 | CHAPTER XVII.
A MORNING WITH CECIL DREEME. Cecil Dreeme |  |
17. CHAPTER XVII.
A MORNING WITH CECIL DREEME.
Through Churm's active friendship, I at once
found my place. I have mentioned my profession,
— chemistry. I was wanted in the world.
Better business came to me than a professorship
at the Terryhutte University, salary Muddefontaine
bonds, or a post at the Nolachucky Polytechnic,
salary Cumberland wild lands.
Churm only waited to establish me, and then
was off, north, south, east, and west. It was one
of those epochs when mankind is in a slough of
despond, and must have a lift from Hercules. It
was a time when society, that drowsy Diogenes,
was beginning to bestir itself after a careless
slumber, and, holding up the great lantern of
public opinion to find honest men, suddenly revealed
a mighty army of rogues. Rogues everywhere;
scurvy rogues in mean places, showy
rogues in high places; rogues cheating for cents
in cheap shops, rogues defrauding for millions in
splendid bank parlors; princely rogues, claiming
princely salaries for unprofitable services, and
the last profits to eke out their puny pay and
give them their base pleasures; potent rogues,
buttoning up a million's worth of steamships or
locomotives in their fob, and rogues, as potent for
ill on a smaller scale, keeping back the widow's
mite, and storing the orphan's portion with the
usurer. Rogues everywhere! and the great,
stern, steady eye of public opinion, at last fully
open and detecting each rogue in the place he
had crept or strode into, marking him there in
his dastard shame or haughty bravado, and branding
him Thief, so that all mankind could know
him.
In this crisis, Society's great eye of Public
Opinion turned itself upon Churm, and demanded
him as The Honest Man. Society's unanimous
voice called upon him to put his shoulder
to the wheel. Society said, “Be Dictator! dethrone,
abolish, raze, redeem, restore, construct!
Condemn; forgive! Do what you please, — only
oust Roguery and instate Honesty.”
This gigantic task engaged Churm totally. I
lost him from my daily life.
It was a busy, practical life, — the life of one
who had his way to work; and yet not without
strange and unlooked-for excitements, in the
region of romance.
My comrades in Europe, countrymen and foreigners,
for home.
“Going back to America!” said they, “to
that matter-of-fact country, where everything is
in the newspapers.”
“You that have lived in Italy!” deplored my
romantic friends, — “in Italy, where skeletons in
closets are packed scores deep; where you can
scarcely step without treading on a murder-stain;
where if a man but sigh in his bedchamber, when
he loosens his waistcoat, the old slumbering sighs,
which chronicle old wrongs done in that palace,
awake and will not sleep until they have whispered
to each other and to the affrighted stranger
their tale of a misery; where the antique dagger
you use for a paper-cutter has rust-marks that
any chemist will say mean maiden's blood; where
the old chalice you buy at a bargain gives a mild
flavor of poison to your wine; — you that have
lived in richly historied Italy, where the magnificent
past overshadows the present, what will you
find to interest you in a country where there is
no past, no yesterday, and if no yesterday, no
to-day worth having, — but life one indefinitely
adjourned to-morrow?”
“Poor Byng! Romantic fellow! Why, unless
there should be a raid of Camanches or
Pawnees from the Ohio country,” said my European
friends, with a refreshing ignorance of
of the red-skinned gentry to snatch a
scalp or a squaw in the Broadway of New
York, you will positively pine away for lack of
adventures.”
“What a bore to dwell in a land where there
are no sbirri to whisk you off to black dungeons!
How tame! a life where no tyrannies exist to
whisper against always, to growl at on anniversaries,
to scream at when they pounce on you, to
roar at when you pounce on them. Yes, what
stupid business, existence in a city where nobody
has more and nobody less than fifteen hundred
dollars a year, paid quarterly in advance; where
there is such simple, easy, matter-of-fact prosperity
that no one is ever tempted to overstep
bounds and grasp a bigger share than his neighbors;
and so there is never any considerable
wrong done to any one; — no wrong, and consequently
hearts never break, and there can be
no need of mercy, pity, or pardon.”
“Why, Byng! life without shade, life all bald,
garish steady sunshine, may do to swell wheat
and puff cabbage-heads; but man needs something
other than monotony of comfort, something
keener than the stolid pleasures of deaconish
respectability. Byng,” said my Florentine,
Heidelberg, or Parisian comrades, each in their
own language and manner, “Byng, you will
detestably new country.”
I confess that I had had some fears on this
subject, myself.
I had made up my mind to drop into systematic
existence, cut fancy, eschew romance, banish
dreams, and occupy my digestion solely on a
diet of commonplace facts.
I might have known that man cannot live on
corporeal, mundane facts alone, unless he can
persuade his immortality to forget him, and leave
him to crawl a mere earth-worm, dirt to dirt,
until he is dust to dust.
As to romance, I might have known, if I had
considered the subject, that wherever youth and
maiden are, there is the certainty of romance
and the chance of tragedy. I might have known
that the important thing in a drama is, what the
characters are, and what they do, not the scenes
where they stand while they are acting. In the
theatre, people are looking at the lover and the
lady, not at the balustrade and the tower.
But though I might have known that the story
of Life and Love is just as potent to create itself
a fitting background when it is acted anew on a
new stage, as when it is announced for repetition
with the old familiar, musty properties, I had,
indeed, been somewhat bullied by the unreflecting
talk just quoted. I had fancied that the
to curtain it, dry-rotted boards for it to tread,
and a time-worn drop for it to stand out against.
I was sceptical as to the possibility of a novel
and beautiful development of romance under the
elms of a new land, in the streets of its new
cities. I had adopted the notion of Europe, and
Europe-tainted America, that my country was
indeed very big, very busy, very prosperous, but
monstrously dull, tame, and prosaic.
Error! Worse, — mere stupid blindness!
My first plunge into life at home proved it.
See how my very first day became over-crowded
with elements of interest and romance, — nay, of
mysterious and tragic excitement!
Even the ancient scenery, whether important
or not to the progress of the drama, had packed
itself up, and followed my travels. Stillfleet's
chambers were an epitome of the whole Past, —
that is to say, of the Past as leading to the Present
and interpreting it. Stillfleet had concentrated
the essence of all the ages in his informal
museum. I had but to glance about, and I had
travelled over all terrestrial space, and lived
through all human centuries. He had relics
from all the famous camps in the great march
of mankind. He had examples, typical objects,
to show what every age and every race had
contributed to the common stock. By art on
curious antiquity, even by the grotesque fabrics
and contrivances of savages and transitory tribes
of men, all distributed about in orderly disorder,
I could study history at a glance, or rather absorb
history with unconscious eyes.
Scenery! I need but to look into the Egyptian
corner of my chamber, and, if I took any
interest in the life of the Pharaohs, there it was
in a pictured slab from the Memnonium; or in
the dead Pharaoh, there himself was grinning
in a mummy-case, — a very lively corpse, — unpleasantly
lively, indeed, when nights were dark,
and matches flashed brimstone and refused to
burn.
Scenery! Greece and Rome, Dark Ages, Crusades,
Middle Ages, Moorish Conquest, '88 in
England, Renaissance, '89 in France, every old
era and the last new era, — all were so thoroughly
represented here, by model of temple,
cast of statue, vase, picture, tapestry, suit of
armor, Moslem scymitar, bundle of pikes, rusty
cross-bow or arquebuse, model of guillotine, — by
some object that showed what the age had most
admired, most used, or most desired, — that
there, restored before me, rose and spread the
age itself, and called its heroes and its caitiffs
forward in review.
If I preferred to live in the Past, I had only to
Present about me, — that stirring life of America,
urged on by the spirit of the Past, and unburdened
by its matter.
Romance, too! Romance had come to me,
whether I would or no. Without any permission
of mine, asked or granted, I was become an
actor, with my special part to play, perforce,
among mysteries.
Cecil Dreeme.
Emma Denman.
Densdeth.
My connection with these three characters
grew daily closer. I do not love mystery. Ignorance
I do not hate; for ignorance is the first
condition of knowledge. Mystery I recoil from.
It generally implies the concealment of something
that should not be concealed, for the sake
of delusion or deception; or if not for these,
because tragedy will follow its revelation.
Cecil Dreeme continued to me a profound
mystery. He kept himself utterly secluded by
day, working hard at his art. He knew no one
but myself. No one ever saw him except myself
and Locksley, or Locksley's children. Only at
night, wrapped in his cloak, did he emerge from
his seclusion, and wander over the dim city.
I became his companion in these walks whenever
my engagements allowed; but such night
state.
“Are you wise, Dreeme,” said I to him, one
morning, in his studio, after we had become intimate,
“to live this nocturnal life? Sunshine
and broad daylight are just as indispensable to
man as they are to flower or plant. I might give
you good chemical reasons for my statement.”
“There are night-blooming flowers, — the
Cereus, and others,” said he, avoiding my question.
“Yes, but they owe their blossom to the day's
accumulation of sunshine. Botany refuses to
protect you.”
“Plants grow by night.”
“In night that follows sunny day.”
“I accept the analogy. I have accumulated
sunshine enough, I hope, for growth, and perhaps
for a pallid kind of bloom, in my past
sunny days. My rank growth went on vigorously
enough in the daylight. I am conscious
of a finer development in the dark.”
“But I do not like this voluntary prison.”
“Few escape a forced imprisonment, longer
or shorter, in their lives. Illness or sorrow
shut us in away from the world's glare, that
we may see colors as they are, and know gold
from pinchbeck. Why should I not go to prison,
of my own accord, for such teaching, and other
reasons?”
“And other reasons? Tell me, Dreeme, before
our friendship goes further, — before I
utterly and irrecoverably give you my confidence.”
“Go on.”
“No! I cannot go on.”
“I understand, and am not insulted. You
mean to ask whether I am hiding here because
I have picked a pocket, or pillaged a till, or
basely broken a heart, or perhaps because I
have a blood-stain to wear out.”
“My imagination had not put its suspicion,
if any existed, into any such crude charges.”
“So I saw, and stated the question blankly.
You could not connect me with vulgar or
devilish crime. At the same time, you had a
certain uneasiness about me, undefined and
misty, but real. You will not deny it,” and
he smiled as he spoke.
“No. Since you affront the fact with such
cheerful confidence, I will not deny the vague
dread.”
“Be at rest, then! There is not a man or
a woman in the world, whom I cannot look in
the eyes without blenching. You need not be
ashamed of me. You may trust me, without
any fear of that harshest of all the shocks our
life can feel, loss of faith in a friend's honor.”
“Well, we will never speak of this again.
light! I demand unquestioned freedom for myself.
I am the last man to refuse it to another.”
“Really,” said Dreeme, “since your projection
into my orbit, I no longer need personal
contact with the outer world.”
“You find me a good enough newsman.”
“The artistic temperament does not love to
bustle about in the crowd, to shoulder and
hustle for its facts. You give me the cream
of what the world says and does. But, by and
by, when you tire of the novelty of a tyro-artist's
society, you will drop me.”
“Never! so long as you consent to be my
in-door man. I often feel, now, as I stir about
among men, collecting my budget of daily facts,
that I only get them for the pleasure of hearing
your remarks when I unpack in the evening.”
“I must try to be a wiser and wittier critic.”
“You return me far more than I bring. I
train my mental muscle with other people. You
give me lessons in the gymnastics of finer forces.
My worldling nature shrivels, the immortal Me
expands under your artistic touch.”
“I am happy to be accused of such a power,”
Dreeme said, with his sweet, melancholy smile.
“It is the noblest one being can exercise over
another, and needed much in this low world of
ours.”
“Yes, Dreeme, your fresh, brave, earnest
character I begin to regard as my guardian
influence. With you I escape from the mean
ambitions, the disloyal rivalries, the mercenary
friendships of men, — from the coarseness, baseness,
and foulness of the world. You neutralize
to me all the evil powers.”
“That Mr. Densdeth, of whom you have once
or twice spoken, — is he one of them?”
“Perhaps so.”
“Are you still intimate with him?”
“Intimate? Hardly. Intimacy implies friendship.”
“Familiar, then?”
“Familiar, yes. He seeks my society. We
are thrown together by circumstances. He interests
me greatly. I know no man of such wide
scope of information, such knowledge, such wit,
such brilliancy, — no one at all to compare with
him, now that my friend Churm is absent.”
“Those two fraternize, I suppose.”
“Churm and Densdeth?”
“Yes; you seem to make one a substitute for
the other.”
“`How happy could I be with either!' O no!
You strangely misapprehend Mr. Churm. The
two are as much asunder in heart as in looks.”
“Ah!” said Dreeme.
“You seem incredulous. But let me tell you
same result as these clairvoyant intuitions of
yours. I suppose I am a perverse fellow for not
obeying everybody's `Fœnum habet in cornu' of
Densdeth; but I have Cato's feeling for the
weaker side, or at least the side assailed. Besides,
I have a scientific experiment with this
terrible fellow. I let him bite, and clap on an
antidote before the brain is benumbed. I play
with Densdeth, who really seems to me like an
avatar of the wise Old Serpent himself, and then,
before he has quite conquered me with his fascination,
I snatch myself away, and come to you, to
be aroused and healed.”
“I am glad to be an antidote to poison. But
have you no fears of such baleful intercourse?”
“None. As a man of the world, I must know
the perilous as well as the safe among my race.
How am I to become as wise as the serpent, unless
I study the serpent? I find Densdeth a most
valuable preceptor. He has sounded every man's
heart, in life or history, and can state the depth
of evil there in fathoms, feet, and inches. I
could no more do without him for that side of
my education, than I could spare your dove-like
teaching to make me harmless as a dove. Pardon
my giving you this unmasculine office.”
“You speak lightly, Mr. Byng. I fear you
are a man who has not yet fully made up his
mind.”
“What? As to the great choice, — Hercules's
choice? Virtue or Vice? O yes, I am absolutely
committed. Virtue has me fast. In fact,
I am deemed quite a Puritan, as men go; I
should be so not to shame my ancestors.”
“Forgive me if I ask, Do you know what
Evil is?”
“I suppose so; as much as is to be known.”
“O, you cannot! You would not trifle with
it, if you dreamed how it soils. You would fly
it.”
“Not face it?”
“Never, unless duty commanded you to face
and crush it. Those who know Evil best fly
farthest, hide deepest, dread its approach, shudder
at the thought of its pursuit. It is so terribly
subtle. The bravest are not brave before it;
the strongest are not strong; the purest are not
pure. It makes cowards of the brave, it paralyzes
the strong, it taints the pure. No one is
safe, — no one, until personal agony has made
him hate Evil worse than death. Mr. Byng, you
have a noble soul; but no soul can safely palter
with a bad man. Palter! I use strong words.
I mean to use them. You have spoken lightly
and pained me. To a bad man — to some bad
men — every pure soul is a perpetual reproach,
and must be sullied. You speak plainly of this
Densdeth; you understand his bad influence, and
chemical combination, which you could safely
handle and analyze. Such a being is never inert;
the less active he seems, the more he is
likely to be insidiously at work to ruin. Forgive
me, my dear friend, that I warn you so
eagerly against this fatal curiosity!”
He had spoken with fervid energy and eloquence.
In fact, there was in this strange
young genius a passionate ardor, always latent,
only waiting to flame forth, when his heart was
touched. And when some deeper interest stirred
him, — when he had some protest to utter against
wrong, — his large, melancholy eyes grew intense,
his voice lost its pensive sadness; color came to
his thin, sallow cheeks. It was so now. For a
moment, he was almost beautiful with this sudden
evanescent inspiration.
I paused after his eager outburst, watching
him with such admiration as we give to a great
actor, and then — for I confess that my conceit
was somewhat offended by this good advice, from
one in years so much my junior — I said, with a
confident smile: “You talk like a Cassandra.
What do you foresee so very terrible, as about to
befall me? Pray do not be uneasy! I am an
old stager. I have managed to make my way
thus far in my life without being worse than my
fellows. `I am indifferent honest.' I will try to
And then, you know, I cannot go far wrong with
you for Mentor.”
My tone seemed to pain him. He painted
some moments in silence on his Lear.
While he painted, I observed him, — interested
much in the picture of his creation, more in the
creator. “Raphael-Angelico,” I thought, “he
merits the name fully. What a delicate being!
The finest organization I have ever seen in man.
How strangely his personality affects me! And
every moment fancies drift across my mind that
I actually know his secret, and am blind, purposely
blind to my knowledge, because I promised
him when we first met that I would be so.”
| CHAPTER XVII.
A MORNING WITH CECIL DREEME. Cecil Dreeme | |