But he met me many times after that, and always [100] ]pursued me with ardour. In the end he gained his desire and, having done so, had no further use for me.
I call him The Man Who Collects Opinions of Himself. He is still in London. And he is not yet insane.
Then there was the lady—since, alas! dead—who used always to appear in public in a kind of purple shroud, her face and fingers chalked. She rather stupidly called herself Cheerio Death, and was one of the jolliest girls I have ever met. She longed and ached for notoriety and for new sensations: she feasted on them and they nourished and fattened her. Only very brave or reckless men dared be seen with her in public, for, though her behaviour was scrupulously correct, her appearance created either veiled ridicule or consternation wherever she went. Yet she never lacked companions.
“Hullo, Gerald!” she used to say to me; “sit down near me. You are so nice and chubby. I like to have you near me. How am I looking?”
“More beautiful than ever.”
“Oh, you are sweet. Isn’t he sweet, Frank?” she would say to one of her companions. “Order him some champagne. I’m thirsty.”
And, really, Cheerio Death was very beautiful in a ghastly and terrible way. By degrees, all the reputable restaurants were closed to her, and in the late autumn of 1913 she disappeared, to die of consumption in Soho. Poor girl! Perhaps in Paris, where they love the outré and the shocking, she would have secured the full, hectic success that in London was denied her.
. . . . . . . .
Are freaks always conscious of their freakishness? I do not think they are. Not even the man who wilfully cultivates his oddities until they have become swollen excrescences hanging bulbous-like on his personality is aware how vastly different, how unreasonably different he is from his fellows. He is more than reconciled to [101] ]himself; he loves himself; he is what other people would be if only they could. Vanity continually lulls and soothes and rots him. The nature that craves to be noticed will go to almost any lengths to secure that notice.
It has always appeared curious to me that the ambition to become famous should very generally be regarded as a worthy passion in a man of genius. It is but natural that a man of genius should desire his work to reach as many people as possible, but whether or not he should be known as the author of that work seems to me a matter of no importance whatever. But to the man himself it is all-important. He has an instinctive feeling that if, in the public eye, he is separated from his work, savour will go from what he has created. He and his work must be closely identified.