 | CHAPTER XVIII.
ANOTHER CASSANDRA. Cecil Dreeme |  |
18. CHAPTER XVIII.
ANOTHER CASSANDRA.
Dreeme went on slowly and carefully with his
work, after my closing remark of the last chapter.
I continued to observe him for some moments in
silence. His palette and brushes were kept with
extreme neatness. The colors on the palette were
arranged methodically, with an eye to artistic
gradation; so that the darker of the smooth, oily
drops squeezed from his paint-tubes made, as it
were, a horizon of shadow on the outer rim of
the palette. Within this little amphitheatre of
hillocks, black, indigo, and brown, the dashes of
brighter hue were disposed in concentric arcs,
shading toward pure white at the focus. All his
utensils and materials betokened the same orderliness
and refinement; nothing was out of place,
nothing daubed or soiled. So careful too was
his handling, that he needed no over-sleeve to
protect his own. The delicate hand and the
flexible wrist seemed incapable of an awkward
or a blundering motion. He could no more do a
slovenly thing, than he could dance a break-down
specially beautiful to me. In my laboratory, at
my task of splitting atoms and unbraiding gases,
I learnt from the exquisite order and proportion
that Nature never forgets in her combinations to
require the same of men. I found it in Dreeme.
His genius in art was not of the ill-regulated,
splashy, blotchy, boisterous class. Nothing coarse
could come from those fine fingers.
“You elaborate your work with great care,”
said I, after some moments' silence, while the
painter had been touching in dots of light, and
then pausing, studying, and touching again, here
a point and there a line.
“I must be careful and elaborate. It is partly
the timidity of a novice. I feel that my hand
lacks the precision of practice, — the rapid, unerring
touch of a master. But besides, now, as
my work approaches completion, I perceive a
failure in creative power. I work feebly and
painfully.”
“Creative power of course is temporarily exhausted
by a complete consistent creation. Jove
felt empty-headed enough when he had thought
Minerva into being. Lie fallow for a season, and
your brain will teem again with images!”
“Yes, that is the law; but you must remember
that my case is solitary. My picture is a
spasm. It came to me prematurely, as a purpose
fever. I have spent all my large force in it.”
“Your picture is older, subject and handling,
than you, as I have said before. But music,
painting, and poetry are gifts of the gods to the
young.”
“Older than my years? Ah yes!” he said,
drearily. “I was in the immortal misery when
I poured out my soul there. It was sore, sore,
sore work. I pray that I may never need to
create tragedy again. I pray that no new or
ancient experience may compel me to confess
and confide it to the impersonal world. No, I
have wreaked my anguish, my pity, my shame
for the guilty, on that canvas, and the virtue is
gone out of me.”
“Essay another vein! You have worked off
bitterness. Open your heart to sweetness! In
brighter mood, you will do fairer things without
the tragic element.”
“Since you and Locksley compelled me to
accept the sweet gift of a life more hopeful, I
have made some sketches in a less severe manner
than my Lear. That was cruel tragedy. These
are only anecdotes.”
“Pray exhibit!”
“To so gentle a critic, I venture. Do not
expect passion, — that I wished to spare myself.
The sentiment is simple and commonplace
enough.”
He placed before me three sketchy pictures,
able and rapid.
“You see,” said he, “I play upon one idea or
its reverse.”
The first sketch depicted a young girl, caught
in a snow-storm, and sunk, a mere shapeless
thing, among the drifts in a dreary pine-wood.
A gentleman, in the costume of a Puritan soldier,
stooped over her. Beside him stood a sturdy
yeoman with a cloak and a basket. A few sunbeams
cleft the pines, glinted on the hero's corslet,
and warmed the group. It was a scene full
of the pathos of doubtful hope.
“Thank you for my immortality,” said I,
“It was a pretty thought to put Locksley and
myself in this scene of rescue, — me too in the
steel and buff of that plucky old pioneer, the
first Byng, with whose exploits I have bored you
so often. I hope we were in time, before the
maiden perished.”
“The sunbeam seems to promise that,” said
he smiling, and handed me the next.
Second picture. Scene, the splendid salon of
a French chateau. Through the window, a mad
mob of sans culottes were visible, forcing the
grand entrance. Within, myself — costume, purple
velvet, lace, and rapier — and Locksley, in
blouse and sabots, were bearing off a fainted
lady, dark-haired, and robed in yellow.
“Twice immortal!” said I. “But why avert
the heroine's face?”
“Good female models are hard to find. My
heroine should be worthy of my hero. Have you
one of your own, whose features I might insert?”
“Have I found my heroine? Not yet, — that
is, not certainly.”
Dreeme handed me the third picture. “My
Incognita,” said he, “is willing to encounter
bad company out of gratitude to her benefactors.
Please appreciate the compliment!”
Third picture. Scene, the same splendid salon
of the same chateau. Without, instead of the
sans culottes, a group of soldiers of the Republic
stood on guard. Within, the same dark-haired
lady, — costume, yellow satin (it reminded me
of that coverlet of Louis Philippe's which had
served Dreeme for wrapper), — the same heroine
as in the second picture, sat with her back to
the spectator. At a table beside her was an
official personage, signing a passport. He was
dressed with careful coxcombry in Robespierre's
favorite color, and resembled that demon slightly,
but enough to recall him. Behind him, I — yes,
I myself again — could be seen through a half-opened
closet-door, sullenly sheathing my sword
in obedience to a sign from the lady. Locksley
also was there, in blouse and stealthy bare feet,
playing prudence to valor and holding me back.
“Ah!” said I, “another person with us in the
pillory of your picture. Strange! Your Robespierre
might almost be a portrait of Densdeth.”
“Indeed! It is a typical bad face, and may
resemble several bad men.”
“Singularly like Densdeth!” I repeated.
“The same cold-blooded resolve, the same latent
sneer, the same suppressed triumph, even the
coxcombry you have given to your gentle butcher
of '93, — all are Densdeth's. May you not have
seen and remembered his marked face?”
“Possibly.” He evaded my inquiring look, as
he replied.
“Perhaps he has stared at you for an instant
in a crowd. Perhaps you have caught a look of
his from the window of a railroad-car. He may
at some moment, without your conscious notice,
have stamped himself ineffaceably upon your
mind.”
“It may be. An artist's brain receives and
stores images often without distinct volition.
But you may lend my villain a likeness from
your own memory.”
“Yes; our talk about Densdeth, and your
warnings against an exaggerated danger are fresh
in my mind. Certainly, as I see the face, it is
Densdeth's very self.”
“Now,” said Dreeme, “take your choice of my
three sketches. Three simple stories, — which
and have taken much grateful pleasure in
the work. One is for you, one for Locksley, one
for myself, — a souvenir for each of us in happier
days.”
“Mine will be precious as a souvenir, apart
from its great value as Art. And, let me tell
you, Dreeme, in their manner, these studies are
as able as your Lear. The anecdotes hold their
own with the tragedy. I believe you are the man
we have been waiting for.”
“Your praise thrills me.”
“Do not let it spoil you,” said I, willing in my
turn to act the Mentor.
“Mr. Byng,” said he gravely, “my life has
been so deepened and solemnized by earnest
trial and bitter experience, that vanity is, I trust,
annihilated. I shall do my work faithfully, because
my nature commands me to it; but I can
never have the exultant feeling of personal pride
in it as mine.”
“That too is a legitimate joy. You will have
it when the world gives you its verdict, `Well
done.'”
Dreeme sighed, and seemed to shrink away.
“To face the world!” said he, — “how dare I?
And yet I must. My scanty means will not last
me many weeks longer.”
“My dear Dreeme,” said I, “my purse is not
keep two spiritual beings, like ourselves, in oysters
and ale, slaw and `Wing's pethy,' — crackers
being thrown in.”
“Thank you,” said he, smiling; “but I suppose
I must go out into daylight, brave my fate,
and take my risk.”
“There is no risk. You must succeed.”
“Ah!” said he, and tears stood in his great
sad eyes; “I speak of another risk. Of another
danger, which I shudder at. Here I am safe,
unharming and unharmed. How can I take up
my life's responsibilities again?”
“Dreeme,” said I, “in any other but you, I
should almost say that these fancies were unmanly.”
He evaded my eye, as I said this, but did not
seem insulted.
“But,” I continued, “there is a certain kind
of courage in your working here alone, — enough
to establish your character. If you want a rough
pugilistic ally against this mysterious peril of
yours, take me into your confidence. Here are
my fists! they are yours. What ogre shall I hit?
What dragon shall I choke?”
“You are neglecting my poor gift,” said he,
resolutely changing the subject; “make your
choice of the three pictures, and I will show you
my portfolio of drawings. You shall see what
careless fancy.”
“I choose the third of the series. Neither
of those where I or my semblance is the chief
figure, — neither where I am doing, but where
I am receiving the favor. My only regret is
that I cannot look through the back of her head
and see the features of the lady, whose gesture
tells me, `Sheathe sword and swallow ire!'
Robespierre — Densdeth too, that adds to its
value. I must hang it up where he can see it.
I am curious to know whether he will recognize
himself.”
“O no! Promise me that you will not show
it at present. No, not to any one!”
“What, not identify myself with the début of
the coming man? May I not be your herald?”
“Wait, at least, till I am ready to follow up
the announcement of my coming. No premature
pæans, if you please!”
“I obey, of course. But I should vastly like
to show it to Towers, Sion, and Pensal. You
know I have a growing intimacy with that trio
of great artists. They would heartily welcome
your advent.”
“Spare me the dread of their condemnation!
Keep my little gift to yourself, at present!
Here is my heap of drawings. Look at them,
and judge with your usual kindness!”
“So these were the thoughts too hot for your
brain to hold. These represent what you must
say, not what you chose to say. I perceive that
the bent of your mind is not toward tragedy.”
Very masterly sketches they were! A fine
fancy, a subtle imagination, a large heart, had
conceived them, an accurate and severe artistic
sense had controlled and developed the thought,
and an unerring hand had executed it. Dreeme
was a youth, certainly not more than twenty-one;
and yet here was the maturity of complete
manhood. Whether he had had opportunities
for studying classic art, or whether his genius
had seized in common life that fine quality
which we name “classic,” these drawings of his
would have stood the test with the purest of
the Italian masters, in the days before Italian
art had suffered blight, — that blight which befell
it when progress ceased in the land, and
a tyrannical Church bade the nation pause and
let the world go by.
Dreeme's female figures were not drawn with
the liberal and almost riotous fancy of youth,
which loves floating and flaunting draperies and
a bold display of the nude. A chaster feeling
had presided over the studies of this fine genius.
There was a severe simplicity in his drawings
of women. He seemed to have approached the
purer sex with a loving reverence, never with
many able men, nullifying all spiritual beauty.
One would say that the artist of these drawings
had taken his mother and his sisters as
models for the elevated and saintly beings, whom
he had placed in scenes of calm beauty, and
engaged in tender offices of mercy, pity, and
pardon. I could safely name him Raphael-Angelico,
— the title saves me longer criticism.
Strangely enough, — and here I recognized
either a wound in Dreeme's life or a want in
his character, — there was not one scene of love
— that is, the love Cupid manages — in the collection.
Not one scene where lovers, happy or
hapless, figured. No pretty picture of consent
and fondness. Not one of passion and fervor.
Now, a young man or a young maiden, in
the early twenties, in whose mind love is not
the primal thought, is a monstrosity, and must
be studied and analyzed with a view to cure.
Either Dreeme's nature was still in the crude,
green state, unripened by passion, or he had
suffered so bitterly from some treachery in love
that he could not reawaken the memory. Either
he was ignorant of love's sweet torture, or he
had felt the agony, without the healing touch.
I suspected the latter.
Often, recently, as my relations with Dreeme
grew closer, I had been conscious of a peculiar
But had he not had a nearer? If not in my
sex, in the other? It was under the influence
of this jealousy, that I said, —
“It seems almost an impertinence, Dreeme,
to suggest a negative fault in this collection of
admirable drawings; but I perceive a want. The
subject of love, — the love that presses hands
and kisses lips, the tender passion, — had you
nothing to say of it?”
“No,” said he, “I am too young.”
“Bah! you are past twenty.”
“Twenty-one — the very day of your coming.”
“Too young! why, as for me, I was in love
while my upper lip was only downy. The
passion increased as that feature began to be
districted off with hairs, stalwart, but sporadic.
And ever since I have grown up to a real moustache,
with ends that can be twirled, I have
been in love, or just out and waiting to jump
or tumble in again, the whole time.”
“How is it now?”
“I hardly know. In love? or almost in?
Which? In, I believe. I am tempted to offer
you a confidence.”
“I would rather not,” said Dreeme, uneasily.
“O yes; you shall interpret my feelings. I
admire a woman, whom it seems to me that I
should love devotedly, if she were a little other
delicacy, — her own sister self, a little angelized.”
Dreeme evaded my questioning look, and made
no reply. I paused a moment, while he painted
a jewel, flashing on the white neck of his
Goneril.
“Come,” said I, “my Mentor, do not dodge
responsibility! Your reply may affect my destiny.”
He met my glance now, and replied, without
hesitation, “Love that admits questions is no
love.”
“Perhaps I am suffering the penalty for the
inconstant mood I have permitted myself heretofore.
Perhaps I only want a steady and sincere
purpose to love and trust, and I shall do
so.”
“Beware such perilous doubts!” said he earnestly.
“With a generous character like yours,
they lead to illusions. You will presently, out
of self-reproach for at all doubting the woman
you fancy, pass into a blind confidence, and so
win some miserable shock, perhaps too late.”
“Cassandra again! Cassandra in the other
sex.”
“Do not say Cassandra! that proves you intend
to disdain my warning.”
“Dear me! what solemn business we are making
my side, by the way. In fact, I really believe
I have cleared my head of my vague doubts of
the unknown lady in question. They only needed
to be put into words, in presence of a third party,
to seem, as you say, utterly ungenerous.”
“I am sorry that you forced the confidence
upon me, — very sorry! But you would have
it so.”
“You talk as if you knew the lady, and considered
her unfitted for me.”
“Believe that I have discernment enough,
knowing you, to know the class of woman who
in this phase of your life will necessarily attract
you. I can divine whom, — that is, what manner
of person you will choose for a love, since you
have characterized the man you are fascinated
by as an intimate.”
“Oh! you mean Densdeth.”
“Yes; while you allow him to dominate you,—
and mind, I take my impression from yourself, —
you will naturally seek a counterpart of his in
the other sex.”
I grew ill at ease under this penetrating analysis
of my secret feelings.
It was, of course, of Emma Denman that I
had spoken.
Emma Denman was the woman I deemed myself
on the verge of loving.
It was she whom I felt that I did not love, and
yet ought to love. It was she whom I should
have loved, without any shadow of hesitation,
if she had been herself touched with a diviner
feminineness, her own sister self, a thought more
angelic.
I had sometimes had a painful lurking consciousness
that if I were nobler than I was, — if
my mind were more resolutely made up and
unwavering on the side of virtue, — I should
have applied the test of a higher and purer
nature on my side to Emma Denman, and found
her in some way fatally wanting. But whenever
this injurious fancy stirred within me, I quelled
it, saying, “If I were nobler, I should not have
morbid notions about others. How can you
learn to trust women while you allow yourself
daily to listen, and only carelessly to protest,
when Densdeth urges his doctrine, that women
and men only wait opportunity to be base?”
In fact, in violation of an instinct, I was going
through the process of resolving to love Emma
Denman, because I distrusted her, and such
vague distrust seemed an unchivalric disloyalty,
a cruel wrong to a friend.
The strange coincidence of Dreeme's warning
determined me to banish my superstitions. No
more of this weakness! I would cultivate, or, as
I persuaded myself, frankly yield to my passion
to win her. I saw now how baseless were my
doubts, when they came to be stated in words.
Indeed, there was no name for one of these misty
beings of the mind.
All this flashed across my mind as I continued
mechanically turning over Dreeme's drawings.
With the thought came the resolve. I would no
more begrudge my faith. I would love Emma
Denman, and by love make myself worthy of it.
Unless the deed go with it,”
leave of Dreeme for the morning, I passed to
Denman's house.
From that time, I was the undeclared lover of
Emma Denman, as I shall presently describe.
And you, Cecil Dreeme, — it was your warning
that urged me so perversely to do violence
to an unerring instinct.
How strangely and fatally we interfere, unconsciously,
for one another's bliss or bale!
Churm away;
Densdeth my intimate;
Cecil Dreeme my friend of friends;
Emma Denman almost my love.
So matters stood with me and the other characters
of this drama, two months from the day
of my instalment in Chrysalis.
But let it not be understood that I had nothing
to do except to study these few persons. My
days were full, and often my nights, with hard
and absorbing work I had undertaken in my
profession. I touched the world on many sides.
I came into collision with various characters.
I had my daily life, like other men, — my real
life, if you will, that handled substances, and did
not deal in mysteries. This I am not describing.
I am at pains to eliminate every fact and thought
of mine which did not bear immediately upon
the development of the story I here compel myself
to write.
| CHAPTER XVIII.
ANOTHER CASSANDRA. Cecil Dreeme | |