Love Among the Artists/Book I/Chapter VI

When Mrs Beatty had been a fortnight in the Isle of Wight with her brother's family, her husband came down from Windsor to see her. On the morning after his arrival, they were in the garden, he smoking, and she in a rocking chair near him, with a newspaper in her hand.

"My dear," he said, after a preliminary cough.

"Yes, Richard," she said amiably, putting down the paper.

"I was saying last night that Clifton is leaving us."

"Oh, the bandmaster! Yes" Mrs Beatty was not interested, and she took up the paper again.

"Mary was speaking to me about it this morning."

Mrs Beatty put down the paper decisively, and looked at her husband.

"She wants me to get that fellow&mdash;Charlie's tutor&mdash; into Clinton's place. I don't know whether he is fit for it?"

"You don't know whether he is fit for it! Pray, Richard, did you allow Mary to think that we will countenance any further transactions between her and that man."

"I thought I would speak to you about it."

"She ought to ashamed of herself. Don't listen to her on any account, Richard."

"Well, will you speak to her? It is not exactly a subject that I can take her to task about; and I really don't exactly know what to say to her when she comes at me. She always argues; and I hate argument."

"Then I suppose I must face her arguments&mdash;I will make short work of them too. Whenever there is anything pleasant to be said in the family, you are willing enough to take it out of my mouth. The unpleasant things are left to me. Then people say, 'Poor Colonel Beatty: he has such a disagreeable wife."

"Who says so?"

"It is not your fault if they do not say so." "If the fellow comes into the regiment, he will soon be taught how to behave himself. Though for all I have seen to the contrary, he can behave himself well enough. That is my difficulty in talking to Mary. If she has no fault to find with him, I am sure I have none."

"You are going to take his part against me, Colonel Beatty. It does not matter that he repeatedly insulted me&mdash;everybody does that. But I thought you might have had some little fault to find with a person who debauched your men and held drunken orgies in my brother's house."

"Well, Jane, if you come to that, you know very well that Charles was an incorrigible scamp long enough before Jack ever met him. As to bringing him to play at Beulah, Charles got five shillings for his trouble, and went as he might have gone to one of your dances. He spoke to me of Jack as a gentleman who had employed him, not as a comrade."

"To you, no doubt he did. Adrian Herbert heard how he spoke to Jack."

"Besides, Mary expressly says that she does not complain of that at all."

"And what does she complain of?"

Colonel Beatty considered for a moment, and then answered, "She does not complain of anything, as far as I can make out."

"Indeed! She dismissed him. You will at least not deny that."

"My dear, I am not denying anyth&mdash;"

"Then let nothing induce you to bring them together again. You ought to understand that much without any hint from me, knowing. as you do, what a strange girl she is."

"Why? Do you think there is anything between them?"

"I never said so. I know very well what I think."

Colonel Beatty smoked a while in silence. Then, seeing Mary come from the house, carrying a box of colors, he busied himself with his pipe, and strolled away.

"What is the matter?" said Mary.

"Nothing that I am aware of," said Mrs. Beatty. "Why?"

"You do not look happy. And Uncle Richard's shoulders have a resigned set, as if he had been blown up lately."

"Ha! Oh! You are a wonderful observer, Mary. Are you going out?"

"I am waiting for Adrian."

Mary went round the garden in search of a flower. She was adorning her bosom with one, when Mrs. Beatty, who had been pretending to read, could contain herself no longer, and exclaimed:

"Now, Mary, it is of no use your asking Richard to get that man as bandmaster. He shall not do it."

"So that is what was the matter," said Mary coolly.

"I mean what I say, Mary. He shall never show his face in Windsor again with my consent."

"He shows his face there once a week already, aunt. Miss Cairns writes to say that he has a singing class at their house, and three pianoforte pupils in the neighborhood."

"If I had known that," said Mrs Beatty, angrily, "I should not have left Windsor. It is of a piece with the rest of his conduct. However, no matter. We shall see how long he will keep his pupils after I go back."

"Why, aunt? Would you take away his livelihood because you do not happen to like him personally?"

"I have nothing to do with his livelihood. I do not consider it proper for him to be at Windsor, after being dismissed by Richard. There are plenty of other places for him to go to. I have quite made up my mind on the subject. If you attempt to dispute me, I shall be offended."

"I have made up my mind too. Whatever mischief you may do to Mr Jack at Windsor will be imputed to me, aunt."

"I never said that I would do him any mischief.'

"You said you would drive him out of Windsor. As he lives by his teaching, I think that would be as great a mischief as it is in your power to do him."

"Well, I cannot help it. It is your fault."

"If I have helped to get him the pupils, and am begging you not to interfere with him, how is it my fault?"

"Ah! I thought you had something to do with it. And now let me tell you, Mary, that it is perfectly disgraceful, the open way in which you hanker after&mdash;"

"Aunt!"

"&mdash;that common man. I wonder at a girl of your tastes and understanding having so little self-respect as to to let everybody see that your head has been turned by a creature without polish or appearance&mdash; not even a gentleman. And all this too while you are engaged to Adrian Herbert, his very opposite in every respect. I tell you, Mary, it's not proper: it's not decent. A tutor! If it were anybody else it would not matter so much&mdash;but Oh for shame, Mary, for shame."

"Aunt Jane &mdash;"

"Hush, for goodness sake. Here he is."

"Who?" cried Mary, turning quickly. But it was only Adrian, equipped for sketching.

"Good morning," he said gaily, but with a thoughtful, polite gaiety. "This is the very sky we want for that bit of the undercliff."

"We were just saying how late you were," said Mrs Beatty graciously. He shook her hand, and looked in some surprise at Mary, whose expression, as she stood motionless, puzzled him.

"Do you know what we were really saying when you interrupted us, Adrian?"

"Mary," exclaimed Mrs. Beatty.

"Aunt Jane was telling me," continued Mary, not heeding her, "that I was hankering after Mr Jack, and that my conduct was not decent. Have you ever remarked anything indecent about my conduct, Adrian?"

Herbert looked helplessly from her to her aunt in silence. Mrs. Beatty's confusion, culminating in a burst of tears, relieved him from answering.

"Do not listen to her," she said presently, striving to control herself. "She is an ungrateful girl."

"I have quoted her exact words," said Mary, unmoved; "and I am certainly not grateful for them. Come, Adrian. We had better lose no more time if we are to finish our sketches before luncheon?"

"But we cannot leave Mrs. Beatty in this&mdash;"

"Never mind me: I am ashamed of myself for giving way, Mr Herbert. It was not your fault. I had rather not detain you."

Adrian hesitated. But seeing that he had better go, he took up his bundle of easels and stools, and went out with Mary, who did not even look at her aunt. They had gone some distance before either spoke. Then he said, "I hope Mrs Beatty has not been worrying you, Mary?"

"If she has, I do not think she will do it again without serious reflexion. I have found that the way to deal with worldly people is to frighten them by repeating their scandalous whisperings aloud. Oh, I was very angry that time, Adrian."

"But what brought Jack on the carpet again? I thought we were rid of him and done with him?"

"I heard that he was very badly off in London; and I asked Colonel Beatty to get him made bandmaster of the regiment in place of John Sebastian Clifton&mdash;the man you used to laugh at&mdash;who is going to America. Then Aunt Jane interfered, and imputed motives to my intercession&mdash;such motives as she could appreciate herself."

"But bow did you find out Jack's position in London." "From Madge Brailsford, who is taking lessons from him. Why? Are you jealous?"

"If you really mean that question, it will spoil my day's work, or rather my day's pleasure; for my work is all pleasure, nowadays."

"No, of course I do not mean it. I beg your pardon."

"Will you make a new contract with me, Mary'"

"What is it?"

"Never to allude to that execrable musician again. I have remarked that his name alone suffices to breed discord everywhere."

"It is true," said Mary, laughing. "I have quarreled a little with Madge, a great deal with Aunt Jane, almost with you, and quite with Charlie about him."

Then let us consider him, from henceforth, in the Index expurgatorius. I swear never to mention him on a sketching excursion&mdash;never at all, in fact, unless on very urgent occasion, which is not likely to arise. Will you swear also?"

"I swear," said Mary, raising her hand." Lo giuroas they say in the Opera. But without prejudice to his bandmastership."

"As to that, I am afraid you have spoiled his chance with Colonel Aunt Jane?"

"Yes," said Mary slowly: "I forgot that. I was thinking only of my own outraged feelings when I took my revenge. And I had intended to coax her into seconding me in the matter."

Herbert laughed.

"It is not at all a thing to be laughed at, Adrian, when you come to think of it. I used to fancy that I had set myself aside from the ordinary world to live a higher life than most of those about me. But I am beginning to find out that when I have to act, I do very much as they do. As I suppose they judge me by my actions and not by my inner life, no doubt they see me much as I see them. Perhaps they have an inner life too. If so, the only difference between us is that I have trained my eye to see more material for pictures in a landscape than they. They may even enjoy the landscape as much, without knowing why." "Do you know why?"

"I suppose not. I mean that I can point out those aspects of the landscape which please me, and they cannot. But that is not a moral difference. Art cannot take us out of the world."

"Not if we are worldly, Mary."

"But how can we help being worldly? I was born into the world: I have lived all my life in it: I have never seen or known a person or thing that did not belong to it. How can I be anything else than worldly?"

"Does the sun above us belong to it, Mary? Do the stars, the dreams that poets have left us, the realms that painters have shewn us, the thoughts you and I interchange sometimes when nothing has occurred to disturb your faith? Do these things belong to it?"

"I don't believe they belong exclusively to us two. If they did, I think we should be locked up as lunatics for perceiving them. Do you know, Adrian, lots of people whom we consider quite foreign to us spiritually, are very romantic in their own way. Aunt Jane cries over novels which make me laugh. Your mother reads a good deal of history, and she likes pictures, I remember when she used to sing very nicely."

"Yes. She likes pictures, provided they are not too good."

"She says the same of you. And really, when she pats me on the shoulder in her wise way, and asks me when I will be tired of playing at what she calls transcendentalism, I hear, or fancy I hear, an echo of her thought in my own mind. I have been very happy in my art studies and I don't think I shall ever find a way of life more tranquil and pleasant than they led me to; but, for all that, I have a notion sometimes that it is a way of life which I am outgrowing. I am getting wickeder as I get older, very likely."

"You think so for the moment. If you leave your art, the world will beat you back to it. The world has not an ambition worth sharing, or a prize worth handling, Corrupt success, disgraceful failures, or sheeplike vegetation are all it has to offer. I prefer Art, which gives me a sixth sense of beauty, with self-respect: perhaps also an immortal reputation in return for honest endeavor in a labor of love."

"Yes, Adrian. That used to suffice for me: indeed, it does so still when I am in the right frame of mind. But other worlds are appearing vaguely on the horizon. Perhaps woman's art is of woman's life a thing apart, 'tis man's whole existence; just as love is said to be the reverse&mdash;though it isn't."

"It does not scan that way," said Adrian, with an uneasy effort to be flippant.

No," said Mary, laughing. "This is the place." "Yes," said Adrian, unstrapping the easels. "You must paint off the fit of depression that is seizing you. The wind has gone round to the south-west. What an exquisite day!"

"It is a little oppressive, I think. I am just in the humor for a sharp evening breeze, with the sea broken up into slate colored waves, and the yachts ripping them up in their hurry home. Thank you, I would rather have the stool that has no back: I will settle the rest myself. Adrian: do you think me ill-tempered?"

"What a question to explode on me! Why?"

"No matter why. Answer my question."

"I think you always control yourself admirably."

"You mean when I am angry?"

"Yes."

"But, putting my self-control out of the question, do you think I get angry often&mdash;too often, even though I do not let my anger get the better of me?"

"Not too often, certainly."

"But often?"

"Well, no. That is, not absolutely angry. I think you are quick to perceive and repel an attack, even when it is only thoughtlessly implied. But now we must drop introspection for the present, Mary. If our sketches are to be finished before luncheon, I must work hard; and so must you. No more conversation until a quarter past one."

"So be it," said Mary, taking her seat on the campstool. They painted silently for two hours, interrupted occasionally by strollers, who stopped to look on, much to Herbert's annoyance, and somewhat to Mary's gratification. Meanwhile the day grew warmer and warmer; and the birds and insects sang and shrilled incessantly.

"Finished," said Mary at last, putting down her palette "And not in the least like nature. I ventured a little Prussian blue in that corner of the sky, with disastrous results."

"I will look presently," said Herbert, without turning from his canvas, "It will take at least another day to finish mine."

"You are too conscientious, Adrian. I feel sure your sketches have too much work in them."

"I have seen many pictures without enough work in them: never with too much. I suppose I must stop now for the present. It is time to return."

"Yes," said Mary, packing her sketching furniture. "Oh, dear!" As Faulconbridge says, 'Now, by my life, the day grows wondrous hot.' Falonbridge, by the bye, would have thought us a pair of fools. Nevertheless I like him."

"I am sorry to hear it. Most women like men who are arrogant bullies. Let me see your sketch."

"It is not a masterpiece, as you may perceive."

"No. You are impatient, Mary, and draw with a stiff, heavy hand. Look before you into the haze. There is no such thing as an outline in the landscape."

"I cannot help it. I try to soften everything as much as possible; but it only makes the colors look sodden. It is all nonsense my trying to paint. I shall give it up."

Must I pay you compliments to keep up your courage. You are unusually diffident today. You have done the cottage and the potato field better than I."

"Very likely. My touch suits potato fields. I think I had better make a specialty of them. Since I can paint neither sky nor sea nor golden grain, I shall devote myself to potato fields in wet weather."

Herbert, glancing up at her as he stooped to shoulder his easel, did not answer. A little later, when they were on their way home, he said, "Are you conscious of any change in yourself since you came down here, Mary?"

"No. What kind of change?" She had been striding along beside him, looking boldly ahead in her usual alert manner; but now she slackened her pace, and turned her eyes uneasily downward.

"I have noticed a certain falling off in the steady seriousness that used to be your chief characteristic. You are becoming a little inconsiderate and even frivolous about things that you formerly treated with unvarying sympathy and reverence. This makes me anxious. Our engagement is likely to be such a long one, that the least change in you alarms me. Mary: is it that you are getting tired of Art, or only of me?"

"Oh, absurd! nonsense, Adrian!"

"There is nothing of your old seriousness in that answer, Mary."

"It is not so much a question as a reproach that you put to me. You should have more confidence in yourself; and then you would not fear my getting tired of you. As to Art, I am not exactly getting tired of it; but I find that I cannot live on Art alone; and I am beginning to doubt whether I might not spend my time better than in painting, at which I am sure I shall never do much good. If Art were a game of pure skill, I should persevere; but it is like whist, chance and skill mixed. Nature may have given you her ace of trumps&mdash;genius; but she has not given me any trumps at all&mdash;not even court cards."

"If we all threw up our cards merely because we had not the ace of trumps in our hand, I fear there would be no more whist played in the world. But, to drop your metaphor, which I do not like, I can assure you that Nature has been kinder to you than to me. I had to paint harder and longer than you have before I could paint as well as you can."

"That sort of encouragement kept up my ardor for a long time, Adrian; but its power is exhausted now. In future I may sketch to amuse myself and to keep mementos with which I have pleasant associations, but not to elevate my tastes and perfect my morals. Perhaps it is that change of intention which makes me frivolous, as you say I have suddenly become.

"And since when," said Herbert gravely, "have you meditated this very important change?"

"I never meditated it at all. It came upon me unawares. I did not even know what it was until your question forced me to give an account of it. What an infidel I am! But let me tell you this, Adrian. If you suddenly found yourself a Turner, Titian, Michael Angelo and Holbein all rolled into one, would you be a bit happier?"

"I cannot conceive how r you can doubt it." "I know you would paint better" (Herbert winced), "but it is not at all obvious to me that you would be happier. However, I am in a silly humor to-day; for I can see nothing in a proper way. We had better talk about something else."

"The humor has lasted for some days, already, Mary. And it must be talked about, and seriously too, if you have concluded, like my mother, that I am wasting my life in pursuit of a chimera. Has she been speaking to you about me?"

"Oh, Adrian, you are accusing me of treachery. You must not think, because I have lost faith in my own artistic destiny, that I have lost faith in yours also."

"I fear, if you have lost your respect for Art, you have lost your respect for me. If so, you know that you may consider yourself free as far as I am concerned. You must not hold yourself in bondage to a dreamer, as people consider me."

"I do not exactly understand. Are you offering me my liberty, or claiming your own?"

"I am offering you yours. I think you might have guessed that."

"I don't think I might. It is not pleasant to be invited to consider oneself free. If you really wish it, I shall consider myself so."

"The question is, do you wish it?"

"Excuse me, Adrian: the question is, do you wish it?"

"My feelings towards you are quite unchanged."

"And so are mine towards you."

After this they walked for a little time in silence. Then Mary said, "Adrian: do you remember our congratulating ourselves last June on our immunity from the lovers' quarrels which occur in the vulgar world? I think&mdash;perhaps it is due to my sudden secession from the worship of Art&mdash;I think we made a sort of first attempt at one that time."

"Ha! ha! Yes. But we failed, did we not, Mary?"

"Thanks to our inexperience, we did. But not very disgracefully. We shall do better the next time, most likely."

"Then I hope the next time will never come."

"I hope not." Here they reached the garden gate.

"You must come in and lunch with us, to save me from facing Aunt Jane after my revenge upon her this morning."

Then they went in together, and found that Mrs Herbert had called and was at table with the Colonel and Mrs Beatty.

"Are we late?" said Mary.

Mrs. Beatty closed her lips and did not reply. The Colonel hastened to say that they had only just sat down. Mrs. Herbert promptly joined in the conversation; and the meal proceeded without Mrs Beatty's determination not to speak to her niece becoming unpleasantly obvious, until Mary put on her eyeglasses and said, looking at her aunt in her searching myopic way:

"Aunt Jane: will you come with me to the two-forty train to meet papa?"

Mrs Beatty maintained her silence for a few seconds. Then she reddened, and said sulkily, "No, Mary, I will not. You can do without me very well."

"Adrian: will you come?"

"Unfortunately," said Mrs Herbert, "Adrian is bound to me for the afternoon. We are going to Portsmouth to pay a visit. It is time for us to go now," she added, looking at her watch and rising.

During the leave taking which followed, Colonel Beatty got his hat, judging that he had better go out with the Herberts than stay between his wife and Mary in their present tempers. But Mrs Beatty did not care to face her niece alone. When the guests were gone, she moved towards the door.

"Aunt," said Mary, "don't go yet. I want to speak to you."

Mrs. Beatty did not turn.

"Very well," said Mary. "But remember, aunt, if there is to be a quarrel, it will not be of my making."

Mrs. Beatty hesitated, and said, "As soon as you express your sorrow for your conduct this morning, I will speak to you."

"I am very sorry for what passed." Mary looked at her aunt as she spoke, not contritely. Mrs Beatty, dissatisfied, held the door handle for a moment longer, then slowly came back and sat down. "I am sure you ought to be." she said.

I am sure you ought to be," said Mary. What!" cried Mrs. Beatty, about to rise again. 'You should have taken what I said as an apology, and let well alone," said Mary. "I am sorry that I resented your accusation this morning in a way that might have made mischief between me and Adrian. But you had no right to say what you did; and I had every right to be angry with you."

"You have a right to be angry with me! Do you know who I am, Miss?"

"Aunt, if you are going to call me 'Miss,' we had better stop talking altogether."

Mrs Beatty saw extreme vexation in her niece's expression, and even a tear in her eye. She resolved to assert her authority. "Mary," she said: "do you wish to provoke me into sending you to your room?"

Mary rose. "Aunt Jane," she said, "if you don't choose to treat me with due respect, as you have to treat other women, we must live apart. If you  cannot understand my feelings, at least you know my age and position. This is the second time you have insulted me today." She went to the door, looking indignantly at her aunt as she passed. The look was returned by one of alarm, as though Mrs Beatty were going to cry again. Mary, seeing this, restrained her anger with an effort as she reached the threshold, stood still for a moment, and then came back to the table.

"I am a fool to lose my temper with you, aunt," she said, dropping into the rocking chair with an air of resolute good humor, which became her less than her anger; "but really you are very aggravating. Now, don't make dignified speeches to me: it makes me feel like a housemaid and I'm sure it makes you feel 1 like a cook." Mrs Beatty colored. In temper and figure she was sufficiently like the cook of caricature to make the allusion disagreeable to her. "I always feel ridiculous and remorseful after a quarrel," continued Mary, "whether I am in the right or not&mdash;if there be any right in a quarrel."

"You are a very strange girl," said Mrs Beatty, ruefully. "When I was your age, I would not have dared to speak to my elders as you speak to me."

"When you were young," responded Mary, "the world was in a state of barbarism and young people used to spoil the old people, just as you fancy the old spoil the young nowadays. Besides, you are not so very much my elder, after all. I can remember quite well when you were married."

"That may be," said Mrs. Beatty, gravely. "It is not so much my age, perhaps; but you should remember, Mary, that I am related to your father."

"So am I."

"Don't be ridiculous, child. Ah, what a pity it is that you have no mother, Mary! It is a greater loss to you than you think."

"It is time to go to meet papa," said Mary, rising. "I hope Uncle Richard will be at the station."

"Why? What do you want with your Uncle Richard?"

"Only to tell him that we are on good terms again, and that he may regard Mr Jack as his future bandmaster." She hurried away as she spoke; and Mrs Beatty' s protest was wasted on the old-fashioned sideboard.