Delphi Collected Works of Marie Corelli (Illustrated) (Delphi Series Eight Book 22)

by Marie Corelli

  CHAPTER IX

  In affairs of love a woman is perhaps most easily ensnared by a man who can combine passion with pleasantry and hot pursuit with social tact and diplomacy. Amadis de Jocelyn was an adept at this kind of thing — he was, if it may be so expressed, a refined libertine, loving women from a purely physical sense of attraction and pleasure conveyed to himself, and obtusely ignorant of the needs or demands of their higher natures. From a mental or intellectual standpoint all women to him were alike, made to be “managed” alike, used alike, and alike set aside when their use was done with. The leaven of the Jew or the Turk was in the temperament of this descendant of a long line of French nobles, who had gained their chief honours by killing men, ravishing women and plundering their neighbours’ lands — though occasional flashes of bravery and chivalry had glanced over their annals in history like the light from a wandering will o’ the wisp flickering over a morass. Gifted in his art, but wholly undisciplined in his nature, he had lived a life of selfish aims to selfish ends, and in the course of it had made love to many women, — one especially, on whose devoted affections he had preyed like an insect that ungratefully poisons the flower from which it has sucked the honey. This woman, driven to bay at last by his neglect and effrontery, had roused the scattered forces of her pride and had given him his conge — and he had been looking about for a fresh victim when he met Innocent. She was a complete novelty to him, and stimulated his more or less jaded emotions, — he found her quaint and charming as a poet’s dream of some nymph of the woodlands, — her manner of looking at life and the things of life was so deliciously simple — almost mediaeval, — for she believed that a man should die rather than break his word or imperil his honour, which to Jocelyn was such a primitive state of things as to seem prehistoric. Then there was her fixed and absurd “fancy” about the noble qualities and manifold virtues of the French knight who had served the Duc d’Anjou, — and who had been to her from childhood a kind of lover in the spirit, — a being whom she had instinctively tried to serve and to please; and he had sufficient imagination to understand and take advantage of the feeling aroused in her when she had met one of the same descent, and bearing the same name, in himself. He had run through the gamut of many emotions and sentiments, — he had joined one or two of the new schools of atheism and modernism started by certain self-opinionated young University men, and in the earlier stages of his career had in the cock-sure impulse of youth designed schemes for the regeneration of the world, till the usual difficulties presented themselves as opposed to such vast business, — he had associated himself with men who followed what is called the “fleshly school” of poetry and art generally, and had evolved from his own mentality a comfortable faith of which the chief tenet was “Self for Self” — a religion which lifts the mind no higher than the purely animal plane; — and in its environment of physical consciousness and agreeable physical sensations, he was content to live.

  With such a temperament and disposition as he possessed, which swayed him hither and thither on the caprice or impulse of the moment, his intentions toward Innocent were not very clear even to himself. When he had begun his “amour” with her he had meant it to go just as far as should satisfy his own whim and desire, — but as he came to know her better, he put a check on himself and hesitated as one may hesitate before pulling up a rose-bush from its happy growing place and flinging it out on the dust-heap to die. She was so utterly unsuspicious and unaware of evil, and she had placed him on so high a pedestal of honour, trusting him with such perfect and unquestioning faith, that for very manhood’s sake he could not bring himself to tear the veil from her eyes. Moreover he really loved her in a curious, haphazard way of love, — more than he had ever loved any one of her sex, — and, when in her presence and under her influence, he gained a glimmering of consciousness of what love might mean in its best and purest sense.

  He laughed at himself however for this very thought. He had always pooh-pooh’d the idea of love as having anything divine or uplifting in its action, — nevertheless in his more sincere moments he was bound to confess that since he had known Innocent his very art had gained a certain breadth and subtlety which it had lacked before. It was a pleasure to him to see her eyes shine with pride in his work, to hear her voice murmur dulcet praises of his skill, and for a time he took infinite pains with all his subjects, putting the very best of himself into his drawing and colouring with results that were brilliant and convincing enough to ensure success for all his efforts. Sometimes — lost in a sudden fit of musing — he wondered how his life would shape itself if he married her? He had avoided marriage as a man might avoid hanging, — considering it, not without reason, the possible ruin of an artist’s greater career. Among many men he had known, men of undoubted promise, it had proved the fatal step downward from the high to the low. One particular “chum” of his own, a gifted painter, had married a plump rosy young woman with “a bit o’ money,” as the country folks say, — and from that day had been steadily dragged down to the domestic level of sad and sordid commonplace. Instead of studying form and colour, he was called upon to examine drains and superintend the plumber, mark house linen and take care of the children — his wife believing in “making a husband useful.” Of regard for his art or possible fame she had none, — while his children were taught to regard his work in that line as less important than if he had been a bricklayer at so much pence the hour.

  “Children!” thought Jocelyn— “Do I want them? … No — I think not! They’re all very well when they’re young — really young! — two to five years old is the enchanting age, — but, most unfortunately, they grow! Yes! — they grow, — often into hideous men and women — a sort of human vultures sitting on their fathers’ pockets and screaming ‘Give! Give!’ The prospect does not attract me! And she? — Innocent? I don’t think I could bear to watch that little flower-like face gradually enlarging into matronly lines and spreading into a double chin! Those pretty eyes peering into the larder and considering the appearance of uncooked bacon! Perish the thought! One might as well think of Shakespeare’s Juliet paying the butcher’s bill, or worse still, selecting the butcher’s meat! Forbid it, O ye heavens! Of course if ideals could be realised, which they never are, I can see myself wedded for pure love, without a care, painting my pictures at ease, with a sweet woman worshipping me, ever at my beck and call, and shielding me from trouble with all the tender force of her passionate little soul! — but commonplace life will net fit itself into these sort of beatific visions! Babies, and the necessary provision of food and clothes and servants — this is what marriage means — love having sobered down to a matter-of-fact conclusion. No — no! I will not marry her! It would be like catching a fairy in the woods, cutting off its sunbeam wings and setting it to scrub the kitchen floor!”

  It was curious that while he pleased himself with this fanciful soliloquy it did not occur to him that he had already caught the “fairy in the woods,” and ever since the capture had been engaged in cutting off its “sunbeam wings” with all a vivisector’s scientific satisfaction. And in his imaginary pictures of what might have been if “ideals” were realised, he did not for a moment conceive HIMSELF as “worshipping” the woman who was to worship HIM, or as being at HER “beck and call,” or as shielding HER from trouble — oh no! He merely considered himself, and how she would care for HIM, — never once did he consider how he would care for HER.

  Meanwhile things went on in an outwardly even and uneventful course. Innocent worked steadily to fulfil certain contracts into which she had entered with the publishers who were eager to obtain as much of her work as she could give them, — but she had lost heart, and her once soaring ambition was like a poor bird that had been clumsily shot at, and had fallen to the ground with a broken wing. What she had dreamed of as greatness, now seemed vain and futile. The “Amadis de Jocelin” of the sixteenth century had taught her to love literature — to believe in it as the refiner of thought and expression, and to use
it as a charm to inspire the mind and uplift the soul, — but the Amadis de Jocelyn of the twentieth had no such lessons to teach. Utterly lacking in reverence for great thinkers, he dismissed the finest passages of poetry or prose from his consideration with light scorn as “purple patches,” borrowing that hackneyed phrase from the lower walks of the press, — the most inspired writers, both of ancient and modern times, came equally under the careless lash of his derision, — so that Innocent, utterly bewildered by his sweeping denunciation of many brilliant and famous authors, shrank into her wounded self with pain, humiliation and keen disappointment, feeling that there was certainly no chance for her to appeal to him in any way through the thoughts she cherished and expressed with truth and fervour to a listening world. That world listened — but HE did not! — therefore the world seemed worthless and its praise mere mockery. She had no vanity to support her, — she was not “strong-minded” enough to oppose her own individuality to that of the man she loved. And so she began to droop a little, — her bright and ardent spirit sank like a sinking flame, — much to the concern of Miss Leigh, who watched her with a jealous tenderness of love beyond all expression. The child of Pierce Armitage, lawfully or unlawfully begotten, was now to her the one joy of existence, — the link that fastened her more closely to life, — and she worried herself secretly over the evident listlessness, fatigue and depression of the girl who had so lately been the very embodiment of happiness. But she did not like to ask questions, — she knew that Innocent had a very resolute mind of her own, and that if she elected to remain silent on any subject whatsoever, nothing, not even the most affectionate appeal, would induce her to speak.

  “You will not let her come to any harm, Pierce!” murmured the old lady prayerfully one day, standing before the portrait of her former and faithless lover— “You will step in if danger threatens her! — yes, I am sure you will! You will guide and help her again as you have guided and helped her before. For I believe you brought her to me, Pierce! — yes, I am sure you did! In that other world where you are, you have learned how much I loved you long ago! — how much I love you now! — and how I love your child for your sake as well as for her own! All wrongs and mistakes are forgiven and forgotten, Pierce! and when we meet again we shall understand!”

  And with her little trembling worn hands she set a rose, just opening its deep red heart-bud into flower, in a crystal vase beside the portrait as a kind of votive offering, with something of the same superstitious feeling that induces a devout Roman Catholic to burn a candle before a favourite saint, in the belief that the spirit of the dead man heard her words and would respond to them.

  Just at this time, Innocent went about a good deal among the few friends who had learned to know her well and to love her accordingly. Lord Blythe was still away, having prolonged his tour in order to enjoy the beauty of the Italian lakes in autumn. Summer in England was practically over, but the weather was fine and warm still, and country-house parties, especially in Scotland, were the order of the day. The “social swim” was subsiding, and what are called “notable” people were beginning to leave town. Once or twice, infected by the general exodus, Innocent thought of going down to Briar Farm just for a few days as a surprise to Priscilla — but a feeling for Robin held her back. It would be needless unkindness to again vex his mind with the pain of a hopeless passion. So she paid a few casual visits here and there, chiefly at houses where Amadis de Jocelyn was also one of the invited guests. She was made the centre of a considerable amount of adulation, which did not move her to any sort of self-satisfaction, because in the background of her thoughts there was always the light jest and smile of her lover, who laughed at praise, except, be it here said, when it was awarded to himself. Then he did not laugh — he assumed a playful humility which, being admirably acted, almost passed for modesty. But if by chance he had to listen to any praise of “Ena Armitage” as author or woman, he changed the subject as soon as he could conveniently do so without brusquerie. And very gradually it dawned upon her that he took no pride in her work or in the position she had won, and that he was more reluctant than glad to hear her praised. He seemed to prefer she should be unnoticed, save by himself, and more or less submissive to his will. Had she been worldly-wise, she would by every action have moved a silent protest against this, his particular form of sex-dominance, but she was of too loving a nature to dispute any right of command he chose to assume. Other men, younger and far higher in place and position than Jocelyn, admired her, and made such advances as they dared, finding her very coldness attractive, united as it was to such sweetness of manner as few could resist, but they had no chance with her. Once or twice some of her women friends had sounded her on the subject of love and lovers, and she had put aside all their questions with a smile. “Love is not to be talked about,” she had said— “It is like God, served best in silence.”

  But by scarcely perceptible degrees, busy rumour got hold of a thread or two of the clue leading to the labyrinth of her mystery, — people nodded mysteriously at each other and began to whisper suggestions — suggestions which certainly did not go very far, but just floated in the air like bits of thistledown.

  “She is having her portrait painted, isn’t she?”

  “Yes — by that man with the queer name — Amadis de Jocelyn.”

  “Has she given him the commission?”

  “Oh no! I believe not. He’s painting it for the French Salon.”

  “Oh!”

  Then there would follow a silence, with an exchange of smiles all round. And presently the talk would begin again.

  “Will it be a ‘case,’ do you think?”

  “A ‘case’? You mean a marriage? Oh dear no! Jocelyn isn’t a marrying man.”

  “Isn’t she a little — er — well! — a little taken with him?”

  “Perhaps! Very likely! Clever women are always fools on one point — if not on several!”

  “And he? Isn’t he very attentive?”

  “Not more so than he has been and is to dozens of other women. He’s too clever to show her any special attention — it might compromise him. He’s a man that takes care of Number One!”

  So the gossip ran, — and only Jocelyn himself caught wind of it sufficiently to set him thinking. His “affaire de coeur” had gone far enough, — and he realised that the time had come for him to beat a retreat. But how to do it? The position was delicate and difficult. If Innocent had been an ordinary type of woman, vain and selfish, fond of frivolities and delighting in new conquests, his task would have been easy, — but with a girl who believed in love as the ultimatum of all good, and who trusted her lover with implicit faith as next in order of worship to God, what was to be done?

  “We talk a vast amount of sentimental rubbish about women being pure and faithful!” he soliloquised— “But when they ARE pure and faithful we are more bored with them than if they were the worst women in town!”

  He had however one subject of congratulation for which he metaphorically patted himself on the back as being “a good boy” — he had not gone to such extremes in his love-affair as could result in what is usually called “trouble” for the girl. He had left her unscathed, save in a moral and spiritual sense. The sweet body, with its delicate wavering tints of white and rose was as the unspoilt sheath of a lily-bud, — no one could guess that within the sheath the lily itself was blighted and slowly withering. One may question whether it is not a more cruel thing to seduce the soul than the body, — to crush all the fine faiths and happy illusions of a fair mind and leave them scorched by a devastating fire whose traces shall never be obliterated. Amadis de Jocelyn would have laughed his gayest and most ironical laugh at the bare possibility of such havoc being wrought by the passion of love alone.

  “What’s the use of loving or remembering anything?” he would exclaim— “One loves — one tires of love! — and by-and-by one forgets that love ever existed. I look forward to the time when my memory shall dwell chiefly on the agreeable entremets
of life — a good dinner — a choice cigar! These things never bother you afterwards, — unless you eat too much or smoke too much, — then you have headache and indigestion — distinctly your own fault! But if you love a woman for a time and tire of her afterwards she always bothers you! — reminding you of the days when you ‘once’ loved her with persistent and dreadful monotony! I believe in forgetting, — and ‘letting go.’”

  With these sentiments, which were the true outcome of his real self, it was not and never would be possible for him to conceive that with certain high and ultra-sensitive natures love is a greater necessity than life itself, and that if they are deprived of the glory they have been led to imagine they possessed, nothing can make compensation for what to them is eternal loss, coupled with eternal sorrow.

  Meanwhile Innocent’s portrait on which he had worked for a considerable time was nearly completed. It was one of the best things he had ever done, and he contemplated it with a pleasant thrill of artistic triumph, forgetting the “woman” entirely in satisfied consideration of the “subject.” As a portrait he realised that it would be the crown of the next year’s Salon, bearing comparison with any work of the greater modern masters. He was however a trifle perplexed, and not altogether pleased at the expression, which, entirely away from his will and intention, had insensibly thrown a shadow of sadness on the face, — it had come there apparently of itself, unbidden. He had been particularly proud of his success in the drawing of the girl’s extremely sensitive mouth, for he had, as he thought, caught the fleeting sweetness of the smile which was one of her greatest charms, — but now, despite his pains, that smile seemed to lose itself in the sorrow and pathos of an unspoken reproach, which, though enthralling and appealing to the beholder as the look of the famous “Mona Lisa,” had fastened itself as it were on the canvas without the painter’s act or consent. He was annoyed at this, yet dared not touch it in any attempt to alter what asserted itself as convincingly finished, — for the picture was a fine work of art and he realised that it would add to his renown.