of these days, my lad. He ran away to the Continent, they tell
me, when your book was published, and it’s perfectly well known that he
never runs away unless things look serious. When the bishop is serious,
those that can’t swim had best take to the boats.”
“I’ll ask you for a seat in your yacht, Tommy. Meantime kindest regards
to her ladyship.”
“Oh! by the way, it’s not true, is it, that the girl has thrown you over
on account of the book?”
For an instant there came a little flush to the face of the Rev. George
Holland; then he shifted his umbrella from one hand to the other,
saying:
“If you mean Phyllis, all I can say in reply is that she is the best and
the truest girl alive at present. I’ve an engagement at a quarter-past
six.”
“Well, good-by. It was my missus who said that the girl would throw you
over on account of that book.”
“Ah! Good-by.”
“Honestly speaking, George, old man, I think you’ve made a mistake this
time. People don’t mind much about Jacob and Jonah and Jeremiah and the
whole job lot of Sheenies; but they do mind about Ruth. Hang it all man!
she was a woman.”
“Ah! so was Jezebel, and yet--ah! good-by. I’ll be late for my
appointment.”
“See you on Sunday,” said the earl, with a broadish smile.
And so he did.
So did the largest congregation that had ever assembled within the
venerable walls of St. Chad’s. They heard him also, and so did the dozen
reporters of the morning papers who were present--some to describe,
with the subtle facetiousness of the newspaper reporter, the amusing
occurrences incidental to the church service of the day, and others to
take down his sermon to the extent of half a column to be headed “The
Rev. George Holland Defends Himself.” One reporter, however, earned an
increase in his salary by making his headline, “The Defense of Holland.”
It was supposed that casual readers would fancy that the kingdom of
Holland had been repelling an invader, and would not find out their
mistake until they had read half through the sermon.
George Holland had not been mistaken when he had assumed that his
appearance in the church and his sermon this day would attract a large
amount of attention. As a matter of fact the building was crowded with
notable persons: Cabinet ministers (2), judges of the superior courts
(4), company promoters (47), actors and actresses (3), music hall and
variety artists (22), Royal Academician (1). Literature was represented
by a lady who had written a high-church novel, and fashion by the
publisher who had produced it. Science appeared in the person of a
professional thought-reader (female). These were all strangers to St.
Chad’s, though some of them could follow the service quite easily. The
habitues of the church included several peers, the members of a foreign
embassy, a few outside brokers, quite a number of retired officers of
both services, and some Members of Parliament and the London County
Council.
One of the chaplains of the bishop occupied a seat in the aisle;
according to the facetious newspaper he held a watching brief.
The rector was, of course, oblivious of his brilliant entourage. He
could not even tell if Phyllis or her father were present. (As a matter
of fact both were in their accustomed seats in their own pew.) He, as
usual, took but a small part in the ritual--as Lord Earlscourt once
remarked, George Holland wasn’t such a fool as to keep a dog and do the
barking himself. (It has already been stated that he had a couple of
excellent curates.) But the sermon was preached by himself, as indeed it
usually was after the morning service.
It was the most brilliant of all his efforts. He took as his text the
words, “All Scripture is given by inspiration and is profitable,” and he
had no difficulty in showing how vast was the profit to be derived from
a consideration of every portion of the sacred volume, it appeared to
him, than the account given of the early history of the Hebrew race.
That account appealed as an object lesson to all nations on the face of
the earth. It allowed every people to see the course which the children
of Israel had pursued at various periods of their existence and to
profit by such observation. The Hebrews were a terrible example to all
the world. If they were slaves when in the land of Egypt, that was their
own fault. Milton had magnificently expressed the origin of slavery:
“He that hath light within his own clear breast May walk i’ the noontide
and enjoy bright day, But he that hides dark deeds and foul thoughts.
. . . Himself is his own dungeon.”
The bondage of Egypt was, he believed, self-imposed. There is no account
available, he said, of the enslavement of the Children of Israel by the
Egyptians, but a careful consideration of the history of various peoples
shows beyond the possibility of a mistake being made, that only those
become enslaved who are best fitted for enslavement. A king arose that
knew not Joseph--a king who could not believe that at any time there was
belonging to that race of strangers a man of supreme intelligence.
The Israelites bowed their heads to the yoke of the superior race, the
Egyptians, and took their rightful place as slaves. After many days a
man of extraordinary intelligence appeared in the person of Moses. A
patriot of patriots, he gave the race their God--they seemed to have
lived in a perfectly Godless condition in Egypt; and their theology had
to be constructed for them by their leader, as well as their laws: the
laws for the desert wanderers, and a decalogue for all humanity. He was
equal to any emergency, and he had no scruples. He almost succeeded in
making a great nation out of a horde of superstitious robbers. Had he
succeeded the record would have thrown civilization back a thousand
years. Happy it was for the world that the triumph of crime was brief.
The cement of bloodshed that kept the kingdom of Israel together for a
time soon dissolved. Captivity followed captivity. For a thousand years
no improvement whatever took place in the condition of the people--they
had no arts; they lived in mud huts at a period when architecture
reached a higher level than it had ever attained to previously. When
the patriot prophets arose, endeavoring to reform them with words of
fire--the sacred fire of truth--they killed them. One chance remained
to them. They were offered a religion that would have purified them, in
place of the superstition that had demoralized them, and they cried
with one voice, as everyone who had known their history and their social
characteristics knew they would cry, “Not this Man, but Barabbas.” That
was from the earliest period in the history of the race the watchword of
the Hebrews. Not the man, but the robber. All that is good and noble and
true in manhood--the mercy, the compassion, the self-sacrifice that are
comprised in true manhood--they cast beneath their feet, they spat upon,
they crucified; but all of the Barabbas in man they embraced. Thus are
they become a hissing in the earth, and properly so; for those who hiss
at the spirit which has always animated Judaism show that they abhor a
thing that is abhorrent. “All Scripture is profitable,” continued the
preacher, “and practically all that is referred to in the text is an
indictment of Judaism. The more earnestly we hold to this truth the
greater will be the profit accruing to us from a consideration of the
Scripture. But what more terrible indictment of the Hebrew systems could
we have than that which is afforded us in the record that the father of
the race had twelve sons? He had. But where are ten of them now? Swept
out of existence without leaving a single record of their destruction
even to their two surviving brethren.” He concluded his sermon by
stating that he hoped it would be clearly understood that he recognized
the fact that in England those members of the Hebrew community who had
adopted the methods, the principles, the truths of Christianity even
though they still maintained their ancient form of worship in their
synagogues, were on a line with civilization. They searched their
scriptures and these scriptures had been profitable to them, inasmuch as
they had been taught by those scriptures how impossible it was for that
form of superstition known as Judaism to be the guide for any people on
the face of the earth.
CHAPTER VIII.
I HOPE THAT YOU WILL NOT EVENTUALLY MARRY AN INFIDEL.
Some of the congregation were greatly disappointed. They had expected a
brilliant and startling attack upon some other Bible personages who had
hitherto been looked on with respect and admiration. But the sermon
had only attacked the Jewish system as a whole, and everyone knows that
there is nothing piquant in an attack, however eloquent it may be, upon
a religious system in the abstract. One might as well find entertainment
in an attack upon the Magnetic Pole or a denunciation of the Precession
of the Equinoxes. No one cared, they said, anything more about the
failure of the laws of Moses than one did about such abstractions as the
Earth’s Axis, or the Great Glacial Epoch. It was quite different when
the characters of well-known individuals were subjected to an assault.
People could listen for hours to an attack upon celebrated persons.
If Mr. Holland’s book had only dealt with the characteristics of the
religion of the Jews, it would never have attracted attention, these
critics said. It had called for notice simply because of its trenchant
remarks in regard to some of those Bible celebrities who, it was
generally understood, were considered worthy of admiration.
Why could Mr. Holland not have followed up the course indicated in his
book by showing up some of the other persons in the Bible? it was asked.
There were quite a number of characters in the Bible who were regarded
as estimable. Why could he not then have followed up his original scheme
of “showing them up?”--that was the phrase of the critics. There was
Solomon, for instance. He was usually regarded as a person of high
intellectual gifts; but there was surely a good deal in his career which
was susceptible of piquant treatment. And then someone said that Noah
should have a chapter all to himself, also Lot; and what about the spies
who had entered Jericho? Could the imagination not suggest the story
which they had told to their wives on their return to the camp, relative
to the house in which they had passed all their spare time? They
supposed that Jericho was the Paris of the high class Jews of those
days.
Then the conversation of these critics drifted on to the Paris of
to-day, and the sermon and its lessons were forgotten as easily as is
an ordinary sermon. But all the same it was plain that the clergyman had
fallen short of what was expected of him upon this occasion. His book
had gone far, and it was felt that he should have gone one better than
his book, so to speak. Instead of that his sermon had been one to which
scarcely any exception could be taken.
But the bishop’s chaplain, who had watched at intervals of praying, came
to the conclusion that the rector of St. Chad’s was a good deal cleverer
than the majority of youngish clergymen who endeavor to qualify
for prosecution. It may be unorthodox to cross one’s arms with the
regularity of clockwork on coming to certain words in the service, and
young clergymen had been prosecuted for less; but it was not unorthodox
to speak evil of the Jews--for did not the Church pray for the Jews
daily? and can anyone insult a man more than by praying for him--unless,
of course, he is a king, in which case it is understood that no insult
is intended?
The bishop’s chaplain prepared a report of the sermon for his lordship,
pointing out its general harmony, broadly speaking, with the tenets of
the Church.
Mr. Ayrton also seemed to perceive a sort of cleverness in the sermon.
There was nothing in it that was calculated to shock even the most
susceptible hearer. Indeed, it seemed to Mr. Ayrton that there was a
good deal in it that was calculated to soothe the nerves of those who
had been shocked by the book. He said something to this effect to his
daughter as they walked homeward. He was rather anxious to find out what
chance George Holland had of being restored to his daughter’s favor.
But Phyllis was firm in her condemnation of the methods of Mr. Holland.
“He attacks the Jews as a race in order to ridicule the statement in
the Bible that they were God’s chosen people, and they were, you know,
papa,” she said.
“They took so much for granted themselves, at any rate,” said her
father, with some show of acquiescence.
“But they were, and they are to be restored to their own land,” said
Phyllis.
“Are they, my dear? I should like to see the prospectus of that
enterprise.”
“You are mocking, papa. They are to be restored; it says so in the Bible
quite clearly.”
“I am not mocking, Phyllis. If gold is discovered in Palestine, the Jews
may go there in some numbers; but, take my word for it, they won’t go
otherwise. They couldn’t live in their own land, assuming that it is
their own, which is going pretty far. Palestine wouldn’t support all the
Jews alive at present; it’s a wretched country--I know it well. Besides,
they don’t want to return to it, and furthermore, we couldn’t spare
them.”
“I believe in the Bible, and I have faith,” said Phyllis firmly.
“That’s right,” said her father. “I hope you may always hold to both.
I think that those girls who expect to be regarded as advanced, because
they scoff at the Bible and at faith, are quite horrid. I also hope that
you will not eventually marry an infidel.”
“That would be impossible,” said Phyllis firmly.
“Would it?” said her father. “There is a stronger influence at work in
most of us, at times, than religion. I wonder if it will make a
victim of you, my child, though you did send George Holland about his
business.”
“I don’t quite know what you mean,” said Phyllis, with only the
slightest possible flush.
And she did not know what he meant until six months had passed; but then
she knew.
Seeing that she did not know what he meant, her father thanked Heaven
that Heaven had given him a daughter who was unlike other daughters. He
prayed that she might never become like other daughters. He thought that
it would be good for his daughter to remain without experience of those
overwhelming passions which make up the life of a woman and a man.
Phyllis went out a good deal during the week, and everywhere she found
herself looked at with interest; sometimes she found herself being
examined through a _pince-nez_ as if she were a curious specimen, and a
woman or two smiled derisively at her. She did not know what was meant
by their curiosity--their derision--until one day an old lady named Mrs.
Haddon went up to her and kissed her, saying:
“I made up my mind that I would kiss you, my dear, the first chance I
had. God bless you, my child! You have given your testimony as a woman
should, in these days of scoffing at the truth.”
“Testimony?” said Phyllis, quite puzzled. Had not her father felt a
thrill of gratitude on reflecting that she had none of the qualities of
the prig about her? “Testimony?”
“You have testified to the truth, Miss Ayrton, and you shall have
your reward. You have shown that the truth is more to you than--than
love--the love of man--all that women hold sweet in life. You are right
Miss Ayrton; and all true women must love and respect you.”
Phyllis turned a very brilliant color, and kept her eyes fixed on the
parquet pattern of the floor.
The dear old lady said a good deal more to her, all in praise of her act
of having given Mr. Holland his _conge_ on account of his having written
that shockingly unorthodox book.
By the end of the week Phyllis Ayrton was looked on as quite as much a
heroine for having given Mr. Holland his _conge_, as Mr. Holland was
a hero for having braved the bishop in writing the book. She wore her
laurels meekly, though she had been rather embarrassed when a ray of
intelligence appeared among the dark sayings of the dear old lady. She
could not help wondering how all the world had become possessed of the
knowledge that she had said good-by to her lover. She considered if
it were possible that Mr. Holland had spread abroad the account of her
ill-treatment of him--he would naturally allude to it as ill-treatment.
The quick judgment of Ella Linton had enabled her to perceive how
valuable to Mr. Holland was the incident of his rejection by Phyllis.
As a beginning of his persecution, its importance could scarcely be
overestimated. But it did not take Phyllis long to reassure herself
on this matter. It was, of course, Ella who had given the incident
publicity. She had done so for two reasons: first, in order that her
little afternoon At Home might have additional luster attached to it
by the presence of a young woman who had, in these days of a marriage
market overstocked with young women (and old women, for that matter),
thrown over an eligible man for conscience’ sake; and secondly, in order
that her At Home might have additional luster attached to it from
the presence of the man who allowed himself to be thrown over by a
delightful girl rather than refrain from publishing what he believed to
be the truth.
Mrs. Linton achieved both the objects which, as a good hostess, she had
in view. Mr. Holland put in an appearance in one of Mrs. Linton’s big
drawing rooms, and so did Phyllis Ayrton.
Everyone admitted that only a woman of the social capacity--some people
called it genius--of Mrs. Linton could accomplish such a feat as the
bringing into the same room two persons who had given unmistakable
evidence of possessing a conscience apiece--the woman who had sacrificed
the man for conscience’ sake, and the man who had sacrificed the woman
under the same influence. It was a social triumph, beyond doubt.
People talked in whispers of conscience, the advantages and the
disadvantages of its possession, and the consensus of opinion was of its
being quite appropriate in regard to a clergyman, and that it was not
altogether out of place on the part of a spinster, provided that she had
counteracting virtues; but, on the whole, it was perhaps wiser to leave
the conscience with the Nonconformists.
Phyllis did not see George Holland until she had got halfway up the
first of Mrs. Linton’s rooms. She did not hear her friend Ella say to
someone, in a low voice of apprehension:
“For Heaven’s sake, keep them apart! They are just the sort of people
to greet each other quite cordially; and if they do, no one here will
believe that their engagement is off. People here don’t understand how a
delicate conscience works.”
That was what Ella murmured to a man who had been invited in order that
he might make himself generally useful. She gave him his instructions
too late, however. Before she had quite completed her greeting of
Phyllis, Mr. Holland was beside them.
He had not forced himself forward with any measure of persistency; no
one seemed to notice any movement on his part until he had shaken
hands with Phyllis, and was chatting with her and Mrs. Linton quite
pleasantly--much too pleasantly for a man with a conscience, someone
said later in the afternoon; but that was someone who wanted to talk to
Phyllis himself.
People watched her when she suffered herself to be gradually withdrawn
from the center of the room to a seat that chanced to be vacant, just
behind the open door of the conservatory. Could it be possible, they
asked one another, that she had indeed given his dismissal to Mr.
Holland the previous week? Why, they were chatting together as
pleasantly as they had ever chatted. Had not the people who talked so
glibly of conscience and its mysterious operations spoken a little too
soon? Or had the quarrel been patched up? If so, which of the two had
got rid of the conscience that had brought about the original rupture?
These questions were answered at divers places by divers persons, all
the time that George Holland and Phyllis Ayrton remained side by side
at the entrance to the conservatory, at the further end of which a vocal
quartette party sang delightfully--delightfully; sufficiently loud to
enable all the guests who wanted to talk to do so without inconvenience,
and at the same time not so loud as to become obtrusive. It is so seldom
that a quartette party manage to hit this happy medium, people said.
They generally sing as if they fancy that people come together to hear
them, not remembering that the legitimate object of music at an At Home
is to act as an accompaniment to the conversation.
When Phyllis was leaving the house half an hour later, a man was just
entering the first drawing room--a man with a face burnt to the color of
an old mezzotint.
He looked at her for a moment as he passed her, for her face had
suddenly lighted up, as such a face as hers does upon occasions.
The man could scarcely fail to perceive that she knew his name was
Herbert Courtland.
But then he was accustomed to be recognized by women as well as men in
every part of Europe, since he had returned from New Guinea with the
tail feathers of the meteor-bird, which were now being made into a fan
for Mrs. Linton.
CHAPTER IX.
MY FATHER HAS HIS IDEAS ON WHAT’S CALLED REALISM.
The last rumble of applause had died away at the Parthenon Theater, but
the audience were leaving very slowly; they wished to linger as long
as possible within the atmosphere of the building; though, like the
atmosphere of many sacred places, that of the Parthenon was, just at
that time, a trifle unsavory. The first performance of the drama of
“Cagliostro” had just taken place, and, as the first nights at the
Parthenon are invariably regarded as the most exclusive functions of the
year, the stalls and boxes had been crowded. And the distinction which
in Mayfair and Belgravia attaches to those who have been in the boxes
and stalls on Parthenon first night is not greater than that which,
in Bloomsbury and Camden Town, accrues to those who have occupied
places--not necessarily seats--in the other parts of the house. It is
understood, too, that the good will of Bloomsbury and Camden Town
is much more valuable to a play than the best wishes of Mayfair and
Belgravia.
The gracious manager had made his customary speech of thanks,--for
everything produced at the Parthenon was a success,--and while the
general audience were moving away very reluctantly, some distinguished
men and women followed the guidance of a strong Irish brogue as a flock
follows a bell-wether, through a door that led to the stage. Here
the great actor and the ever-charming lady who divided with him
the affections of West as well as East, received their guests’
congratulations in such a way as made the guests feel that the success
was wholly due to their good will.
Mrs. Linton, who was a personage in society,--her husband had found a
gold mine (with the assistance of Herbert Courtland) and she had herself
written a book of travels which did not sell,--had brought Phyllis with
her party to the theater, and they had gone on the stage with the other
notabilities, at the conclusion of the performance. George Holland,
having become as great a celebrity as the best of them during that
previous fortnight, had naturally received a stall and an invitation to
the stage at the conclusion of the performance. He had not been of Mrs.
Linton’s party, but he lay in wait for that party as they emerged from
their box.
Another man also lay in wait for them, and people--outsiders--nudged
one another in the theater as the passers down Piccadilly had nudged one
another, whispering his name, Herbert Courtland. Others--they were not
quite such outsiders--nudged one another when Mrs. Linton laid down her
new feather fan on the ledge of the box. It was possibly the loveliest
thing that existed in the world at that moment. No artist had
ever dreamed of so wonderful a scheme of color--such miracles
of color--combinations in every feather from the quill to the
spider-web-like fluffs at the tips, each of which shone not like gold
but like glass. It was well worth all the nudging that it called forth.
But when Mrs. Linton had picked it up from the ledge, beginning to
oscillate it in front of her fair face, the nudging ceased. People
looked at the thing with eyes wide with astonishment, but with lips
mute.
A more satisfactory evening she had never spent, Mrs. Linton felt; and
now the fan was hanging down among the brocaded flowers of her dress,
making them look tawdry as she left the box, and noticed how at
least two men were lying in wait for her party. There was, however, a
frankness in Herbert Courtland’s strategy which George Holland’s did
not possess. Mr. Courtland was looking directly at her; Mr. Holland was
pretending to be engrossed in conversation with a man in one of the end
stalls.
She lifted a finger and Courtland went to her side. The difficulties of
the jungle along the banks of the Fly River were trifling compared with
the obstacles he had to overcome in obeying her.
“I had no idea that you would be here,” she said.
“Where else should I be?” he said, in so low a tone as to be heard only
by her.
“We are so glad,” said Mrs. Linton. “I want to present you to my dearest
friend, Phyllis Ayrton.”
“A woman!” said he.
“Not yet. She has never met a man. She will to-night,” said Ella. Then
she turned to Phyllis, who was walking beside Lord Earlscourt. “Come
here, Phyllis,” she said; “you are the only person in London who doesn’t
yet know Mr. Herbert Courtland. This is Mr. Courtland.”
Thus it was that Phyllis went upon the stage of the Parthenon by the
side of Herbert Courtland instead of by the side of George Holland;
and the little laugh that Mrs. Linton gave was due to her careful
observation of the latter’s face when he perceived, as he did in spite
of the engrossing nature of his conversation with his friend in the end
stall, how his designs had been defeated by her tactics. She would not
have minded having Herbert Courtland with her for the hour they might
remain at the theater, but she had made up her mind that it was not
to Phyllis’ advantage that Mr. Holland should continue by her side in
public after she had given him his dismissal.
She also perceived, with even greater gratification, that Herbert
Courtland was looking nearly as dissatisfied with the result of her
tactics as George Holland. If he had looked pleased at being by the side
of Phyllis when he expected to be with her--Ella--what would life be
worth to her?
But if he was dissatisfied at being with Phyllis instead of Mrs. Linton,
he did not consider that any reason for neglecting the former. He
wondered if she had any choice in sandwiches--of course she had in
champagne. His curiosity was satisfied, and Phyllis was amply provided
for.
“You are Mrs. Linton’s dearest friend,” he remarked casually, as they
leaned up against the profile of the Church scene in “Cagliostro,” for
they were standing in the “wings”--to be exact--on the O. P. side.
“She is my dearest friend, at any rate,” said Phyllis.
“You were not at school together. She is four or five years older than
you.”
“Only three. When she got married she seemed to me to be almost
venerable. Three years seemed a long time then.”
“But now you fancy that you have formed a right idea of what is meant by
three years?”
“Well, a better idea, at any rate.”
“You are still a good way off it. But if you have formed a right
estimate of a woman’s friendship----”
“That’s still something, you mean to say? But why did you stop short,
Mr. Courtland?”
Phyllis was looking up to his face with a smile of inquiry.
“I was afraid that you might think I was on the way to preach a sermon
on the text of woman’s friendship. I pulled myself up just in time. I’m
glad that I didn’t frighten you.”
“Oh, no; you didn’t frighten me, Mr. Courtland. I was only wondering
how you would go on--whether you would treat the topic sentimentally or
cynically.”
“And what conclusion did you come to on the subject?”
“I know that you are a brave man--perhaps the bravest man alive. You
would, I think, have treated the question seriously--feelingly.”
He laughed.
“The adoption of that course implies courage certainly. All the men of
sentimentality--which is something quite different from sentiment, mind
you--have taken to writing melodrama and penny novelettes. You didn’t
hear much sentimentality on this stage to-night, or any other night, for
that matter.”
“No; it would have sounded unreal. A Parthenon audience would resent
what they believed to be a false note in art; and a Parthenon audience
is supposed to be the concentration of the spirit of the period in
thought and art; isn’t it?”
“I don’t know. I’m half a savage. But I like to think the best of
a Parthenon audience; you and I formed part of that concentration
to-night--yes, I like to think the best of it. I suppose we know--we,
the Parthenon audience, I mean--what our feelings are on the art of
acting--the art of play-writing.”
“I shouldn’t like to have to define my feelings at a moment’s notice.”
“One must make a beginning, and then work up gradually to the
definition.”
“For instance----”
“Well, for instance, there’s something that people call realism
nowadays.”
“My father has his ideas on what’s called realism,” Phyllis laughed.
“‘Realism in painting is the ideal with a smudge.’”
“I should like to hear what you think of it?”
He also laughed sympathetically.
“Oh, I only venture to think that realism is the opposite to reality.”
“And, so far as I can gather, your definition is not wanting in
breadth--no, nor in accuracy. Sentimentality is the opposite to
sentiment.”
“That is a point on which we agreed a moment ago. My father says
that sentiment is a strong man’s concealment of what he feels, while
sentimentality is a weak man’s expression of what he doesn’t feel.”
“And the Parthenon audience--you and I--laugh at the latter--that is,
because we have practiced some form of athletics. The bicycle has given
its _coup de grace_ to sentimentality. That man over there with the head
and face like a lion’s, and that woman whose face is nature illuminated,
have long ago recognized the shallowness of sentimentality--the depths
of sentiment. We could not imagine either of them striking a false note.
They have been the teachers of this generation--the generation to which
you belong. Great Heavens! to think that for so many years human passion
should be banished from art, though every line of Shakspere is tremulous
with passion! Why, the word was absolutely banished; it was regarded as
impure.”
“I know that--I was at a boarding school. The preceptresses regarded as
impure everything that is human.”
“Whereas, just the opposite is the case?”
“I didn’t say that, Mr. Courtland.”
“You could scarcely say it. I am only beginning to think it, and I have
lived among savages for years. That man with the lion’s face has not
feared to deal with passion. All actors who have lived since Garrick
have never gone further than to illustrate passion in the hands of a
man; but that lion-man, whose stage we are now standing on, shows us
not the passion in the hands of a man, but the man in the hands of the
passion. The man who tears the passion to tatters is the robustious
periwig-pated fellow; the actor, who shows us the man torn in tatters
by the passion, is the supreme artist. I am no authority on modern
literature; but I must confess that I was astonished at the change that
a few years have brought about. I was in a proper position for noticing
it, having been practically without books for two years.”
“Is it a change for the better, do you think, Mr. Courtland?”
“I feel certain that it is for the better. I refer, of course, only
to the books of those real investigators--real artists. I refer to the
fountain-heads, not to the hydrants laid down by the water companies at
the end of about ten miles of foul piping. I don’t like the product of
the hydrants. I like the springs, and, however natural they may be, I
don’t find anything impure in them. Why I love the Bible is because it
is so very modern.”
“You don’t think, then, that it is yet obsolete, Mr. Courtland?”
“No book that deals so truly with men and women can ever be obsolete,
the fact being that men and women are the same to-day as they were ten
thousand years ago, perhaps ten million years ago, though I’m not quite
so sure of that. The Bible, and Shakspere, and Rofudingding, a New
Guinea poet, who ate men for his dinner when he had a chance, and,
when he had finished, sang lyrics that stir the hearts of all his
fellow-islanders to this day,--he lived a hundred years ago,--dealt with
men and women; that is why all are as impressive to-day as they were
when originally composed. Men and women like reading about men and
women, and it is becoming understood, nowadays, that the truth about men
and women can never be contemptible.”
“Ah, but how do we know that it is the truth?”
“Therein the metaphysician must minister to himself. I cannot suggest to
you any test of the truth, if you have none with you. Everyone capable
of pronouncing a judgment on any matter must feel how truthfully the
personages in the Bible have been drawn.”
“Yes; the Bible is the Word of God.”
“I believe that it is, most certainly. That profound wisdom; that
toleration of the weaknesses of men; that sympathy with men, who cannot
fathom the mysteries of life, and the struggle for life of all things
that love life; that spirit I call God, and I don’t think that a better
name has been found for it.”
“It--for _it_? You think of God as merely a force of nature?”
“Just the contrary. God is the spirit that lives in warfare with nature.
Great Heavens! isn’t that the truth of which the whole Bible is the
allegory? Nature and nature’s laws constitute the Devil. God is the
opposing Force. It is a law of nature to kill off the weak, to crush
that which has fallen in the struggle. It is God who helps the weak--who
helps the feeble.”
“But merely a force?”
“Oh, I have no private opinion on that part of the question. I am not
like that modern philosopher who fancied he had solved the whole problem
by spelling God with a small g. But don’t you think that we have gone
quite far enough in our exchange of confidence for a first meeting?
You are what the Italians call _simpatica_--that is, more than merely
sympathetic. You look at one, and lead one on to confide in you as one
does not confide in most girls. You are a thoroughly dangerous young
woman, Miss Ayrton, though you are Mrs. Linton’s dearest friend. By the
way, can you make her confide in you?”
There seemed to be a measure of curiosity, not to say anxiety, in the
tone of this inquiry.
“Well, she makes me confide in her. I wonder if that is just the same
thing,” said Phyllis.
“It’s not exactly the same thing,” said he. “But it’s the proper course
for dearest friends to adopt toward each other. For the maintenance of
a firm friendship between any two persons, only one should confide; the
other should be strictly the confidante. By the way, I wonder what is
the average duration of the dearest friendship between two women.”
“Why should it have any limits?” said Phyllis gravely. “What is the
duration of the friendship between two men?”
“It mostly depends on when the woman makes her appearance,” said he,
with a laugh.
“Ah! So that----Ah, never mind. Ella was my dearest friend before Mr.
Linton put in an appearance.”
“And he was mine before she put in an appearance,” said he.
“I didn’t know that,” said Phyllis.
“There, you see, is my contention borne out,” said he. “You are the one
who confides; she is the one who receives the confidences, and respects
them, I’m sure. I hope that you will do the same, Miss Ayrton. Don’t let
anyone know that I confided in you all that I think on the subject of
the old Adam and the new Eve.”
“No one except Ella Linton, and you know that I can keep nothing from
her if we are to remain dearest friends. Perhaps she knows already the
limits of your belief, Mr. Courtland.”
“She does--she does.”
At that moment Ella Linton came up with Lord Earlscourt.
“Has Mr. Courtland been telling you all about the bird of paradise?” she
asked of Phyllis, while she waved the tail feathers of the loveliest of
the birds of paradise before her face.
“The bird?--not the _bird_,” laughed Phyllis.
“But the topic was paradise?” Ella joined in the laugh--yes, to some
extent.
“I talked of Adam--the old one of that name,” said Mr. Courtland.
“And Eve--the new one of that name,” said Phyllis.
“Theology is in the air!” cried Ella. “Even the stage of a theater is
not free from the taint. It must be the case of Mr. Holland. Where is
Mr. Holland, by the way, Lord Earlscourt?”
“I haven’t seen him for some time. He must have gone away. I’m not Mr.
Holland’s keeper, thank Heaven!” said Lord Earlscourt, with heartfelt
devoutness.
“Now you know that everyone holds you accountable for what he has done!”
said Ella.
“Then that’s just where everyone makes a mistake,” said he. “Great
Lord! is it your idea of British justice to persecute the wrong man? Why
doesn’t the bishop do his duty? What do we pay him for?”
“We won’t abandon our charity at the call of theology,” said Ella.
“Theology--represented by Lord Earlscourt,” said Mr. Courtland.
“You don’t know how I’ve been abused during the past fortnight, indeed
you don’t,” moaned Lord Earlscourt. “Why, there’s my own wife, she
abused me like a cab-driver because George Holland had been with us on
the platform when the Chinese teetotalers came here to protest against
the public houses in England; she says that his backsliding will
put back the cause a quarter of a century. Then there are the other
churchwardens; they look on me as if I had been making a suggestion to
raffle the sacred plate. George Holland has a run for his money, but
I’ve had no fun out of it.”
“It does seem hard,” said Courtland. “But it’s plain that the case calls
for persecution, and why not persecute you? Someone must be persecuted,
you’ll admit.”
“Then why the--”
“I thought that your good old Bunyip would look in on us before long,”
said Courtland. “There’s no possibility of discussing delicate points in
theology without him.”
“I think we had better go home,” said Ella.
“We must have some consideration for our host,” said Courtland. “We
didn’t all play the part of _Cagliostro_ to-night.”
During the movement of her circle and the adjustment of wraps,
preparatory to the delivery of a valedictory word of congratulation to
the great actor, Ella said in a low tone to Herbert Courtland:
“Cagliostro? No; we didn’t all play the part; but--well, Cagliostro was
a weaver of spells.”
There was a pause before he said:
“Yes, but the art did not die with him. He had a daughter to whom he
taught his art.”
“Not that I ever heard of,” said she. “What do you think of Phyllis
Ayrton?”
“I think that she is the dearest friend of my dearest friend,” he
replied.
“And I should like her to become the dearest friend of my dearest
friend.”
“That would be impossible,” he said.
Then the felicitous valedictory word was said to the great actor and
actress, and Mrs. Linton’s carriage received Phyllis. Lord Earlscourt
took a seat in Mr. Courtland’s hansom.
“What do you think about Mr. Courtland?” inquired Ella of her dearest
friend, as they lay back with their heads very close together.
There was a long pause before Phyllis replied:
“I really don’t know what I think about him. He is, I suppose, the
bravest man alive at present.”
“What? Is that the result of your half hour’s chat with him?”
“Oh, dear, no! but all the same, it’s pleasant for a girl to feel that
she has been talking to a brave man. It gives one a sense of--of--is it
of being quite safe?”
“Good gracious, no! just the opposite--that is----Oh, you don’t
understand.”
“No, I don’t.”
“Never mind. Tell me what he talked about?”
“Oh, everything! God.”
“I know that it was in the air. He has ideas, I believe. He never
talked on that topic to me. I hope you found him to be quite sound,
theologically.”
“But it seems rather funny, doesn’t it?” said Phyllis; “but I really
don’t think that when I was listening to him I considered for a moment
whether he was sound or the opposite in his views.”
“Funny? It would have been rather funny if you had done that,” laughed
Ella. “The question that a healthy girl--and you are a healthy girl,
Phyllis--asks herself after talking to such a man as Herbert Courtland
is not, Is his theology sound? What healthy girl cares the fraction of
a farthing about the theology of a man with a face like Herbert
Courtland’s and arms like Herbert Courtland’s? You talked with him for
half an hour, and then come to me and say that you suppose he is the
bravest man alive in the world. That was right--quite right. That is
just what every healthy girl should say. We understand a man’s thews and
sinews; we likewise understand what bravery in a man is, but what do we
know, or, for that matter, care about his theology, whether it is sound
or the opposite? Nothing. We don’t even care whether he has any theology
or not.”
“Good gracious, Ella! one would fancy that you thought----”
“Thought what?”
“I don’t quite know. You see I met Mr. Courtland quite casually, just
as I met a dozen men at various places during the week. Why should you
question me more closely about him than about the dozen other men? He
only talked a little more widely, and perhaps wildly. His bravery is no
more to me than his theology.”
“Of course it isn’t, Phyllis. But there was the case of George
Holland--”
“That is very different, Ella. I had engaged myself to marry George
Holland. It would be impossible for me to marry any man who had shown
his contempt for--for everything that I regard as sacred.”
“I believe it would, if you didn’t love that man. But if you loved
the man----Oh, when you come to know what it means to love you will
understand all. A woman before she loves is--what is she, an egg before
it is hatched? That sounds ridiculous. Better say a green chrysalis
before it breaks into a butterfly; for the transition comes at
once. Theology! Oh, my Phyllis, haven’t you read in history, true
history--novels written by men who know us and how we were created, and
why--haven’t you read what women do when they truly love a man? How they
fling every consideration to the winds: heaven--home--husband--God--Mrs.
Grundy? Theology! Ah, you are a healthy girl. You never cared a scrap
for George Holland. You were glad when the excuse presented itself in
order to throw him over.”
“Yes; I believe that is quite true.”
Ella’s cry of surprise, and her laugh that followed, shocked her
companion, and feeling that this was the case, the one who laughed
hastened to make her apologies.
“Don’t be annoyed with me, dear,” she cried. “But I really couldn’t
help that laugh when I thought of your earnestness the week before
last. Then, you will remember, you were in great pain because of the
heterodoxy of George Holland. Didn’t I tell you at that time that you
had never loved him? You were ready to assure me that you had, and that
you were making a great sacrifice to your principles?”
“I remember very well,” said Phyllis, with a sound that was not far
removed from a sob.
“Ah, you are a puzzle to yourself, you poor little chrysalis,” said
Ella, putting the meteoric feathers playfully down upon the serious
face of Phyllis--its seriousness was apparent beneath the light of the
carriage lamp. “No, don’t make the attempt to explain anything to me.
Don’t try to reconcile your frankness now with your pretense then,
because you’ll certainly make a muddle of it, and because no such
attempt is necessary to be made to me. I know something of the girl and
her moods--not a great deal, perhaps, but enough to prevent my doing you
an injustice. You are perfectly consistent, my Phyllis.”
“Oh, consistent?”
“Perfectly consistent with your nature as a girl. It is the nature of
a girl to change with every wind that blows. It is only the female prig
who acts consistently under all circumstances. In a world the leading
of which is its men, inconsistency is the best nature of a healthy girl
made to be loved by men. One doesn’t sneer at the weathercock because
one hour it points to the north and the next to the east. ‘Tis its
nature to. ‘Tis our nature to change with every breeze of man that bears
down on us. That’s why they love us and detest the prigs. Here we are at
your house. I hope you don’t keep your maid up for you. I would scorn to
keep a girl out of her bed for the sake of brushing my hair. Good-night,
dear, and dream of the paradise that awaits you--a paradise in which
there are birds to be shot, birds of paradise to make feather fans for
women who hold them to their bosoms one minute, and the next dispose of
them to Mr. and Mme. Abednego with last season’s opera wrap. There’s a
parable for you to sleep upon.”
“And you--you?” cried Phyllis.
“Oh, as for me, I’ll, I’ll--well, I think I’ll put my meteor fan on
the pillow beside my own to-night. I’m still newfangled with my toy
and--well, I’m a woman.”
At this instant the carriage pulled up to Mr. Ayrton’s hall door and the
footman jumped down from the box to run up the steps and ring the bell.
“Good-night,” said Phyllis. “I enjoyed my evening greatly, and the drive
home best of all.”
Ella Linton’s laugh was smothered among the delicate floss of the
feathers which she held up to her face.
CHAPTER X.
IT IS THE PRICE OF BLOOD.
Phyllis had a good deal to think of after she had sat for half an
hour with her father in the room where they worked together for the
discomfiture of the opposite party, and had given him some account
of the representation of the play at the Parthenon. Her father was
delighted to find her in high spirits. So many people come back from the
theater looking glum and worn out, yawning and mumbling when asked what
they have seen and what it had all been about. Phyllis was not glum,
nor did she mumble. She was able to describe scene after scene, and more
than once she sprang from her seat, carried away by her own powers of
description, and began to act the bits that had impressed her--bits the
force of which could only be understood when described with gestures and
pretty posturing.
Her father thought he had never seen anything so pretty in his life.
(What a girl she was, to be sure, to have so easily recovered from the
effects of that terrible ordeal through which she had passed--having to
dismiss at a moment’s notice the man whom she had promised to marry!)
He had certainly never seen anything so fascinating as her pretty
posturing, with the electric lights gleaming over her white neck with
its gracious curves, and her firm white arms from which her gloves had
been stripped.
It had been his intention to describe to her a scene which had taken
place in the House of Commons that night--a scene of Celt and Saxon
mingling in wild turmoil over a question of neglected duty on the part
of a Government official: not the one who was subsequently decorated
by the sovereign a few days after his neglect of duty had placed the
country in jeopardy, and had precipitated the downfall of the ministry
and the annihilation of his party as a political factor; not this
man, but another, who had referred to Trafalgar Square as the private
thoroughfare of the crown. The scene had been an animated one, and Mr.
Ayrton had hoped to derive a good deal of pleasure from describing it to
his daughter; but when he had listened to her, and watched her for a few
minutes, he came to the conclusion that it would be absurd for him to
make an effort to compete with her. What was his wretched little story
of Parliamentary squalor compared with these psychological subtleties
which had interested his daughter all the evening?
He listened to and watched that lovely thing, overflowing with the
animation that comes from a quick intelligence--a keen appreciation of
the intelligence of the great artists who had interpreted a story which
thrilled the imagination of generation after generation, and he felt
that Parliament was a paltry thing. Parliament--what was Parliament? The
wrangle of political parties over a paltry issue. It had no real life
in it; it had nothing of the fullness and breadth of the matters that
interested such people as had minds--imagination.
“You are tired,” she cried at last. “It is thoughtless of me to keep you
out of your bed. You have had a weary night, I am sure. Was it the Irish
again, or the horrid teetotalers?”
“It was both, my dear,” said he. “Phyllis,” he added solemnly, “an Irish
teetotaler is a fearful thing.”
“You shall forget all the intemperate teetotalers in a beautiful sleep,”
said she, putting her arms around his neck. “Good-night, papa! It was so
thoughtless of me to keep you up. It is one o’clock.”
“It appears to me that you are the one who should be ready to succumb,”
said her father. “I had nothing to stimulate my imagination. Practical
politics has not yet discovered a good working reply to the man who
calls his fellow-man a liar, so the political outlook is not very
cheering.”
“That is what is greatly needed: a satisfactory retort--verbal, of
course--to that every-day assertion.”
“It has become the most potent influence in the House of Commons, during
the past year or two; and the worst of the matter is that the statement
is nearly always correct.”
“Then there is all the greater need for a _modus vivendi_”--she had an
ample acquaintance with the jargon of diplomacy. “I don’t despair of
Parliament being able to suggest an efficient retort.”
“Parliament: two ragamuffins quarreling up an entry over a rotten
orange. Good-night, my child!”
She was at last in her own room: an apartment of gracious-tinted fabrics
and pink satin panels; of tapestried sofas made by French artists before
the lovely daughter of Maria Teresa went to her death. She switched on
the lights in the candle sconces, and threw herself down upon one of the
sofas. Her theater wrap and fan she had laid over a chair.
It was not to the drama which she had seen superbly acted at the
Parthenon that her thoughts went out; but to the words which her dearest
friend had spoken when driving back from the theater.
What words were they?
She could not recollect them now; but she was still conscious of the
impression which they had produced upon her while they were being
spoken. That impression was that up to that instant all the issues of
her life had been unworthy of a moment’s consideration. She had taken
what she believed to be a deep interest in many matters during the five
years that she had been the head of her father’s house. She had, she
knew, been of the greatest help to her father in his political life, not
merely turning her memory to good account in discovering the incautious
phrases in the speeches of the men who were foolish enough to be his
opponents, but actually advising him, when he asked her, on many matters
about which the newspapers had been full. Then she had taken an active
part in more than one of those “movements” which became the topic of a
London season until compelled by an invisible but all-powerful authority
to move on and make way for the next new thing. She had moved with
every movement, and had proved her capacity to control herself when the
movement became uncontrollable. And then she had thought how worthy a
position in life would be that of the wife of the rector of a church
like St. Chad’s.
That idea had remained with her, as had already been said, for some
months, until, to be exact in regard to the date, the other young women,
whom she had been watching with interest, had bought their brilliant
blouses with the newest and, consequently, most abnormal sleeves,
casting aside the sober-hued bodices which they had worn in hope.
How paltry were all these aspirations, these undertakings!
That was what was dinning in her ears all the time Ella had been talking
in the carriage.
But why, why, why should all her previous interests, including the
consideration of the questions of orthodoxy and the other thing, seem so
ridiculously small while Ella was speaking?
That was the question which puzzled her. Had Ella shown her a way to
something better, something higher, something better worthy of the
aspiration of a woman? She could not say that that had been the drift of
her large discourse. What she had said had actually been puzzling in its
vagueness, its daring images--all images are vague; its allegories--all
allegories are indefinite.
And yet--and yet--and yet----
With a motion of impatience Phyllis sprang to her feet. After a pause
she went to a little satin-wood cabinet which she had turned into a
bookshelf, and took out her Bible. She had never slept a night for years
without reading a chapter; and in order to avert the possibility of her
own feelings or fancies of the moment making any invidious distinction
between the various component parts of a book which is profitable
in every line, she had accustomed herself to read the chapters in
consecutive order from The Genesis to The Revelation. Sometimes, when
she found herself face to face of a night with a purely genealogical
chapter, Phyllis of Philistia had difficulty in crushing down her
unworthy desire to turn to some chapter that seemed to her frail
judgment to contain words of wider comfort to the children of men than
a genealogical tree of the Children of Israel; but she had never yielded
to so unworthy an impulse. Who was she that she should suggest that
one part of the Sacred Book was calculated to be more profitable than
another? Was it not all the Bible?
She had plowed her way through the slough of Hebrew names upon these
occasions, and the blessing of the words had been borne to her in the
form of a sweet sleep.
Her chapter for this night was that which describes the campaign of
David, during which he and his hosts were besieged in their earthworks,
and how the three mighty men had made a sortie through the camp of the
enemy in order to obtain for their leader a cup of water.
She continued the chapter to the end, but all through it those words
were ringing in her ears:
“It is the price of blood; it is the price of blood.”
And as she knelt down beside her bed, her bare white feet peeping out
from beneath the drapery of her white night-dress, in a posture
that would have made the most human atheist believe in the beauty of
devotion, those words were still in her ears: “The price of blood; the
price of blood.”
Good Heavens! How could she carry that feather fan? How could Ella
Linton hold it up to her face--hold her face down to it, flutter
its fairy fluff upon her cheeks? It was the price of blood. Herbert
Courtland had run a greater risk to obtain those feathers than David’s
mighty men had run to draw the water from the well. She had heard all
about the insatiable savagery of the natives of New Guinea. Paradise?
Who had named those birds the birds of paradise? She recollected how
the feathers which Ella had whirled about had held in the very center of
every wonderful disc of rich purple, edged with unequal radiating lines
of gold, a single spot of brilliant crimson, with a tiny star of silver
in the center. The effect of the sunlight glinting over this combination
on the thousand feathers that swept after the bird had caused Herbert
Courtland, the first white man who had seen this glory of glories, to
call it the meteor-bird. But those crimson drops: were they not the
blood of the men who had perished miserably while endeavoring to wrest
its marvels from the tropical forests of that great island?
Paradise?
And Ella could treat those feathers as though they had been plucked from
a tame pheasant? And now she was lying in her bed with the fan on the
pillow beside her!
How could she do it? That was what the girl asked herself while she lay
awake on her own bed. Would Ella not see, on the white pillow beside her
head, the crimson stains of the feathers that had been snatched out
of the dripping red hand of death, but the man who had not feared to
grapple with death itself in that hell which people called a paradise?
But the man, the man who had gripped death by the throat and had torn
the feathers from his grisly, fleshless fingers,--her imagination was
very vivid at night, especially after reading a thrilling chapter of
Hebrew massacre,--that man had talked with her upon such trifles
as books and plays, strange pageants enacted among paper and canvas
unrealities of life. She had actually been leaning against some of these
painted scenes while the man who had fought his way into the depths of
that forest which no white man but himself had yet penetrated,--the man
whose life had, day by day and night by night, been dependent upon the
accuracy of his rifle aim,--had talked with her.
That was really the sum of all her thoughts. She did not try to recall
the words that he had spoken; it was simply the figure of the man who
had been before her that now remained on her mind. She did not stop to
think whether or not he had spoken as a man with intellect would speak;
whether he had spoken as a man whose orthodoxy was beyond suspicion
would speak. The question of his orthodoxy, of his intellect (which may
be just the opposite), did not occur to her. All she felt was that she
had been talking face to face with a man.
So that the result of her evening’s entertainment, after she had read
her inspiring chapter in the Bible and said her bedside prayer, she
might have defined in precisely the same words as she had spoken to
her friend Ella when Ella had asked her, immediately on entering the
carriage, what she thought of Herbert Courtland.
“He is the bravest man in the world at present.”
She did not fall asleep for a considerable time.
CHAPTER XI.
I’M AFRAID THAT I MUST HAVE PRINCIPLE ON MY SIDE.
“It is quite ridiculous, besides being untrue,” said Phyllis, when she
had read the article in the newspaper to which her father called her
attention one morning, a week after the criticism on “Cagliostro” had
appeared. The article was headed:
“DYNAMITE VERSUS EVANGELIZATION,”
and it came out in a weekly paper devoted to the interests of
Nonconformists.
“It is with the deepest regret that we have to call the attention of
our readers and the public [the article ran] to the series of charges
brought by the Revs. Joseph Capper and Evans Jones, the eminent pioneers
of the Nonconformist Eastern Mission, against a gentleman to whom
a considerable amount of honor is just now being given by the Royal
Geographical Society, the Ethnological Institute, the Ornithological
Association, and other secular organizations, on account of his
exploration in the Island of New Guinea. It is scarcely necessary to
say that we allude to Mr. Herbert Courtland. The position which has been
occupied for several years by the two distinguished ministers whose self
sacrifice in endeavoring to spread the Light through the dark places of
the tropical forests of a savage land is well known to the subscribers
to the N. E. M., precludes the possibility of a mistake being made in
this matter, and yet they declare in a letter which we publish this
morning that the manner in which Mr. Courtland pursued his so-called
explorations in the forests which line the banks of the Fly River has
practically made impossible all attempts at mission work in that region.
In several directions it is not denied that Mr. Courtland entered into
friendly relations with some native tribes; but instead of endeavoring
to make the poor benighted creatures acquainted with the Truth, he
actually purchased as slaves over a hundred of them to aid him in
penetrating the Kallolu forest, where, it will be remembered, he
succeeded in shooting the much illustrated meteor-bird, as well
as several other specimens which will delight the members of the
Ornithological Association rather than professing Christians. Our
distinguished correspondents state, and we have no room to doubt their
word, that Mr. Courtland purchased his slaves by a promise to assist
the head man of their tribe against his enemies belonging to another
tribe--a promise which he only too amply fulfilled, the result being an
indiscriminate slaughter of savages who, though avowed cannibals, might
eventually have embraced the truths of Nonconformity. The elephant
rifles of the explorer did their deadly work only too efficiently; but
we trust that, for his own sake, Mr. Courtland will be able to bring
forward trustworthy evidence to rebut the suspicion of his having upon
at least one occasion induced even the friendly natives to believe
that he possessed the power of the Deity to perform miracles, and upon
another occasion of having used dynamite against them by which hundreds
were destroyed in cold blood. It is the evil influences of such
irresponsible men as Mr. Courtland, whose ill-directed enterprise we
cannot in justice to him refrain from acknowledging, that retard the
efforts of those noble pioneers of Nonconformity who have already made
such sacrifices for the cause, and who rejoice at the difficulties with
which they find themselves beset. We understand that a question will
be put to the Minister for the Annexation Department in the House of
Commons toward the latter end of the week, on the subject of the alleged
excesses of the most recent explorer (so-called) of New Guinea--excesses
which if committed in Bulgaria or Armenia, or even Ireland, would have
called for an expression of the horror of Christian Europe; and we may
mention that subscriptions on behalf of the Revs. Joseph Capper and
Evans Jones will be received at the office of this paper to enable them
to substantiate the truth of their statements.”
“It is quite ridiculous, besides being untrue, papa,” cried Phyllis;
“and I hope that you will not fail to take his part and show the
falsehood of such accusations. Could anything be more absurd than that
about the slaves? Slaves! Dynamite!”
“Leading up to subscriptions--don’t forget that,” said her father. “If
subscriptions are to be forthcoming, they must be got up. Traffic in
human flesh, insults to aborigines, Siberia, the conversion of the
Jews--all these appeal directly to the pockets of the Great English
People. Any one of them will constitute an excellent peg on which to
hang an appeal to the pocket. Those two distinguished pioneers of--well,
shall we say civilization or Nonconformity?--understand their business,
my dear.”
“It is no part of their business to try and hold a brave man up to the
execration of everyone.”
“I’m not so sure of that. The technicalities of the mission field
are not so apparent all at once. The Vineyard--well, the system of
vine-culture of some of the organizations is a trifle obscure.”
Phyllis became impatient.
“The House of Commons--a question is to be asked in the House. Then you
must ask another, papa, showing the nonsense of the first.”
“Heavens above! Why should I be dragged into the quarrel, if it is a
quarrel, of Herbert Courtland on the one hand and the Reverends Joseph
Capper and what’s the other, Smith--no, Jones--Evans Jones? I shouldn’t
wonder if he is of Welsh extraction.”
“You will surely not stand passively by and hear a brave man slandered.
That would be unlike you, papa. No; you are bound to protest against the
falsehood.”
“Am I indeed? Why? Because the slandered man, if he is slandered, is the
friend of my daughter’s friend?”
“Exactly--that’s quite sufficient for you to go upon--that and the
falsehood.”
“If it is a falsehood.”
“If--oh, papa--if?”
“If I have your personal guarantee that the statements are
unsubstantiated----”
“Now, you are beginning to jest. I cannot jest on so serious an issue.
Think of it--slaves--dynamite!”
“Both excellent words for missionaries to send home to England--almost
equal to opium and idols from the standpoint of the mission-box.”
Phyllis was solemn for a moment; then she burst into a merry laugh that
only wanted a note of merriment to be delightful. Her father did not
miss that note. He was thinking of another phrase.
“Now, why shouldn’t you say that or something like that, my father?”
cried the girl. “Something to set the House laughing before the Minister
of the Annexation Department has had time to reply? You can do it, you
know.”
“I believe I could,” said Mr. Ayrton thoughtfully. “But why, my child;
why?”
“Why! Why! Oh, if one only said good things when there was a reason for
saying them, how dull we should all be! Any stick for a dog--any jest is
good enough for the House of Commons.”
“Yes; but suppose it is inferred that I am not on the side of the
missionaries? What about Hazelborough?”
Hazelborough was the constituency which Mr. Ayrton represented in the
House of Commons.
“My dear father, where would you be if you couldn’t steer through the
Hazelborough prejudices now and again? You can always say something so
good as to make people not care which way it cuts.”
“What? Oh, Phyllis! I am ashamed of you. Besides, the people of
Hazelborough have got to be extremely sensitive. They have caught the
Nonconformist Conscience. The bacillus of the Nonconformist Conscience
was rampant a short time ago, and it has not yet been stamped out. I’m
afraid that I must have principle on my side--some show of principle,
at any rate--not so wide as a church door or so deep as a well, but
still----”
“And you will, too, papa. I’ll see Ella and get her to find out from Mr.
Courtland what is the truth.”
“Well, perhaps it mightn’t be wise to rush into extremes all at once! I
wouldn’t insist on the truth, if I were you. What’s the House of Commons
that it should be cockered up with the truth? All that is needed is
enough to go on with. An electro-plating of veracity is in keeping with
the economic tendencies of the age.”
“I am not afraid of the truth,” cried Phyllis, without giving the
cynicism of her father the tribute of a smile. “Mr. Courtland would, I
know, be incapable of doing anything unworthy of--of----”
“Let us say an explorer,” suggested her father. He knew that the word
which was in her mind was _Englishman_. She only checked herself when
her imagination caused her to perceive the average silk-hatted man with
his tongue in his cheek at the utterance of the phrase. “Let us say
‘unworthy of an explorer,’” repeated her father; “that is an elastic
phrase.”
Phyllis was irritated.
“I have talked with him,” she said a trifle coldly.
“Yes,” said her father, “once.”
“I should have said that I know Ella.”
“And yet Ella is a woman!”
“Oh, the charges are too ridiculous! Slaves! What nonsense! We all know
what slavery is. Well, where are his slaves now? If he only hired the
natives for a month or two they were only servants, not slaves. The
thing is manifestly ridiculous.”
“Then why should we trouble ourselves with the attempt to rebut it?”
“Because so many people are idiots nowadays,” cried Phyllis warmly.
“Because, no matter how ridiculous a charge which is brought against a
distinguished person may be, some people will be found ready to believe
in its truth. Never mind; I’ll find out the truth; I’ll go to Ella.”
“The fountain-head indeed,” said Mr. Ayrton. “When in search of the
truth, go to a woman.”
“I will, at any rate,” said Phyllis.
And she went thither.
CHAPTER XII.
DYNAMITE--SLAVE-DEALING--MASSACRES--ARMENIA!
Phyllis, of course, knew when to go to Ella with the certainty of
finding her at home. At the luncheon hour Mrs. Linton was always visible
to the three friends whom she had within the confines of Mayfair. She
considered herself blessed among women in the numerical strength of her
friendships; and so perhaps she was; she had three.
She was in one of her drawing rooms--the one that was decorated with
water colors set in fluted panels of yellow silk--not the one with the
pink blinds so beloved by those of her visitors who had reached an age
to regard a pink light as a woman’s best friend. She was wearing a new
gown which Phyllis, in spite of her enthusiasm on behalf of a brave man
maligned, found admirable both as regards fabric, fit, and fashion.
Then followed a word or two of commendation of the artists who had been
concerned in its production. They had not been absurd about the sleeves,
and they had not vetoed the sweep of lace--it was about half a yard
wide--which the person who occupied so insignificant a position as is
usually allocated to the mere wearer of the gown had suggested for
the bodice. The gown was an unequivocal success, and had Ella seen the
disgraceful article which had appeared in the _Spiritual Aneroid_ on the
subject of Mr. Courtland’s explorations?
Ella smiled a slow smile, as the question joined the congratulation
without the lapse of a breath.
“The _Spiritual Aneroid_? Who is the _Spiritual Aneroid_? What is
the _Spiritual Aneroid_?” she asked. “Oh, a newspaper. What could a
newspaper with such a funny name have to say about Mr. Courtland?”
“I have brought it with me,” said Phyllis. “It is quite disgraceful. I’m
sure you’ll agree with me.”
“I’m certain of it.”
Ella accepted the proffered paper and glanced down the article pointed
out to her by Phyllis. Phyllis’ eyes were gleaming as she placed her
finger on the words, “Dynamite _versus_ Evangelization,” but Ella’s eyes
did not gleam while she was reading all the words printed beneath the
heading. She folded the paper and glanced carelessly at the name at the
top of the outside page and said, “Well?”
“Was there ever anything so disgraceful?” cried the girl. “Was there
every anything so false?”
“Is it false?” asked Ella.
“How can you doubt it? Do you fancy that Mr. Courtland would be a
slave-dealer?”
“I wonder how he’d look in the broad flat hat which appears in all the
pictures of the slave-dealers? Rather well, I fancy,” said Mrs. Linton.
“Oh, how can you talk of his looking well or ill when you read such an
attack upon him?” said Phyllis, jumping up with a charmingly rosy face.
“Surely it is something to you when so distinguished a man--your friend
as well--is attacked!”
“If we were traveling with him across the desert in a caravan, should we
mind much if the whole caravan were attacked by Bedouins or missionaries
or people of that stamp, my dear? Of course we shouldn’t. We should
feel that he would be equal to the defense of all of us, and himself as
well.”
“Oh, of course; but this is quite another thing, isn’t it?”
“Where is the difference? If anybody minds the nonsense printed in that
thing, Herbert Courtland will certainly be able to defend himself when
called on to do so.”
Phyllis seated herself once again.
“But a question is to be asked in Parliament about him?” she suggested.
“And can you, the daughter of a member of that Parliament, honestly
tell me that you fancy that any human being minds how many questions are
asked about him in the Questionable House?”
“But the least breath of
suspicion--dynamite--slave-dealing--massacres--Armenia. Oh, the article
is certain to be copied into dozens of other papers--the public do so
like to get hold of some scandal against a man who has done something
great.”
“They do indeed. Would you suggest organizing a committee of ladies for
the protection of Mr. Courtland?”
“Don’t talk nonsense, Ella. I though that you were his friend, and that
you would be as indignant as I was at that disgraceful attack upon his
reputation.”
“I don’t think that it will place his reputation in jeopardy, unless
with the readers of that paper, and they are not worth taking into
account, are they?”
“Papa says the thing has a large circulation among a certain class. I
want him to ridicule the question which is threatened in that article;
he knows how to do that kind of thing very well.”
“Is it come to that, my Phyllis? Were you really so greatly interested
in the one conversation you had with him as to constitute yourself his
champion?”
Above all things Phyllis was truthful. She had never had an experience
of love--that passion which can change the most truthful of womankind
into the least scrupulous. There was no pause between Ella’s question
and Phyllis’ answer.
“Certainly the one conversation that I had with him interested me--I
told you so returning in the carriage. Has he never succeeded in
interesting you, Ella? He told me that you were his friend--I believe he
said his dearest friend.”
“And I believe that he told you the truth,” said Ella. “But, being
his best friend and a woman, I refrain from constituting myself his
champion. You see we live in Philistia, my Phyllis, and the champions
that Philistia sends forth usually come to grief; there was the case of
one Goliath of Gath, for example. I have no desire to have stones slung
at me by the chosen people.”
“I’m not quite sure that I understand you,” said Phyllis, with a very
pretty pucker on her forehead. “You don’t mean to say that a woman
should not do her best for a man whom she knows to be maligned? You
don’t suggest that she should stand silently to one side while people
are saying what’s false about him?”
“I say that it’s unwise in Philistia; though I admit that it is of the
greatest advantage to the man, for people at once cease maligning him
and take to maligning her.”
“If she is any sort of a woman she will not mind that, however unjust
it may be. In this case, however, I don’t think there is much risk: even
the most unscrupulous person could hardly say that--that----”
“That we were becoming Herbert Courtland’s champions, because we were in
love with him?”
“Well, I don’t know. Wasn’t that what you meant to suggest people would
say of a woman who became a man’s champion?”
“Something in that way. How straightforwardly you speak out what’s on
your mind!”
“Oh, I’m a girl of to-day. I have got over all those absurd affectations
of childishness which used to be thought feminine long ago. The gambols
of the kitten were once thought the most attractive thing on earth, and
they are very interesting: but for the full-grown cat to pretend that it
is perfectly happy with a ball of worsted, when all the time it has its
heart set on a real mouse, is nonsense.”
“That is an allegory, a subtle parable, Phyllis. But I fancy I can
interpret it. You are quite right. Men know that we, the full-grown
cats, take no interest in the ravelings of wool as mediums of
diversion--that we have our hearts set on mice. Oh, yes! it is much
better to be straightforward in our speech--it is even sometimes
better to be quite straight in our ways as well. It usually prevents
misunderstanding. There is scarcely a subject that women may not talk
about to men in the most direct way, nowadays. But about the question of
championship----”
Here the door of the room was thrown open and Mr. Herbert Courtland was
announced.
“I quite forgot to mention that Mr. Courtland was lunching with us
to-day, Phyllis,” said Ella, while shaking hands with her visitor. “Now
you will have a chance of getting the slave-dealer’s account of the
whole business. Are you a slave-dealer, Bertie? If so, why don’t you
wear the usual broad-leaved hat of your order?”
“It is I who am the enslaved one,” said Mr. Courtland, laying his hand
to the left of the buttons of his white waistcoat and bowing the bow of
the early years of the century, with a glance at each lady.
“What a pretty reminiscence of the age of artificiality!” said Ella;
“and what an apt commentary upon the subject we were talking about,
Phyllis! We were discussing the merits of directness in speech and
straightness in every way. We were ridiculing the timid maid--all
sandals and simper--of forty years ago. Why should men and women have
ever taken the trouble to be affected? Let us go in to lunch and eat
with the appetites of men and women of the nineties, not with the
nibblings of society of the fifties. Come along, Phyllis. Mr. Courtland
will tell us all about his dreadful goings on, his slave-dealings, his
dynamitings. Have you seen that article in the--what’s the name of the
paper, Phyllis?”
“The _Spiritual Aneroid_,” said Phyllis.
“I haven’t been so fortunate,” said he.
“Then we shall take the paper into the dining room with us, and place it
before you. If you were guilty of the doings that the article details,
you would do well to--to--well, to adopt the picturesque costume
incidental to ruffianism--the linen jacket of the slave-trader, the
mangy fur collar of the dynamity man of war. Have you ever trafficked in
human beings, Mr. Courtland?”
“Well, yes,” said he. “I have done a little in that way, I admit.”
“And dynamite--have you ever massacred people with dynamite?” Ella
continued.
“Well, when my dynamite exploded, the people who were in the immediate
neighborhood were never just the same afterward,” said he.
“Finally, did you allow yourself to be worshiped as God?” she asked.
“Yes, I got them to do that,” he replied. “I have experienced all human
sensations, including those of a god in working order.”
“Then I hope you will make a good lunch. We begin with white-bait.”
“I am quite satisfied to begin with white-bait,” said he.
CHAPTER XIII.
EVEN THE HOUSE OF COMMONS DOESN’T MATTER MUCH.
“I did not intend to stay for lunch,” said Phyllis, “but your
overpowering will swept me along with it, Ella. But I hope you will
let me say that I don’t think you should jest about what is--what some
people at any rate think very serious.”
“Phyllis is of Philistia,” said Ella, “and Philistia was always given
to ordeal by champions. She thinks the attack made upon you by two
missionaries in their newspaper organ quite disgraceful. It doesn’t seem
so disgraceful after all.”
“I haven’t seen the attack,” said he. “But I feel it to be very good of
Miss Ayrton to think it disgraceful.”
“Of course I thought it disgraceful,” said Phyllis, “and I came to Ella
to talk it all over. The article accuses you of atrocities, and said
that a question would shortly be put to the Minister of the Annexation
Department in the House of Commons. Now, I know that there is nothing
my father enjoys more than snubbing those detestable men who endeavor to
get up a reputation for philanthropy, and temperance, and bimetallism,
and other virtues, by putting questions on the paper; and he could,
I think, ask some counter question in this particular case that would
ridicule the original busybody.”
“It was very good of you to think so, Miss Ayrton,” said he. “I can’t
say that, personally, I mind all the attacks that all the missionaries
who earn precarious salaries in South Seas may make upon me; but I must
confess that I have a weakness for seeing busybodies put to shame.”
“You may depend upon Mr. Ayrton’s satire,” said Ella. “It never misses
the point in the harness. The barb of the dart is, I believe, Mr.
Ayrton’s, the feather at the other end is Phyllis’.”
“Only once that happened,” said Phyllis. “Oh, no! papa manufactures his
own darts, from feather to tip.”
“But supposing that the charges brought against me are true?” suggested
Mr. Courtland.
“Why, then, can’t you see there is all the greater need for ingenuity in
your defense?” said Ella.
“It is impossible to think of the charges as true,” said Phyllis
stoutly.
“For example?” said he.
“Well, the article said that you had made slaves of some of the natives
of New Guinea, purchasing them by a promise to help a native chief
against his enemies.”
“There wasn’t much harm in that: I did it,” said he.
“And then it went on to say that you kept your promise,” said Phyllis.
“What! They accused me of keeping my promise?” said he. “Well, I’m
afraid I can’t deny that charge either.”
“Did you really slaughter the natives?” cried Phyllis.
The interest which she felt appeared in her eyes.
“I did my best for the savages who had purchased my services,” he
replied. “The campaign was not a protracted one. Two days after the
outbreak of hostilities brought things to a climax. We fought
our decisive battle--the Sedan of King Mubamayo. You see, I had a
trustworthy Winchester. I believe that about seventy of the enemy bit
the dust.”
“Only seventy? That was unworthy of you, Mr. Courtland,” cried Ella.
“Nothing short of thousands counts as a civilized battle. Seventy! Oh,
I’m afraid you don’t do yourself justice.”
“Of course a battle is a battle,” said Phyllis stoutly. “If you hadn’t
killed them they would have killed you. You were in the right, I’m
sure.”
“I’m not so sure of that,” said he, shaking his head. “To tell you the
truth, the elements of the crisis of Headman Glowabyola were somewhat
involved. The original dispute was difficult for a foreigner to
understand--it was, in fact, the Schleswig-Holstein question of
Kafalonga.”
“You settled it, anyway,” suggested Ella. “You were the Bismarck of
what’s-its-name?”
“I doubled the parts of Bismarck and Von Moltke,” said he.
“And that’s why they worshiped you as their god? I don’t wonder at
the heathen in his blindness doing that. Any man who was the same as
Bismarck and Von Moltke would certainly shoulder a deity out of his
way,” laughed Ella.
“It so happened, however, that my deification was due neither to my
recognition as a diplomatist nor as a military strategist,” said the
explorer. “No, they wanted something beyond the mere fighting man to
worship, and my knowledge of that fact combined with their paeans of
victory--to the _obbligato_ of a solid iron-wood drum beaten with the
thigh bones of the conquered--to keep me awake at night. But one morning
the headman came upon me when I was about to boil my kettle to make
myself a cup of tea. I had a small lamp that burned spirits, and he
stood by while I filled it up from the bottle that I carried with me.
He took it for granted that the spirit was water, and he was greatly
impressed when he saw it flare up as I applied a lighted match to it. He
asked me if I possessed the power to set water in a blaze, and I assured
him that that was something for which I had long been celebrated; adding
that when I had had my breakfast I meant to while away an hour or two
by setting fire to the ocean itself. He implored of me to reconsider my
decision, and when I had poured a little spirit into the hollow of my
hand and lighted it in the presence of his most eminent scientists, they
said that they also desired to associate themselves with the headman’s
petition. I was, however, inexorable; I walked down to the beach and
had just struck a match on the brink of the ocean when the whole tribe
prostrated themselves around me, promising to continue worshiping me if
I would only stay my hand. Well, what could I do? I weakly yielded and
spared the multitudinous sea from being the medium of what would in all
likelihood have been the greatest conflagration on record. From that
moment, I’m happy to say, they worshiped me as their supreme deity,
and I’m bound to say that I behaved as such; I was certainly the most
superior class of god they had ever had, and they gave me a testimonial
to this effect in case I might ever be looking out for a new situation.”
“That was how you managed to get such a collection of birds, including
my meteor-bird,” said Ella. “But Phyllis of Philistia is shocked at the
bare recital of such a tale of idolatry. Are you not, Phyllis?”
“I think I am a little shocked,” said Phyllis. She did not say that her
first thought just then was that the feather fan was not, after all, the
price of blood: it was something much worse. “It was an encouragement of
idolatry, was it not, Mr. Courtland?”
“Scarcely,” said he. “On the contrary, it was an honest attempt to lead
them from their idols to something higher and better.”
“You are something higher and better,” suggested Ella.
“Quite so; I am a little lower than the angels, but a good deal higher
than the awful image which they worshiped before I turned up,” said he.
“The whole tribe admitted in the most honorable manner that I was by far
the best god they had ever had; they had not an unlucky day so long as
they worshiped me, and I retained my Winchester and a full supply of
cartridges.”
“The testimony was flattering,” said Ella. “But still Phyllis is
shocked.”
“I am,” said Phyllis. “I believe in God. Mr. Courtland believes in a
Principle.”
“Anyhow, I led some thousands of savages from idolatry and cannibalism
to something higher, and that’s a better record than most gods of my
acquaintance can show. Everything must be done gradually to be done
permanently. Nothing could be more absurd than the _modus operandi_ of
your missionary. Most of them have got rid of their Christianity to make
way for their theology. They endeavor to inculcate upon the natives the
most subtle points of their theological system, immediately after
they have preached against the wickedness of economy in the matter of
clothing.”
“A large missionary work might be done among husbands at home,” said
Ella. “But what about the dynamite, that is the charge which still hands
over you--a charge of dynamite?”
“That was my worst hour,” said Courtland. “I had gone up the Fly River
in my steam launch to a point never previously reached by a European.
I was fortunate enough to get some specimens that had never been
seen before, and I was returning to the coast. My engineer and I were
captured when ashore one night getting fuel for our furnace. They took
us into the forest a long way, binding our hands with the fiber of one
of the creepers, and I had no trouble whatever gathering that it was
their intention to make a feast of us--a sort of high tea, it was to be,
for they began brewing the herbs which I knew they used only when
they were cannibalizing. We were courteously permitted to watch these
preparations, for it was rightly assumed that they would be in some
degree interesting to us. We were, indeed, greatly interested in all
we saw, but much more so when, toward evening, a number of the natives
arrived on the scene carrying with them some of the stores which they
had found aboard the steam launch. They broke open with a stone hatchet
some tins of preserved meat, and seemed to enjoy the contents greatly.
The biscuits they didn’t care for much, and the cakes of soap which
they began to eat could not honestly be said to be an entire success as
comestibles. But while we watched them at these _hors d’oeuvres_ to the
banquet at which we were expected to take a prominent part, a straggler
came up with some reserve supplies; I saw them; tins of dynamite--we
carried dynamite for blowing up the snags that obstructed the narrower
reaches of the river. We watched the thieves crowd around the bearer
of the tins, and we saw that the general impression that prevailed
in regard to them was that they had come upon some of the most highly
concentrated beef they had ever had in their hands. When they laid the
tins among the hot ashes of their fires and began to break them open
with their stone hatchets, my engineer thought with me that all the
interest there would be in the subsequent proceedings could not possibly
compensate us for the waste of precious time which would be entailed by
our remaining. We bolted in spite of our fettered hands, but before we
had got more than a couple of hundred yards from the camp, there took
place the severest earthquake, coincidental with a thunderstorm and the
salute of a battery of a thousand heavy guns. We were whirled into the
air like feathers in a breeze, but managed to cling--our bonds being
broken--to some of the boughs among which we found ourselves. Shortly
afterward, a quarter of an hour or so, there came on the heaviest shower
I had ever experienced. Such a downpour of branches of trees, gnarled
roots, broken fruits, birds’ feathers, mutilated apes of many species,
and--well, anatomical specimens! It went on and on until the boughs
around us were made into splinters and we were beaten to the ground with
the force of those missiles, all the dense forest around us echoing to
the shrieks of the lories and parrots, the monkeys and the wildcats.”
“And now the missionaries,” said Ella, after a pause.
“And what happened after that?” whispered Phyllis.
He shook his head.
“After that we came away,” he said. “We couldn’t see that there was any
need for us to stay loafing about the forest when we had our business
to mind in another direction. It took us two days, however, finding our
launch.”
“And that is what the missionaries call your dynamite outrage against
the natives?” said Ella.
“So it would seem,” said he. “I suppose they managed to get some account
of the business; one can’t hush up a dynamite outrage even in the
interior of New Guinea.”
“But what a gross misrepresentation of facts it was to say that you had
massacred the natives,” cried Phyllis indignantly.
He laughed with a shrug.
“Oh, we must all live,” he said.
“Unless those who treat tins of dynamite as though they were tins of
brawn,” said Ella. Then turning to Phyllis she smiled.
Phyllis had no difficulty interpreting the smile.
“Yes,” she said, “your opinion was quite correct: Mr. Courtland doesn’t
care what people say, and it doesn’t matter in the least what they do
say, or what falsehoods are spread abroad.”
“Not in the smallest degree,” said Ella. “Herbert Courtland is still
Herbert Courtland.”
“But so far as I can gather,” said Mr. Courtland, “all that the
missionaries said of me was substantially correct.”
“Read the paper and you will see how detestably false all the charges
are,” cried Phyllis, rising,--the servants had now left the room,--and
picking up the _Spiritual Aneroid_ from where Ella had laid it on a
chair.
Herbert Courtland had not yet opened it. He took it from her, saying:
“Thank you, Miss Ayrton. But I really don’t see that it concerns me very
much whether or not the charges brought against me are true or false.
The matter is certainly one for the--the--ah--_Spiritual Aneroid_ and
its special _clientele_.”
“But a question is to be asked about it in the House of Commons. I said
so just now,” cried Phyllis.
“And even the House of Commons doesn’t matter much,” said Ella.
“That is what papa thought,” said Phyllis meekly. “Only I know that if
Mr. Courtland thought it worth noticing, papa would be quite pleased to
put a counter question. That is why I came here to-day.”
“It was so good of you,” said the man.
“My Phyllis is all that is good. Let us return to the drawing room,”
said Ella, rising.
They returned to the drawing room; but when they had been in the
apartment for perhaps four minutes, certainly not five, Phyllis said it
was necessary for her to hurry home in order that the afternoon letters
should be sent to her father at the House.
With another word of appreciation of her kindness, Mr. Courtland held
her hand a second longer than was absolutely necessary to maintain a
character for civility.
“She is the most charming girl in the world,” remarked Ella to the
visitor, who remained when Phyllis had left.
“Is she?” said he.
“I know it. Don’t you?” asked she.
“How do I know?” he said. “I have thought nothing about it. If you say
she is charming, I am pleased to hear it. It matters no more to me that
the world is full of charming girls than that the kraken is still at the
bottom of the sea. One woman fills all my thoughts. My heart is full of
her.”
“And you want her to risk the salvation of her soul for you?”
“Yes; that is just what I want.”
He remained with her for another hour.
CHAPTER XIV.
THE HONORABLE MEMBER IS CLEARLY OUT OF ORDER.
Mr. Ayrton met his daughter the next morning with the good news that
he had found among his specimen cases of phrases, one that would
effectually silence the member from Wales who had been nominated by the
Nonconformist Eastern Missionary Society to put that question to the
minister of the Annexation Department on the subject of Mr. Courtland,
the explorer. Mr. Ayrton was the better pleased at his discovery,
because of the inoffensive nature of the phrase which he had taken out
of its case, so to speak. As a rule, he did not mind being offensive if
only his phrase was apt. Only people who had no artistic appreciation
found fault with the tone of some of his most notable phrases. He did
not mind whether they were just or unjust, they said. As if a man can be
both honest and witty at the same time!
It so happened, however, that the party to which Mr. Ayrton belonged had
become greatly concerned in respect of an element that had just come to
the surface to still further complicate the course of politics. This was
the Nonconformist Conscience--hitherto a _quantite negligeable_ in the
calculations of the leaders, but now one that it appeared absolutely
necessary to take into account as a factor. To be sure, there were a
good many people who put their tongues in their cheeks when any mention
was made of the Nonconformist Conscience: they said it was no more to be
taken seriously than the Spector on the Brocken or the Athanasian Creed.
It was only the trick of an electioneering agent desirous of escaping
from an untenable position.
There were other persons, however (mostly Nonconformists), who were
found ready to declare that the Nonconformist Conscience was a Great and
Living Truth. The only point upon which statesmen of all parties were
agreed was that it was worth purchasing. The Nonconformists themselves,
upon whom the Great and Living Truth was sprung, had no notion at first
that it could be turned into a negotiable security occupying as high a
place in the market as, say, Argentine bonds. But it did not take them
very long to find out that even an abstraction such as this could be
turned to good account by discreet maneuvering. Truth sometimes is heard
on an election platform, and yet truth is but an abstract quality. Why,
then should not a Great and Living Truth become a regular gold mine to
its inventor? It was as great an invention as the art of electroplating,
which it closely resembled, and a quite as nice thing could be made out
of it by a little dexterous manipulation. If the conscience is silver,
the Nonconformist Conscience is at least electroplate of a first-class
quality, it was argued; and a political manifesto, which was practically
a financial prospectus, was issued with a view of floating the
Nonconformist Conscience Company, Limited.
English politics cannot by any possibility be regarded as an exact
science; and thus it was that all political parties were at this time
making bids for shares in the enterprise. The leaders of one party, in
fact, expressed themselves ready to buy up the whole concern, and they
actually tendered bills payable at twelve months for all the vendors’
interest, and it was only when these bills became due and were returned
dishonored that the shadowy character of the transaction was made plain,
and the country was convulsed at the disclosure of the fact that the
vendors had disposed of a perfectly worthless invention, and that the
purchasers had paid for it by promises that were equally worthless.
All this happened later, however; when the fuss was made about
the atrocities by an explorer in New Guinea, and Mr. Ayrton was
contemplating a counter question that should cast ridicule upon the
missionaries and their champion, he was given to understand by the
leaders of his party, who, it was believed, had a small parcel of
baronetcies done up in official twine, with blank spaces for the name
and address in each, awaiting distribution at the first change of
Government, that he must take no step that might jeopardize the
relations of the party with the vendors of the Nonconformists
Conscience. The _Spiritual Aneroid_ was the leading Nonconformist organ,
and it would not do to sneer at the missionaries whom it supported. It
would be better that all the explorers who had ever risked their lives
on behalf of civilization should go by the board than that a single vote
should be lost to the party, he was assured by the Senior Whip.
This was rather irritating to the artist in phrases; because it stood to
reason that the majority of his phrases were calculated to be hurtful
to his opponents. He was thus quite elated when he came upon something
which would, he felt sure, call comment in the press at the expense
of the member from Wales without casting any slight upon Nonconformist
Missionary enterprise.
He read out the thing to his daughter, and he was surprised to find that
she was not appreciative of its unique charm. This was rather too bad,
he felt, considering that it was she who had enlisted his services in
this particular matter.
“I don’t think Mr. Courtland wants anybody to take his part in
Parliament or out of it,” said she. “And that’s why I think it would be
better to let that Mr. Apthomas ask his question without interruption.
What can the Minister of Annexation say except that he has no
information on the subject, and that if he had he could not interfere,
as he had no jurisdiction on the Fly River?”
“That is what he will reply as a matter of course,” said her father.
“But that will not prevent the newspapers that are on the side of Wales
and the missionaries from saying what they please in the way of comment
on the atrocities in New Guinea.”
“Mr. Courtland will not mind whatever they may say,” cried Phyllis.
“That was the view I took of the matter in regard to Mr. Courtland’s
attitude when you mentioned it to me at first,” said he. “I didn’t
suppose that he was the man to be broken down because some foolish paper
attacks him; but you were emphatic in your denunciation of the injustice
that would be liable to be done if--”
“Oh, I had only spoken for about half an hour to Mr. Courtland then,”
said Phyllis. “I think I know him better now.”
“Yes, you have spoken with him for another half hour; you therefore
know him twice as well as you did,” remarked her father. “I wonder if he
admitted to you having done all that he was accused of doing.”
He saw in a moment from the little uneasy movement of her eyes that he
had made an excellent guess at the general result of the conversation
at Mrs. Linton’s little lunch. He had not yet succeeded in obtaining any
details from his daughter regarding her visit to Ella. She had merely
told him that Ella had kept her to lunch, and that Mr. Courtland had
been there also.
“Yes. I do believe that he admitted everything,” he continued, with
a laugh as he thought how clever he was. (He had frequent reasons for
laughing that laugh.)
“No,” said Phyllis doubtfully; “he did not admit everything.”
“There was some reservation? Perhaps it was melinite that he employed
for the massacre of the innocents of New Guinea, not dynamite.”
“No; it was dynamite. But the natives had stolen it from his steam
launch and they exploded it themselves.”
Mr. Ayrton lay back in his chair convulsed with laughter.
“And that is the true story of the dynamite massacre?” he cried. “That
is how it comes that, in the words of the _Aneroid_, the works of
evangelization on Nonconformist principles is likely to be retarded
for some time? The missionaries are quite right too. And what about his
miracles--they suggested a miracle, didn’t they?”
“Oh, that was some foolishness about setting spirits of wine on fire,”
said Phyllis. “The natives thought that it was water, you know.”
Mr. Ayrton laughed more heartily than before.
“That is the crowning infamy,” he cried. “My dear Phyllis, it would be
quite impossible to allow so delicious a series of missionary muddles to
pass unnoticed. I think I see my way clearly in the matter.”
She knew that he did. She knew that he regarded most incidents in the
political world merely as feeders to his phrase-making capacity. She
knew that it would be impossible to repress him now in the matter of
Courtland and the missionaries; she fully realized the feelings of
Frankenstein.
Only the weakest protest did she make against her father’s intended
action; and thus when the day came for Mr. Apthomas’ question,
that gentleman from Wales inquired, “If Her Majesty’s Minister for
Annexations could give the House any information regarding the so-called
explorations of Mr. Herbert Courtland in the island of New Guinea,
particularly in respect of a massacre of natives by dynamite in the
region of the Fly River; and if it was true that the gentleman just
named had permitted himself to be worshiped as a god by the aborigines
of another region; and if Her Majesty’s Minister for Domestic Affairs
was prepared to say that it was legal for one of Her Majesty’s subjects
to assume the privileges and functions of a god, and if the First Lord
of the Treasury was prepared to communicate to the House what course,
if any, Her Majesty’s government meant to adopt with a view to the
prevention of similar outrages in the same region in the future?”
Mr. Ayrton rose before the Minister of the Annexation Department had
quite concluded his yawn, and said he trusted that he was in order
(cries of “Yes, yes,” from those members who knew that the honorable
member had an enlivening phrase which he wanted to get rid of) in
inquiring, in connection with the same subject, if the right honorable
gentleman could inform the House if there was any truth in the
report current in financial and other circles that the object of the
explorations of Mr. Herbert Courtland was the discovery of a small
mammal of the porcine tribe, and if one of the Law Officers of the
Crown was prepared to assure the House that it would be contrary to the
provisions of the Companies Act, and the Companies Act Amendment Act,
to permit this New Guinea pig to assume the functions of the director of
Limited Liability Companies, whose directorate was largely composed
of members of both Houses of Parliament (great laughter from honorable
gentlemen who were aware that the Mr. Apthomas had no income beyond
the remuneration he received as a director of companies); and if Her
Majesty’s Minister for Agriculture was prepared to state that it was the
intention of Her Majesty’s Government to prohibit the introduction of,
at any rate the males of the mammals just referred to, considering the
rapid increase in representative assemblies of the English or Welsh
bore----(Great laughter, which prevented the concluding words of the
sentence being audible in the gallery.)
THE SPEAKER: Order! order! The honorable member for Hazelborough must
confine himself strictly to the issued raised by the honorable gentleman
from Wales. The honorable member for Hazelborough is only permitted
to follow the honorable gentleman from Wales by the indulgence of the
House.
MR. AYRTON: Sir, I bow to the ruling of the chair, and will continue by
inquiring if Her Majesty’s Minister for the Public Worship Department
can state to the House if it is true that a newspaper published within
the Principality of Wales recently made the announcement that the
honorable member who had just made inquiries regarding the exploration
of Mr. Herbert Courtland, was the idol of his constituents [Laughter,
and cries of “Order!”], and if the right honorable gentleman is prepared
to state that the provisions of the Idolatry Act are--
THE SPEAKER: The honorable member is clearly out of order. The question
of idolatry in Wales is not at present before the House.
MR. AYRTON: Sir, I give notice that next session I shall move a
resolution regarding idolatry in the Principality of Wales [Laughter and
cheers.]
The minister for Annexation was about to rise when
MR. MUDLARKY (Ballynamuck) asked if the introduction of the guinea pigs
would be prejudicial to the interests of the higher and nobler Irish
animal who, he would remind the Minister for Public Worship, was not to
be confounded with the herd whose example was clearly emulated by the
present government in seeking self-destruction by running down a steep
place into the sea. (Cries of “Order, order!”) If there was any doubt
before, the honorable member continued, as to the influence which was at
work in that Gadarene herd, which assumed the functions of Her Majesty’s
government, the sounds that now came from the Treasury Benches would
convince even the most skeptical that sacred history is sometimes
repeated by profane, but he could not compliment the devils, who had the
bad taste to--(Several honorable members here rose amid the cheers of
the Irish Members, and a scene of confusion took place.)
THE SPEAKER [sternly]: Order, Order! The honorable member from
Ballynamuck must resume his seat. He is out of order. The question
before the House is not the good taste of demoniac visitants. I call
upon the right honorable gentleman, the Minister for the Department of
Annexation.
MR. McCULLUM (Blairpukey Burghs): Mr. Speaker, one moment. To save time,
will the right honorable gentleman say if the Highland Crofters, whose
land was stolen from them in order that the members of the Upper House--
THE SPEAKER: Order! The Minister for the Department of Annexation.
MR. BLISTER (Battersea, Mid): Mr. Speaker, though I don’t do any work
myself, I’m the representative of labor, only those contemptible skunks,
the workingmen, don’t see that they have a man for a leader--a
man, that’s me--that’s Joe Blister. And as the Upper House has been
introduced, I’ll run, eat, or swear with the best of that lot of
tap-room loafers; I’ll do anything but fight them--except, of course, on
a labor platform, and if--
THE SPEAKER: The honorable member is out of order. The Minister for the
Department of Annexations.
THE MINISTER FOR ANNEXATIONS: No, sir; I have no information [Cheers and
laughter.]
The House then went into Committee of Supply.
CHAPTER XV.
BUT MR. COURTLAND----AH, NEVER MIND!
Mr. Ayrton entertained his daughter with a description of the scene
in the House incidental to the annihilation of Mr. Apthomas. He rather
thought himself that his counter-question had been neat. He had been
congratulated on it by quite a number of his friends in the tea room,
and six messages had been delivered to him by representatives of the
press to the effect that if he could provide them with the exact text of
his counter-question they would be greatly obliged.
“They mean to report it in full?” said Phyllis. She had an ample
experience of the decimation of his questions as well as speeches by the
members of the press gallery. They had reduced it to a science.
“I am much mistaken if they don’t comment on it as well,” said her
father. “Poor Apthomas! he alone sat glum and mute while everyone around
him was convulsed.”
“I hope that Mr. Courtland will not feel hurt at what has occurred,”
said Phyllis doubtfully.
“Mr. Courtland? Who is Mr. Courtland? What has Mr. Courtland to say to
the matter? What business is it of his, I should like to know.”
“Well, considering that he was the original subject of the questions,
though I must confess that he didn’t remain long so, I don’t think it
altogether unreasonable to wonder what he will think about the whole
episode,” remarked Phyllis.
“Ah, you always do take an original view of such incidents,” said
her father indulgently. “It is so like a woman to try and drag poor
Courtland into the business. You ought to know better than to fancy
that any interest attaches to the original subject of a question in the
House. You’ll be suggesting next that some credit should be given to the
youths who pass brilliant examinations in things, and that all should
not be absorbed by their grinders.”
“I’m not so silly as that, papa,” said she. “No; but Mr.
Courtland----Ah, never mind.”
He did not mind.
It so happened, however, that several of the newspapers which commented
on the questions and counter-questions the next day introduced the name
of Mr. Herbert Courtland and his explorations; though, of course, most
attention was directed to what Mr. Ayrton’s party called the brilliant,
and the other party the flippant, methods of Mr. Ayrton. His reference
to the New Guinea pig some thought a trifle too personal to be in
good taste, but if politicians refrained from personalities and
were punctilious in matters of taste, what chance would they have of
“scoring,” and where would the caricaturists be? The reputation of a
politician is steadily built up nowadays, not by consistency, certainly;
not by brilliant rhetoric; not even by the unscrupulous exercise of
a faculty for organizing impromptu “scenes,” but by the wearing of a
necktie, or a boot, or a waistcoat that is susceptible of caricature.
A very ordinary young man has before now been lifted into fame by the
twists of his mustache, and another of less than mediocre ability has
been prevented from sinking in the flood of forgetfulness by the kindly
efforts of a caricaturist who supported him by a simple lock on his
scalp. Thus it was that Mr. Apthomas found himself famous before a week
had passed, through the circumstance of being represented in the leading
journal of caricature as a guinea pig, flying, with the spoil of bubble
boards of directors under his arm, from the attack of a number of
quaint-looking mammals wearing collars inscribed “ACCURACY,” “CORRECT
BALANCE SHEETS,” “LEGITIMATE SPECULATIONS,” and other phrases that
suggested the need for the old guinea pig to give way to a new breed.
Underneath the picture was printed a portion of the counter-question of
Mr. Ayrton, and opposite to it were some verses with a jingling refrain
that everyone could remember, and which everyone quoted during the next
few days.
The firm of publishers who had been fortunate enough to secure the issue
of Mr. Courtland’s new book were delighted. If Mr. Ayrton could only
have seen his way to introduce their names and their address in his
counter-question, their cup of happiness would have been complete, they
said. They managed, however, to induce the proprietors of a young
lady who was reputed to be the vulgarest and most fascinating of all
music-hall artistes, to introduce Mr. Courtland’s name into one of
the movable stanzas of her most popular lyric: those stanzas which are
changed from week to week, so as to touch upon the topics which are
uppermost in the minds--well, not exactly the minds--of the public. It
is scarcely necessary to say that this form of advertisement is worth
columns of the daily papers; and if Mr. Courtland had only shown himself
appreciative of his best interests and had changed the title of his
book to “The Land of the New Guinea Pig,” instead of “The Quest of
the Meteor-Bird,” they would have gone to press with an extra thousand
copies.
But even as it was they knew that between the member of Parliament and
the music-hall young lady the sale of the book was a certainty.
Their calculations were not at fault. The publishers sent a liberal
subscription to the Nonconformist Eastern Mission, whose agents had
stimulated public curiosity in Mr. Courtland’s new book by suggesting
that he had carried out, single-handed, one of the most atrocious
massacres of recent years; and a diamond brooch to the music-hall young
lady who had so kindly worked in the reference to the book after dancing
one of her most daring hornpipes in the uniform of a midshipman; they
doubled the lines of their announcements in the advertising columns
of the paper that had issued the cartoon of the New Guinea Pig,
and, finally, they sent a presentation copy of “The Quest of the
Meteor-Bird,” to Mr. Ayrton.
Then, as everyone was humming the lines of the music-hall young lady:
“From the land of far New Guinea
Came a little pig-a-ninny,”
the daily papers were bound to give two-column reviews to the book on
the day of its publication; and as the rod which Moses cast down before
Pharaoh swallowed up the wriggling rods of the magicians, the interest
attaching to Mr. Courtland’s book absorbed that which attached to all
the other books of the season, including “Revised Versions,” though the
publishers of the latter moved heaven and earth (that is to say, the
bishop and the people’s churchwarden) to get the Rev. George Holland
prosecuted. If either had been susceptible to reason, and had got up a
case against their author, the publishers declared that Mr. Courtland’s
book would not have had a chance with “Revised Versions.” To be sure
they admitted that the report that Mr. Holland had been thrown over by
the lady who had promised to marry him had given a jerk forward to the
sales; but when Mr. George Holland had been so idiotically blind to his
best interests and (incidentally) the best interests of his publishers,
as to contradict this suggestion of incipient martyrdom, and thus an
excellent advertisement had been lost, and everyone was, in a week or
two, talking about “The Quest of the Meteor-Bird,” while only a few
continued shaking their heads over “Revised Versions.”
Meantime, however, Mr. Courtland thought it well to call upon Mr. Ayrton
in order to thank him for his kindness in replying in the House of
Commons so effectively to the questions put to the various ministers by
Mr. Apthomas; and Mr. Ayrton had asked Mr. Courtland to dinner, and Mr.
Courtland had accepted the invitation, Miss Ayrton begging Mrs. Linton
to be of the party, and Mrs. Linton yielding to her petition without
demur.
CHAPTER XVI.
WOULD IT BE WELL WITH MY HUSBAND?
It was on their way back from this little dinner-party that Mr.
Courtland confessed to Ella Linton that he had come to think of her
dearest friend as a most charming and original girl; she had never once
referred to his achievements in New Guinea, nor had she asked him to
write his name in her birthday book. Yes, she was not as other girls.
“I’m so delighted to hear you say so much,” said Ella. “Oh, Bertie! why
not make yourself happy with a sweet girl such as she, and give no more
thought to such absurdities as you have been indulging in? Believe me,
you don’t know so well as I do in what direction your happiness lies.”
“I don’t know anything about happiness,” said he. “I don’t seem to care
much, either. When I made up my mind to find the meteor-bird, don’t you
suppose that there were many people who told me that, even if it was
found, it was quite unlikely that it would be more succulent eating than
a Dorking chicken? I’m sure they were right. You see, I didn’t go to New
Guinea in search of a barndoor fowl. I don’t want domestic happiness, I
don’t want anything but you--you are my meteor-bird. I found, after my
first visit to New Guinea, that it was impossible for me to rest until I
had found the meteor-bird. I have found that it is impossible for me to
live without you, my beloved.”
“You will have to learn to live without me,” said she, laying her hand
upon his. They had now reached her house, so that no immediate reply was
possible. He did not attempt to make a reply until they had gone into a
small drawing room, and she had flung off her wrap. They were alone.
Then he knelt on the rug before her and took both her hands in his
own--a hand in each of his hands--as they lay on her dress. His face was
close to hers: she was in a low chair. Each could hear the sound of the
other’s breathing--the sound of the other’s heart-beats. That duet went
on for some minutes--the most perfect music in life--the music which is
life itself--the music by which man becomes immortal.
“Do not hold me any longer, Bertie,” said she. “Kiss me and go
away--away. Oh, why should you ever come back? I believe that, if you
loved me, you would go away and never come back. Oh, what is this farce
that is being played between us? It is unworthy of either of us!”
“A farce? A tragedy!” said he. “I want you, Ella. I told you that I
could not live without you.”
“You want me? You want me, Bertie?” said she. Tears were in her eyes and
in her voice, for there was to her a passion of pathos in those words
of his. “You want me, and you know that it is only my soul that shall be
lost if I give myself to you. God has decreed that only the soul of the
woman pays the penalty of the man’s longing for her.”
“You soul shall be saved, not lost,” said he. “At present it is your
soul that is in peril, when you give your sweetness to the man whom you
have ceased to love--ah! whom you never loved. You will save your soul
with me.”
“I shall lose it for all eternity,” said she. “Do you think that I
complain? Do you fancy for a moment that I grumble at the decree of God,
or that I rail against it as unjust?”
“You are a woman.”
“I am a woman, and therefore you know I will one day be ready to lose my
soul for you, Bertie, my love. Oh, my dear, dear love, you say you want
me?”
“Oh, my God!”
He had sprung to his feet and was pacing the room before her.
“You say that you want me. Oh, my love, my love, do you fancy for a
moment that your longing for me is anything to be compared to my longing
for you?”
“My beloved, my beloved!”
His arms were about her. His lips were upon hers. She kissed him as he
kissed her.
Then she turned her head away so that his kisses fell upon her cheek
instead of her mouth. She turned it still farther and they fell upon her
neck--it was exquisite in its shape--and lay there like red rose-leaves
clinging to a carved marble pillar.
“Wait,” she said. “Wait; let me talk to you.”
She untwined his arms from about her--the tears were still in her eyes
as she tried to face him.
“Why should you still have tears?” said he. “If anything stood between
us and love, there might be room for tears, but nothing stands between
us now. I am yours, you are mine.”
“That is the boast of a man who sees only the beginning of a love; mine
are the tears of a woman who sees its end, and knows that it is not far
off.”
“How can you say that? The end? the end of love such as ours? Oh, Ella!”
“Oh, listen to me, my love! I am ashamed of the part I have played
during the past six months--since we were together on the Arno, and you
are ashamed, too.”
“I am not ashamed. I have no reason to be ashamed.”
“No; you are not ashamed of the part you have played; but you are
ashamed of me, Bertie.”
“Oh you? I--ashamed of you? Oh, my darling, if you talk longer in that
strain I will be ashamed of you.”
“You are ashamed of me--I have sometimes felt it. A man with a heart
such as I know yours to be, cannot but be ashamed of a woman, who,
though the wife of another man, allows him to kiss her--yes, and who
gives him kiss for kiss. Oh, go away--go away! I have had enough of your
love--enough of your kisses, enough shame! Go away! I never wish to see
you again--to kiss you again.”
She had walked to the other end of the room, and stood under a Venetian
mirror--it shone like a monstrous jewel above her head--looking at him,
her hands clenched, her eyes flashing through the tears that had not yet
fallen.
He had had no experience of women and their moods, and he was
consequently amazed at her attitude. He took a step toward her.
“No--no,” she cried angrily. “I will not have any more of you. I tell
you that I have had enough. I find now that what I mistook for love was
just the opposite. I believe that I hate you. No--no, Bertie, not that,
it cannot be that, only----Oh, I know now that it is not hate for you
that I feel--it is hate for myself, hate for the creature who is hateful
enough to stand between you and the happiness which you have earned by
patience, by constancy, by self-control. Yes, I hate the creature who is
idiotic enough to put honor between us, to put religion between us, to
put her soul’s salvation between us.”
“Ella, Ella, why will you not trust me?” he said, when she had flung
herself into a chair. He was standing over her with his hands clasped
behind him. He was beginning to understand something of her nature; of
the nature of the woman to whom love has come as a thief in the night.
He was beginning to perceive that she had, in her ignorance, been ready
to entertain love without knowing what was entailed by entertaining him.
“If you would only trust me, all would be well.”
She almost leaped from her chair.
“Would it?” she cried. “Would all be well? Would it be well with my
soul? Would it be well with both of us in the future? Would it be well
with my husband?”
He laughed.
“I know your husband,” he said.
“And I know him, too,” said she. “He cares for me no more than I care
for him, but he has never been otherwise than kind to me. I think of
him--I think of him. I know the name that men give to the man who tries
to make his friend’s wife love him. It is not my husband who has earned
that name, Mr. Courtland.”
He looked into her face, but he spoke no word. Even he--the lover--was
beginning to see, as in a glass, darkly, something of the conflict that
was going on in the heart of the woman before him. She had uttered words
against him, and they had stung him, and yet he had a feeling that, if
he had put his arms about her again, she would have held him close to
her as she had done before; she would have given him kiss for kiss as
she had done before. It is the decree of nature that the lover shall
think of himself only; but had he not told Phyllis that his belief
was that Nature and Satan were the same? He was sometimes able to say,
“_Retro me, Sathana_”--not always. He said it now, but not boldly, not
loudly--in a whisper. The best way of putting Satan behind one is to run
away from him. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. Yes, but, on
the whole, it is safer to show him a clean pair of heels than to enter
on an argument with him, hoping that he will be amenable to logic.
Herbert Courtland said his, “_Retro me_,” in a whisper, half hoping, as
the gentlewoman with the muffins for sale hoped, that he would escape
notice. For a few moments he ceased to think of himself. He thought of
that beautiful thing before him--she was tall, and her rosy white flesh
was as a peach that has reached its one hour of ripeness--he thought of
her and pitied her.
He had not the heart to put his arms about her, though he knew that to
do so would be to give him all the happiness for which he longed. What
was he that he should stand by and see that struggle tearing her heart
asunder?
“My poor child!” said he, and then he repeated his words, “My poor
child! It would have been better if we had never come together. We are
going to part now.”
She looked at him and laughed in his face.
He did not know what this meant. Had she been simply acting a part all
along? Had she been playing a comedy part all the while he was thinking
that a great tragedy was being enacted? Or was it possible that she
was mocking him? that her laugh was the laugh of the jailer who hears a
prisoner announce his intention of walking out of his cell?
“Good-by,” said he.
She fixed her eyes upon his face, then she laughed again.
He now knew what she meant by her laugh.
“Perhaps you may think that you have too firm a hold upon me to give me
a chance of parting from you,” said he. “You may be right; but if you
tell me to go I shall try and obey you. But think what it means before
you tell me to leave you forever.”
She did think what it meant. She looked at him, and she thought of his
passing away from her forever more. She wondered what her life would be
when he should have passed out of it. A blank? Oh, worse than a blank,
fo
Showing first 200,000 characters. Full text: gutenberg.org/ebooks/2155