"Ah, but wait till to-night!" and Alwyn's eyes sparkled mirthfully—"Perhaps you will alter your opinion then!"—Here, collecting his scattered manuscripts, he put them by—"I've done work for the present,"—he said—"Shall we go for a walk somewhere?"
Villiers assented, and they left the room together.
CHAPTER XXXV.
ONE AGAINST MANY.
The beautiful and socially popular Duchess de la Santoisie sat her at brilliantly appointed dinner-table, and flashed her bright eyes comprehensively round the board,—her party was complete. She had secured twenty of the best-known men and women of letters in all London, and yet she was not quite satisfied with the result attained. One dark, splendid face on her right hand had taken the lustre out of all the rest,—one quiet, courteous smile on a mouth haughty, yet sweet, had somehow or other made the entertainment of little worth in her own estimation. She was very fair to look upon, very witty, very worldly-wise,—but for once her beauty seemed to herself defective and powerless to charm, while the graceful cloak of social hypocrisy she was always accustomed to wear would not adapt itself to her manner tonight so well as usual. The author of "Nourhalma" the successful poet whose acquaintance she had very eagerly sought to make, was not at all the kind of man she had expected,—and now, when he was beside her as her guest, she did not quite know what to do with him.
She had met plenty of poets, so called, before,—and had, for the most part, found them insignificant looking men with an enormous opinion of themselves, and a suave, condescending contempt for all others of their craft; but this being,—this stately, kingly creature with the noble head, and far-gazing, luminous eyes,—this man, whose every gesture was graceful, whose demeanor was more royal than that of many a crowned monarch,—whose voice had such a singular soft thrill of music in its tone,—he was a personage for whom she had not been prepared,—and in whose presence she felt curiously embarrassed and almost ill at ease. And she was not the only one present who experienced these odd sensations. Alwyn's appearance, when, with his friend Villiers, he had first entered the Duchess's drawing-room that evening, and had there been introduced to his hostess, had been a sort of revelation to the languid, fashionable guests assembled; sudden quick whispers were exchanged—surprised glances,—how unlike he was to the general type of the nervous, fagged, dyspeptic "literary" man!
And now that every one was seated at dinner, the same impression remained on all,—an impression that was to some disagreeable and humiliating, and that yet could not be got over,—namely, that this "poet," whom, in a way, the Duchess and her friends had intended to patronize, was distinctly superior to them all. Nature, as though proud of her handiwork, proclaimed him as such,—while he, quite unconscious of the effect he produced, wondered why this bevy of human beings, most of whom were more or less distinguished in the world of art and literature, had so little to say for themselves. Their conversation was BANAL,—tame,—ordinary; they might have been well-behaved, elegantly dressed peasants for aught they said of wise, cheerful, or witty. The weather,—the parks,—the theatres,—the newest actress, and the newest remedies for indigestion,—these sort of subjects were bandied about from one to the other with a vaguely tame persistence that was really irritating,—the question of remedies for indigestion seemed to hold ground longest, owing to the variety of opinions expressed thereon.
The Duchess grew more and more inwardly vexed, and her little foot beat an impatient tattoo under the table, as she replied with careless brevity to a few of the commonplace observations addressed to her, and cast an occasional annoyed glance at her lord, M le Duc, a thin, military-looking individual, with a well waxed and pointed mustache, whose countenance suggested an admirably executed mask. It was a face that said absolutely nothing,—yet beneath its cold impassiveness linked the satyr-like, complex, half civilized, half brutish mind of the born and bred Parisian,—the goblin-creature with whom pure virtues, whether in man or woman, are no more sacred than nuts to a monkey. The suave charm of a polished civility sat on M le Due's smooth brow, and beamed in his urbane smile,—his manners were exquisite, his courtesy irreproachable, his whole demeanor that of a very precise and elegant master of deportment. Yet, notwithstanding his calm and perfectly self-possessed exterior, he was, oddly enough, the frequent prey of certain extraordinary and ungovernable passions; there were times when he became impossible to himself,—and when, to escape from his own horrible thoughts, he would plunge headlong into an orgie of wild riot and debauchery, such as might have made the hair of his respectable English acquaintances stand on end, had they known to what an extent he carried his excesses. But at these seasons of moral attack, he "went abroad for his health," as he said, delicately touching his chest in order to suggest some interesting latent weakness there, and in these migratory excursions his wife never accompanied him, nor did she complain of his absence. When he returned, after two or three months, he looked more the "chevalier sans peur et sans reproche" than ever; and neither he, nor the fair partner of his joys and sorrows, even committed such a breach of politeness as to inquire into each other's doings during the time of their separation. So they jogged on together, presenting the most delightful outward show of wedded harmony to the world,—and only a few were found to hazard the remark, that the "racy" novels Madame la Duchesse wrote to wile away her duller hours were singularly "bitter" in tone, for a woman whose lot in life was so extremely enviable!
On this particular evening, the Duke affected to be utterly unconscious of the meaning looks his beautiful spouse shot at him every now and then,—looks which plainly said—"Why don't you start some interesting subject of conversation, and stop these people from talking such every-day twaddle?" He was a clever man in his way, and his present mood was malign and mischievous; therefore he went on eating daintily, and discussing mild platitudes in the most languidly amiable manner imaginable, enjoying to the full the mental confusion and discomfort of his guests,—confusion and discomfort which, as he very well knew, was the psychological result of their having one in their midst whose life and character were totally opposite to, and distinctly separate from, their own. As Emerson truly says, "Let the world beware when a Thinker comes into it!".. and here WAS this Thinker,—this type of the Godlike in Man,—this uncomfortably sincere personage, whose eyes were clear of falsehood, whose genius was incontestable, whose fame had taken society by assault, and who, therefore, was entitled to receive every attention and consideration.
Everybody had desired to see him, and here he was,—the great man, the new "celebrity"—and now that he was actually present, no one knew what to say to him; moreover, there was a very general tendency in the company to avoid his direct gaze. People fidgeted on their chairs and looked aside or downward, whenever his glance accidentally fell on them,—and to the analytical Voltairean mind of M. le Duc there was something grimly humorous in the whole situation. He was a great admirer of physical strength and beauty, and Alwyn's noble face and fine figure had won his respect, though of the genius of the poet he knew nothing, and cared less. It was enough for all the purposes of social usage that the author of "Nourhalma" was CONSIDERED illustrious,—no matter whether he deserved the appellation or not. And so the Duke, satirically amused at the obvious embarrassment of the other "notabilities" assembled, did nothing whatsoever to relieve or to lighten the conversation, which remained so utterly dull and inane that Alwyn, who had been compelled, for politeness' sake, to appear interested in the account of a bicycle race detailed to him by a very masculine looking lady-doctor whose seat at table was next his own, began to feel a little weary, and to wonder dismally how long this "feast of reason and flow of soul" was going to last.