Meanwhile he had come to Millbank for consolation, only to discover, as so many must have done before him, that there is in good art a quality which demands contentment if not happiness in its observer, its very harmonies serving but to accentuate disharmonies within. On the other hand, contemplation of the second-rate, by arousing the mind to a sort of amused fury, can sometimes distract it a little. Hence Mrs Rossetti. Paul felt, however, that his present unhappiness was too deeply seated to be much shaken, and that even time would be powerless against such a situation as his. There seemed to be no hope, no ray of comfort. The career for which he had longed from childhood, that of a writer, was evidently closed to him; he never wished again to face a chorus of praise uttered in such lack of comprehension. Nor could his affair with Marcella come to any more satisfactory conclusion, for although he loved her, he knew that he would always dislike her.
The copyist now came down from her high stool and began to pack up. Lights appeared, making the place look more dismal than before, and a little fog seemed to have penetrated, although outside the day had been clear and beautiful. Paul’s thoughts returned to his present surroundings. He looked at his watch, which had stopped as usual, and decided that he would go home. Marcella might telephone, in which case he would like to be there – his landlady was bad at taking messages. He rose to his feet, and was about to wander towards the door when he noticed the unmistakable figure of Walter Monteath hurrying through the Turner room on his way, no doubt, to the French pictures. He looked round on hearing his name, and catching sight of Paul, said:
‘Hullo, old boy, fancy seeing you here. I am pleased. Sally and I have just laughed ourselves ill over your book by the way; it is heavenly. Those policemen! Honestly, my sides ached. And the pawnbroker was divinely funny too. How did you think of it all? I’d give a lot to write a book like that, everyone’s talking about it. Well, and where are you off to now?’
‘I don’t know,’ said Paul, trying to look pleased at this praise. ‘What are you doing? Can’t we have a drink somewhere?’
‘Yes let’s. As a matter of fact, I’m just on my way to Amabelle’s for a cocktail, so why don’t you come along too. I know she wants to see you; she was asking about you only yesterday. If you don’t mind waiting a moment while I have a look at the Puvis we’ll go straight away. I’ve got the car outside; for once it’s not being repaired at the works.’
Whilst Walter, who apparently was going to write an article on Puvis de Chavannes, was examining the picture of John the Baptist, Paul gazed at the large Manet and wished he were dead. He felt, however, that like the hero of his own book, he would be too cowardly and ineffective ever to achieve a satisfactory suicide; he was no Roman soldier to lean upon his sword.
Presently, as they drove towards Mrs Fortescue’s house in Portman Square, Walter said, shouting to make himself heard above the twitterings, groanings and squeakings of his ancient motor car:
‘Sally and I met your Marcella last night; she was out with that poor mut Remnant and they joined our party later. We thought she was rather a dreary old do. Whatever do you see in her, Paul?’
‘Heaven knows,’ said Paul, drearily.
2
Amabelle Fortescue, unlike so many members of her late profession, was an intelligent, a cultured and a thoroughly nice woman. The profession itself had, in fact, been more a result of circumstances than the outcome of natural inclination. Cast alone and penniless upon the world at eighteen by the death of her father, who had been a respectable and well-known don at Oxford, she had immediately decided, with characteristic grasp of a situation, that the one of her many talents which amounted almost to genius should be that employed to earn her bread, board and lodging. Very soon after this decision was put into practice, the bread was, as it were, lost to sight beneath a substantial layer of Russian caviare; the board, changing with the fashions of years, first took to itself a lace tablecloth, then exposed a gleaming surface of polished mahogany, and finally became transformed into a piece of scrubbed and rotting oak; while the lodging, which had originally been one indeed, and on the wrong side of Campden Hill, was now a large and beautiful house in Portman Square.
Amabelle, without apparently the smallest effort, without arousing much jealousy or even causing much scandal, had risen to the top of her trade. Then just as, at an unusually early age, she was about to retire on her savings, she had married a charming, well-known and extremely eligible Member of Parliament whom she lost (respectably, through his death) some three years later.
