"And what was the end of the story?" asked Isabel.
"The end, dear lady? There is but one end to all stories. The rose faded."
CHAPTER XV.
Angus Grey.
He proved that Hope was all a lie,
And Faith a form of bigotry,
And Love a snare that caught him;
Then thought to comfort human tears
By sundry ill-considered sneers
At things his mother taught him.
Early in the year following Isabel's cruel treatment of Paul, a novel was published which made some little stir. It was called Shams and Shadows, and was by an unknown author, Angus Grey.
It was not what is generally known as a bad book; yet, nevertheless, it was very far from being good. Its cleverness was undeniable; but, on the other hand, its style was flippant, its teaching mischievous, and its philosophy cynical in the extreme. The aim of the book was to prove that the fashionable world is rotten at the core, and that the religious world is no better; and that in all Churches and sects there are little side-chapels dedicated to Mammon, where the majority of the worshippers are to be found.
Angus Grey was apparently a man who had eaten of apples of Sodom, and had found them turn to ashes in his mouth; and he was anxious to share his meal with the rest of mankind, and to exclude no one from partaking of his bitter hospitality. Evidently he was a disappointed man, and his disappointment had not improved him. With a crude and cheap cynicism, he set forth that the ideals of youth are a dream, and the professions of later life a delusion; and he sneered alike at the follies of the young and the pretences of the middle-aged.
To Angus Grey there was nothing sacred, nothing holy; and he pointed his morals and adorned his tale with caricatures of personages well known in society.
To the initiated, some of the characters in Shams and Shadows were portraits but thinly disguised. It was easy to recognize Lord Wrexham, Bobby Thistletown, and Mr. Madderley; but the best drawn character in the book was the heroine, who was the counterfeit presentment of Isabel Carnaby; yet not Isabel as she really was, and as Nature had meant her to be; but Isabel as she appeared to outward seeming, when the worldly and frivolous side of her character was upper-most. She had all Isabel's fun and sparkle and good-humour; but underneath them lay a cold and shallow selfishness, which disgusted the readers she had at first charmed.