Chapter 3

“But duchesses don’t fall in love with bricklayers,” returned the Minor Poet. “Now, why not? The stockbroker flirts with the barmaid—cases have been known; often he marries her. Does the lady out shopping ever fall in love with the waiter at the bun-shop? Hardly ever. Lordlings marry ballet girls, but ladies rarely put their heart and fortune at the feet of the Lion Comique. Manly beauty and virtue are not confined to the House of Lords and its dependencies. How do you account for the fact that while it is common enough for the man to look beneath him, the woman will almost invariably prefer her social superior, and certainly never tolerate her inferior? Why should King Cophetua and the Beggar Maid appear to us a beautiful legend, while Queen Cophetua and the Tramp would be ridiculous?”

[Picture: Does the lady out shopping ever fall in love with the waiter at the bun-shop?]

“The simple explanation is,” expounded the Girton Girl, “woman is so immeasurably man’s superior that only by weighting him more or less heavily with worldly advantages can any semblance of balance be obtained.”

“Then,” answered the Minor Poet, “you surely agree with me that woman is justified in demanding this ‘make-weight.’ The woman gives her love, if you will. It is the art treasure, the gilded vase thrown in with the pound of tea; but the tea has to be paid for.”

“It all sounds very clever,” commented the Old Maid; “yet I fail to see what good comes of ridiculing a thing one’s heart tells one is sacred.”

“Do not be so sure I am wishful to ridicule,” answered the Minor Poet. “Love is a wondrous statue God carved with His own hands and placed in the Garden of Life, long ago. And man, knowing not sin, worshipped her, seeing her beautiful. Till the time came when man learnt evil; then saw that the statue was naked, and was ashamed of it. Since when he has been busy, draping it, now in the fashion of this age, now in the fashion of that. We have shod her in dainty bottines, regretting the size of her feet. We employ the best artistes to design for her cunning robes that shall disguise her shape. Each season we fix fresh millinery upon her changeless head. We hang around her robes of woven words. Only the promise of her ample breasts we cannot altogether hide, shocking us not a little; only that remains to tell us that beneath the tawdry tissues still stands the changeless statue God carved with His own hands.”

“I like you better when you talk like that,” said the Old Maid; “but I never feel quite sure of you. All I mean, of course, is that money should not be her first consideration. Marriage for money—it is not marriage; one cannot speak of it. Of course, one must be reasonable.”

“You mean,” persisted the Minor Poet, “you would have her think also of her dinner, of her clothes, her necessities, luxuries.”

“It is not only for herself,” answered the Old Maid.

“For whom?” demanded the Minor Poet.

The white hands of the Old Maid fluttered on her lap, revealing her trouble; for of the old school is this sweet friend of mine.

“There are the children to be considered,” I explained. “A woman feels it even without knowing. It is her instinct.”

The Old Maid smiled on me her thanks.

“It is where I was leading,” said the Minor Poet. “Woman has been appointed by Nature the trustee of the children. It is her duty to think of them, to plan for them. If in marriage she does not take the future into consideration, she is untrue to her trust.”

[Picture: Woman has been appointed by Nature the trustee of the children]

“Before you go further,” interrupted the Philosopher, “there is an important point to be considered. Are children better or worse for a pampered upbringing? Is not poverty often the best school?”

“It is what I always tell George,” remarked the Woman of the World, “when he grumbles at the tradesmen’s books. If Papa could only have seen his way to being a poor man, I feel I should have been a better wife.”

“Please don’t suggest the possibility,” I begged the Woman of the World; “the thought is too bewildering.”

“You were never imaginative,” replied the Woman of the World.

“Not to that extent,” I admitted.

“‘The best mothers make the worst children,’” quoted the Girton Girl. “I intend to bear that in mind.”

“Your mother was a very beautiful character—one of the most beautiful I ever knew,” remarked the Old Maid.

“There is some truth in the saying,” agreed the Minor Poet, “but only because it is the exception; and Nature invariably puts forth all her powers to counteract the result of deviation from her laws. Were it the rule, then the bad mother would be the good mother and the good mother the bad mother. And—”

“Please don’t go on,” said the Woman of the World. “I was up late last night.”

“I was merely going to show,” explained the Minor Poet, “that all roads lead to the law that the good mother is the best mother. Her duty is to her children, to guard their infancy, to take thought for their equipment.”

“Do you seriously ask us to believe,” demanded the Old Maid, “that the type of woman who does marry for money considers for a single moment any human being but herself?”

“Not consciously, perhaps,” admitted the Minor Poet. “Our instincts, that they may guide us easily, are purposely made selfish. The flower secretes honey for its own purposes, not with any sense of charity towards the bee. Man works, as he thinks, for beer and baccy; in reality, for the benefit of unborn generations. The woman, in acting selfishly, is assisting Nature’s plans. In olden days she chose her mate for his strength. She, possibly enough, thought only of herself; he could best provide for her then simple wants, best guard her from the disagreeable accidents of nomadic life. But Nature, unseen, directing her, was thinking of the savage brood needing still more a bold protector. Wealth now is the substitute for strength. The rich man is the strong man. The woman’s heart unconsciously goes out to him.”

“Do men never marry for money?” inquired the Girton Girl. “I ask merely for information. Maybe I have been misinformed, but I have heard of countries where the _dot_ is considered of almost more importance than the bride.”

“The German officer,” I ventured to strike in, “is literally on sale. Young lieutenants are most expensive, and even an elderly colonel costs a girl a hundred thousand marks.”

“You mean,” corrected the Minor Poet, “costs her father. The Continental husband demands a dowry with his wife, and sees that he gets it. He in his turn has to save and scrape for years to provide each of his daughters with the necessary _dot_. It comes to the same thing precisely. Your argument could only apply were woman equally with man a wealth producer. As it is, a woman’s wealth is invariably the result of a marriage, either her own or that of some shrewd ancestress. And as regards the heiress, the principle of sale and purchase, if I may be forgiven the employment of common terms, is still more religiously enforced. It is not often that the heiress is given away; stolen she may be occasionally, much to the indignation of Lord Chancellors and other guardians of such property; the thief is very properly punished—imprisoned, if need be. If handed over legitimately, her price is strictly exacted, not always in money—that she possesses herself, maybe in sufficiency; it enables her to bargain for other advantages no less serviceable to her children—for title, place, position. In the same way the Neolithic woman, herself of exceptional strength and ferocity, may have been enabled to bestow a thought upon her savage lover’s beauty, his prehistoric charm of manner; thus in other directions no less necessary assisting the development of the race.”

“I cannot argue with you,” said the Old Maid. “I know one case. They were both poor; it would have made no difference to her, but it did to him. Maybe I am wrong, but it seems to me that, as you say, our instincts are given us to guide us. I do not know. The future is not in our hands; it does not belong to us. Perhaps it were wiser to listen to the voices that are sent to us.”

“I remember a case, also,” said the Woman of the World. She had risen to prepare the tea, and was standing with her back to us. “Like the woman you speak of, she was poor, but one of the sweetest creatures I have ever known. I cannot help thinking it would have been good for the world had she been a mother.”

“My dear lady,” cried the Minor Poet, “you help me!”

“I always do, according to you,” laughed the Woman of the World. “I appear to resemble the bull that tossed the small boy high into the apple-tree he had been trying all the afternoon to climb.”

“It is very kind of you,” answered the Minor Poet. “My argument is that woman is justified in regarding marriage as the end of her existence, the particular man as but a means. The woman you speak of acted selfishly, rejecting the crown of womanhood because not tendered to her by hands she had chosen.”

“You would have us marry without love?” asked the Girton Girl.

“With love, if possible,” answered the Minor Poet; “without, rather than not at all. It is the fulfilment of the woman’s law.”

“You would make of us goods and chattels,” cried the Girton Girl.

“I would make of you what you are,” returned the Minor Poet, “the priestesses of Nature’s temple, leading man to the worship of her mysteries. An American humorist has described marriage as the craving of some young man to pay for some young woman’s board and lodging. There is no escaping from this definition; let us accept it. It is beautiful—so far as the young man is concerned. He sacrifices himself, deprives himself, that he may give. That is love. But from the woman’s point of view? If she accept thinking only of herself, then it is a sordid bargain on her part. To understand her, to be just to her, we must look deeper. Not sexual, but maternal love is her kingdom. She gives herself not to her lover, but through her lover to the great Goddess of the Myriad Breasts that shadows ever with her guardian wings Life from the outstretched hand of Death.”

“She may be a nice enough girl from Nature’s point of view,” said the Old Maid; “personally, I shall never like her.”

IV

“WHAT is the time?” asked the Girton Girl.

I looked at my watch. “Twenty past four,” I answered.

“Exactly?” demanded the Girton Girl.

“Precisely,” I replied.

“Strange,” murmured the Girton Girl. “There is no accounting for it, yet it always is so.”

“What is there no accounting for?” I inquired. “What is strange?”

“It is a German superstition,” explained the Girton Girl, “I learnt it at school. Whenever complete silence falls upon any company, it is always twenty minutes past the hour.”

“Why do we talk so much?” demanded the Minor Poet.

“As a matter of fact,” observed the Woman of the World, “I don’t think we do—not we, personally, not much. Most of our time we appear to be listening to you.”

“Then why do I talk so much, if you prefer to put it that way?” continued the Minor Poet. “If I talked less, one of you others would have to talk more.”

“There would be that advantage about it,” agreed the Philosopher.

“In all probability, you,” returned to him the Minor Poet. “Whether as a happy party we should gain or lose by the exchange, it is not for me to say, though I have my own opinion. The essential remains—that the stream of chatter must be kept perpetually flowing. Why?”

“There is a man I know,” I said; “you may have met him, a man named Longrush. He is not exactly a bore. A bore expects you to listen to him. This man is apparently unaware whether you are listening to him or not. He is not a fool. A fool is occasionally amusing—Longrush never. No subject comes amiss to him. Whatever the topic, he has something uninteresting to say about it. He talks as a piano-organ grinds out music steadily, strenuously, tirelessly. The moment you stand or sit him down he begins, to continue ceaselessly till wheeled away in cab or omnibus to his next halting-place. As in the case of his prototype, his rollers are changed about once a month to suit the popular taste. In January he repeats to you Dan Leno’s jokes, and gives you other people’s opinions concerning the Old Masters at the Guild-hall. In June he recounts at length what is generally thought concerning the Academy, and agrees with most people on most points connected with the Opera. If forgetful for a moment—as an Englishman may be excused for being—whether it be summer or winter, one may assure oneself by waiting to see whether Longrush is enthusing over cricket or football. He is always up-to-date. The last new Shakespeare, the latest scandal, the man of the hour, the next nine days’ wonder—by the evening Longrush has his roller ready. In my early days of journalism I had to write each evening a column for a provincial daily, headed ‘What People are Saying.’ The editor was precise in his instructions. ‘I don’t want your opinions; I don’t want you to be funny; never mind whether the thing appears to you to be interesting or not. I want it to be real, the things people _are_ saying.’ I tried to be conscientious. Each paragraph began with ‘That.’ I wrote the column because I wanted the thirty shillings. Why anybody ever read it, I fail to understand to this day; but I believe it was one of the popular features of the paper. Longrush invariably brings back to my mind the dreary hours I spent penning that fatuous record.”

“I think I know the man you mean,” said the Philosopher. “I had forgotten his name.”

“I thought it possible you might have met him,” I replied. “Well, my cousin Edith was arranging a dinner-party the other day, and, as usual, she did me the honour to ask my advice. Generally speaking, I do not give advice nowadays. As a very young man I was generous with it. I have since come to the conclusion that responsibility for my own muddles and mistakes is sufficient. However, I make an exception in Edith’s case, knowing that never by any chance will she follow it.”

“Speaking of editors,” said the Philosopher, “Bates told me at the club the other night that he had given up writing the ‘Answers to Correspondents’ personally, since discovery of the fact that he had been discussing at some length the attractive topic, ‘Duties of a Father,’ with his own wife, who is somewhat of a humorist.”

“There was the wife of a clergyman my mother used to tell of,” said the Woman of the World, “who kept copies of her husband’s sermons. She would read him extracts from them in bed, in place of curtain lectures. She explained it saved her trouble. Everything she felt she wanted to say to him he had said himself so much more forcibly.”

“The argument always appears to me weak,” said the Philosopher. “If only the perfect may preach, our pulpits would remain empty. Am I to ignore the peace that slips into my soul when perusing the Psalms, to deny myself all benefit from the wisdom of the Proverbs, because neither David nor Solomon was a worthy casket of the jewels that God had placed in them? Is a temperance lecturer never to quote the self-reproaches of poor Cassio because Master Will Shakespeare, there is evidence to prove, was a gentleman, alas! much too fond of the bottle? The man that beats the drum may be himself a coward. It is the drum that is the important thing to us, not the drummer.”

“Of all my friends,” said the Woman of the World, “the one who has the most trouble with her servants is poor Jane Meredith.”

“I am exceedingly sorry to hear it,” observed the Philosopher, after a slight pause. “But forgive me, I really do not see—”

“I beg your pardon,” answered the Woman of the World. “I thought everybody knew ‘Jane Meredith.’ She writes ‘The Perfect Home’ column for _The Woman’s World_.”

“It will always remain a riddle, one supposes,” said the Minor Poet. “Which is the real ego—I, the author of ‘The Simple Life,’ fourteenth edition, three and sixpence net—”

“Don’t,” pleaded the Old Maid, with a smile; “please don’t.”

“Don’t what?” demanded the Minor Poet.

“Don’t ridicule it—make fun of it, even though it may happen to be your own. There are parts of it I know by heart. I say them over to myself when— Don’t spoil it for me.” The Old Maid laughed, but nervously.

“My dear lady,” reassured her the Minor Poet, “do not be afraid. No one regards that poem with more reverence than do I. You can have but small conception what a help it is to me also. I, too, so often read it to myself; and when— We understand. As one who turns his back on scenes of riot to drink the moonlight in quiet ways, I go to it for sweetness and for peace. So much do I admire the poem, I naturally feel desire and curiosity to meet its author, to know him. I should delight, drawing him aside from the crowded room, to grasp him by the hand, to say to him: ‘My dear—my very dear Mr. Minor Poet, I am so glad to meet you! I would I could tell you how much your beautiful work has helped me. This, my dear sir—this is indeed privilege!’ But I can picture so vividly the bored look with which he would receive my gush. I can imagine the contempt with which he, the pure liver, would regard me did he know me—me, the liver of the fool’s hot days.”

“A short French story I once read somewhere,” I said, “rather impressed me. A poet or dramatist—I am not sure which—had married the daughter of a provincial notary. There was nothing particularly attractive about her except her _dot_. He had run through his own small fortune and was in some need. She worshipped him and was, as he used to boast to his friends, the ideal wife for a poet. She cooked admirably—a useful accomplishment during the first half-dozen years of their married life; and afterwards, when fortune came to him, managed his affairs to perfection, by her care and economy keeping all worldly troubles away from his study door. An ideal _Hausfrau_, undoubtedly, but of course no companion for our poet. So they went their ways; till, choosing as in all things the right moment, when she could best be spared, the good lady died and was buried.

“And here begins the interest of the story, somewhat late. One article of furniture, curiously out of place among the rich appointments of their fine _hôtel_, the woman had insisted on retaining, a heavy, clumsily carved oak desk her father had once used in his office, and which he had given to her for her own as a birthday present back in the days of her teens.

“You must read the story for yourselves if you would enjoy the subtle sadness that surrounds it, the delicate aroma of regret through which it moves. The husband finding after some little difficulty the right key, fits it into the lock of the bureau. As a piece of furniture, plain, solid, squat, it has always jarred upon his artistic sense. She too, his good, affectionate Sara, had been plain, solid, a trifle squat. Perhaps that was why the poor woman had clung so obstinately to the one thing in the otherwise perfect house that was quite out of place there. Ah, well! she is gone now, the good creature. And the bureau—no, the bureau shall remain. Nobody will need to come into this room, no one ever did come there but the woman herself. Perhaps she had not been altogether so happy as she might have been. A husband less intellectual—one from whom she would not have lived so far apart—one who could have entered into her simple, commonplace life! it might have been better for both of them. He draws down the lid, pulls out the largest drawer. It is full of manuscripts, folded and tied neatly with ribbons once gay, now faded. He thinks at first they are his own writings—things begun and discarded, reserved by her with fondness. She thought so much of him, the good soul! Really, she could not have been so dull as he had deemed her. The power to appreciate rightly—this, at least, she must have possessed. He unties the ribbon. No, the writing is her own, corrected, altered, underlined. He opens a second, a third. Then with a smile he sits down to read. What can they be like, these poems, these stories? He laughs, smoothing the crumpled paper, foreseeing the trite commonness, the shallow sentiment. The poor child! So she likewise would have been a _littérateure_. Even she had her ambition, her dream.

“The sunshine climbs the wall behind him, creeps stealthily across the ceiling of the room, slips out softly by the window, leaving him alone. All these years he had been living with a fellow poet. They should have been comrades, and they had never spoken. Why had she hidden herself? Why had she left him, never revealing herself? Years ago, when they were first married—he remembers now—she had slipped little blue-bound copy-books into his pocket, laughing, blushing, asking him to read them. How could he have guessed? Of course, he had forgotten them. Later, they had disappeared again; it had never occurred to him to think. Often in the earlier days she had tried to talk to him about his work. Had he but looked into her eyes, he might have understood. But she had always been so homely-seeming, so good. Who would have suspected? Then suddenly the blood rushes into his face. What must have been her opinion of his work? All these years he had imagined her the amazed devotee, uncomprehending but admiring. He had read to her at times, comparing himself the while with Molière reading to his cook. What right had she to play this trick upon him? The folly of it! The pity of it! He would have been so glad of her.”

[Picture: Comparing himself the while with Molière reading to his cook]

“What becomes, I wonder,” mused the Philosopher, “of the thoughts that are never spoken? We know that in Nature nothing is wasted; the very cabbage is immortal, living again in altered form. A thought published or spoken we can trace, but such must only be a small percentage. It often occurs to me walking down the street. Each man and woman that I pass by, each silently spinning his silken thought, short or long, fine or coarse. What becomes of it?”

“I heard you say once,” remarked the Old Maid to the Minor Poet, “that ‘thoughts are in the air,’ that the poet but gathers them as a child plucks wayside blossoms to shape them into nosegays.”

“It was in confidence,” replied the Minor Poet. “Please do not let it get about, or my publisher will use it as an argument for cutting down my royalties.”

“I have always remembered it,” answered the Old Maid. “It seemed so true. A thought suddenly comes to you. I think of them sometimes, as of little motherless babes creeping into our brains for shelter.”

“It is a pretty idea,” mused the Minor Poet. “I shall see them in the twilight: pathetic little round-eyed things of goblin shape, dimly luminous against the darkening air. Whence come you, little tender Thought, tapping at my brain? From the lonely forest, where the peasant mother croons above the cradle while she knits? Thought of Love and Longing: lies your gallant father with his boyish eyes unblinking underneath some tropic sun? Thought of Life and Thought of Death: are you of patrician birth, cradled by some high-born maiden, pacing slowly some sweet garden? Or did you spring to life amid the din of loom or factory? Poor little nameless foundlings! I shall feel myself in future quite a philanthropist, taking them in, adopting them.”

“You have not yet decided,” reminded him the Woman of the World, “which you really are: the gentleman we get for three and sixpence net, or the one we are familiar with, the one we get for nothing.”