“For having shown me my ideal woman, the woman in whose existence I believed, though I never hoped to see her. I was tired of the women who cared for and studied nothing but the art of fooling men; I wanted a new type, the woman of sincerity. I don’t know whether you’ve noticed it—I’m something of an artist in my way. I can’t paint, and I can’t write, but I believe I have the artist’s way of looking at things. I live on refinements of sensation—you know what I mean? There’s nothing good or valuable in me; I’ve no moral force; I’m just as selfish as I can be; but I have a sort of delicacy of perception, I discriminate in my likings. Now you’ve heard all sorts of ill of me, of course; you’ve been told I pitched away ten thousand pounds in less than a couple of years; that I’ve——— Well, never mind. But, Miss Warren, I haven’t lived a life of vulgar dissipation; I have not debased myself. My senses are finer-edged than they were, instead of being dulled and coarsened. I’ve led the life a man ought to lead who is going to be a great poet—though, as far as I know, I haven’t it in me to be that. But at least I understand the poetical temperament. I couldn’t help my extravagance. I was purchasing experience; the kind of experience my nature needed. Others feed their senses grossly; that would have cost less money, but my tendencies are not to grossness. I had certain capacities to develop, and I obeyed the need without looking very far ahead. Capacities of enjoyment, I admit; entirely egoistic. An egoist; I pretend to be nothing better. But believe me when I tell you that the admiration of a frank egoist is worth more than that of people who pretend to all the virtues. It is of necessity sincere.”
Ada had seated herself whilst these remarkable utterances were falling upon her ear. Lacour knelt upon a chair near her, leaning over the back.
“You are leaving England?” she said, quietly reminding him of the professed object of his visit.
“A place has been offered me in a house of business in Calcutta; I have no choice but to take it. Or, rather, there is an alternative; one I can’t accept.”
“Will you tell me what that is?”
She looked up, and he smiled sadly at her. His face just then had all that a man’s face can possess of melancholy beauty. The fineness of its lineaments contrasted remarkably with Ada’s over-prominence of feature. Hers was the individual countenance, his the vague alluring type.
“My brother,” he replied, “had been persuaded to offer me an allowance of two hundred a year, on condition that I do what I originally intended, read for the Bar.”
“And that you can’t accept? Why not?”
“For the simple reason that I should not read. I should take the money, get into debt, do nothing. I am past the possibility of voluntary work. In a house of business I suppose I shall be made to work, and perhaps it may lead to a competence sooner or later. But for reading here at home I have no motive. I lack an impulse. Life would be intolerable.”
Ada did not raise her eyes. He was still leaning forward on the back of the chair, but now at length held himself upright, passed his fingers through his hair, and uttered an exclamation of weariness.