Susan bent nearer, and gazed at her attentively.
Suddenly she whispered tenderly: “What do you expect of him? What is the purpose of this new game? He’s the most banal of them all. I never heard him make a polished or a witty remark. Does he realize what you are? Not in his wildest dreams. His head is empty. Your art means about as much to him as the acrobatics of a circus dancer to some dreary shop-keeper. Nations are at your feet, and he grants you a supercilious smile. You have given the world a new kind of delight, and this German know-it-all is untouched and unchanged by it.”
Eva said: “If the North Sea is too sinister, we must seek a coast in the South.”
Susan grew excited: “One would like to yell into his ears: ‘Get on your knees! Pray!’ But he wouldn’t be shaken any more than the pillar of Vendôme. Is he ever shaken by anything? I described to him how we were adored in Russia, the ecstasy, the festivities, the outbursts of enthusiasm. He acted as if he were hearing a moderately interesting bit of daily news. I told him about the Grand Duke. No, don’t frown. I had to, or I would have choked. I described that chained barbarian, that iron soul dissolved! It’s certainly uncommon; it would make any heart beat faster. I tried to make him visualize the situation: fifty millions of trembling slaves and all, through his power, at your bidding. No poet could have been more impressive than I was. If you had heard me trying to penetrate his mind, you would have been astonished at my talent for sewing golden threads on sack cloth. It was all in vain. His breath came as regularly as the ticking of a clock. Once or twice he seemed to be startled. But it was due to a breeze or a mosquito.”
“I wonder whether the gowns from Paris have arrived at Heyst,” Eva said. The long oval of her face seemed to grow a trifle longer; her lips curled a little, and her teeth showed like pallid, freshly peeled almonds.
“Why did you refuse yourself to him?” Susan went on. “What we possess is part of our past, but a joy put off is a burden. Men are to be the rungs of your ladder—no more. Let them give you magical nights, but send them packing when the cock crows. How has he deserved a higher office? You’ve yielded to a whim, and made a grinning idol of him. Why did you summon him? I’m afraid you’re going to commit a folly.”
Eva did not answer. The tip of her tongue appeared between her lips, and she closed her eyes cunningly. Susan thought she understood those gestures, and said: “It’s true, he has the marvellous diamond for which you cried. But you have but to command, and they’ll trim your very shoes with such baubles.”
“When did you ever see me cry for a diamond?” Eva, asked indifferently. She raised herself up, and in her transparent, wavering, blossomy wrappings seemed like a spirit emerging from the dimness. “When did you ever see me cry for a diamond?” she asked again, and touched Susan’s shoulder.
“You told me so yourself.”
“Have you no better proof?” Eva laughed, and her laughter was her most sensuous form of expression, as her smile was her most spiritual.