The Romantic Lady

by Michael Arlen

And since eventually such a pose as his must make indecency a fact where it had once only been vaguely suggested, so Antony actually became, in the course of time, the rogue and outsider that his crooked vanity had once made him parade as a pose. For, be you ever so arrogant, nature has been proved to have its laws for men as well as for beasts, laws not astral but severely human, that never cease to confound alchemists of every kind to their own hurt; and it is obvious that a man may not play the fool with his soul without covering it with the verdigris of his own folly—that sourness of heart and crookedness that stole gradually on poor Antony, so that in his thirties he was, to stretch a likeness, like a Hyde to the Jekyll of his schooldays.

The advantages of a commission in the Brigade, of a name sufficient to ensure a reasonable amount of credit and consideration, those details which can so warm the cockles of even a philosophic heart on a dull afternoon, and a little more than the usual pittance that falls to the younger brothers of pukka baronets, warranted, surely, a very fair prospect. And yet, in a few years' time, he had finally convinced people beyond a shadow of doubt of what they had so far only disliked to guess, of his complete failure to be either an officer or a gentleman.

No man could be more noticeable in appearance than Antony, nor more adequately fulfil the name by which he was often known, Red Antony; for he was very tall and stoutly built, rather foppishly dressed, and as consistently ginger as any man could well be—moustaches, eyebrows that no brushing could tame into regularity, hair which waved back from his forehead in a most attractive ginger but ordered profusion; and a complexion appropriately coloured, and always so clear and fresh as to seem to give the lie to the certain dissipation of the night before. A very fine looking man, Red Antony, if you liked that kind of looks; but so noticeable that his own appearance, no doubt, took a hand against him, labelling his escapades with its prominence so that once pointed out he was never forgotten; and men and women could cross the street in good time to avoid the difficulty of acknowledging or of cutting him.

It was an accumulation of escapades, many of which had been overlooked but for his manner of braving them, that had led to his final extinction—which was long seen in coming. A thousand little and unpleasant things were known and more than whispered about him. He was a man of red-hot tempers, which there was no restraint in him to keep within bounds; his weren't the rages that burnt inwardly and grew in brooding, but in their sudden heat must burn outwardly, devouring everything with no care nor heed for even primitive restraint. (There have been times when I've been rather afraid of Antony myself.) And so, from his great height of stature and violence, he had outrageously insulted men in return for a fancied slight. He had committed follies, when drunk, which his companions had hurriedly disavowed. He had, as if by rote, done the one thing a man may still not do and remain this side of Styx, despite all that we hear of the present laxity of etiquette—had been unable to pay his gambling debts, and then paid them with worthless cheques. He had been the centre of innumerable brawls in which, if ever a woman's name was concerned, it was never to Antony's credit; had been twice a corespondent and not once a husband—an apparent failure to act upon his obligations which does no man any good; and from the second (the first had too obviously been the result of carelessness) he had emerged in so discreditable a light that, on top of all his past follies, Antony Poole was no longer a name to be mentioned in any ordinary English company.

That was four years before that night I met him on Piccadilly, when he was thirty-two. He still continued for two years in England, Heaven alone knew why! No one sought him, he was seldom seen—except by me, and later, another. His elder brother, Roger, had not spoken to him for years.

It was about a year before he finally left England that I began to see Antony in his best light; and pretty closely since, in the precarious condition of his affairs and reputation, it was mostly in my flat that he could enjoy that company which presented him in this new and improved light. He was in love, and he was making love: furtively and hopelessly as to manner, for what girl would dream of marrying him! And who ever stood more firmly upon his honour than he who has been proved to have none?... But in his heart there was hope, I am sure there was hope in his heart, else Antony would not have been Antony.

A queer man. For all his appalling rudeness and brutality on a thousand occasions, he could be so very courteous and simple when he was moved to it; could turn a tale, rather candidly it's true, but very amusingly, and had altogether a very diverting way with him in company that didn't offend his absurd feelings or ruffle his dangerous vanity—though even then he couldn't help a, well, cunning satire that might more profitably, for him, have bit into paper.

It is in recalling this time that I feel most uncomfortable, because of the ridiculous position in which my own weakness placed me. During the previous few months I had fallen into the habit of wanting to see Iris Portairley every day—or rather, she had graciously allowed me fall into that habit. And that, indeed, was the only encouragement I had from her, the pleasure which she showed that she had from my company; so that, if we had not happened to meet for some days over lunch or dinner at the same table, she very often managed by some contrivance, say of a tame chaperon, to come to see me of an afternoon. Deliciously often though she managed her contrivances, I was always surprised to see her, who had so many more amusing things to do! And with the carelessness of a man ten years my junior I accepted the pleasure of her company without inquiring of myself whither I was being led. The truth was that it depressed me to think of what might come of it, for the back of my mind could never be entirely rid of an ugly high wall at the far end of my meadow....

And yet I chartered ill luck to my suit, or pretence of a suit, by aiding and abetting Red Antony in his quite impossible and absurd pretensions! Though, in justice to the man, he must have realised clearly how very impossible they were.

The excuse for the anomaly was in the queer sympathy (and a very conscious one) that Antony always had the power to raise in me; and particularly at that time, when he was so definitely an outcast, forced to solitary meals in the grill-rooms of those maîtres d'hôtel who still gallantly pretended to believe in his signature at the foot of a bill. I simply couldn't bring myself just then, whether for my own or Iris's good, to deprive him of the solace he found in her occasional company at my flat, generally at some odd hour between three to seven—more often nearer seven, for Antony allowed that I could shake a cocktail very prettily. And though, from a tentative beginning (if that word could ever be applicable to Antony) it became a bare-faced intrusion on my privacy, even so I hadn't the heart to forbid, or definitely to discourage, the apparent coincidence of his visits with hers; "apparent," for Antony at this time never said a word of his admiration, nor gave any other hint of gratitude for my complaisance than in an added pressure of my hand as he left. Antony was a noisy man, but never by any chance did he make a noise about anything one really wanted to hear.