At His Gates. Volume 1. Oliphant Margaret
poem had seized upon her, partly because of her intense feeling on the subject. Sometimes she felt as if she herself was Andrea – not Robert, for Robert had none of that heart-rending sense of failure. Was she Lucrezia rather, the wife that goaded him into misery? No, no! she could not so condemn herself. When her thoughts reached this point she forsook the studio and the conservatory, and rushed back to the drawing-room, where little Norah, with her head pressed close against the window to take advantage of the last glimmer of light, was reading a book of fairy tales. Great painters had not wives. Those others – Leonardo, and Angelo, and the young Urbinese – had none of them wives. Was that the reason? But not to be as great as Michel Angelo, not to win the highest honours of art, would Robert give up his wife and his child. Therefore was it not best that he should give up being a painter, and become a commercial man instead, and grow rich! Helen sat down in the gathering darkness and looked at the three windows glimmering with their mist of white curtains, and little Norah curled up on the carpet, with her white face and her brown curls relieved against the light. Some faint sounds came in soft as summer and evening made them, through the long casement, which was open, and with it a scent of mignonette, and of the fresh earth in the flower-beds, refreshed by watering and dew. Sometimes the voices of her husband and cousin from the adjoining room would reach her ear; but where she was all was silent, nothing to disturb her thoughts. No, he would never do better. He had won his crown. Helen was proud and glad that he had won it; but in her heart did not consent. He had won and he had not won. His victory was because he had caught the banal fancy of the public, and pleased his brethren by his beautiful work; but he had failed because – because – Why had he failed? Because he was not Raphael or Leonardo – nor even that poor Andrea – but only Robert Drummond, painting his pictures not out of any inspiration within him, but for money and fame. He had gained these as men who seek them frankly so often seem to do. But it was better, far better, that he should make money now, by legitimate means, without pursuing a profession in which he never could be great.
These were not like a wife's reasonings; but they were Helen's, though she was loyal to her husband as ever woman was. She would have liked so much better to worship his works and himself, as most women do; and that would have done him good more than anything else in earth or heaven. But she could not. It was her hard fate that made her eye so keen and so true. It felt like infidelity to him, to come to such a conclusion in his own house, with his kind voice sounding in her ear. But so it was, and she could not make it different, do what she would. He was so pleased when he found she did not oppose his desires, so grateful to her, so strongly convinced that she was yielding her own pleasure to his, that his thanks were both lavish and tender. When their visitor had left them, and they were alone, he poured out his gratitude like a lover. 'I know you are giving in to me,' he said, 'my love, my self-forgetting Helen! It is like you. You always have given up your pleasure to mine. Am I a brute to accept it, and take my own way?'
'I am not making any sacrifice, Robert. Don't thank me, please. It is because I think you have judged right, and this is best.'
'And you think I am so blind and stupid not to see why you say that,' he said in his enthusiasm. 'Helen, I often wonder what providence was thinking of to give you only such a poor fellow as I am. I wish I was something better for your sake, something more like you; but I have not a wish or a hope in the world, my darling, except for you. If I want to be rich, Helen, it is only for you. You know that, at least.'
'And for Norah,' she said, smiling.
'For Norah, but most for Norah's mother, who trusted me when I was nobody, and gave me herself when I had little chance of being either rich or great,' said Drummond. He said it, poor fellow, with a swelling of his heart. His new dignity had for the moment delivered him even from the chill of his wife's unexpressed indifference to his work. With a certain trustful simplicity, which it would have been impossible to call vanity, he accepted the verdict of his profession – even though he had doubts himself as to his own eminence, they must know. He had won the greatness he wanted most, he had acquired a distinction which could not but vanquish his own doubts and hers. And as he was now, he would not change positions with any man in England. He was great, and please God, for Helen's sake, he would be rich too. He put his arm round his wife and drew her into the open conservatory. The moon was up, and shone down upon them, lighting up with a wan and spiritual light the colourless silent flowers. It was curious to see them, with all their leaves silvered, and all their identity gone, yet pouring forth their sweet scents silently, no one noting them. 'How sweet it is here,' said the painter, drawing a long breath in his happiness. It was a moment that lived in his mind, and remained with him, as moments do which are specially happy, detaching themselves from the common tenor of life with all the more distinctness that they are so few.
'Yes, it is the place I love best,' said Helen, whose heart was touched too, 'because you made it for me, Robert. The rest is ordinary and comfortable, but this is different. It is your sonnet to me, like that we were reading of – like Raphael's sonnet and Dante's angel.' This she said with a little soft enthusiasm, which perhaps went beyond the magnitude of the fact. But then she was compunctious about her sins towards him; and his fondness, and the moonlight, and the breath of the flowers, moved her, and the celestial fumes of Mr Browning's book of poetry had gone to Helen's head, as the other influences went to her heart.
'My darling! it will be hard upon me if I don't give you better yet,' he said. And then with a change in his voice – cheerful, yet slightly deprecating, 'Come and have a look at "Francesca,"' he said.
It was taking an unfair advantage of her; but she could not refuse him at such a moment. He went back to the drawing-room for the lamp, and returned carrying it, drawing flecks of colour round him from all the flowers as he passed flashing the light on them. Helen felt her own portrait look at her reproachfully as she went in with reluctant steps following him, wondering what she could say. It made her heart sick to look at his pet picture, in its beauty and feebleness; but he approached it lovingly, with a heart full of satisfaction and content. He held up the lamp in his hand, though it was heavy, that the softened light might fall just where it ought, and indicated to her the very spot where she ought to stand to have the full advantage of all its beauties. 'I don't think there is much to find fault with in the composition,' he said, looking at it fondly. 'Give me your honest opinion, Helen. Do you think it would be improved by a little heightening of those lights?'
Helen gazed at it with confused eyes and an aching heart. It was his diploma picture, the one by which most probably he would be known best to posterity, and she said to herself that he, a painter, ought to know better than she did. But that reflection did not affect her feelings. Her impulse was to snatch the lamp from his hand, and say, 'Dear Robert, dearest husband, come and make money, come and be a banker, or sweep a crossing, and let Francesca alone for ever!' But she could not say that. What she did say faltering was – 'You must know so much better than I do, Robert; but I think the light is very sweet. It is best not to be too bright.'
'Do you think so?' he said anxiously. 'I am not quite sure. I think it would be more effective with a higher tone just here; and this line of drapery is a little stiff – just a little stiff. Could you hold the lamp for a moment, Helen? There! that is better. Now Paolo's foot is free, and the attitude is more distinct. Follow the line of the chalk and tell me what you think. That comes better now?'
'Yes, it is better,' said Helen; and then she paused and summoned all her courage. 'Don't you think,' she faltered, 'that Francesca – is – almost too innocent and sweet?'
'Too innocent!' said poor Robert, opening his honest eyes. 'But, dear, you forget! She was innocent. Why, surely, you are not the one to go in for anything sensational, Helen! This is not Francesca in the Inferno, but Francesca in the garden, before any harm had come near her. I don't like your impassioned women.' He had grown a little excited, feeling, perhaps, more in the suggestion than its mere words; but now he came to a stop, and his voice regained its easy tone. 'The whole thing wants a great deal of working up,' he said; 'all this foreground is very imperfect – it is too like an English garden. I acknowledge my weakness; my ideal always smacks of home.'
Helen said no more. How could she. He was ready laughingly to allow that England came gliding into his pencil and his thoughts when he meant to paint Italy: a venial, kindly error. But candid and kind as he was, he could not bear criticism on the more vital points. She held the lamp for him