“Mademoiselle Szczympliça has been paying you a high compliment — I fully agree with Mr Herbert that it is an exaggerated one,” said Phipson, “She wishes she could play like you.”
“And so Mr Herbert thinks ‘God forbid! does he? Well, he is right Why do you want to trample on the pianoforte as I do, Fraulein, when you can do so much better? What would you think of a skiff on the waters envying the attempts of a cavalry charger to swim?”
“I see from your playing how far I fall short in the last movement of the fantasia, Monsieur Jacqes. I am not strong enough to play it as you think it should be played. Ah yes, yes, yes; but I know — I know.”
“No, Mademoiselle; nor are you strong enough to dance the wardance as an Iroquois Indian thinks it should be danced. The higher you attain, the more you leave below you. Eh, Mr Herbert?”
“I am not a musician,” said Herbert, irritated by Jack’s whimsical appeals to him. “My confirmation of your opinion would not add much to its value.”
“Come,” said Jack: “I care nothing for professional opinions. According to them, I do not know the rudiments of music. Which would you rather hear the Fraulein play or me?”
“Since you compel me to express a preference, I had rather hear Mademoiselle Sczympliça.”
“I thought so,” said Jack, delighted “Now I must go back to Miss Sutherland, who has been left to take care of herself whilst I was playing.”
Herbert reddened. Jack nodded and walked away.
“Miss — Miss — , I cannot say it. She is the young lady who was with you at the concert, when Monsieur Feepzon introduced us. She is very dark, and wears lunettes. Is not that so?”
“Yes.”
“She is not stiff, like some of the English ladies. Is she a great friend of yours?”
“She — Her elder brother, who is married to Mrs Phipson’s daughter, was at school with me; and we were great friends.”
“Perhaps I should not have asked you. I fear I often shock your English ideas of reserve. I beg your pardon.”
“Not at all,” said Herbert, annoyed at himself for having betrayed his uneasiness. “Pray do not let any fear of our national shyness — for it is not really reserve — restrain you from questioning me whenever you are interested in anything concerning me. If you knew how much I prize that interest—” She drew back a little; and he stopped, afraid to go on without encouragement, and looking wistfully at her in the hope of seeing some in her face.
“How do you call this lady who is going to sing?” she said, judging it better to ask an irrelevant question than to look down and blush. Jack’s voice, speaking to Mary close by, interrupted them.
“I can listen to Josefs because he can play the fiddle,” said he, “and to Szczympliça because she can play the piano; and I would listen to her” — pointing to the singer — if she could sing. She is only about four years older than you; and already she dare attempt nothing that cannot be screamed through by main force. She has become what they call a dramatic singer, which means a singer with a worn out voice. Come, make haste: she is going to begin.”
“But perhaps she will feel hurt by your leaving the room. Now that you are famous, you cannot come and go unnoticed, as I can.”
“So much the worse for those who notice me. I hate singers, a miserable crew who think that music exists only in their own throats. There she goes with her Divinités du Styx. Come away God’s sake.”
“I think this room is the pleas — No, I do not — Let us go.”
Mary’s habitual look of resolution had gathered into a frown. They went back to the settee which was now deserted: Mrs Phipson and her neighbors having gone to hear the music.
Ä penny for your thoughts,” said Jack, sitting down beside Mary. “Are you jealous?”
She started and said “What do you mean?” Then, recovering herself a little, “Jealous of whom; and why?”
“Jealous of Sczympliça because Master Herbert seems to forget that there anyone else in the whole world tonight.”
“] did not notice his absorption. I am sure she is very welcome. He ought to be tired of me by this time.”
“You think to hoodwink me, do you? I saw you watching him the whole time she was playing. I wish you would quarrel with him.”
“Why do you wish that.”
“Because I am tired of him. If you were well rid of the fellow, you would stick to your music; pitch your nasty oil paints into the Thames; and be friendly to me without accusing yourself of treason to him. He is the most uncomfortable chap I know, and the one least suited to you. Besides, he can’t paint. I could do better myself, if I tried.”
“Other people do not think so. I have suspected ever since I first met you in his studio you did not admire his painting.”
“You had the same idea yourself, or you would never have detected it in me. I am no draughtsman; but I recognize weakness by instinct. You feel that he is a duffer. So do I.”
“Do you think, if he were a duffer, that his picture of last year would have been hung on the line at the Academy; or that the Art Union would have bought it to engrave; or that the President would have spoken of it so highly to Adrian himself?”
“Pshaw! There must be nearly two hundred pictures on the line every year at the Academy; and did you, or anyone else, ever see an Academy exhibition with ten pictures in it that had twenty years of life in them? Did the President of the Academy of Music ever speak well of me; or, if he did, do you think I should fell honored by his approval? That is another superfine duffer’s quality in your Mr Adrian. He is brimming over with reverence. He is humble, and speaks with bated breath of every painter that has ever had a newspaper notice written about him. He grovels before his art because he thinks that grovelling becomes him.”
“I think his modesty and reverence do become him.”
“Perhaps they do, because he has nothing to be bumptious about; but they are not the qualities that make a creative artist. Ha! ha!”
Mary opened her fan, and began to fan herself, with her face turned away from Jack.
Well,” said he, “are you angry?”
“No. But if you must disparage Adrian, why do you do so to me? You know the relation between us.”
“I disparage him because I think he is a humbug. If he spends whole days in explaining to you what a man of genius is and feels, knowing neither the one nor the other, I do not see why I should not give you my opinion on the subject, since I am in my own way — not a humble way — a man of genius myself.”
“Adrian, unfortunately, has not the same faith in himself that you have.”
“Perhaps he has got a good reason. A man’s own self is the last person to believe in him, and is harder to to cheat than the rest of the world. I sometimes wonder whether I am not an impostor. Old Beethoven once asked a pupil whether he really considered him a good composer. Shakespeare, as far as I can make out, only succeeded about half-a-dozen times in his attempts at play writing. Do you suppose he didn’t know it?”
“Then why do you blame Adrian for his diffidence?”
“Ah! that’s a horse another color. He thinks himself worse than other men, mortal like himself. I think myself a fool occasionally, because there are times when composing music seems to me to be a ridiculous thing in itself. Why should a rational man spend his life in making jingle-jingle with twelve notes? But at such times, Bach seems just as great a fool as I. Ask me at any time whether