The Yellow Book Volume I Part 17

_Lucy._ Of course. The man she had loved was dead. The new person she was indifferent to.

_Agnes._ But how--but you don't suggest that Mr. Reddell could behave like that? he couldn't. He wouldn't, I feel certain. But there must surely have been something else; I can't believe that any man would behave so utterly unfeelingly--so brutally. They say there are always two sides to every story. Mayn't there have been some reason that you knew nothing about? Mayn't she have done something? She must have been a little bit to blame, too, and this side of the story you never heard.

_Lucy._ Yes--it is possible.

_Agnes._ I can't think that any man would deliberately behave so like a cad as you say he did.

_Lucy._ It may have been her fault. I used to think it might be--just a little, as you say.

_Agnes._ Well, it sha'n't be mine at all events. I won't give any cause--besides even if I did----Oh, no, it is utterly impossible to imagine such a thing!

_Lucy._ I hope it is, for your sake.

_Agnes._ Of course it is; of that I am quite certain. And you don't think it is very wrong of me to--to----

_Lucy._ To say Yes to a man you love. No, my dear, that can never be wrong, although it may be foolish.

_Agnes._ From a worldly point of view, perhaps; but I should never have thought that you----

_Lucy._ I didn't mean that. But love seems to grow so quickly when you once allow it to do so, that it is sometimes wiser to----but never mind, bring him to see me, and--and may you be happy. [_A long pause._]

_Agnes._ You are crying now, Auntie! You have nothing----

_Lucy._ Haven't I? What, not at the chance of losing you? So this is what brought you out so early this morning and occasioned your bright, rosy cheeks? You didn't only come to see me.

_Agnes._ To see you and talk to you, yes, that was all. No, by-the-by, it wasn't all. Have you seen a paper this morning? No? I thought it would interest you so I brought it round. It is bad news, not good news; your favourite author is dead.

_Lucy._ I am afraid my favourite authors have been dead very many years.

_Agnes._ I should say the author of your favourite book.

_Lucy._ You mean----

_Agnes._ Sir Harold Sekbourne. [Lucy _leans back in her chair_.] He died last night. Here it is; here is the paragraph. [_Reads._] "We regret to announce the death of Sir Harold Sekbourne, the well-known novelist, which occurred at his town house, in Prince's Gate, late last evening."

Shall I read it to you?

_Lucy._ No--no, give me the paper. And--and, Agnes, do you mind going down to Franklin's room, and telling her that receipt you promised her?

_Agnes._ For the j.a.panese custard? Of course I will; I quite forgot all about it. There it is. [_Gives her the paper, indicating the paragraph with her finger, then goes out._]

_Lucy._ [_Sits staring at the paper for a few seconds, then reads slowly._] "Sir Harold had been slightly indisposed for some weeks, but no anxiety was felt until two days ago, when a change for the worse set in, and despite all the care, attention, and skill of Drs. Thornton and Douglas, who hardly left his bedside, he never rallied, and pa.s.sed peacefully away, at the early age of fifty-eight, at the time above mentioned. It is now thirty years ago since the deceased baronet published his first book, 'Grace: a Sketch,' which had such an immediate and great success. This was followed nearly a year afterwards by 'Alain Treven,' the scene of which is laid in Brittany; and from that time until his death his pen was never idle. His last work, 'The Incoming Tide,' has just been published in book form, it having appeared in the pages of _The Ill.u.s.trated Courier_ during the last year. Despite the rare power of his later works, disclosing thoroughly, as they do, his scholarly knowledge, his masterly construction, vivid imagination, and his keen insight into character and details of every-day life, they none of them can, for exquisite freshness and rare delicacy of execution, compare with his first publication, 'Grace: a Sketch.' We have before us, as we write, a first edition of this delightful story, with its curiously sentimental dedication 'To my Lady Luce,' which in the subsequent editions was omitted. A baronetcy was conferred on Sir Harold by her Majesty two years ago, at the personal instigation, it is said, of the Prime Minister, who is one of his greatest admirers, but the t.i.tle is now extinct, as Sir Harold leaves no son. He married in June, 1866, a daughter of the late Sir Humphrey Mockton, who survives him. His two daughters are both married--one to Lord Duncan, eldest son of the Earl of Andstar; the other to Sir Reginald de Laver. His loss will be greatly felt, not only in the literary world, but wherever the English tongue is spoken and read."

[Lucy _goes to the bookcase, takes out a book, and opens it_. Agnes _comes in_.]

_Agnes._ Franklin is silly. I had to repeat the directions three times, and even now I doubt if she understands them properly. [_Comes behind_ Lucy _and looks over her shoulder_.] Why, I never knew you had a first edition. [Lucy _starts and closes the book, then opens it again_.] May I look at it? But this is written; the ink is quite faded. "To my Lady Luce. Harold Sekbourne, 3rd November, 1863." What a strong handwriting it is! Luce! how strange that the name should be the same as---- [_Looks suddenly at_ Lucy.] Oh, Auntie, forgive me. I never dreamt----I am so sorry.

The Head of Minos

By J. T. Nettleship

_Reproduced by the Swan Electric Engraving Company_

[Ill.u.s.tration: The Head of Minos]

A Lost Masterpiece

A City Mood, Aug. '93

By George Egerton

I regret it, but what am I to do? It was not my fault--I can only regret it. It was thus it happened to me.

I had come to town straight from a hillside cottage in a lonely ploughland, with the smell of the turf in my nostrils, and the swish of the scythes in my ears; the scythes that flashed in the meadows where the upland hay, drought-parched, stretched thirstily up to the clouds that mustered upon the mountain-tops, and marched mockingly away, and held no rain.

The desire to mix with the crowd, to lay my ear once more to the heart of the world and listen to its life-throbs, had grown too strong for me; and so I had come back--but the sights and sounds of my late life clung to me--it is singular how the most opposite things often fill one with a.s.sociative memory.

That _gamin_ of the bird-tribe, the c.o.c.kney sparrow, recalled the swallows that built in the tumble-down shed; and I could almost see the gleam of their white bellies, as they circled in ever narrowing sweeps and clove the air with forked wings, uttering a shrill note, with a querulous grace-note in front of it.

The freshness of the country still lurked in me, unconsciously influencing my att.i.tude towards the city.

One forenoon business drove me citywards, and following an inclination that always impels me to water-ways rather than roadways, I elected to go by river steamer.

I left home in a glad mood, disposed to view the whole world with kindly eyes. I was filled with a happy-go-lucky _insouciance_ that made walking the pavements a loafing in Elysian fields. The coa.r.s.er touches of street-life, the oddities of accent, the idiosyncrasies of that most eccentric of city-dwellers, the Londoner, did not jar as at other times--rather added a zest to enjoyment; impressions crowded in too quickly to admit of a.n.a.lysis, I was simply an interested spectator of a varied panorama.

I was conscious, too, of a peculiar dual action of brain and senses, for, though keenly alive to every unimportant detail of the life about me, I was yet able to follow a process by which delicate inner threads were being spun into a fanciful web that had nothing to do with my outer self.

At Chelsea I boarded a river steamer bound for London Bridge. The river was wrapped in a delicate grey haze with a golden subtone, like a beautiful bright thought struggling for utterance through a mist of obscure words. It glowed through the turbid waters under the arches, so that I feared to see a face or a hand wave through its dull amber--for I always think of drowned creatures washing wearily in its murky depths--it lit up the great warehouses, and warmed the brickwork of the monster chimneys in the background. No detail escaped my outer eyes--not the hideous green of the velveteen in the sleeves of the woman on my left, nor the supercilious giggle of the young ladies on my right, who made audible remarks about my personal appearance.

But what cared I? Was I not happy, absurdly happy?--because all the while my inner eyes saw undercurrents of beauty and pathos, quaint contrasts, whimsical details that tickled my sense of humour deliciously. The elf that lurks in some inner cell was very busy, now throwing out tender mimosa-like threads of creative fancy, now recording fleeting impressions with delicate sure brushwork for future use; touching a hundred vagrant things with the magic of imagination, making a running comment on the scenes we pa.s.sed.

The warehouses told a tale of an up-to-date Soll und Haben, one of my very own, one that would thrust old Freytag out of the book-mart. The tall chimneys ceased to be giraffic throats belching soot and smoke over the blackening city. They were obelisks rearing granite heads heavenwards! Joints in the bricks, weather-stains? You are mistaken; they were hieroglyphics, setting down for posterity a tragic epic of man the conqueror, and fire his slave; and how they strangled beauty in the grip of gain. A theme for a Whitman!

And so it talks and I listen with my inner ear--and yet nothing outward escapes me--the slackening of the boat--the stepping on and off of folk--the lowering of the funnel--the name "Stanley" on the little tug, with its self-sufficient puff-puff, fussing by with a line of grimy barges in tow; freight-laden, for the water washes over them--and on the last a woman sits suckling her baby, and a terrier with badly cropped ears yaps at us as we pa.s.s....

And as this English river scene flashes by, lines of a.s.sociation form angles in my brain; and the point of each is a dot of light that expands into a background for forgotten ca.n.a.l scenes, with green-grey water, and leaning balconies, and strange crafts--Ca.n.a.letti and Guardi seen long ago in picture galleries....

A delicate featured youth with gold-laced cap, sc.r.a.pes a prelude on a thin-toned violin, and his companion thrums an accompaniment on a harp.

I don't know what they play, some tuneful thing with an undernote of sadness and sentiment running through its commonplace--likely a music-hall ditty; for a lad with a cheap silk hat, and the hateful expression of knowingness that makes him a type of his kind, grins appreciatively and hums the words.

I turn from him to the harp. It is the wreck of a handsome instrument, its gold is tarnished, its white is smirched, its stucco rose-wreaths sadly battered. It has the air of an antique beauty in dirty ball finery; and is it fancy, or does not a shamed wail lurk in the tone of its strings?