by Henry James
Produced by An Anonymous Volunteer and David Widger
THE EUROPEANS
by Henry James
CHAPTER I
A narrow grave-yard in the heart of a bustling, indifferent city, seenfrom the windows of a gloomy-looking inn, is at no time an object ofenlivening suggestion; and the spectacle is not at its best when themouldy tombstones and funereal umbrage have received the ineffectualrefreshment of a dull, moist snow-fall. If, while the air is thickenedby this frosty drizzle, the calendar should happen to indicate that theblessed vernal season is already six weeks old, it will be admitted thatno depressing influence is absent from the scene. This fact was keenlyfelt on a certain 12th of May, upwards of thirty years since, by a ladywho stood looking out of one of the windows of the best hotel in theancient city of Boston. She had stood there for half an hour--stoodthere, that is, at intervals; for from time to time she turned backinto the room and measured its length with a restless step. In thechimney-place was a red-hot fire which emitted a small blue flame; andin front of the fire, at a table, sat a young man who was busily plyinga pencil. He had a number of sheets of paper cut into smallequal squares, and he was apparently covering them with pictorialdesigns--strange-looking figures. He worked rapidly and attentively,sometimes threw back his head and held out his drawing at arm's-length,and kept up a soft, gay-sounding humming and whistling. The lady brushedpast him in her walk; her much-trimmed skirts were voluminous. She neverdropped her eyes upon his work; she only turned them, occasionally, asshe passed, to a mirror suspended above the toilet-table on the otherside of the room. Here she paused a moment, gave a pinch to her waistwith her two hands, or raised these members--they were very plumpand pretty--to the multifold braids of her hair, with a movement halfcaressing, half corrective. An attentive observer might have fanciedthat during these periods of desultory self-inspection her face forgotits melancholy; but as soon as she neared the window again it began toproclaim that she was a very ill-pleased woman. And indeed, in whatmet her eyes there was little to be pleased with. The window-panes werebattered by the sleet; the head-stones in the grave-yard beneath seemedto be holding themselves askance to keep it out of their faces. A talliron railing protected them from the street, and on the other side ofthe railing an assemblage of Bostonians were trampling about in theliquid snow. Many of them were looking up and down; they appeared to bewaiting for something. From time to time a strange vehicle drew near tothe place where they stood,--such a vehicle as the lady at the window,in spite of a considerable acquaintance with human inventions, hadnever seen before: a huge, low omnibus, painted in brilliant colors,and decorated apparently with jangling bells, attached to a species ofgroove in the pavement, through which it was dragged, with a great dealof rumbling, bouncing and scratching, by a couple of remarkably smallhorses. When it reached a certain point the people in front of thegrave-yard, of whom much the greater number were women, carryingsatchels and parcels, projected themselves upon it in a compact body--amovement suggesting the scramble for places in a life-boat at sea--andwere engulfed in its large interior. Then the life-boat--or thelife-car, as the lady at the window of the hotel vaguely designatedit--went bumping and jingling away upon its invisible wheels, with thehelmsman (the man at the wheel) guiding its course incongruously fromthe prow. This phenomenon was repeated every three minutes, and thesupply of eagerly-moving women in cloaks, bearing reticules and bundles,renewed itself in the most liberal manner. On the other side of thegrave-yard was a row of small red brick houses, showing a series ofhomely, domestic-looking backs; at the end opposite the hotel a tallwooden church-spire, painted white, rose high into the vagueness ofthe snow-flakes. The lady at the window looked at it for some time; forreasons of her own she thought it the ugliest thing she had ever seen.She hated it, she despised it; it threw her into a state of irritationthat was quite out of proportion to any sensible motive. She had neverknown herself to care so much about church-spires.
She was not pretty; but even when it expressed perplexed irritation herface was most interesting and agreeable. Neither was she in herfirst youth; yet, though slender, with a great deal of extremelywell-fashioned roundness of contour--a suggestion both of maturity andflexibility--she carried her three and thirty years as a light-wristedHebe might have carried a brimming wine-cup. Her complexion wasfatigued, as the French say; her mouth was large, her lips too full, herteeth uneven, her chin rather commonly modeled; she had a thick nose,and when she smiled--she was constantly smiling--the lines beside itrose too high, toward her eyes. But these eyes were charming: grayin color, brilliant, quickly glancing, gently resting, full ofintelligence. Her forehead was very low--it was her only handsomefeature; and she had a great abundance of crisp dark hair, finelyfrizzled, which was always braided in a manner that suggested someSouthern or Eastern, some remotely foreign, woman. She had a largecollection of ear-rings, and wore them in alternation; and they seemedto give a point to her Oriental or exotic aspect. A compliment had oncebeen paid her, which, being repeated to her, gave her greater pleasurethan anything she had ever heard. "A pretty woman?" some one had said."Why, her features are very bad." "I don't know about her features," avery discerning observer had answered; "but she carries her head like apretty woman." You may imagine whether, after this, she carried her headless becomingly.
She turned away from the window at last, pressing her hands to her eyes."It 's too horrible!" she exclaimed. "I shall go back--I shall go back!"And she flung herself into a chair before the fire.
"Wait a little, dear child," said the young man softly, sketching awayat his little scraps of paper.
The lady put out her foot; it was very small, and there was an immenserosette on her slipper. She fixed her eyes for a while on this ornament,and then she looked at the glowing bed of anthracite coal in the grate."Did you ever see anything so hideous as that fire?" she demanded."Did you ever see anything so--so affreux as--as everything?" She spokeEnglish with perfect purity; but she brought out this French epithetin a manner that indicated that she was accustomed to using Frenchepithets.
"I think the fire is very pretty," said the young man, glancing at ita moment. "Those little blue tongues, dancing on top of the crimsonembers, are extremely picturesque. They are like a fire in analchemist's laboratory."
"You are too good-natured, my dear," his companion declared.
The young man held out one of his drawings, with his head on one side.His tongue was gently moving along his under-lip. "Good-natured--yes.Too good-natured--no."
"You are irritating," said the lady, looking at her slipper.
He began to retouch his sketch. "I think you mean simply that you areirritated."
"Ah, for that, yes!" said his companion, with a little bitter laugh. "It's the darkest day of my life--and you know what that means."
"Wait till to-morrow," rejoined the young man.
"Yes, we have made a great mistake. If there is any doubt about itto-day, there certainly will be none to-morrow. Ce sera clair, aumoins!"
The young man was silent a few moments, driving his pencil. Then atlast, "There are no such things as mistakes," he affirmed.
"Very true--for those who are not clever enough to perceive them. Notto recognize one's mistakes--that would be happiness in life," the ladywent on, still looking at her pretty foot.
"My dearest sister," said the young man, always intent upon his drawing,"it 's the first time you have told me I am not clever."
"Well, by your own theory I can't call it a mistake," answered hissister, pertinently enough.
The young man gave a clear, fresh laugh. "You, at least, are cleverenough, dearest sister," he said.
"I was not so when I proposed this."
"Was it you who proposed it?" asked her brother.
She turn
ed her head and gave him a little stare. "Do you desire thecredit of it?"
"If you like, I will take the blame," he said, looking up with a smile.
"Yes," she rejoined in a moment, "you make no difference in thesethings. You have no sense of property."
The young man gave his joyous laugh again. "If that means I have noproperty, you are right!"
"Don't joke about your poverty," said his sister. "That is quite asvulgar as to boast about it."
"My poverty! I have just finished a drawing that will bring me fiftyfrancs!"
"Voyons," said the lady, putting out her hand.
He added a touch or two, and then gave her his sketch. She looked at it,but she went on with her idea of a moment before. "If a woman were toask you to marry her you would say, 'Certainly, my dear, with pleasure!'And you would marry her and be ridiculously happy. Then at the end ofthree months you would say to her, 'You know that blissful day when Ibegged you to be mine!'"
The young man had risen from the table, stretching his arms a little; hewalked to the window. "That is a description of a charming nature," hesaid.
"Oh, yes, you have a charming nature; I regard that as our capital. IfI had not been convinced of that I should never have taken the risk ofbringing you to this dreadful country."
"This comical country, this delightful country!" exclaimed the youngman, and he broke into the most animated laughter.
"Is it those women scrambling into the omnibus?" asked his companion."What do you suppose is the attraction?"
"I suppose there is a very good-looking man inside," said the young man.
"In each of them? They come along in hundreds, and the men in thiscountry don't seem at all handsome. As for the women--I have never seenso many at once since I left the convent."
"The women are very pretty," her brother declared, "and the whole affairis very amusing. I must make a sketch of it." And he came back to thetable quickly, and picked up his utensils--a small sketching-board,a sheet of paper, and three or four crayons. He took his place at thewindow with these things, and stood there glancing out, plying hispencil with an air of easy skill. While he worked he wore abrilliant smile. Brilliant is indeed the word at this moment for hisstrongly-lighted face. He was eight and twenty years old; he had ashort, slight, well-made figure. Though he bore a noticeable resemblanceto his sister, he was a better favored person: fair-haired, clear-faced,witty-looking, with a delicate finish of feature and an expression atonce urbane and not at all serious, a warm blue eye, an eyebrow finelydrawn and excessively arched--an eyebrow which, if ladies wrote sonnetsto those of their lovers, might have been made the subject of such apiece of verse--and a light moustache that flourished upwards as ifblown that way by the breath of a constant smile. There was somethingin his physiognomy at once benevolent and picturesque. But, as I havehinted, it was not at all serious. The young man's face was, in thisrespect, singular; it was not at all serious, and yet it inspired theliveliest confidence.
"Be sure you put in plenty of snow," said his sister. "Bonte divine,what a climate!"
"I shall leave the sketch all white, and I shall put in the littlefigures in black," the young man answered, laughing. "And I shall callit--what is that line in Keats?--Mid-May's Eldest Child!"
"I don't remember," said the lady, "that mamma ever told me it was likethis."
"Mamma never told you anything disagreeable. And it 's not likethis--every day. You will see that to-morrow we shall have a splendidday."
"Qu'en savez-vous? To-morrow I shall go away."
"Where shall you go?"
"Anywhere away from here. Back to Silberstadt. I shall write to theReigning Prince."
The young man turned a little and looked at her, with his crayon poised."My dear Eugenia," he murmured, "were you so happy at sea?"
Eugenia got up; she still held in her hand the drawing her brother hadgiven her. It was a bold, expressive sketch of a group of miserablepeople on the deck of a steamer, clinging together and clutching at eachother, while the vessel lurched downward, at a terrific angle, intothe hollow of a wave. It was extremely clever, and full of a sort oftragi-comical power. Eugenia dropped her eyes upon it and made a sadgrimace. "How can you draw such odious scenes?" she asked. "I shouldlike to throw it into the fire!" And she tossed the paper away. Herbrother watched, quietly, to see where it went. It fluttered down to thefloor, where he let it lie. She came toward the window, pinching inher waist. "Why don't you reproach me--abuse me?" she asked. "I thinkI should feel better then. Why don't you tell me that you hate me forbringing you here?"
"Because you would not believe it. I adore you, dear sister! I amdelighted to be here, and I am charmed with the prospect."
"I don't know what had taken possession of me. I had lost my head,"Eugenia went on.
The young man, on his side, went on plying his pencil. "It is evidentlya most curious and interesting country. Here we are, and I mean to enjoyit."
His companion turned away with an impatient step, but presently cameback. "High spirits are doubtless an excellent thing," she said; "butyou give one too much of them, and I can't see that they have done youany good."
The young man stared, with lifted eyebrows, smiling; he tapped hishandsome nose with his pencil. "They have made me happy!"
"That was the least they could do; they have made you nothing else. Youhave gone through life thanking fortune for such very small favors thatshe has never put herself to any trouble for you."
"She must have put herself to a little, I think, to present me with soadmirable a sister."
"Be serious, Felix. You forget that I am your elder."
"With a sister, then, so elderly!" rejoined Felix, laughing. "I hoped wehad left seriousness in Europe."
"I fancy you will find it here. Remember that you are nearly thirtyyears old, and that you are nothing but an obscure Bohemian--a pennilesscorrespondent of an illustrated newspaper."
"Obscure as much as you please, but not so much of a Bohemian as youthink. And not at all penniless! I have a hundred pounds in my pocket.I have an engagement to make fifty sketches, and I mean to paint theportraits of all our cousins, and of all their cousins, at a hundreddollars a head."
"You are not ambitious," said Eugenia.
"You are, dear Baroness," the young man replied.
The Baroness was silent a moment, looking out at the sleet-darkenedgrave-yard and the bumping horse-cars. "Yes, I am ambitious," she saidat last. "And my ambition has brought me to this dreadful place!" Sheglanced about her--the room had a certain vulgar nudity; the bed and thewindow were curtainless--and she gave a little passionate sigh. "Poorold ambition!" she exclaimed. Then she flung herself down upon a sofawhich stood near against the wall, and covered her face with her hands.
Her brother went on with his drawing, rapidly and skillfully; after somemoments he sat down beside her and showed her his sketch. "Now, don'tyou think that 's pretty good for an obscure Bohemian?" he asked. "Ihave knocked off another fifty francs."
Eugenia glanced at the little picture as he laid it on her lap. "Yes,it is very clever," she said. And in a moment she added, "Do you supposeour cousins do that?"
"Do what?"
"Get into those things, and look like that."
Felix meditated awhile. "I really can't say. It will be interesting todiscover."
"Oh, the rich people can't!" said the Baroness.
"Are you very sure they are rich?" asked Felix, lightly.
His sister slowly turned in her place, looking at him. "Heavenlypowers!" she murmured. "You have a way of bringing out things!"
"It will certainly be much pleasanter if they are rich," Felix declared.
"Do you suppose if I had not known they were rich I would ever havecome?"
The young man met his sister's somewhat peremptory eye with his bright,contented glance. "Yes, it certainly will be pleasanter," he repeated.
"That is all I expect of them," said the Baroness. "I don't count upontheir being clever or friendly--at firs
t--or elegant or interesting. ButI assure you I insist upon their being rich."
Felix leaned his head upon the back of the sofa and looked awhile at theoblong patch of sky to which the window served as frame. The snow wasceasing; it seemed to him that the sky had begun to brighten. "I countupon their being rich," he said at last, "and powerful, and clever, andfriendly, and elegant, and interesting, and generally delightful! Tu vasvoir." And he bent forward and kissed his sister. "Look there!" he wenton. "As a portent, even while I speak, the sky is turning the color ofgold; the day is going to be splendid."
And indeed, within five minutes the weather had changed. The sun brokeout through the snow-clouds and jumped into the Baroness's room. "Bontedivine," exclaimed this lady, "what a climate!"
"We will go out and see the world," said Felix.
And after a while they went out. The air had grown warm as well asbrilliant; the sunshine had dried the pavements. They walked about thestreets at hazard, looking at the people and the houses, the shops andthe vehicles, the blazing blue sky and the muddy crossings, the hurryingmen and the slow-strolling maidens, the fresh red bricks and the brightgreen trees, the extraordinary mixture of smartness and shabbiness.From one hour to another the day had grown vernal; even in the bustlingstreets there was an odor of earth and blossom. Felix was immenselyentertained. He had called it a comical country, and he went aboutlaughing at everything he saw. You would have said that Americancivilization expressed itself to his sense in a tissue of capital jokes.The jokes were certainly excellent, and the young man's merriment wasjoyous and genial. He possessed what is called the pictorial sense;and this first glimpse of democratic manners stirred the same sort ofattention that he would have given to the movements of a livelyyoung person with a bright complexion. Such attention would have beendemonstrative and complimentary; and in the present case Felix mighthave passed for an undispirited young exile revisiting the haunts ofhis childhood. He kept looking at the violent blue of the sky, at thescintillating air, at the scattered and multiplied patches of color.
"Comme c'est bariole, eh?" he said to his sister in that foreign tonguewhich they both appeared to feel a mysterious prompting occasionally touse.
"Yes, it is bariole indeed," the Baroness answered. "I don't like thecoloring; it hurts my eyes."
"It shows how extremes meet," the young man rejoined. "Instead of comingto the West we seem to have gone to the East. The way the sky touchesthe house-tops is just like Cairo; and the red and blue sign-boardspatched over the face of everything remind one of Mahometandecorations."
"The young women are not Mahometan," said his companion. "They can't besaid to hide their faces. I never saw anything so bold."
"Thank Heaven they don't hide their faces!" cried Felix. "Their facesare uncommonly pretty."
"Yes, their faces are often very pretty," said the Baroness, who wasa very clever woman. She was too clever a woman not to be capable ofa great deal of just and fine observation. She clung more closely thanusual to her brother's arm; she was not exhilarated, as he was; she saidvery little, but she noted a great many things and made her reflections.She was a little excited; she felt that she had indeed come to a strangecountry, to make her fortune. Superficially, she was conscious of a gooddeal of irritation and displeasure; the Baroness was a very delicateand fastidious person. Of old, more than once, she had gone, forentertainment's sake and in brilliant company, to a fair in a provincialtown. It seemed to her now that she was at an enormous fair--that theentertainment and the disagreements were very much the same. She foundherself alternately smiling and shrinking; the show was very curious,but it was probable, from moment to moment, that one would be jostled.The Baroness had never seen so many people walking about before; shehad never been so mixed up with people she did not know. But little bylittle she felt that this fair was a more serious undertaking. She wentwith her brother into a large public garden, which seemed very pretty,but where she was surprised at seeing no carriages. The afternoon wasdrawing to a close; the coarse, vivid grass and the slender tree-boleswere gilded by the level sunbeams--gilded as with gold that was freshfrom the mine. It was the hour at which ladies should come out for anairing and roll past a hedge of pedestrians, holding their parasolsaskance. Here, however, Eugenia observed no indications of this custom,the absence of which was more anomalous as there was a charming avenueof remarkably graceful, arching elms in the most convenient contiguityto a large, cheerful street, in which, evidently, among the moreprosperous members of the bourgeoisie, a great deal of pedestrianismwent forward. Our friends passed out into this well lighted promenade,and Felix noticed a great many more pretty girls and called his sister'sattention to them. This latter measure, however, was superfluous; forthe Baroness had inspected, narrowly, these charming young ladies.
"I feel an intimate conviction that our cousins are like that," saidFelix.
The Baroness hoped so, but this is not what she said. "They are verypretty," she said, "but they are mere little girls. Where are thewomen--the women of thirty?"
"Of thirty-three, do you mean?" her brother was going to ask; for heunderstood often both what she said and what she did not say. But heonly exclaimed upon the beauty of the sunset, while the Baroness, whohad come to seek her fortune, reflected that it would certainly be wellfor her if the persons against whom she might need to measure herselfshould all be mere little girls. The sunset was superb; they stoppedto look at it; Felix declared that he had never seen such a gorgeousmixture of colors. The Baroness also thought it splendid; and she wasperhaps the more easily pleased from the fact that while she stood thereshe was conscious of much admiring observation on the part of variousnice-looking people who passed that way, and to whom a distinguished,strikingly-dressed woman with a foreign air, exclaiming upon thebeauties of nature on a Boston street corner in the French tongue,could not be an object of indifference. Eugenia's spirits rose. Shesurrendered herself to a certain tranquil gayety. If she had come toseek her fortune, it seemed to her that her fortune would be easy tofind. There was a promise of it in the gorgeous purity of the westernsky; there was an intimation in the mild, unimpertinent gaze of thepassers of a certain natural facility in things.
"You will not go back to Silberstadt, eh?" asked Felix.
"Not to-morrow," said the Baroness.
"Nor write to the Reigning Prince?"
"I shall write to him that they evidently know nothing about him overhere."
"He will not believe you," said the young man. "I advise you to let himalone."
Felix himself continued to be in high good humor. Brought up amongancient customs and in picturesque cities, he yet found plenty of localcolor in the little Puritan metropolis. That evening, after dinner, hetold his sister that he should go forth early on the morrow to look uptheir cousins.
"You are very impatient," said Eugenia.
"What can be more natural," he asked, "after seeing all those prettygirls to-day? If one's cousins are of that pattern, the sooner one knowsthem the better."
"Perhaps they are not," said Eugenia. "We ought to have brought someletters--to some other people."
"The other people would not be our kinsfolk."
"Possibly they would be none the worse for that," the Baroness replied.
Her brother looked at her with his eyebrows lifted. "That was not whatyou said when you first proposed to me that we should come out here andfraternize with our relatives. You said that it was the prompting ofnatural affection; and when I suggested some reasons against it youdeclared that the voix du sang should go before everything."
"You remember all that?" asked the Baroness.
"Vividly! I was greatly moved by it."
She was walking up and down the room, as she had done in the morning;she stopped in her walk and looked at her brother. She apparently wasgoing to say something, but she checked herself and resumed her walk.Then, in a few moments, she said something different, which had theeffect of an explanation of the suppression of her earlier thought. "Youwill never
be anything but a child, dear brother."
"One would suppose that you, madam," answered Felix, laughing, "were athousand years old."
"I am--sometimes," said the Baroness.
"I will go, then, and announce to our cousins the arrival of apersonage so extraordinary. They will immediately come and pay you theirrespects."
Eugenia paced the length of the room again, and then she stopped beforeher brother, laying her hand upon his arm. "They are not to come and seeme," she said. "You are not to allow that. That is not the way I shallmeet them first." And in answer to his interrogative glance she went on."You will go and examine, and report. You will come back and tell mewho they are and what they are; their number, gender, their respectiveages--all about them. Be sure you observe everything; be ready todescribe to me the locality, the accessories--how shall I say it?--themise en scene. Then, at my own time, at my own hour, under circumstancesof my own choosing, I will go to them. I will present myself--I willappear before them!" said the Baroness, this time phrasing her idea witha certain frankness.
"And what message am I to take to them?" asked Felix, who had a livelyfaith in the justness of his sister's arrangements.
She looked at him a moment--at his expression of agreeable veracity;and, with that justness that he admired, she replied, "Say what youplease. Tell my story in the way that seems to you most--natural." Andshe bent her forehead for him to kiss.
