The Princess Casamassima (Classics)

by Henry James

‘Well, to get inside of you a little; to know how a chap feels when he’s going to part with his best friend.’

  ‘To part with him?’ Muniment repeated.

  ‘I mean, putting it at the worst.’

  ‘I should think you would know by yourself, if you’re going to part with me!’

  At this Hyacinth prostrated himself, tumbled over on the grass, on his face, which he buried in his arms. He remained in this attitude, saying nothing, for a long time; and while he lay there he thought, with a sudden, quick flood of association, of many strange things. Most of all, he had the sense of the brilliant, charming day; the warm stillness, touched with cries of amusement; the sweetness of loafing there, in an interval of work, with a friend who was a tremendously fine fellow, even if he didn’t understand the inexpressible. Muniment also kept silent, and Hyacinth perceived that he was unaffectedly puzzled. He wanted now to relieve him, so that he pulled himself together again and turned round, saying the first thing he could think of, in relation to the general subject of their conversation, that would carry them away from the personal question. ‘I have asked you before, and you have told me, but somehow I have never quite grasped it (so I just touch on the matter again), exactly what good you think it will do.’

  ‘This idea of Hoffendahl’s? You must remember that as yet we know only very vaguely what it is. It is difficult, therefore, to measure closely the importance it may have, and I don’t think I have ever, in talking with you, pretended to fix that importance. I don’t suppose it will matter immensely whether your own engagement is carried out or not; but if it is it will have been a detail in a scheme of which the general effect will be decidedly useful. I believe, and you pretend to believe, though I am not sure you do, in the advent of the democracy. It will help the democracy to get possession that the classes that keep them down shall be admonished from time to time that they have a very definite and very determined intention of doing so. An immense deal will depend upon that. Hoffendahl is a capital admonisher.’

  Hyacinth listened to this explanation with an expression of interest that was not feigned; and after a moment he rejoined, ‘When you say you believe in the democracy, I take for granted you mean you positively wish for their coming into power, as I have always supposed. Now what I really have never understood is this – why you should desire to put forward a lot of people whom you regard, almost without exception, as donkeys.’

  ‘Ah, my dear lad,’ laughed Muniment, ‘when one undertakes to meddle in human affairs one must deal with human material. The upper classes have the longest ears.’

  ‘I have heard you say that you were working for an equality in human conditions, to abolish the immemorial inequality. What you want, then, for all mankind is a similar nuance241 of asininity.’

  ‘That’s very clever; did you pick it up in France? The low tone of our fellow-mortals is a result of bad conditions; it is the conditions I want to alter. When those that have no start to speak of have a good one, it is but fair to infer that they will go further. I want to try them, you know.’

  ‘But why equality?’ Hyacinth asked. ‘Somehow, that word doesn’t say so much to me as it used to. Inequality – inequality! I don’t know whether it’s by dint of repeating it over to myself, but that doesn’t shock me as it used.’

  ‘They didn’t put you up to that in France, I’m sure!’ Muniment exclaimed. ‘Your point of view has changed; you have risen in the world.’

  ‘Risen? Good God, what have I risen to?’

  ‘True enough; you were always a bloated little swell!’ And Muniment gave his young friend a sociable slap on the back. There was a momentary bitterness in its being imputed to such a one as Hyacinth, even in joke, that he had taken sides with the fortunate ones of the earth, and he had it on his tongue’s end to ask his friend if he had never guessed what his proud titles were – the bastard of a murderess, spawned in a gutter, out of which he had been picked by a sewing-girl. But his life-long reserve on this point was a habit not easily broken, and before such an inquiry could flash through it Muniment had gone on: ‘If you’ve ceased to believe we can do anything, it will be rather awkward, you know.’

  ‘I don’t know what I believe, God help me!’ Hyacinth remarked, in a tone of an effect so lugubrious that Paul gave one of his longest, most boyish-sounding laughs. And he added, ‘I don’t want you to think I have ceased to care for the people. What am I but one of the poorest and meanest of them?’

  ‘You, my boy? You’re a duke in disguise, and so I thought the first time I ever saw you. That night I took you to Hoffendahl you had a little way with you that made me forget it; I mean that your disguise happened to be better than usual. As regards caring for the people, there’s surely no obligation at all,’ Muniment continued. ‘I wouldn’t if I could help it – I promise you that. It all depends on what you see. The way I’ve used my eyes in this abominable metropolis has led to my seeing that present arrangements won’t do. They won’t do,’ he repeated, placidly.

  ‘Yes, I see that, too,’ said Hyacinth, with the same dolefulness that had marked his tone a moment before – a dolefulness begotten of the rather helpless sense that, whatever he saw, he saw (and this was always the case), so many other things beside. He saw the immeasurable misery of the people, and yet he saw all that had been, as it were, rescued and redeemed from it: the treasures, the felicities, the splendours, the successes, of the world. All this took the form, sometimes, to his imagination, of a vast, vague, dazzling presence, an irradiation of light from objects undefined, mixed with the atmosphere of Paris and of Venice. He presently added that a hundred things Muniment had told him about the foul horrors of the worst districts of London, pictures of incredible shame and suffering that he had put before him, came back to him now, with the memory of the passion they had kindled at the time.

  ‘Oh, I don’t want you to go by what I have told you; I want you to go by what you have seen yourself. I remember there were things you told me that weren’t bad in their way.’ And at this Paul Muniment sprang to his feet, as if their conversation had drawn to an end, or they must at all events be thinking of their homeward way. Hyacinth got up, too, while his companion stood there. Muniment was looking off toward London, with a face that expressed all the healthy singleness of his vision. Suddenly Paul remarked, as if it occurred to him to complete, or at any rate confirm, the declaration he had made a short time before, ‘Yes, I don’t believe in the millennium, but I do believe in the democracy.’

  The young man, as he spoke these words, struck his comrade as such a fine embodiment of the spirit of the people; he stood there, in his powerful, sturdy newness, with such an air of having learnt what he had learnt and of good-nature that had purposes in it, that our hero felt the simple inrush of his old, frequent pride at having a person of that promise, a nature of that capacity, for a friend. He passed his hand into Muniment’s arm and said, with an imperceptible tremor in his voice, ‘It’s no use your saying I’m not to go by what you tell me. I would go by what you tell me, anywhere. There’s no awkwardness to speak of. I don’t know that I believe exactly what you believe, but I believe in you, and doesn’t that come to the same thing?’

  Muniment evidently appreciated the cordiality and candour of this little tribute, and the way he showed it was by a movement of his arm, to check his companion, before they started to leave the spot, and by looking down at him with a certain anxiety of friendliness. ‘I should never have taken you to Hoffendahl if I hadn’t thought you would jump at the job. It was that flaring little oration of yours, at the club, when you floored Delancey for saying you were afraid, that put me up to it.’

  ‘I did jump at it – upon my word I did; and it was just what I was looking for. That’s all correct!’ said Hyacinth, cheerfully, as they went forward. There was a strain of heroism in these words – of heroism of which the sense was not conveyed to Muniment by a vibration in their interlocked arms. Hyacinth did not make the reflection that he was infernally literal; he dismiss
ed the sentimental problem that had bothered him; he condoned, excused, admired – he merged himself, resting happy for the time in the consciousness that Paul was a grand fellow, that friendship was a purer feeling than love, and that there was an immense deal of affection between them. He did not even observe at that moment that it was preponderantly on his own side.

  36

  A certain Sunday in November, more than three months after she had gone to live in Madeira Crescent, was so important an occasion for the Princess Casamassima that I must give as complete an account of it as the limits of my space will allow. Early in the afternoon a loud peal from her door-knocker came to her ear; it had a sound of resolution, almost of defiance, which made her look up from her book and listen. She was sitting by the fire, alone, with a volume of a heavy work on Labour and Capital in her hand. It was not yet four o’clock, but she had had candles for an hour; a dense brown fog made the daylight impure, without suggesting an answer to the question whether the scheme of nature had been to veil or to deepen the sabbatical dreariness. She was not tired of Madeira Crescent – such an idea she would indignantly have repudiated; but the prospect of a visitor was rather pleasant to her – the possibility even of his being an ambassador, or a cabinet minister, or another of the eminent personages with whom she had associated before embracing the ascetic life. They had not knocked at her present door hitherto in any great numbers, for more reasons than one; they were out of town, and she had taken pains to diffuse the belief that she had left England. If the impression prevailed, it was exactly the impression she had desired; she forgot this fact whenever she felt a certain surprise, even, it may be, a certain irritation, in perceiving that people were not taking the way to Madeira Crescent. She was making the discovery, in which she had had many predecessors, that in London it is only too possible to hide one’s self. It was very much in that fashion that Godfrey Sholto was in the habit of announcing himself, when he reappeared after the intervals she explicitly imposed upon him; there was a kind of artlessness, for so world-worn a personage, in the point he made of showing that he knocked with confidence, that he had as good a right as any other. This afternoon she was ready to accept a visit from him: she was perfectly detached from the shallow, frivolous world in which he lived, but there was still a freshness in her renunciation which coveted reminders and enjoyed comparisons; he would prove to her how right she had been to do exactly what she was doing. It did not occur to her that Hyacinth Robinson might be at her door, for it was understood between them that, except by special appointment, he was to come to see her only in the evening. She heard in the hall, when the servant arrived, a voice that she failed to recognise; but in a moment the door of the room was thrown open and the name of Mr Muniment was pronounced. It may be said at once that she felt great pleasure in hearing it, for she had both wished to see more of Hyacinth’s extraordinary friend and had given him up, so little likely had it begun to appear that he would put himself out for her. She had been glad he wouldn’t come, as she had told Hyacinth three months before; but now that he had come she was still more glad.

  Presently he was sitting opposite to her, on the other side of the fire, with his big foot crossed over his big knee, his large, gloved hands fumbling with each other, drawing and smoothing the gloves (of very red, new-looking dog-skin242) in places, as if they hurt him. So far as the size of his extremities, and even his attitude and movement, went, he might have belonged to her former circle. With the details of his dress remaining vague in the lamp-light, which threw into relief mainly his powerful, important head, he might have been one of the most considerable men she had ever known. The first thing she said to him was that she wondered extremely what had brought him at last to come to see her: the idea, when she proposed it, evidently had so little attraction for him. She had only seen him once since then – the day she met him coming into Audley Court as she was leaving it, after a visit to his sister – and, as he probably remembered, she had not on that occasion repeated her invitation.

  ‘It wouldn’t have done any good, at the time, if you had,’ Muniment rejoined, with his natural laugh.

  ‘Oh, I felt that; any silence wasn’t accidental!’ the Princess exclaimed, joining in his merriment.

  ‘I have only come now – since you have asked me the reason – because my sister hammered at me, week after week, dinning it into me that I ought to. Oh, I’ve been under the lash! If she had left me alone I wouldn’t have come.’

  The Princess blushed on hearing these words, but not with shame or with pain; rather with the happy excitement of being spoken to in a manner so fresh and original. She had never before had a visitor who practised so racy a frankness, or who, indeed, had so curious a story to tell. She had never before so completely failed, and her failure greatly interested her, especially as it seemed now to be turning a little to success. She had succeeded promptly with every one, and the sign of it was that every one had rendered her a monotony of homage. Even poor little Hyacinth had tried, in the beginning, to say sweet things to her. This very different type of man appeared to have his thoughts fixed on anything but sweetness; she felt the liveliest hope that he would move further and further away from it. ‘I remember what you asked me – what good it would do you. I couldn’t tell you then; and though I now have had a long time to turn it over, I haven’t thought of it yet.’

  ‘Oh, but I hope it will do me some,’ said Paul. ‘A fellow wants a reward, when he has made a great effort.’

  ‘It does me some,’ the Princess remarked, gaily.

  ‘Naturally, the awkward things I say amuse you. But I don’t say them for that, but just to give you an idea.’

  ‘You give me a great many ideas. Besides, I know you already a good deal.’

  ‘From little Robinson, I suppose,’ said Muniment.

  The Princess hesitated. ‘More particularly from Lady Aurora.’

  ‘Oh, she doesn’t know much about me!’ the young man exclaimed.

  ‘It’s a pity you say that, because she likes you.’

  ‘Yes, she likes me,’ Muniment replied, serenely.

  Again the Princess hesitated. ‘And I hope you like her.’

  ‘Ay, she’s a dear old girl!’

  The Princess reflected that her visitor was not a gentleman, like Hyacinth; but this made no difference in her present attitude. The expectation that he would be a gentleman had had nothing to do with her interest in him; that, in fact, had rested largely on the supposition that he had a rich plebeian strain. ‘I don’t know that there is any one in the world I envy so much,’ she remarked; an observation which her visitor received in silence. ‘Better than any one I have ever met she has solved the problem – which, if we are wise, we all try to solve, don’t we? – of getting out of herself. She has got out of herself more perfectly than any one I have ever known. She has merged herself in the passion of doing something for others. That’s why I envy her,’ said the Princess, with an explanatory smile, as if perhaps he didn’t understand her.

  ‘It’s an amusement, like any other,’ said Paul Muniment.

  ‘Ah, not like any other! It carries light into dark places; it makes a great many wretched people considerably less wretched.’

  ‘How many, eh?’ asked the young man, not exactly as if he wished to dispute, but as if it were always in him to enjoy an argument.

  The Princess wondered why he should desire to argue at Lady Aurora’s expense. ‘Well, one who is very near to you, to begin with.’

  ‘Oh, she’s kind, most kind; it’s altogether wonderful. But Rosy makes her considerably less wretched,’ Paul Muniment rejoined.

  ‘Very likely, of course; and so she does me.’

  ‘May I inquire what you are wretched about?’ Muniment went on.

  ‘About nothing at all. That’s the worst of it. But I am much happier now than I have ever been.’

  ‘Is that also about nothing?’

  ‘No, about a sort of change that has taken place in my life. I have been able t
o do some little things.’

  ‘For the poor, I suppose you mean. Do you refer to the presents you have made to Rosy?’ the young man inquired.

  ‘The presents?’ The Princess appeared not to remember. ‘Oh, those are trifles. It isn’t anything one has been able to give; it’s some talks one has had, some convictions one has arrived at.’

  ‘Convictions are a source of very innocent pleasure,’ said the young man, smiling at his interlocutress with his bold, pleasant eyes, which seemed to project their glance further than any she had seen.

  ‘Having them is nothing. It’s the acting on them,’ the Princess replied.

  ‘Yes; that doubtless, too, is good.’ He continued to look at her peacefully, as if he liked to consider that this might be what she had asked him to come for. He said nothing more, and she went on:

  ‘It’s far better, of course, when one is a man.’

  ‘I don’t know. Women do pretty well what they like. My sister and you have managed, between you, to bring me to this.’

  ‘It’s more your sister, I suspect, than I. But why, after all, should you have disliked so much to come?’

  ‘Well, since you ask me,’ said Paul Muniment, ‘I will tell you frankly, though I don’t mean it uncivilly, that I don’t know what to make of you.’

  ‘Most people don’t,’ returned the Princess. ‘But they usually take the risk.’

  ‘Ah, well, I’m the most prudent of men.’

  ‘I was sure of it; that is one of the reasons why I wanted to know you. I know what some of your ideas are – Hyacinth Robinson has told me; and the source of my interest in them is partly the fact that you consider very carefully what you attempt.’

  ‘That I do – I do,’ said Muniment, simply.

  The tone in which he said this would have been almost ignoble, as regards a kind of northern canniness which it expressed, had it not been corrected by the character of his face, his youth and strength, and his military eye. The Princess recognised both the shrewdness and the latent audacity as she rejoined, ‘To do anything with you would be very safe. It would be sure to succeed.’