CHAPTER XVIII
And now, in the sunlit hour of dawn, he was bathing again. An excellent habit. It did him good, this physical contact with nature. Africa had weakened his constitution. Nepenthe made him feel younger once more—capable of fun and mischief. The muscles were acquiring a fresh tone, that old zest of life was coming back to him. His health, without a shadow of doubt, had greatly improved.
While disporting himself in amphibious joy among the tepid waves he seemed to cast off that sense of unease which had pursued him of late. It was good to inhale the harsh salty savour—to submit himself to these calming voices—to float, like a careless Leviathan, in the blue immensity; good to be alive, simply alive.
Another hot and clammy day was in store for the island. No matter. This sirocco, of which older inhabitants might well complain, had so far exerted no baleful influence upon him. Quite the reverse. Under its tender moistening touch his frame, desiccated in the tropics, seemed to open out, even as a withered flower uncloses its petals in water. In Africa all this thoughts and energies had been concentrated upon a single point. Here he expanded. New interests, new sensations, seemed to lie in wait for him. Never had he felt so alert, so responsive to spiritual impressions, so appreciative of natural beauty.
Lying in motionless ecstasy on the buoyant element he watched the mists of morning as they soared into the air. Reluctantly, with imperceptible movement, they detached themselves from their watery home; they clambered aloft in spectral companies, drawn skyward, as by some beckoning hand, under the stealthy compulsion of the sun. They crept against the tawny precipices, clinging to their pinnacles like shreds of pallid gauze, and nestling demurely among dank clefts where something of the mystery of night still lingered. It was a procession of dainty shapes wreathing themselves into gracious attitudes; mounting—ever mounting. As he beheld their filmy draperies that swayed phantom-like among the crags overhead, he understood those pagan minds of olden days for whom such wavering exhalations were none other than sea-nymphs, Atlantides, offspring of some mild-eyed god of Ocean rising to greet their playfellows, the Oreads, on the hills.
The wildest stretch of Nepenthe coast-line lay before him. Its profile suggested not so much the operation of terrestrial forces as a convulses and calcined lunar landscape—the handiwork of some demon in delirium. Gazing landwards, nothing met his eye save jagged precipices of fearful height, tormented rifts and gulleys scorched by fires of old into fantastic shapes, and descending confusedly to where the water slept in monster-haunted caverns.
Not a sign of humanity was visible save one white villa, far away. It was perched on a promontory of heliotrope-tinted trachyte; struck by the morning beams it flashed and glowed like a jewel in the sunshine. He knew the place: Madame Steynlin's abode. The sight of it reminded him of a promise to attend her picnic next week; all Nepenthe would be invited, after the feast of Saint Eulalia. And hard by the shore, at its foot, he discerned certain minute scarlet specks.
What could they be?
Why, of course! They were recognizable, even at this distance, as the blouses of the Sacred Sixty-three, who frequented this somewhat public spot for bathing purposes, blandly indifferent, or resigned, to the gaze of inquisitive onlookers. Mr. Heard, among others, had witnessed their aquatic diversions.
The Messiah was hindered by age and growing infirmities from taking part in the proceedings; moreover, he had been sickening lately, it was said, for some new Revelation—a Revelation of which the island was to become cognizant that very morning. But others of the Muscovite band were fond of congregating at this spot and hour for their lustral summer rites—white-skinned lads and lasses, matrons and reverent elders, all in a state of Adamitic nudity, splashing about the water of this sunny cover, devouring raw fish and crabs after the manner of the fabled Ichthyophagi, laughing, kissing, saying nice things about God, and combing out each other's long tow-coloured hair. Madame Steynlin, a spectator by necessity if not deliberate choice of these patriarchal frolics, disdained to controvert certain frivolous folk who resorted to the same beach to gratify a morbid curiosity, under the pretext that it was a delectable entertainment and one of the sights of Nepenthe. She disdained, nowadays. It had not ever been thus. Things were different before Peter the Great came upon the scene. In those unregenerate times her Lutheran upbringing condemned, in no measured terms, this frank exhibition of animal nature. A warm friendship with the good-looking apostle had now opened her eyes to the mystic sense of what went on. Earthly love had given an unearthly tinge to her mind. The veil had fallen; she saw through external appearances into the Symbolic Beyond. Deeply penetrated of its inner meaning, she would say that the spectacle called up visions of the Age of Innocence, when the world was young….
An elegant rowing-boat suddenly swept into Mr. Heard's field of vision. It had approached from round the entrance of the small bay and was already within a few yards ere he caught sight of it. He dived skilfully, and on returning to the surface beheld Mr. Keith smiling upon him, with owlish benevolence, through his spectacles.
"How pretty you look," he said. "Just like a mermaid that's lost its tail."
"You flatter me!"
"Not at all. Climb in and I'll take you for a row."
"Hadn't I better get some clothes on?"
"As you please. We can take you off that boulder if you want to dress."
"You're very kind."
Kind indeed. To admit a friend into one of his yachts or rowing-boats was an act of rare self-sacrifice on the part of Mr. Keith, who maintained that no vessel, not even an Atlantic liner, was large enough for more than one passenger.
"You are comfortable in here," the bishop remarked, as he presently stepped on board and looked around him. "Cleopatra's barge must have been something like this."
"There will be no breeze worth talking about all day. We must row."
An awning of red silk screened off the rays of the sun; the appointments of the small boat—the polished wood of rare texture, morocco leather cushions, and elaborate fittings—bespoke the taste or at least the income of a Sybarite. A grizzly brown sailor and his curly-pated son were the oarsmen; in the stern sat a couple of Keith's attendants, whom Mr. Heard might have mistaken for two Green genii but for the fact that between them lay an enormous and hideously modern receptacle of wicker-work which impaired the illusion. It troubled the bishop, both by reason of its incongruity and because he could not divine what its purpose might be, till Keith solved the mystery by saying:
"I thought I would like to see for myself about this fountain of Saint Elias and, incidentally, enjoy a little al fresco luncheon by the shore. Now I wonder whether there will be enough food for both of us in the basket?"
"That thing? Dear me. I thought it might contain a cottage piano. What fountain?"
"You haven't heard anything? Nothing at all?"
He outlined the events of the preceding day.
"What?" he continued. "They didn't even tell you about Miss Wilberforce? Well, whether she thought it was her birthday, or whether all these omens upset her nerves—Oh, the usual thing, only rather more so. Decidedly more so. It was late at night, you see, and she insisted on singing 'Auld Lang Syne,' and even on translating it, for the benefit of the constable who arrested her, into her own particular brand of Italian. In fact, there was a good deal of trouble, till somebody let down a blanket from a window. It happened to be a new policeman unaccustomed to her ways, and he has had a bad shock. His wife complained to the judge, who set round word to me this morning that she was in the lock-up."
"In prison. An English lady!"
"It is not the first time by any means. But I feel exactly as you do about it. I've bailed her out, and stopped his mouth with a fifty-franc note. Please keep this between ourselves."
Mr. Heard was not pleased to learn this incident. It seemed a discordant note on Nepenthe. He observed:
"Miss Wilberforce apparently can be relied upon to create a diversion of a scandalous nature. I wish I could do something to help such a poor creature."
"The dear lady! I don't know what we should do without her. By the way,
have you seen Denis lately? We must be friendly to that young fellow,
Heard. I don't think he is altogether happy in this clear pagan light.
He seems to be oppressed about something. What do you make of him?"
"Of Denis? Nothing at all."
"You interest me."
"How so?"
"Because your values appear to be perverted. Your heart remains dead to Denis, but goes out to a worthless and incurable drunkard. The one is supremely happy. The other plainly troubled in mind. It leaves you cold. How do you explain it?"
Mr. Heard began to wonder. Were his values really vitiated? Had he done anything to justify self-reproach? He remembered meeting Denis lately, in a fit of dejection, as it seemed; they had passed each other with a few words of greeting. Perhaps he might have been a little more friendly. Well, he would atone for it on the next occasion. He asked:
"Has he no relations?"
"A mother, at present in Florence. There have been misunderstandings, I suspect. He has probably found her out, like he found out our Duchess; like he will find out both you and me, if we give him the chance. Meanwhile he gropes about in a wistful fashion, trying to carve out a scheme of life for himself and to learn something from al lof us. What can a person of that kind have in common with a mother of any kind?"
"Everything," said Mr. Heard enthusiastically.
"Nothing at all. You are thinking of your own mother. You forget that you never see her. Any son can live with any mother under those conditions. The fact remains: nobody can misunderstand a boy like his own mother. Look around you, and see if it is not true! Honour thy father and thy mother. Perhaps. But we must civilize our mothers before we can expect any rational companionship between them and their sons. Girls are different. They are more cynical and less idealistic, they can put up with mothers, they can laugh at them. I am speaking in a general way. Of course there are shining exceptions. Mothers at present can bring children into the world, but this performance is apt to mark the end of their capacities. They can't even attend to the elementary animal requirements of their offspring. It is quite surprising how many children survive in spite of their mothers. Ask any doctor."
"If that is the case there must be something wrong with our social system. You may be sure that the female cat or canary bird is just as efficient in her department as the male in his. Speaking from my own experience among the London poor, I should say that the father is often a mere parasite on his wifo and children—"
"We may both of us be right. But I wish you would take Denis in hand a little. Will you? Perhaps you misread his character. He may be afraid of you."
"Have you any particular reason—?"
"I don't like his looks. There is something tragic about him lately."
Mr. Heard was slightly nettled. After all, he was not on Nepenthe for the purpose of doling out consolations to melancholy undergraduates.
"I should be sorry to think myself singled out for his distrust," he replied. "At the same time, I don't notice that he has much to say to certain other people—to the Commissioner, for instance, or to Mr. Muhlen."
"Muhlen? He is quite right to leave Muhlen alone. Quite right. It proves his intuition. I have learnt all about that man. A beastly character. He has a bad record. Lives on blackmail and women. His real name is Retlow."
And Mr. Keith lit a cigar, as though to dismiss the subject.
"Retlow, you say? That's queer."
The name sounded familiar to the bishop. Where had he heard it before? He racked his memory. Where could it have been? Retlow…. It was not a common name. Long ago, obviously. Where?
In African days, or earlier?
His searchings were interrupted by the voice of the old boatman who, relinquishing an oar, pointed to a swart precipice near at hand and said in tolerable English (the older generation of natives all spoke English—their children were learning Russian):
"The suicides' rock, gentlemens. Ah! Many is the poor Christian I have
pick up there. He throw down hisself. Him dead. Often in small pieces.
Here blood. Here brain. Here leg and boot. Here finger. Ah! The poor
Chiristian. That so, gentlemens."
The bishop scanned with a shudder this frowning cliff of basalt, and turned to address his companion.
"Do people really throw themselves over here?"
"Very few. Not more than three or four in a season, I'm told. The local suicides, as a rule, are not as spectacular as they might be considering the landscape. They shoot themselves or take poison, which shows a certain consideration for other people. It is not a pleasant job, you know, to row to this remote spot and scramble about the cliff at the risk of a broken neck, collecting shattered fragments of humanity into a potato sack."
"Not at all pleasant!"
"As compared with England," Keith pursued, "life here is intense, palpitating, dramatic—a kind of blood-curdling farce full of irresponsible crimes and improbable consequences. The soil is saturated with blood. People are always killing themselves or each other for motives which, to an Englishman, are altogether outside the range of comprehensibility. Shall I tell you about one of our most interesting cases? I happen to be on the island at the time. There was a young fellow here—an agreeable young fellow—an artist; he was rich; he took a villa, and painted. We all liked him. Then, by degrees, he became secretive and moody. Said he was studying mechanics. He told me himself that much as he liked landscape painting he thought an artist—a real artist, he said—ought to be versed in ancillary sciences; in fortification, wood-carving, architecture, and so on. Leonardo da Vinci, you know. Well, one day they could not get into his bedroom. They broke open his door and discovered that he had constructed a perfectly-formed guillotine; the knife had fallen; his head lay on one side and his body on the other. You may well be surprised. I went carefully into that case. He was in the best of health, with a creditable artistic record behind him. He had no troubles, financial or domestic."
"Then what on earth—?"
"The scenery of Nepenthe. It got on his nerves; it unstrung him. Does that surprise you too? Don't you feel its effect upon yourself? The bland winds, the sea shining in velvety depths as though filled with some electric fluid, the riot of vegetation, these extravagant cliffs that change colour with every hour of the day? Look at that peak yonder—is it not almost transparent, like some crystal of amethyst? This coast-line alone—the sheer effrontery of its mineral charm—might affect some natures to such an extent as to dislocate their stability. Northern minds seem to become fluid here, impressionable, unstable, unbalanced—what you please. THere is something in the brightness of this spot which decomposes their old particles and arranges them into fresh and unexpected patterns. That is what people mean when they say that they 'diswcover' themselves here. You discover a mechanism, you know, when you take it to pieces. You catch my meaning?"
"I catch it."
He nodded. He understood perfectly. Some analogous process was going on within him at that moment. He, too, was discovering himself.
"Have you discovered yourself, Keith?"
"Yes, by other methods, elsewhere. I am only here for a short time in the Spring and another ten days in September. That is hardly enough, even supposing I were the sort of person to be accessible to these externals. I have passed that stage. I am too old, too unemotional. I prefer devouring a partridge EN CASSEROLE or listening to your conversation ("listening to my conversation!" thought Mr. Heard) to all the scenery in the world But I watch other people; I make it my business to study their condition; I put myself in their places. JE CONSTATE, as the French say. To them, the landscape of Nepenthe is alive, often malignantly alive. They do what you cannot so effectually do in the North; they humanize it, identifying its various aspects with their own moods, its features with their own traditions."
Mr. Heard thought of those tremendous mists he had seen only an hour ago—the daughters of old Ocean.
"They humanize it," he echoed. "The mythopoetic faculty!"
"Perhaps this capacity of Southern scenery to bear a mortal interpretation accounts for the anthropomorphic deities of classical days. I often think it does. Even we moderns are unaccountably moved by its varying facets which act sometimes as an aphrodisiac, and sometimes by their very perfection, their discouraging spell, their insolent beauty, suggest the hopelessness of all human endeavour…. Denis! I should think him capable of anything, just now. Do you imagine a person like this could possibly remain insensible to the beguiling influence of these surroundings?"
"I never thought about him."
"Really? You interest me, Heard. If you deny the susceptibility of a temperament like his, you deny the whole operation of externals upon character and action. You deny, for example, the success of the Roman Catholic Church which relies, for its moral effects, upon such optic appeals to the senses, and upon the ease with which transitory feelings can be transmuted into axioms of conduct. Do you deny this?"
"Not at all. I have seen enough of their system to realize its extreme simplicity."
"And then think of the peculiar history of this island and its situation as a converging-point for men of every race and every creed. All these things stimulate to rapid nervous discharges; that is, to inconsidered, foolish actions—"
"All fools!" the boatman interrupted. "All foreigners! We people don't do these things. Only dam-fool foreigners. That so, gentlemens. They have trouble themselves, then they come to this rock and, boom! make trouble for their friends."
"Boom!" echoed his son, who had apparently caught the drift of the old man's speech. Whereat the two Greek genii in the stern laughed immoderately; knowing, as they did, that the boy had not the slightest idea of what his father was talking about.
"Boom!" they repeated, in derisive chorus.
At that moment all the occupants of the boat pricked up their ears. A sound had reached them, a similar sound—a sound that recalled the distant firing of a big gun. Boom! It reverberated among the rocks. The rowers dropped their oars. Everyone listened.
The sound came again. This time there was no question as to its origin.
It was artillery, beyond a doubt.
The old sailor had grown preternaturally grave.
"IL CANNONE DEL DUCA," he said.
The cannon of the Good Duke Alfred, never used save on urgent or solemn occasions, was being discharged.
Then the boatman made another remark, in Italian, to Keith.
"What does he say?" asked Mr. Heard.
"He thinks they must be calling out the militia."
Something was very wrong, up yonder, on the market-place.