Ugly Idol, etc

Chapter I

This was the thoroughfare that Gilbert had passed along for some years every morning and evening ; yes, this was it, teaming with life ; — not the politest. The lights of all kinds of vehicles joggled, flashed, flared backwards and forwards behind the thin curtain of the fog, and broad, quivering patches of light from the shop-windows lay on the pavement. Lamps fringing the streets twinkled away in all directions ; everywhere there were cross reflections, a medley, a turmoil of shifting lights. A world of clerks, peopling the darkness with red cigar-tips, chattered and giggled in the ecstasy of the young life that wakes with the closing of office hours ; costers, on business and pleasure ; children with big baskets or broken mugs ; thin, white-faced girls with small, very small, bundles of work ; and other women with no work at all, but open red lips agape over glistening teeth, jostled each other on the crowded pavement.

Gilbert swung along mechanically, engrossed in his own thoughts, a bad habit that had grown on him recently, and he no longer noticed what passed on either side of him ; with the callousness A of habit he walked every day upon the pavement he had so hated a while ago. Yet this crowd, coarse, roaring, pushing, swearing, repulsed him still when he awoke to its reality ; sometimes he smelt the hot air from restaurants, the odours of tobacco and strong wine, and heard anew the excited voices and suggestive giggles from within, and turned aside shuddering. And yet, he thought bitterly, the people that passed him were miserable, like himself; one, here and there, — that shivering woman, clutching at her meagre black shawl with a bruised hand, — even tragic ; others — that tipsy man, guided by a female urchin in laceless boots — absurd.

Or was the woman in the black shawl, with her dirty face, her straining, gazing eyes, her bleeding fingers, amusing also ? No doubt. Some six years since, he had torn down here, assailed with that need of action — action, that comes on a man in the height of passion ; and six months ago, vaguely aware of the throbbing life that hustled past him, and swept along the steaming pavement, he had stridden again, in such a fine fresh anger as comes to us only once in fifty years ; that storms and swirls about the roots of our being like some flooded river that tears up trees in its herculean fury. All this, of course, had ended in nothing par ticular ; his passions generally did. Just now, engrossed in his own thoughts, and far away in very flowery fields, he knocked by chance against a woman, who seized him by the arm and told him with a loud laugh ' to clear out of the w'y of lydies.' He became conscious of others of her kind round about, and fled in horror.

Vile street ! he had known it so long, and it never ceased to repulse him ; he looked round him with a new shiver of disgust. He was not of the kind who become hardened to things they do not like, nor yet of those who stand by and mark with idle observance all the filth the gutter washes past them ; his one defence was the garment of dreams he tried to wrap about him. He was an unfortunate person with ideals ; ideals, these ice creams of things of which boys take a farthing lick before they discover how they are made and how soon they melt. Then instead of doing as sensible people do, and discarding them for some thing more solid, Gilbert stuck to his poor ices : they were not very nourishing. A swish of swing doors, a sudden roar of voices and a gust of bad odours reminded him that he was near the public-house at the corner.

A bar man came to the door with a half-empty pot in his hand, and asked briskly of a respectable woman outside what she wanted. Gilbert did not hear her reply, being too pre-occupied, but his ear caught a burst of uproarious mirth, the splash of the fluid from the pot and ' Ere 's a kiss from me, ducky.' He grinned sardonically to himself as he turned away into a dark silent row of dwelling-houses ; this very thing had happened to him in polite society a few months ago. He had overheard Graham whispering, so very wittily, his abominable dregs of scandal ; he had splashed and stained Gilbert to the best of his ability ; more politely than the barman perhaps, but with the same intention. After all, he thought, there was nothing nice in life, and why was one so desperately anxious to live ? Why did he, himself, love his life so much ?

And then he smiled ; for he loved Agatha, and she was life to him. Why was it a sin for him to love her, when it was no sin for her to love Lester ? Ah, pah ! he threw away the end of his cigarette ; he was going home, to his wife. Yes, he had a wife, and he had married for money. He said this plainly, for he enjoyed being cruel to himself sometimes, and wilfully ignored the fact that he had after all the best of the bargain. As he took out his latch-key, he thought mockingly of the many resolutions he had formed on that night when he had gone to Agatha, and had paced up and down outside the front-door. He had resolved to be the dummy of others no longer ; he would not give up all that was dearest to him in accord ance with his father's arrangements ; he, with his artist nature, ambitious, restless, — and clerk at Stanley's, — he would go to her to-morrow, would en force her attention, would cry to her that he loved her, had loved her for many long months.

All these things he had resolved, — outside the front door. He was a strong-willed man, but his will manacled his own hands'; a passionate man, but life had been hard to him, and the fool had never dared to show his passion in daylight On a foggy night, freshly roused and insulted, he could scheme earnestly the downfall of the world : in the morning he was a clerk, trudged forth to the office, and had other things to do. With that prickly sensitiveness, so annoying to other people, he was afraid on the morrow to hurt his own tender soul or hers. He turned his key in the door, and on entering was met with a pleasant warmth, an appetising smell of dinner, and his wife. ' Are not you rather late ? I wish you would try to be more punctual — it upsets the servants,' she said, in that extremely good-natured way she had of saying everything, and that took the sting from any reproach.

Then she waited beside him, with round eyes and open mouth, expecting a caress. She was accustomed to an affectionate brother who hugged her and tom-boyed about her with an unceremonious and apparent love that suited her, simple mind ; but this was not Gilbert's way, and he was quite unconscious of her disappointment, and the blank he left when he hurried into the study to look for the evening post, without a word of welcome or affection. At dinner, with his eyes glancing side-wards at the letters beside his plate, he asked what she had been doing during the day, and received in reply a little flood of news. ' I saw father's new coffee-house in Portal Lane ; I hope it will do as well as the others. I managed to get the paint to-day for the mission-room texts, and Miss Spears has started a sewing-club that I looked in upon ; but I am already so busy for the Sisters' Bazaar that I did not undertake any more work.

I am afraid Sister Francis Secunda is passing away,' she added, in the unctuous tone she had learned from hearing her mother preach in the mission-rooms. ' But one must thank the Lord for deliverance in her case, poor dear saintly creature ! ' This was only laughable in Ella, while it was objectionable in her mother. It was odd, perhaps, to hear this big, buxom woman, with her ruddy face, big mouth, evident teeth, bespattering her conversation with sudden religious reference as other people use slang. She had grown up in an atmosphere of religion, which was somewhat mixed in her mind by reason of having her mother's Salvation Army tendencies on one hand, and her aunt's Anglican Sisterhood principles on the other. She busied herself with all these things as a matter of course, and without any particular thought.

It troubled her a little after her marriage when she found that Gilbert was much too busy to go to any but very exceptional bazaars, and even her mother could only persuade him to attend one of the very charming prayer meetings that were given in the drawing-room once a fortnight. And Ella suspected that the presence of the German ambassador and Mrs. Budd had accounted for his compliance. But she had an equable nature ; she preferred sewing to those meetings, and did not regret the circum stance much. Her marriage had not made any great change in her life. She saw very little of her husband, and continued to district-visit and to receive the same circle of friends as before. She lived in much less opulence, of course, than at home ; but the house was her own, and she mistress of it ; the wife of a man poor, but with expectations.

She loved Gilbert, and saw him in the evenings and on Sundays. In those circumstances there was no reason why she should not be happy. Once he had taken her to see some very odd friends of his. He had known one, whom he called ' Theresa,' all his life, he told her, and she liked her better than some of the people she saw there, who behaved in a very queer manner, it seemed to her, and she owned frankly that she did not care for them. Gilbert smiled. ' Very well,' he said, ' I will not press you to know them. I dare say they will not trouble you much' Since that she had, in her simple way, tried to make him drop them. She distrusted them. ' Where have you been ? ' — ' Why are you so late ? ' — ' Are you going out ? ' — ' You won't be long, dear ? ' — all those little questions conveyed to him that ' they ' were absorbing too much of his attention.

He invariably had a crisp answer ready, invariably did what he intended to do, and his calmness baffled his loving wife. But they got on very well together, and looked very comfortable sitting opposite each other at dinner, in their neat little dining-room. 'O Gilbert,' Ella went on, 'I saw that Miss Humberston to-day. Isn't she an artist, or some thing of that kind ? Of course Uncle Laurence is an artist, but he never comes to the house now. He was really very nice, but I am afraid that he was lost to the ways of righteousness. Oh, I looked for that sock this morning in the bedroom, but I had not time to mend it, or your coat Do you see this lovely fern I got to-day ? ' So she chattered on, an endless flow of small talk, which is generally interesting to a husband who has been away all day, and likes to hear of what has happened during his absence.

And Ella was a person who made home bright. Big as she was, she had a certain school-girlish gaucherie of movement that gave one an impression of youthfulness — not elegant, but frank and whole some. Her face had a freshness about it, too, that atoned in the eyes of some for its plainness and air of astonished simplicity ; her odd, loud laugh was startling ; her heavy footsteps and manner of banging doors also ; but these habits gave a taste of life to the dull house. She had an eye for decoration, and was at present painting the drawing-room chimney-piece in a bold design, free enough in touch to be artistic — unexpectedly so, for nothing in her appearance led one to expect such real taste and ability. ' Come and see,' she cried to Gilbert, bouncing from the table and running upstairs on the impulse.

She continued at the pitch of her voice from the landing — 'It's not quite dry. I am afraid the dust is sticking to it. Just call to Mary to bring me a cloth. Mary! a cover, please,' and after all she ran down to get it herself. ' Yes,' said Gilbert, suddenly conscious that he had not spoken much since he came home. 'Really pretty, my dear, and very well done. After all, you are quite an artist, Ella.' He put his arm through hers. ' I 'm glad you like it,' she said simply. ' Your judgment counts for so much. I wish you would draw the design for the door.' Then she laughed — ' guffawed ' her father called it. ' Mrs. Leighs called just when I was busy at it, and she looked rather shocked. Of course I used to do most things in the boys' photography room at home after they gave up using it. When she turned round to say good-bye, she swept the whole of this poppy off, and I had a great business in getting the paint from her dress.' ' You shouldn't have told her it was there.' ' Oh,' said Ella, to whom this had never occurred, ' I could not have let her go with it like that.

She is such a very good person, Gilbert, so charitable, and has brought the Bible and the name of the Lord to many poor boys for the first time. She will never forgive me. I am afraid she thinks I am not as good as I should be, and,' she added meditatively, ' it was such a handsome dress, too, — silk, — and it must have been very expensive.' Gilbert laughed. ' The cause of her anger, I dare say. If it had happened to any one else, she would have exhorted them to bear it patiently. Never mind her. She is not worth bothering about.' Ella opened wide her mouth. This was entirely against the principles to which she had been educated, and it astonished her that her husband should be such a good man without doing any of the things she looked upon as necessary to good ness. So, without replying, she dropped the subject, and reverted again to the chimney-piece. 'Don't you think a bee or something there would be a great improvement — a blue butterfly would look very well ? ' Gilbert's arm stiffened, and he frowned painfully. ' No,' he said quickly. ' I 'd put a white one, or a brown one, or — any colour but blue.

Put a bee.' He retreated from her, and she was astonished to observe the veins swell on his brow as they did when he was put out. What had she said to disturb him ? She began to wind some wool, and having, of course, no idea of silence, she asked, in the act of dividing a skein, why he was cross. Was he tired ? Why did he not take his medicine if he had a headache ? Gilbert, exasperated, was turning his head to answer, when he saw something black with the corner of his eye, and he bounded from his chair, glad that an excuse offered itself on which he could expend his irritation. ' That damned cat in the drawing-room again ! ' he shouted, and the beast, recognising its enemy, fled through the door incontinently. ' O Gilbert, I wish you were fonder of cats ! But I did tell the servants to keep it in the kitchen,' Ella said with a sigh.

She looked so good as she said this, and it was so kind of her to give up her own liking for the animal to his dislike of it, that Gilbert sat down again, con science-stricken, determined to be pleasant for the rest of the evening. Just then his dog came in, a big, handsome fellow, wriggling all over with happy recognition of his master. ' Here you are,' he said with his laughing mouth. ' Glad to see you. Had a good dinner ? So have I.' He sat down between Gilbert's knees. ' Well, old boy, what devilry have you been up to to-day? I see a satisfaction and repletion in your eye that bodes ill.' 'No,' said Ella, 'I don't think he has done anything to-day.' 'You are getting that all in a mess. Let me hold it for you,' and Gilbert sat patiently for half an hour while his wife disentangled the skein.

She chattered and laughed. Ah ! this good Ella ; life would surely never be very unkind to her. So they sat close together before the fire, the dog snoring peacefully on the hearthrug beside them. This is how things should be after a few months of marriage. ' A little blue butterfly ' had got into Gilbert's head, and as he went upstairs when Ella had gone to her room, he said again and again -to himself, ' Petit papillon bleu, p' tit papillon blest.' He loitered down the passage to his father's room. Inside here was all that he knew of happiness, and sometimes it too turned to sorrow ; a bitter grief swept over him when his father forgot to love him, and he had grown to dread the look in those eyes, the look that came and went. It was curious to see this neat, precise man standing thus, his hair almost singed by the gas jet, his face drooping, thinking of a little blue butterfly and a golden head in the sunshine.

Ella suddenly burst open her door, and issued forth in search of matches. ' If you were tidier, and kept things in one place, you would know where to find them,' said her husband tartly. There could be no doubt that Gilbert was developing into a martinet. He went in hurriedly to see his father. Mr. Strode was sitting in his big armchair beside the fire, and the light shone brightly on his silver ringlets. He was busy dictating some thing to Martha, an arduous task for both. He could no longer write well with his trembling hand, and Martha, of course, had never written well, and poetry, above other things, she found difficult to comprehend. Mr. Strode ruffled his curls with one hand, with the other motioned Gilbert to be silent, and Martha crumpled her rugged brow painfully. ' Now, did you put " when " on the next line ?

Bless me, make haste, what's the matter now? I must get a secretary, Gilbert, I have said that over and over again. How often do you intend to forget ? You forget me altogether, you never do a thing I ask you ! I must have a secretary : it is of the greatest importance that my book should come out ; and I suppose you have not seen about it yet ? I believe you would like to starve me ; you don't remember that it 's owing to me that you are better off. Martha, is that a blot I see ? Blotting-paper, quick, — must copy it out again — how careless you are!' He gazed about him irately. ' Put it away in the drawer, and the pen : shut the ink-pot : now hand me that book, no, that one. Now, Gilbert, listen to this.' Mr. Strode's eyesight was no longer very good : but he thought the fault lay in his spectacles : he took them off and wiped them, tried them this way and that, and at last burst out — ' I must speak to the doctor to-morrow ; that man in the shop cheated me, and when I wrote to him, answered me impertinently.

You must get me a new pair, — now don't forget.' He fidgeted in his chair, and his ringlets hung in a quivering halo round his face. Old face, aged by illness, with an odd vagueness on it, in spite of its irasci bility. Ah ! this vagueness, Gilbert watched it growing every day. Beautiful face, with its fault less outline, its little cross smile only wiped out now and then by that flickering confusion that came and went. Gilbert knelt down at the side of the chair, and took up the manuscript with a smile. ' Let us go on from where we left off last night,' he said, and began to read. Mr. Strode listened, and a pleased smile soon superseded his frown. ' Ah ! what do you think of that ? Hush, more slowly,— now— what, a word left out ? ' so he com mented as Gilbert read, marking time on his son's shoulder.

Gilbert also seemed interested, and turned with a bright smile when he laid the manuscript back on the table. ' We must make haste and get it finished ; but a secretary would be a nuisance ; he would not know your ways, you see, and we could not trust him. I will write it out properly, eh, how will that do ? ' 'Well, it might be better. But be sure you make no mistakes. Do so many pages, and bring it to me to correct every day.' Mr. Strode seemed to think that his son was still a little boy, and Gilbert did not mind, he enjoyed it. Mr. Strode was about to speak again, when a sudden expres sionlessness came over his face, and he paused. ' Er, what was I saying ? ' he murmured. ' About this,' said Gilbert anxiously. ' Look, I shall begin here, do you see ? ' He laid his hand on his father's. ' You will let me do it ? ' 'Yes, yes, my boy, of course.

Now, observe how busy your old father is, he has done some thing else to-day ! ' ' Really ? Yes, you are always at something, but don't work too hard.' ' Aha ! ' cried Mr. Strode merrily, ' I always was busy. I could not live without something to do. Just lend me a hand.' He rose from his chair with difficulty, and Gilbert guided him, holding him firmly and gently by the arm. Martha, entering at that moment with her master's supper, watched with a sad eye Mr. Strode carefully feeling for each step, his eager face forward, clinging tightly to the pro tecting hand of his son, Gilbert, as watchful, as careful, peering down through his glasses at every obstacle. ' Can't think what makes me so shaky,' grumbled his father. ' Never used to be like this. The piano-stool, — careful — yes, that 's it.

I composed the music for the chanson to-day. You are sur prised, aren't you ? ' his merry laughter rang through the room. ' I thought you would be, — but what's that? Martha, don't make such a noise, and put that down in the fender, to keep warm. Gilbert, just see that the ashes don't fall into it.' Gilbert placed the cup carefully, and returned, and then Mr. Strode lifted a dainty hand with a movement suggestive of lace-ruffle, and began to play with his tremulous fingers upon the piano. His head went to the music, he sang a word or two, and Gilbert, at his bidding, manœuvred the pedals. Martha stood at the table, still watching them as they sat side by side at the piano, producing a music that was worth listening to, for Mr. Strode never did anything that was not worth listening to or looking at.

Every one acknowledged his genius. ' There, you see, are the birds,— hush, softly, remember it is early morning,— tree-tops just gilded with the first rays of the sun, everything else grey and misty, — covers not taken off yet, you know, birds waking,— that 's the stream,— go on, louder ' Gilbert approached his short-sighted eyes closer to the ill-written music, a proud smile upon his face the while. If some one only heard these compositions of his father's ! When they finished, Mr. Strode turned to his son with a smile. 'Charming, isn't it?' he said simply. 'It isa long time since we had a table-cloth opera ' ' Yes,' answered Gilbert quickly. ' Let us have one to-night,' and he busied himself about it, pleased to see his father so happy and untroubled. A folded cloth was laid on the keyboard, and Mr. Strode played thereon without any hesitation, never making a fault.

It gave an odd, faraway sound that was effective. ' This is the angry father,' said Mr. Strode, with an appreciative smile on his lips. ' Now this is the daughter pleading.' ' Now she runs off with the hero,' put in Gilbert. ' Precisely, and meets with a misadventure, — these agitated chromatics.' So they laughed together over the piano, to the wonderment of the old servant behind them, and Mr. Strode was very happy. A big cinder, sparkling suddenly from the fire, fell with a great fizzing into the cup that had been put there to keep hot. Mr. Strode jumped from the stool nervously, ■7 and would have fallen if Gilbert had not held him safely. 'What do you mean by putting it there?' he burst out. ' Your carelessness as usual, Gilbert. I never knew a more handless, clumsy boy, — you spoil everything, tear everything you don't break, especially my things.

I believe you do it on purpose. Leave go, you will make me fall if you hold me ; leave go at once ! You upset my nerves completely, when I have done everything for you too ! I shall tell the doctor how I am treated ! ' He called Martha to aid him to his chair, and he would not turn to speak again to Gilbert. ' Take him away, he does it on purpose; he takes advantage of this rheumatism I have in my legs. He declares I 'm ill.' ' I know it's only rheumatism,' he grumbled to Martha, who said, yes, it was very annoying. ' Get out of my sight,' he added, when Gilbert tried to approach him, and did not settle down until his son was out of the room. The loving look died from his eyes, and turned to suspicion and mistrust ; he was certain that every one in the house plotted against him ; he was kept shut up and told he was ill because he was in the way, — oh, he knew all about it, his observation did not go for nothing, — he said ; he saw, he would pay them out yet.

Gilbert went down to his study with the manu script he was to copy out in his hand. He gazed at it a long while, and sighed over it miserably. Then he set to work upon it, but the pen twirled B aimlessly in his fingers, and only a big blot fell on the paper. He sprang from his chair, his veins all throb bing ; he strode up and down the room ; what was the matter with him, — what was he going to do ? Nothing, he was only wretched, miserable. But so many people are miserable. ' Dog ! Is that you ? ' said Gilbert, returning to his chair, and becoming aware of a moist black thing, a sniffing, muzzly, affectionate nose at his elbow. He embraced the beast with the silly effusion that comes of sitting up late at night, and meditating in solitude over the littleness of life, the coldness and dirtiness of the Thames. ' Doggy ! ' said Gilbert, with his cheek against a soft ear, ' dear old dog ! ' Dolphin wagged his tail sleepily.

This indiffer ence offended Gilbert, and he said, 'Cats!' to arouse his uncaring companion. Dolphin at once bristled, and every hair asked, ' Where ! ' ' You are a selfish brute, too, you — no, don't look at me like that, I didn't say anything.' Then he laughed, and then his head dropped on the table. In this house everything was quiet, with the heavy, full silence of sleeping night Upstairs Ella slept the deep, sound sleep of a healthy child. Mr. Strode dreamed of his manuscript, a little pleased smile on his beautiful face. Down stairs, Dolphin snored peacefully, his nose between two big paws,— Gilbert, his head on the table, cried, cried ... to the tune of ' Petit papillon bleu, petit papillon bleu! Ah, ah ! p' tit papillon bleu.

Chapter II

Everywhere was heat, — heat. A still haze lay over the Campagne Saleve ; a great, glowing yellowness glared on its white walls and the dusty road outside, lay in a big sweep on the lawn in front, scintillated in ridges of light on the surface of the lake. The shadow under the trees was very blue, the mountains in the distance very purple, but a brazen sun poured its gorgeous heat upon the world, and things ached and quivered with excess of colour. The air was pregnant with the buzz of insects, butterflies swung daintily on the tendrils of the vines, and the wasps quarrelled among the fruit-trees. Spahi was stretched out on the stones in the courtyard, guarding the big iron gate as usual, snapping at flies, and panting, a long pink tongue dangling from the corner of his black mouth. Through the gate one saw the clustering roofs of the old town, the glittering water of the lake, and a ribbon of dusty road, leading thither.