I think I shall wear my white muslin tomorrow.
(End of Miss Margaret Goodwin’s narrative.)
PART TWO
James Orlebar Cloyster’s Narrative
CHAPTER 1
THE INVASION OF BOHEMIA
It is curious to reflect that my marriage (which takes place today week) destroys once and for all my life’s ambition. I have never won through to the goal I longed for, and now I never shall.
Ever since I can remember I have yearned to be known as a Bohemian. That was my ambition. I have ceased to struggle now. Married Bohemians live in Oakley Street, King’s Road, Chelsea. We are to rent a house in Halkett Place.
Three years have passed since the excellent, but unsteady, steamship Ibex brought me from Guernsey to Southampton. It was a sleepy, hot, and sticky wreck that answered to the name of James Orlebar Cloyster that morning; but I had my first youth and forty pounds, so that soap and water, followed by coffee and an omelette, soon restored me.
The journey to Waterloo gave me opportunity for tobacco and reflection.
What chiefly exercised me, I remember, was the problem whether it was possible to be a Bohemian, and at the same time to be in love. Bohemia I looked on as a region where one became inevitably entangled with women of unquestionable charm, but doubtful morality. There were supper parties.... Festive gatherings in the old studio.... Babette.... Lucille.... The artists’ ball.... Were these things possible for a man with an honest, earnest, whole-hearted affection?
The problem engaged me tensely till my ticket was collected at Vauxhall. Just there the solution came. I would be a Bohemian, but a misogynist. People would say, “Dear old Jimmy Cloyster. How he hates women!” It would add to my character a pleasant touch of dignity and reserve which would rather accentuate my otherwise irresponsible way of living.