The Daughters of Danaus Part 30

"Oh, yes; what was that about some method of killing animals instantaneously to avoid the horrors of the slaughter-house? Professor Theobald has been saying what a pity it is that a man so able should waste his time over these fads. It would never bring him fame or profit, only ridicule. Every man had his little weakness, but this idea of saving pain to animals, Professor Theobald said, was becoming a sort of mania with poor Fortescue, and one feared that it might injure his career. He was greatly looked up to in the scientific world, but this sort of thing of course----

"Though it is nice of him in a way," added Lady Engleton.

"His weaknesses are n.o.bler than most people's virtues," said Miss Du Prel.

"Then you number this among his weaknesses?"

Algitha, who had joined the group, put this question.

"I would rather see him working in the cause of humanity," Miss Du Prel answered.

Ernest surprised everyone by suggesting that possibly humanity was well served, in the long run, by reminding it of the responsibility that goes with power, and by giving it an object lesson in the decent treatment of those who can't defend themselves.

"You must have sat at the Professor's feet," cried Miss Du Prel, raising her eyebrows.

"I have," said Ernest, with a little gesture of pride.

Lady Engleton shook her head. "I fear he flies too high for ordinary mortals," she said; "and I doubt if even he can be quite consistent at that alt.i.tude."

"Better perhaps fly fairly high, and come down now and again to rest, if one must, than grovel consistently and always," observed Ernest.

Lady Engleton gave a little scream. "Mrs. Temperley, come to the rescue.

Your brother is calling us names. He says we grovel consistently and always."

Ernest laughed, and protested. Lady Engleton pretended to be mortally offended. Mrs. Temperley was sorry she could give no redress. She had suffered from Ernest's painful frankness from her youth upwards.

The conversation grew discursive. Lady Engleton enjoyed the pastime of lightly touching the edges of what she called "advanced" thought. She sought the society of people like the two Professors and Miss Du Prel in order to hear what dreadful and delightful things they really would say.

She read all the new books, and went to the courageous plays that Mrs.

Walker wouldn't mention.

"Your last book, _Caterina_, is a mine of suggestion, Miss Du Prel," she said. "It raises one most interesting point that has puzzled me greatly. I don't know if you have all read the book? The heroine finds herself differing in her view of life from everyone round her. She is married, but she has made no secret of her scorn for the old ideals, and has announced that she has no intention of being bound by them."

Mrs. Temperley glanced uneasily at Miss Du Prel.

"Accordingly she does even as she had said," continued Lady Engleton.

"She will not brook that interference with her liberty which marriage among us old-fashioned people generally implies. She refuses to submit to the attempt that is of course made (in spite of a pre-nuptial understanding) to bring her under the yoke, and so off she goes and lives independently, leaving husband and relatives lamenting."

The vicar's wife said she thought she must be going home. Her husband would be expecting her.

"Oh, won't you wait a little, Mrs. Walker? Your daughters would perhaps like a game of tennis with my brothers presently."

Mrs. Walker yielded uneasily.

"But before _Caterina_ takes the law into her own hands, in this way,"

Lady Engleton continued, "she is troubled with doubts. She sometimes wonders whether she ought not, after all, to respect the popular standards (notwithstanding the compact), instead of disturbing everybody by clinging to her own. Now was it strength of character or obstinate egotism that induced her to stick to her original colours, come what might? That is the question which the book has stated but left unanswered."

Miss Du Prel said that the book showed, if it showed anything, that one must be true to one's own standard, and not attempt to respect an ideal in practice that one despises in theory. We are bound, she a.s.serted, to produce that which is most individual within us; to be ourselves, and not a poor imitation of someone else; to dare even apparent wrong-doing, rather than submit to live a life of devotion to that which we cannot believe.

Mrs. Walker suggested to her daughters that they might go and have a look at the rose-garden, but the daughters preferred to listen to the conversation.

"In real life," said the practical Algitha, "_Caterina_ would not have been able to follow her idea so simply. Supposing she had had children and complicated circ.u.mstances, what could she have done?"

Miss Du Prel thought that a compromise might have been made.

"A compromise by which she could act according to two opposite standards?"

Valeria was impatient of difficulties. It was not necessary that a woman should leave her home in order to be true to her conscience. It was the best method in _Caterina's_ case, but not in all.

Miss Du Prel did not explain very clearly what she meant. Women made too much of difficulties, she thought. Somehow people _had_ managed to overcome obstacles. Look at--and then followed a list of shining examples.

"I believe you would blame a modern woman who imitated them," said Mrs.

Temperley. "These women have the inestimable advantage of being dead."

"Ah, yes," Lady Engleton agreed, with a laugh, "we women may be anything we like--in the last century."

"The tides of a hundred years or so sweeping over one's audacious deed, soften the raw edges. Then it is tolerated in the landscape; indeed, it grows mossy and picturesque." Mrs. Temperley made this comparison.

"And then think how useful it becomes to prove that a daring deed _can_ be done, given only the necessary stuff in brain and heart."

Mrs. Walker looked at Algitha in dismay.

"One can throw it in the teeth of one's contemporaries," added Algitha, "if they fail to produce a dramatic climax of the same kind."

"Only," said Mrs. Temperley, "if they _do_ venture upon their own dreadful deed--the deed demanded by their particular modern predicament--then we all shriek vigorously."

"Oh, we shriek less than we used to," said Lady Engleton. "It is quite a relief to be able to retain one's respectability on easier terms."

"In such a case as Miss Du Prel depicts? I doubt it. _Caterina_, in real life, would have a lively story to tell. How selfish we should think her! How we should point to the festoons of bleeding hearts that she had wounded--a dripping cordon round the deserted home! No; I believe Miss Du Prel herself would be horrified at her own _Caterina_ if she came upon her unexpectedly in somebody's drawing-room."

There was a laugh.

"Of course, a great deal is to be said for the popular way of looking at the matter," Lady Engleton observed. "This fascinating heroine must have caused a great deal of real sorrow, or at least she _would_ have caused it, were it not that her creator had considerably removed all relatives, except a devoted couple of unorthodox parents, who are charmed at her decision to scandalize society, and wonder why she doesn't do it sooner.

Parents like that don't grow on every bush."

Mrs. Walker glanced nervously at her astonished girls.

Lady Engleton pointed out that had _Caterina_ been situated in a more ordinary manner, she would have certainly broken her parents' hearts and embittered their last years, to say nothing of the husband and perhaps the children, who would have suffered for want of a mother's care.

"But why should the husband suffer?" asked Algitha. "_Caterina's_ husband cordially detested her."

"It is customary to regard the occasion as one proper for suffering,"

said Mrs. Temperley, "and every well-regulated husband would suffer accordingly."

"Clearly," a.s.sented Lady Engleton. "When the world congratulates us we rejoice, when it condoles with us we weep."

"That at least, would not affect the children," said Algitha. "I don't see why of necessity _they_ should suffer."

"Their share of the woe would be least of all, I think," Mrs. Temperley observed. "What ogre is going to ill-treat them? And since few of us know how to bring up so much as an earth-worm reasonably, I can't see that it matters so very much which particular woman looks after the children. Any average fool would do."