The Flying Inn

CHAPTER I: A SERMON ON INNS

THE sea was a pale elfin green and the afternoon had already felt the fairy touch of evening as a young woman with dark hair, dressed in a crinkly copper-coloured sort of dress of the artistic order, was walking rather listlessly along the parade of Pebblewick-on-Sea, trailing a parasol and looking out upon the sea’s horizon. She had a reason for looking instinctively out at the sea-line; a reason that many young women have had in the history of the world. But there was no sail in sight.

On the beach below the parade were a succession of small crowds, surrounding the usual orators of the seaside; whether niggers or socialists, whether clowns or clergymen. Here would stand a man doing something or other with paper boxes; and the holiday makers would watch him for hours in the hope of some time knowing what it was that he was doing with them. Next to him would be a man in a top hat with a very big Bible and a very small wife, who stood silently beside him, while he fought with his clenched fist against the heresy of Milnian Sublapsarianism so wide-spread in fashionable watering-places. It was not easy to follow him, he was so very much excited; but every now and then the words “our Sublapsarian friends” would recur with a kind of wailing sneer. Next was a young man talking of nobody knew what (least of all himself), but apparently relying for public favour mainly on having a ring of carrots round his hat. He had more money lying in front of him than the others. Next were niggers. Next was a children’s service conducted by a man with a long neck who beat time with a little wooden spade. Farther along there was an atheist, in a towering rage, who pointed every now and then at the children’s service and spoke of Nature’s fairest things being corrupted with the secrets of the Spanish Inquisition–by the man with the little spade, of course. The atheist (who wore a red rosette) was very withering to his own audience as well. “Hypocrites!” he would say; and then they would throw him money. “Dupes and dastards!” and then they would throw him more money. But between the atheist and the children’s service was a little owlish man in a red fez, weakly waving a green gamp umbrella. His face was brown and wrinkled like a walnut, his nose was of the sort we associate with Judaea, his beard was the sort of black wedge we associate rather with Persia. The young woman had never seen him before; he was a new exhibit in the now familiar museum of cranks and quacks. The young woman was one of those people in whom a real sense of humour is always at issue with a certain temperamental tendency to boredom or melancholia; and she lingered a moment, and leaned on the rail to listen.

It was fully four minutes before she could understand a word the man was saying; he spoke English with so extraordinary an accent that she supposed at first that he was talking in his own oriental tongue. All the noises of that articulation were odd; the most marked was an extreme prolongation of the short “u” into “oo”; as in “poo-oot” for “put.” Gradually the girl got used to the dialect, and began to understand the words; though some time elapsed even then before she could form any conjecture of their subject matter. Eventually it appeared to her that he had some fad about English civilisation having been founded by the Turks; or, perhaps by the Saracens after their victory in the Crusades. He also seemed to think that Englishmen would soon return to this way of thinking; and seemed to be urging the spread of teetotalism as an evidence of it. The girl was the only person listening to him.

“Loo-ook,” he said, wagging a curled brown finger, “loo-ook at your own inns” (which he pronounced as “ince”). “Your inns of which you write in your boo-ooks! Those inns were not poo-oot up in the beginning to sell ze alcoholic Christian drink. They were put up to sell ze non-alcoholic Islamic drinks. You can see this in the names of your inns. They are eastern names, Asiatic names. You have a famous public house to which your omnibuses go on the pilgrimage. It is called the Elephant and Castle. That is not an English name. It is an Asiatic name. You will say there are castles in England, and I will agree with you. There is the Windsor Castle. But where,” he cried sternly, shaking his green umbrella at the girl in an angry oratorical triumph, “where is the Windsor Elephant? I have searched all Windsor Park. No elephants.”

The girl with the dark hair smiled, and began to think that this man was better than any of the others. In accordance with the strange system of concurrent religious endowment which prevails at watering-places, she dropped a two shilling piece into the round copper tray beside him. With honourable and disinterested eagerness, the old gentleman in the red fez took no notice of this, but went on warmly, if obscurely, with his argument.

“Then you have a place of drink in this town which you call The Bool!”

“We generally call it The Bull,” said the interested young lady, with a very melodious voice.

“You have a place of drink, which you call The Bool,” he reiterated in a sort of abstract fury, “and surely you see that this is all vary ridiculous!”

“No, no!” said the girl, softly, and in deprecation.

“Why should there be a Bull?” he cried, prolonging the word in his own way. “Why should there be a Bull in connection with a festive locality? Who thinks about a Bull in gardens of delight? What need is there of a Bull when we watch the tulip-tinted maidens dance or pour the sparkling sherbert? You yourselves, my friends?” And he looked around radiantly, as if addressing an enormous mob. “You yourselves have a proverb, ‘It is not calculated to promote prosperity to have a Bull in a china shop.’ Equally, my friends, it would not be calculated to promote prosperity to have a Bull in a wine shop. All this is clear.”

He stuck his umbrella upright in the sand and struck one finger against another, like a man getting to business at last.

“It iss as clear as the sun at noon,” he said solemnly. “It iss as clear as the sun at noon that this word Bull, which is devoid of restful and pleasurable associations, is but the corruption of another word, which possesses restful and pleasurable associations. The word is not Bull; it is the Bul-Bul!” His voice rose suddenly like a trumpet and he spread abroad his hands like the fans of a tropic palm-tree.

After this great effect he was a little more subdued and leaned gravely on his umbrella. “You will find the same trace of Asiatic nomenclature in the names of all your English inns,” he went on. “Nay, you will find it, I am almost certain, in all your terms in any way connected with your revelries and your reposes. Why, my good friends, the very name of that insidious spirit by which you make strong your drinks is an Arabic word: alcohol. It is obvious, is it not, that this is the Arabic article ‘Al,’ as in Alhambra, as in Algebra; and we need not pause here to pursue its many appearances in connection with your festive institutions, as in your Alsop’s beer, your Ally Sloper, and your partly joyous institution of the Albert Memorial. Above all, in your greatest feasting day–your Christmas day–which you so erroneously suppose to be connected with your religion, what do you say then? Do you say the names of the Christian Nations? Do you say, ‘I will have a little France. I will have a little Ireland. I will have a little Scotland. I will have a little Spain?’ No–o.” And the noise of the negative seemed to waggle as does the bleating of a sheep. “You say, ‘I will have a little Turkey,’ which is your name for the Country of the Servant of the Prophet!”

And once more he stretched out his arms sublimely to the east and west and appealed to earth and heaven. The young lady, looking at the sea-green horizon with a smile, clapped her grey gloved hands softly together as if at a peroration. But the little old man with the fez was far from exhausted yet.

“In reply to this you will object–” he began.

“O no, no,” breathed the young lady in a sort of dreamy rapture. “I don’t object. I don’t object the littlest bit!”

“In reply to this you will object–” proceeded her preceptor, “that some inns are actually named after the symbols of your national superstitions. You will hasten to point out to me that the Golden Cross is situated opposite Charing Cross, and you will expatiate at length on King’s Cross, Gerrard’s Cross and the many crosses that are to be found in or near London. But you must not forget,” and here he wagged his green umbrella roguishly at the girl, as if he was going to poke her with it, “none of you, my friends, must forget what a large number of Crescents there are in London! Denmark Crescent; Mornington Crescent! St. Mark’s Crescent! St. George’s Crescent! Grosvenor Crescent! Regent’s Park Crescent! Nay, Royal Crescent! And why should we forget Pelham Crescent? Why, indeed? Everywhere, I say, homage paid to the holy symbol of the religion of the Prophet! Compare with this network and pattern of crescents, this city almost consisting of crescents, the meagre array of crosses, which remain to attest the ephemeral superstition to which you were, for one weak moment, inclined.”

The crowds on the beach were rapidly thinning as tea-time drew nearer. The west grew clearer and clearer with the evening, till the sunshine seemed to have got behind the pale green sea and be shining through, as through a wall of thin green glass. The very transparency of sky and sea might have to this girl, for whom the sea was the romance and the tragedy, the hint of a sort of radiant hopelessness. The flood made of a million emeralds was ebbing as slowly as the sun was sinking: but the river of human nonsense flowed on for ever.

“I will not for one moment maintain,” said the old gentleman, “that there are no difficulties in my case; or that all the examples are as obviously true as those that I have just demonstrated. No-o. It is obvious, let us say, that the ‘Saracen’s Head’ is a corruption of the historic truth ‘The Saracen is Ahead’–I am far from saying it is equally obvious that the ‘Green Dragon’ was originally ‘the Agreeing Dragoman’; though I hope to prove in my book that it is so. I will only say here that it is su-urely more probable that one poo-ooting himself forward to attract the wayfarer in the desert, would compare himself to a friendly and persuadable guide or courier, rather than to a voracious monster. Sometimes the true origin is very hard to trace; as in the inn that commemorates our great Moslem Warrior, Amir Ali Ben Bhoze, whom you have so quaintly abbreviated into Admiral Benbow. Sometimes it is even more difficult for the seeker after truth. There is a place of drink near to here called ‘The Old Ship’–”

The eyes of the girl remained on the ring of the horizon as rigid as the ring itself; but her whole face had coloured and altered. The sands were almost emptied by now: the atheist was as non-existent as his God; and those who had hoped to know what was being done to the paper boxes had gone away to their tea without knowing it. But the young woman still leaned on the railing. Her face was suddenly alive; and it looked as if her body could not move.

“It shood be admitted–” bleated the old man with the green umbrella, “that there is no literally self-evident trace of the Asiatic nomenclature in the words ‘the old ship.’ But even here the see-eeker after Truth can poot himself in touch with facts. I questioned the proprietor of ‘The Old Ship’ who is, according to such notes as I have kept, a Mr. Pumph.”

The girl’s lip trembled.

“Poor old Hump!” she said. “Why, I’d forgotten about him. He must be very nearly as worried as I am! I hope this man won’t be too silly about this! I’d rather it weren’t about this!”

“And Mr. Pumph to-old me the inn was named by a vary intimate friend of his, an Irishman who had been a Captain in the Britannic Royal Navy, but had resigned his po-ost in anger at the treatment of Ireland. Though quitting the service, he retained joost enough of the superstition of your western sailors, to wish his friend’s inn to be named after his old ship. But as the name of the ship was ‘The United Kingdom–’”

His female pupil, if she could not exactly be said to be sitting at his feet, was undoubtedly leaning out very eagerly above his head. Amid the solitude of the sands she called out in a loud and clear voice, “Can you tell me the Captain’s name?”

The old gentleman jumped, blinked and stared like a startled owl. Having been talking for hours as if he had an audience of thousands, he seemed suddenly very much embarrassed to find that he had even an audience of one. By this time they seemed to be almost the only human creatures along the shore; almost the only living creatures, except the seagulls. The sun, in dropping finally, seemed to have broken as a blood orange might break; and lines of blood-red light were spilt along the split, low, level skies. This abrupt and belated brilliance took all the colour out of the man’s red cap and green umbrella; but his dark figure, distinct against the sea and the sunset, remained the same, save that it was more agitated than before.

“The name,” he said, “the Captain’s name. I–I understood it was Dalroy. But what I wish to indicate, what I wish to expound, is that here again the seeker after truth can find the connection of his ideas. It was explained to me by Mr. Pumph that he was rearranging the place of festivity, in no inconsiderable proportion because of the anticipated return of the Captain in question, who had, as it appeared, taken service in some not very large Navy, but had left it and was coming home. Now, mark all of you, my friends,” he said to the seagulls “that even here the chain of logic holds.”

He said it to the seagulls because the young lady, after staring at him with starry eyes for a moment and leaning heavily on the railing, had turned her back and disappeared rapidly into the twilight. After her hasty steps had fallen silent there was no other noise than the faint but powerful purring of the now distant sea, the occasional shriek of a sea-bird, and the continuous sound of a soliloquy.

“Mark, all of you,” continued the man flourishing his green umbrella so furiously that it almost flew open like a green flag unfurled, and then striking it deep in the sand, in the sand in which his fighting fathers had so often struck their tents, “mark all of you this marvellous fact! That when, being for a time, for a time, astonished-embarrassed–brought up as you would say short–by the absence of any absolute evidence of Eastern influence in the phrase ‘the old ship,’ I inquired from what country the Captain was returning, Mr. Pumph said to me in solemnity, ‘From Turkey.’ From Turkey! From the nearest country of the Religion! I know men say it is not our country; that no man knows where we come from, of what is our country. What does it matter where we come from if we carry a message from Paradise? With a great galloping of horses we carry it, and have no time to stop in places. But what we bring is the only creed that has regarded what you will call in your great words the virginity of a man’s reason, that has put no man higher than a prophet, and has respected the solitude of God.”

And again he spread his arms out, as if addressing a mass meeting of millions, all alone on the dark seashore.

CHAPTER II: THE END OF OLIVE ISLAND

THE great sea-dragon of the changing colours that wriggles round the world like a chameleon, was pale green as it washed on Pebblewick, but strong blue where it broke on the Ionian Isles. One of the innumerable islets, hardly more than a flat white rock in the azure expanse, was celebrated as the Isle of Olives; not because it was rich in such vegetation, but because, by some freak of soil or climate, two or three little olives grew there to an unparalleled height. Even in the full heat of the South it is very unusual for an olive tree to grow any taller than a small pear tree; but the three olives that stood up as signals on this sterile place might well be mistaken, except for the shape, for moderate sized pines or larches of the north. It was also connected with some ancient Greek legend about Pallas the patroness of the olive; for all that sea was alive with the first fairyland of Hellas; and from the platform of marble under the olive trees could be seen the grey outline of Ithaca.

On the island and under the trees was a table set in the open air and covered with papers and inkstands. At the table were sitting four men, two in uniform and two in plain black clothes. Aides-de-camps, equerries and such persons stood in a group in the background; and behind them a string of two or three silent battle-ships lay along the sea. For peace was being given to Europe.

There had just come to an end the long agony of one of the many unsuccessful efforts to break the strength of Turkey and save the small Christian tribes. There had been many other such meetings in the later phases of the matter as, one after another, the smaller nations gave up the struggle, or the greater nations came in to coerce them. But the interested parties had now dwindled to these four. For the Powers of Europe being entirely agreed on the necessity for peace on a Turkish basis, were content to leave the last negotiations to England and Germany, who could be trusted to enforce it; there was a representative of the Sultan, of course; and there was a representative of the only enemy of the Sultan who had not hitherto come to terms.

For one tiny power had alone carried on the war month after month, and with a tenacity and temporary success that was a new nine-days marvel every morning. An obscure and scarcely recognized prince calling himself the King of Ithaca had filled the Eastern Mediterranean with exploits that were not unworthy of the audacious parallel that the name of his island suggested. Poets could not help asking if it were Odysseus come again; patriotic Greeks, even if they themselves had been forced to lay down their arms, could not help feeling curious as to what Greek race or name was boasted by the new and heroic royal house. It was, therefore, with some amusement that the world at last discovered that the descendant of Ulysses was a cheeky Irish adventurer named Patrick Dalroy; who had once been in the English Navy, had got into a quarrel through his Fenian sympathies and resigned his commission. Since then he had seen many adventures in many uniforms; and always got himself or some one else into hot water with an extraordinary mixture of cynicism and quixotry. In his fantastic little kingdom, of course, he had been his own General, his own Admiral, his own Foreign Secretary and his own Ambassador; but he was always careful to follow the wishes of his people in the essentials of peace and war; and it was at their direction that he had come to lay down his sword at last. Besides his professional skill, he was chiefly famous for his enormous bodily strength and stature. It is the custom in newspapers nowadays to say that mere barbaric muscular power is valueless in modern military actions, but this view may be as much exaggerated as its opposite. In such wars as these of the Near East, where whole populations are slightly armed and personal assault is common, a leader who can defend his head often has a real advantage; and it is not true, even in a general way, that strength is of no use. This was admitted by Lord Ivywood, the English Minister, who was pointing out in detail to King Patrick the hopeless superiority of the light pattern of Turkish field gun; and the King of Ithaca, remarking that he was quite convinced, said he would take it with him, and ran away with it under his arm. It would be conceded by the greatest of the Turkish warriors, the terrifying Oman Pasha, equally famous for his courage in war and his cruelty in peace; but who carried on his brow a scar from Patrick’s sword, taken after three hours mortal combat–and taken without spite or shame, be it said, for the Turk is always at his best in that game. Nor would the quality be doubted by Mr. Hart, a financial friend of the German Minister, whom Patrick Dalroy, after asking him which of his front windows he would prefer to be thrown into, threw into his bedroom window on the first floor with so considerate an exactitude that he alighted on the bed, where he was in a position to receive any medical attention. But, when all is said, one muscular Irish gentleman on an island cannot fight all Europe for ever, and he came, with a kind of gloomy good humour, to offer the terms now dictated to him by his adopted country. He could not even knock all the diplomatists down (for which he possessed both the power and the inclination), for he realised, with the juster part of his mind, that they were only obeying orders, as he was. So he sat heavily and sleepily at the little table, in the green and white uniform of the Navy of Ithaca (invented by himself); a big bull of a man, monstrously young for his size, with a bull neck and two blue bull’s eyes for eyes, and red hair rising so steadily off his scalp that it looked as if his head had caught fire: as some said it had.

The most dominant person present was the great Oman Pasha himself, with his strong face starved by the asceticism of war, his hair and mustache seeming rather blasted with lightning than blanched with age; a red fez on his head, and between the red fez and mustache, a scar at which the King of Ithaca did not look. His eyes had an awful lack of expression.

Lord Ivywood, the English Minister, was probably the handsomest man in England, save that he was almost colourless both in hair and complexion. Against that blue marble sea he might almost have been one of its old marble statues that are faultless in line but show nothing but shades of grey or white. It seemed a mere matter of the luck of lighting whether his hair looked dull silver or pale brown; and his splendid mask never changed in colour or expression. He was one of the last of the old Parliamentary orators; and yet he was probably a comparatively young man; he could make anything he had to mention blossom into verbal beauty; yet his face remained dead while his lips were alive. He had little old-fashioned ways, as out of old Parliaments; for instance, he would always stand up, as in a Senate, to speak to those three other men, alone on a rock in the ocean.

In all this he perhaps appeared more personal in contrast to the man sitting next to him, who never spoke at all but whose face seemed to speak for him. He was Dr. Gluck, the German Minister, whose face had nothing German about it; neither the German vision nor the German sleep. His face was as vivid as a highly coloured photograph and altered like a cinema: but his scarlet lips never moved in speech. His almond eyes seemed to shine with all the shifting fires of the opal; his small, curled black mustache seemed sometimes almost to hoist itself afresh, like a live, black snake; but there came from him no sound. He put a paper in front of Lord Ivywood. Lord Ivywood took a pair of eyeglasses to read it, and looked ten years older by the act.

It was merely a statement of agenda; of the few last things to be settled at this last conference. The first item ran:

“The Ithacan Ambassador asks that the girls taken to harems after the capture of Pylos be restored to their families. This cannot be granted.” Lord Ivywood rose. The mere beauty of his voice startled everyone who had not heard it before.

“Your Excellencies and gentlemen,” he said, “a statement to whose policy I by no means assent, but to whose historic status I could not conceivably aspire, has familiarised you with a phrase about peace with honour. But when we have to celebrate a peace between such historic soldiers as Oman Pasha and His Majesty the King of Ithaca, I think we may say that it is peace with glory.”

He paused for half an instant; yet even the silence of sea and rock seemed full of multitudinous applause, so perfectly had the words been spoken.

“I think there is but one thought among us, whatever our many just objections through these long and harassing months of negotiations–I think there is but one thought now. That the peace may be as full as the war–that the peace may be as fearless as the war.”

Once more he paused an instant; and felt a phantom clapping, as it were, not from the hands but the heads of the men. He went on.

“If we are to leave off fighting, we may surely leave off haggling. A statute of limitations or, if you will, an amnesty, is surely proper when so sublime a peace seals so sublime a struggle. And if there be anything in which an old diplomatist may advise you, I would most strongly say this: that there should be no new disturbance of whatever amicable or domestic ties have been formed during this disturbed time. I will admit I am sufficiently old-fashioned to think any interference with the interior life of the family a precedent of no little peril. Nor will I be so illiberal as not to extend to the ancient customs of Islam what I would extend to the ancient customs of Christianity. A suggestion has been brought before us that we should enter into a renewed war of recrimination as to whether certain women have left their homes with or without their own consent. I can conceive no controversy more perilous to begin or more impossible to conclude. I will venture to say that I express all your thoughts, when I say that, whatever wrongs may have been wrought on either side, the homes, the marriages, the family arrangements of this great Ottoman Empire, shall remain as they are today.”

No one moved except Patrick Dalroy, who put his hand on his sword-hilt for a moment and looked at them all with bursting eyes; then his hand fell and he laughed out loud and sudden.

Lord Ivywood took no notice, but picked up the agenda paper again, and again fitted on the glasses that made him look older. He read the second item–needless to say, not aloud. The German Minister with the far from German face, had written this note for him:

“Both Coote and the Bernsteins insist there must be Chinese for the marble. Greeks cannot be trusted in the quarries just now.”

“But while,” continued Lord Ivywood, “we desire these fundamental institutions, such as the Moslem family, to remain as they are even at this moment, we do not assent to social stagnation. Nor do we say for one moment that the great tradition of Islam is capable alone of sustaining the necessities of the Near East. But I would seriously ask your Excellencies, why should we be so vain as to suppose that the only cure for the Near East is of necessity the Near West? If new ideas are needed, if new blood is needed, would it not be more natural to appeal to those most living, those most laborious civilisations which form the vast reserve of the Orient? Asia in Europe, if my friend Oman Pasha will allow me the criticism, has hitherto been Asia in arms. May we not yet see Asia in Europe and yet Asia in peace? These at least are the reasons which lead me to consent to a scheme of colonisation.”

Patrick Dalroy sprang erect, pulling himself out of his seat by clutching at an olive-branch above his head. He steadied himself by putting one hand on the trunk of the tree, and simply stared at them all. There fell on him the huge helplessness of mere physical power. He could throw them into the sea; but what good would that do? More men on the wrong side would be accredited to the diplomatic campaign; and the only man on the right side would be discredited for anything. He shook the branching olive tree above him in his fury. But he did not for one moment disturb Lord Ivywood, who had just read the third item on his private agenda (“Oman Pasha insists on the destruction of the vineyards”) and was by this time engaged in a peroration which afterwards became famous and may be found in many rhetorical text books and primers. He was well into the middle of it before Dalroy’s rage and wonder allowed him to follow the words.

“… do we indeed owe nothing,” the diplomatist was saying “to that gesture of high refusal in which so many centuries ago the great Arabian mystic put the wine-cup from his lips? Do we owe nothing to the long vigil of a valiant race, the long fast by which they have testified against the venomous beauty of the Vine? Ours is an age when men come more and more to see that the creeds hold treasures for each other, that each religion has a secret for its neighbour, that faith unto faith uttereth speech, and church unto church showeth knowledge. If it be true, and I claim again the indulgence of Oman Pasha when I say I think it is true, that we of the West have brought some light to Islam in the matter of the preciousness of peace and of civil order, may we not say that Islam in answer shall give us peace in a thousand homes, and encourage us to cut down that curse that has done so much to thwart and madden the virtues of Western Christendom. Already in my own country the orgies that made horrible the nights of the noblest families are no more. Already the legislature takes more and more sweeping action to deliver the populace from the bondage of the all-destroying drug. Surely the prophet of Mecca is reaping his harvest; the cession of the disputed vineyards to the greatest of his champions is of all acts the most appropriate to this day; to this happy day that may yet deliver the East from the curse of war and the West from the curse of wine. The gallant prince who meets us here at last, to offer an olive branch even more glorious than his sword, may well have our sympathy if he himself views the cession with some sentimental regret; but I have little doubt that he also will live to rejoice in it at last. And I would remind you that it is not the vine alone that has been the sign of the glory of the South. There is another sacred tree unstained by loose and violent memories, guiltless of the blood of Pentheus or of Orpheus and the broken lyre. We shall pass from this place in a little while as all things pass and perish:

“Far called, our navies melt away.

On dune and headland sinks the fire,

And all our pomp of yesterday

Is one with Nineveh and Tyre.

“But so long as sun can shine and soil can nourish, happier men and women after us shall look on this lovely islet and it shall tell its own story; for they shall see these three holy olive trees lifted in everlasting benediction, over the humble spot out of which came the peace of the world.”

The other two men were staring at Patrick Dalroy; his hand had tightened on the tree, and a giant billow of effort went over his broad breast. A small stone jerked itself out of the ground at the foot of the tree as if it were a grasshopper jumping; and then the coiled roots of the olive tree rose very slowly out of the earth like the limbs of a dragon lifting itself from sleep.

“I offer an olive branch,” said the King of Ithaca, totteringly leaning the loose tree so that its vast shadow, much larger than itself, fell across the whole council. “An olive branch,” he gasped, “more glorious than my sword. Also heavier.”

Then he made another effort and tossed it into the sea below.

The German, who was no German, had put up his arm in apprehension when the shadow fell across him. Now he got up and edged away from the table; seeing that the wild Irishman was tearing up the second tree. This one came out more easily; and before he flung it after the first, he stood with it a moment; looking like a man juggling with a tower.

Lord Ivywood showed more firmness; but he rose in tremendous remonstrance. Only the Turkish Pasha still sat with blank eyes, immovable. Dalroy rent out the last tree and hurled it, leaving the island bare.

“There!” said Dalroy, when the third and last olive had splashed in the tide. “Now I will go. I have seen something today that is worse than death: and the name of it is Peace.”

Oman Pasha rose and held out his hand.

“You are right,” he said in French, “and I hope we meet again in the only life that is a good life. Where are you going now?”

“I am going,” said Dalroy, dreamily, “to ‘The Old Ship.’”

“Do you mean?” asked the Turk, “that you are going back to the warships of the English King?”

“No,” answered the other, “I am going back to ‘The Old Ship’ that is behind the apple trees by Pebblewick; where the Ule flows among the trees. I fear I shall never see you there.”

After an instant’s hesitation he wrung the red hand of the great tyrant and walked to his boat without a glance at the diplomatists.

CHAPTER III: THE SIGN OF “THE OLD SHIP”

UPON few of the children of men has the surname of Pump fallen, and of these few have been maddened into naming a child Humphrey in addition to it. To such extremity, however, had the parents of the innkeeper at “The Old Ship” proceeded, that their son might come at last to be called “Hump” by his dearest friends, and “Pumph” by an aged Turk with a green umbrella. All this, or all he knew of it, he endured with a sour smile; for he was of a stoical temper.

Mr. Humphrey Pump stood outside his inn, which stood almost on the seashore, screened only by one line of apple trees, dwarfed, twisted and salted by the sea air; but in front of it was a highly banked bowling green, and behind it the land sank abruptly; so that one very steep sweeping road vanished into the depth and mystery of taller trees. Mr. Pump was standing immediately under his trim sign, which stood erect in the turf; a wooden pole painted white and suspending a square white board, also painted white but further decorated with a highly grotesque blue ship, such as a child might draw, but into which Mr. Pump’s patriotism had insinuated a disproportionately large red St. George’s cross.

Mr. Humphrey Pump was a man of middle size, with very broad shoulders, wearing a sort of shooting suit with gaiters. Indeed, he was engaged at the moment in cleaning and reloading a double-barrelled gun, a short but powerful weapon which he had invented, or at least improved, himself; and which, though eccentric enough as compared with latest scientific arms, was neither clumsy nor necessarily out of date. For Pump was one of those handy men who seem to have a hundred hands like Briareus; he made nearly everything for himself and everything in his house was slightly different from the same thing in anyone else’s house. He was also as cunning as Pan or a poacher in everything affecting every bird or dish, every leaf or berry in the woods. His mind was a rich soil of subconscious memories and traditions; and he had a curious kind of gossip so allusive as to almost amount to reticence; for he always took it for granted that everyone knew his county and its tales as intimately as he did; so he would mention the most mysterious and amazing things without relaxing a muscle on his face, which seemed to be made of knotted wood. His dark brown hair ended in two rudimentary side whiskers, giving him a slightly horsy look, but in the old-fashioned sportsman’s style. His smile was rather wry and crabbed; but his brown eyes were kindly and soft. He was very English.

As a rule his movements, though quick, were cool; but on this occasion he put down the gun on the table outside the inn in a rather hurried manner and came forward dusting his hands in an unusual degree of animation and even defiance. Beyond the goblin green apple trees and against the sea had appeared the tall, slight figure of a girl, in a dress about the colour of copper and a large shady hat. Under the hat her face was grave and beautiful though rather swarthy. She shook hands with Mr. Pump; then he very ceremoniously put a chair for her and called her “Lady Joan.”

“I thought I would like a look at the old place,” she said. “We have had some happy times here when we were boys and girls. I suppose you hardly see any of your old friends now.”

“Very little,” answered Pump, rubbing his short whisker reflectively. “Lord Ivywood’s become quite a Methody parson, you know, since he took the place; he’s pulling down beer-shops right and left. And Mr. Charles was sent to Australia for lying down flat at the funeral. Pretty stiff I call it; but the old lady was a terror.”

“Do you ever hear,” asked Lady Joan Brett, carelessly, “of that Irishman, Captain Dalroy?”

“Yes, more often than from the rest,” answered the innkeeper. “He seems to have done wonders in this Greek business. Ah! He was a sad loss to the Navy!”

“They insulted his country,” said the girl, looking at the sea with a heightened colour. “After all, Ireland was his country; and he had a right to resent it being spoken of like that.”

“And when they found he’d painted him green,” went on Mr. Pump.

“Painted him what?” asked Lady Joan.

“Painted Captain Dawson green,” continued Mr. Pump in colourless tones. “Captain Dawson said green was the colour of Irish traitors, so Dalroy painted him green. It was a great temptation, no doubt, with this fence being painted at the time and the pail of stuff there; but, of course, it had a very prejudicial effect on his professional career.”

“What an extraordinary story!” said the staring Lady Joan, breaking into a rather joyless laugh. “It must go down among your county legends. I never heard that version before. Why, it might be the origin of the ‘Green Man’ over there by the town.”

“Oh, no,” said Pump, simply, “that’s been there since before Waterloo times. Poor old Noyle had it until they put him away. You remember old Noyle, Lady Joan. Still alive, I hear, and still writing love-letters to Queen Victoria. Only of course they aren’t posted now.”

“Have you heard from your Irish friend lately?” asked the girl, keeping a steady eye on the sky-line.

“Yes, I had a letter last week,” answered the innkeeper. “It seems not impossible that he may return to England. He’s been acting for one of these Greek places, and the negotiations seem to be concluded. It’s a queer thing that his lordship himself was the English minister in charge of them.”

“You mean Lord Ivywood,” said Lady Joan, rather coldly. “Yes, he has a great career before him, evidently.”

“I wish he hadn’t got his knife into us so much,” chuckled Pump. “I don’t believe there’ll be an inn left in England. But the Ivywoods were always cranky. It’s only fair to him to remember his grandfather.”

“I think it’s very ungallant on your part,” said Lady Joan, with a mournful smile, “to ask a lady to remember his grandfather.”

“You know what I mean, Lady Joan,” said her host, good humouredly. “And I never was hard on the case myself; we all have our little ways. I shouldn’t like it done to my pig; but I don’t see why a man shouldn’t have his own pig in his own pew with him if he likes it. It wasn’t a free seat. It was the family pew.”

Lady Joan broke out laughing again. “What horrible things you do seem to have heard of,” she said. “Well, I must be going, Mr. Hump–I mean Mr. Pump–I used to call you Hump … oh, Hump, do you think any of us will ever be happy again?”

“I suppose it rests with Providence,” he said, looking at the sea.

“Oh, do say Providence again!” cried the girl. “It’s as good as ‘Masterman Ready.’”

With which inconsequent words she betook herself again to the path by the apple trees and walked back by the sea front to Pebblewick.

The inn of “The Old Ship” lay a little beyond the old fishing village of Pebblewick; and that again was separated by an empty half-mile or so from the new watering-place of Pebblewick-on-Sea. But the dark-haired lady walked steadily along the sea-front, on a sort of parade which had been stretched out to east and west in the insane optimism of watering-places, and, as she approached the more crowded part, looked more and more carefully at the groups on the beach. Most of them were much the same as she had seen them more than a month before. The seekers after truth (as the man in the fez would say) who assembled daily to find out what the man was doing with the paper-boxes, had not found out yet; neither had they wearied of their intellectual pilgrimage. Pennies were still thrown to the thundering atheist in acknowledgment of his incessant abuse; and this was all the more mysterious because the crowd was obviously indifferent, and the atheist was obviously sincere. The man with the long neck who led Low Church hymns with a little wooden spade had indeed disappeared; for children’s services of this kind are generally a moving feast; but the man whose only claim consisted of carrots round his hat was still there; and seemed to have even more money than before. But Lady Joan could see no sign of the little old man in the fez. She could only suppose that he had failed entirely; and, being in a bitter mood, she told herself bitterly that he had sunk out of sight precisely because there was in his rubbish a touch of unearthly and insane clearheadedness of which all these vulgar idiots were incapable. She did not confess to herself consciously that what had made both the man in the fez and the man at the inn interesting was the subject of which they had spoken.

As she walked on rather wearily along the parade she caught sight of a girl in black with faint fair hair and a tremulous, intelligent face which she was sure she had seen before. Pulling together all her aristocratic training for the remembering of middle class people, she managed to remember that this was a Miss Browning who had done typewriting work for her a year or two before; and immediately went forward to greet her, partly out of genuine good nature and partly as a relief from her own rather dreary thoughts. Her tone was so seriously frank and friendly that the lady in black summoned the social courage to say:

“I’ve so often wanted to introduce you to my sister who’s much cleverer than I am, though she does live at home; which I suppose is very old-fashioned. She knows all sorts of intellectual people. She is talking to one of them now; this Prophet of the Moon that everyone’s talking about. Do let me introduce you.”

Lady Joan Brett had met many prophets of the moon and of other things. But she had the spontaneous courtesy which redeems the vices of her class, and she followed Miss Browning to a seat on the parade. She greeted Miss Browning’s sister with glowing politeness; and this may really be counted to her credit; for she had great difficulty in looking at Miss Browning’s sister at all. For on the seat beside her, still in a red fez but in a brilliantly new black frock coat and every appearance of prosperity, sat the old gentleman who had lectured on the sands about the inns of England.

“He lectured at our Ethical Society,” whispered Miss Browning, “on the word Alcohol. Just on the word Alcohol. He was perfectly thrilling. All about Arabia and Algebra, you know, and how everything comes from the East. You really would be interested.”

“I am interested,” said Lady Joan.

“Poot it to yourselfs,” the man in the fez was saying to Miss Browning’s sister, “joost what sort of meaning the names of your ince can have if they do not commemorate the unlimitable influence of Islam. There is a vary populous Inn in London, one of the most distinguished, one of the most of the Centre, and it is called the Horseshoe? Now, my friendss, why should anyone commemorate a horse-shoe? It iss but an appendage to a creature more interesting than itself. I have already demonstrated to you that the very fact that you have in your town a place of drink called the Bool–”

“I should like to ask–” began Lady Joan, suddenly.

“A place of drink called the Bool,” went on the man in the fez, deaf to all distractions, “and I have urged that the Bool is a disturbing thought, while the Bul-Bul is a reassuring thought. But even you my friends, would not name a place after a ring in a Bool’s nose and not after the Bool? Why then name an equivalent place after the shoo, the mere shoo, upon a horse’s hoof, and not after the noble horse? Surely it is clear, surely it is evident that the term ‘horse-shoe’ is a cryptic term, an esoteric term, a term made during the days when the ancient Moslem faith of this English country was oppressed by the passing superstition of the Galileans. That bent shape, that duplex curving shape, which you call horse-shoe, is it not clearly the Crescent?” and he cast his arms wide as he had done on the sands, “the Crescent of the Prophet of the only God?”

“I should like to ask,” began Lady Joan, again, “how you would explain the name of the inn called ‘The Green Man,’ just behind that row of houses.”

“Exactly! exactly!” cried the Prophet of the Moon, in almost insane excitement. “The seeker after truth could not at all probably find a more perfect example of these principles. My friendss, how could there be a green man? You are acquainted with green grass, with green leaves, with green cheese, with green chartreuse. I ask if any one of you, however wide her social circle, has ever been acquainted with a green man. Surely, surely, it is evident, my friendss, that this is an imperfect version, an abbreviated version, of the original words. What can be clearer than that the original expression, was ‘the green-turban’d man,’ in allusion to the well-known uniform of the descendants of the Prophet? ‘Turban’d’ surely is just the sort of word, exactly the sort of foreign and unfamiliar word, that might easily be slurred over and ultimately suppressed.”

“There is a legend in these parts,” said Lady Joan, steadily, “that a great hero, hearing the colour that was sacred to his holy island insulted, really poured it over his enemy for a reply.”

“A legend! a fable!” cried the man in the fez, with another radiant and rational expansion of the hands. “Is it not evident that no such thing can have really happened?”

“Oh, yes–it really happened,” said the young lady, softly. “There is not much to comfort one in this world; but there are some things. Oh, it really happened.”

And taking a graceful farewell of the group, she resumed her rather listless walk along the parade.

CHAPTER IV: THE INN FINDS WINGS

MR. HUMPHREY PUMP stood in front of his inn once more, the cleaned and loaded gun still lay on the table, and the white sign of The Ship still swung in the slight sea breeze over his head; but his leatherish features were knotted over a new problem. He held two letters in his hand, letters of a very different sort, but letters that pointed to the same difficult problem. The first ran:

CHAPTER V: THE ASTONISHMENT OF THE AGENT

LORD IVYWOOD shared the mental weakness of most men who have fed on books; he ignored, not the value but the very existence of other forms of information. Thus Humphrey Pump was perfectly aware that Lord Ivywood considered him an ignorant man who carried a volume of Pickwick and could not be got to read any other book. But Lord Ivywood was quite unaware that Humphrey never looked at him without thinking that he could be most successfully hidden in a wood of small beeches, as his grey-brown hair and sallow, ashen face exactly reproduced the three predominant tints of such a sylvan twilight. Mr. Pump, I fear, had sometimes partaken of partridge or pheasant, in his early youth, under circumstances in which Lord Ivywood was not only unconscious of the hospitality he was dispensing, but would have sworn that it was physically impossible for anyone to elude the vigilance of his efficient system of game-keeping. But it is very unwise in one who counts himself superior to physical things to talk about physical impossibility.

Lord Ivywood was in error, therefore, when he said that the fugitives could not possibly escape in modern England. You can do a great many things in modern England if you have noticed; some things, in fact, which others know by pictures or current speech; if you know, for instance, that most roadside hedges are taller and denser than they look, and that even the largest man lying just behind them, takes up far less room than you would suppose; if you know that many natural sounds are much more like each other than the enlightened ear can believe, as in the case of wind in leaves and of the sea; if you know that it is easier to walk in socks than in boots, if you know how to take hold of the ground; if you know that the proportion of dogs who will bite a man under any circumstances is rather less than the proportion of men who will murder you in a railway carriage; if you know that you need not be drowned even in a river, unless the tide is very strong, and unless you practise putting yourself into the special attitudes of a suicide; if you know that country stations have objectless, extra waiting rooms that nobody ever goes into; and if you know that county folk will forget you if you speak to them, but talk about you all day if you don’t.

By the exercise of these and other arts and sciences Humphrey Pump was able to guide his friend across country, mostly in the character of trespasser and occasionally in that of something like housebreaker, and eventually, with sign, keg, cheese and all to step out of a black pinewood onto a white road in a part of the county where they would not be sought for the present.

Opposite them was a cornfield and on their right, in the shades of the pine trees, a cottage, a very tumbledown cottage that seemed to have collapsed under its own thatch. The red-haired Irishman’s face wore a curious smile. He stuck the inn-sign erect in the road and went and hammered on the door.

It was opened tremulously by an old man with a face so wrinkled that the wrinkles seemed more distinctly graven than the features themselves, which seemed lost in the labyrinth of them. He might have crawled out of the hole in a gnarled tree and he might have been a thousand years old.

He did not seem to notice the sign-board, which stood rather to the left of the door; and what life remained in his eyes seemed to awake in wonder at Dalroy’s stature and strange uniform and the sword at his side. “I beg your pardon,” said the Captain, courteously. “I fear my uniform startles you. It is Lord Ivywood’s livery. All his servants are to dress like this. In fact, I understand the tenants also and even yourself, perhaps … excuse my sword. Lord Ivywood is very particular that every man should have a sword. You know his beautiful, eloquent way of putting his views. ‘How can we profess,’ he was saying to me yesterday, while I was brushing his trousers. ‘How can we profess that all men are brothers while we refuse to them the symbol of manhood; or with what assurance can we claim it as a movement of modern emancipation to deny the citizen that which has in all ages marked the difference between the free man and the slave. Nor need we anticipate any such barbaric abuses as my honourable friend who is cleaning the knives has prophesied, for this gift is a sublime act of confidence in your universal passion for the severe splendours of Peace; and he that has the right to strike is he who has learnt to spare.’”

Talking all this nonsense with extreme rapidity and vast oratorical flourishes of the hand, Captain Dalroy proceeded to trundle both the big cheese and the cask of rum into the house of the astonished cottager: Mr. Pump following with a grim placidity and his gun under his arm.

“Lord Ivywood,” said Dalroy, setting the rum cask with a bump on the plain deal table, “wishes to take wine with you. Or, more strictly speaking, rum. Don’t you run away, my friend, with any of these stories about Lord Ivywood being opposed to drink. Three-bottle Ivywood, we call him in the kitchen. But it must be rum; nothing but rum for the Ivywoods. ‘Wine may be a mocker,’ he was saying the other day (and I particularly noted the phrasing, which seemed to be very happy even for his lordship; he was standing at the top of the steps, and I stopped cleaning them to make a note of it), ‘wine may be a mocker; strong drink may be raging, but nowhere in the sacred pages will you find one word of censure of the sweeter spirit sacred to them that go down to the sea in ships; no tongue of priest and prophet was ever lifted to break the sacred silence of Holy Writ about Rum.’ He then explained to me,” went on Dalroy, signing to Pump to tap the cask according to his own technical secret, “that the great tip for avoiding any bad results that a bottle or two of rum might have on young and inexperienced people was to eat cheese with it, particularly this kind of cheese that I have here. I’ve forgotten its name.”

“Cheddar,” said Pump, quite gravely.

“But mind you!” continued the Captain almost ferociously, shaking his big finger in warning at the aged man. “Mind you ‘nobread with the cheese. All the devastating ruin wrought by cheese and the once happy homes of this country, has been due to the reckless and insane experiment of eating bread with it.’ You’ll get no bread from me, my friend. Indeed, Lord Ivywood has given directions that the allusion to this ignorant and depraved habit shall be eliminated from the Lord’s Prayer. Have a drink.”

He had already poured out a little of the spirit into two thick tumblers and a broken teacup, which he had induced the aged man to produce; and now solemnly pledged him.

“Thank ye kindly, sir,” said the old man, using his cracked voice for the first time. Then he drank; and his old face changed as if it were an old horn lantern in which the flame began to rise.

“Ar,” he said. “My son he be a sailor.”

“I wish him a happy voyage,” said the Captain. “And I’ll sing you a song about the first sailor there ever was in the world; and who (as Lord Ivywood acutely observes) lived before the time of rum.”

He sat down on a wooden chair and lifted his loud voice once more, beating on the table with the broken tea-cup.

“Old Noah, he had an ostrich farm, and fowls on the greatest scale;

He ate his egg with a ladle in an egg-cup big as a pail,

And the soup he took was Elephant Soup and the fish he took was Whale;

But they all were small to the cellar he took when he set out to sail;

And Noah, he often said to his wife when he sat down to dine,

‘I don’t care where the water goes if it doesn’t get into the wine.’

“The cataract of the cliff of heaven fell blinding off the brink,

As if it would wash the stars away as suds go down a sink,

The seven heavens came roaring down for the throats of hell to drink,

And Noah, he cocked his eye and said, ‘It looks like rain, I think,

The water has drowned the Matterhorn as deep as a Mendip mine,

But I don’t care where the water goes if it doesn’t get into the wine.’

“But Noah he sinned, and we have sinned; on tipsy feet we trod,

Till a great big black teetotaller was sent to us for a rod,

And you can’t get wine at a P. S. A. or chapel or Eisteddfod;

For the Curse of Water has come again because of the wrath of God,

And water is on the Bishop’s board and the Higher Thinker’s shrine,

But I don’t care where the water goes if it doesn’t get into the wine.”

“Lord Ivywood’s favourite song,” concluded Mr. Patrick Dalroy, drinking. “Sing us a song yourself.”

Rather to the surprise of the two humourists, the old gentleman actually began in a quavering voice to chant,

“King George that lives in London Town,

I hope they will defend his crown,

And Bonyparte be quite put down

On Christmas Day in the morning.

“Old Squire is gone to the Meet today

All in his–”

It is perhaps fortunate for the rapidity of this narrative that the old gentleman’s favourite song, which consists of forty-seven verses, was interrupted by a curious incident. The door of the cottage opened and a sheepish-looking man in corduroys stood silently in the room for a few seconds and then said, without preface or further explanation,

“Four ale.”

“I beg your pardon?” inquired the polite Captain.

“Four ale,” said the man with solidity; then catching sight of Humphrey seemed to find a few more words in his vocabulary.

“Morning, Mr. Pump. Didn’t know as how you’d moved ‘The Old Ship.’”

Mr. Pump, with a twist of a smile, pointed to the old man whose song had been interrupted.

“Mr. Marne’s seeing after it now, Mr. Gowl,” said Pump with the strict etiquette of the country side. “But he’s got nothing but this rum in stock as yet.”

“Better’nowt,” said the laconic Mr. Gowl; and put down some money in front of the aged Marne, who eyed it wonderingly. As he was turning with a farewell and wiping his mouth with the back of his hand, the door once more moved, letting in white sunlight and a man in a red neckerchief.

“Morning, Mr. Marne; Morning, Mr. Pump; Morning, Mr. Gowl,” said the man in the red neckerchief.

“Morning, Mr. Coote,” said the other three, one after another.

“Have some rum, Mr. Coote?” asked Humphrey Pump, genially. “That’s all Mr. Marne’s got just now.”

Mr. Coote also had a little rum; and also laid a little money under the rather vague gaze of the venerable cottager. Mr. Coote was just proceeding to explain that these were bad times, but if you saw a sign you were all right still; a lawyer up at Grunton Abbot had told him so; when the company was increased and greatly excited by the arrival of a boisterous and popular tinker, who ordered glasses all round and said he had his donkey and cart outside. A prolonged, rich and confused conversation about the donkey and cart then ensued, in which the most varied views were taken of their merits; and it gradually began to dawn on Dalroy that the tinker was trying to sell them.

An idea, suited to the romantic opportunism of his present absurd career, suddenly swept over his mind, and he rushed out to look at the cart and donkey. The next moment he was back again, asking the tinker what his price was, and almost in the same breath offering a much bigger price than the tinker would have dreamed of asking. This was considered, however, as a lunacy specially allowed to gentlemen; the tinker had some more rum on the strength of the payment, and then Dalroy, offering his excuses, sealed up the cask and took it and the cheese to be stowed in the bottom of the cart. The money, however, he still left lying in shining silver and copper before the silver beard of old Marne.

No one acquainted with the quaint and often wordless camaraderie of the English poor will require to be told that they all went out and stared at him as he loaded the cart and saw to the harness of the donkey –all except the old cottager, who sat as if hypnotised by the sight of the money. While they were standing there they saw coming down the white, hot road, where it curled over the hill, a figure that gave them no pleasure, even when it was a mere marching black spot in the distance. It was a Mr. Bullrose, the agent of Lord Ivywood’s estates.

Mr. Bullrose was a short, square man with a broad, square head with ridges of close, black curls on it, with a heavy, froglike face and starting, suspicious eyes; a man with a good silk hat but a square business jacket. Mr. Bullrose was not a nice man. The agent on that sort of estate hardly ever is a nice man. The landlord often is; and even Lord Ivywood had an arctic magnanimity of his own, which made most people want, if possible, to see him personally. But Mr. Bullrose was petty. Every really practical tyrant must be petty.

He evidently failed to understand the commotion in front of Mr. Marne’s partly collapsed cottage, but he felt there must be something wrong about it. He wanted to get rid of the cottage altogether, and had not, of course, the faintest intention of giving the cottager any compensation for it. He hoped the old man would die; but in any case he could easily clear him out if it became suddenly necessary, for he could not possibly pay the rent for this week. The rent was not very much; but it was immeasurably too much for the old man who had no conceivable way of borrowing or earning it. That is where the chivalry of our aristocratic land system comes in.

“Good-bye, my friends,” the enormous man in the fantastic uniform was saying, “all roads lead to rum, as Lord Ivywood said in one of his gayer moments, and we hope to be back soon, establishing a first class hotel here, of which prospectuses will soon be sent out.”

The heavy froglike face of Mr. Bullrose, the agent, grew uglier with astonishment; and the eyes stood out more like a snail’s than a frog’s. The indefensible allusion to Lord Ivywood would in any case have caused a choleric intervention, if it had not been swallowed up in the earthquake suggestion of an unlicensed hotel on the estate. This again would have effected the explosion, if that and everything else had not been struck still and rigid by the sight of a solid, wooden sign-post already erected outside old Marne’s miserable cottage.

“I’ve got him now,” muttered Mr. Bullrose. “He can’t possibly pay; and out he shall go.” And he walked swiftly towards the door of the cottage, almost at the same moment that Dalroy went to the donkey’s head, as if to lead it off along the road.

“Look here, my man,” burst out Bullrose, the instant he was inside the cottage. “You’ve cooked yourself this time. His lordship has been a great deal too indulgent with you; but this is going to be the end of it. The insolence of what you’ve done outside, especially when you know his lordship’s wishes in such things, has just put the lid on.” He stopped a moment and sneered. “So unless you happen to have the exact rent down to a farthing or two about you, out you go. We’re sick of your sort.”

In a very awkward and fumbling manner, the old man pushed a heap of coins across the table. Mr. Bullrose sat down suddenly on the wooden chair with his silk hat on, and began counting them furiously. He counted them once; he counted them twice; and he counted them again. Then he stared at them more steadily than the cottager had done.

“Where did you get this money?” he asked in a thick, gross voice. “Did you steal it?”

“I ain’t very spry for stealin’,” said the old man in quavering comedy.

Bullrose looked at him and then at the money; and remembered with fury that Ivywood was a just though cold magistrate on the bench.

“Well, anyhow,” he cried, in a hot, heady way, “we’ve got enough against you to turn you out of this. Haven’t you broken the law, my man, to say nothing of the regulations for tenants, in sticking up that fancy sign of yours outside the cottage? Eh?”

The tenant was silent.

“Eh?” reiterated the agent.

“Ar,” replied the tenant.

“Have you or have you not a sign-board outside this house?” shouted Bullrose, hammering the table.

The tenant looked at him for a long time with a patient and venerable face, and then said: “Mubbe, yes. Mubbe, no.”

“I’ll mubbe you,” cried Mr. Bullrose, springing up and sticking his silk hat on the back of his head. “I don’t know whether you people are too drunk to see anything, but I saw the thing with my own eyes out in the road. Come out, and deny it if you dare!”

“Ar,” said Mr. Marne, dubiously.

He tottered after the agent, who flung open the door with a businesslike fury and stood outside on the threshold. He stood there quite a long time, and he did not speak. Deep in the hardened mud of his materialistic mind there had stirred two things that were its ancient enemies; the old fairy tale in which every thing can be believed; the new scepticism in which nothing can be believed–not even one’s own eyes. There was no sign, nor sign of a sign, in the landscape.

On the withered face of the old man Marne there was a faint renewal of that laughter that has slept since the Middle Ages.

CHAPTER VI: THE HOLE IN HEAVEN

THAT delicate ruby light which is one of the rarest but one of the most exquisite of evening effects warmed the land, sky and seas as if the whole world were washed in wine; and dyed almost scarlet the strong red head of Patrick Dalroy as he stood on the waste of furze and bracken, where he and his friends had halted. One of his friends was re-examining a short gun, rather like a double-barrelled carbine, the other was eating thistles.

Dalroy himself was idle and ruminant, with his hands in his pockets and his eye on the horizon. Land-wards the hills, plains and woods lay bathed in the rose-red light; but it changed somewhat to purple, to cloud and something like storm over the distant violet strip of sea. It was towards the sea that he was staring.

Suddenly he woke up; and seemed almost to rub his eyes, or at any rate, to rub his red eyebrow.

“Why, we’re on the road back of Pebblewick,” he said. “That’s the damned little tin chapel by the beach.”

“I know,” answered his friend and guide. “We’ve done the old hare trick; doubled, you know. Nine times out of ten it’s the best. Parson Whitelady used to do it when they were after him for dog-stealing. I’ve pretty much followed his trail; you can’t do better than stick to the best examples. They tell you in London that Dick Turpin rode to York. Well, I know he didn’t; for my old grandfather up at Cobble’s End knew the Turpins intimately–threw one of them into the river on a Christmas day; but I think I can guess what he did do and how the tale got about. If Dick was wise, he went flying up the old North Road, shouting ‘York! York!’ or what not, before people recognised him; then if he did the thing properly, he might half an hour afterwards walk down the Strand with a pipe in his mouth. They say old Boney said, ‘Go where you aren’t expected,’ and I suppose as a soldier he was right. But for a gentleman dodging the police like yourself, it isn’t exactly the right way of putting it. I should say, ‘Go where you ought to be expected’ –and you’ll generally find your fellow creatures don’t do what they ought about expecting any more than about anything else.”

“Well, this bit between here and the sea,” said the Captain, in a brown study, “I know it so well–so well that–that I rather wish I’d never seen it again. Do you know,” he asked, suddenly pointing to a patch and pit of sand that showed white in the dusky heath a hundred yards away, “do you know what makes that spot so famous in history?”

“Yes,” answered Mr. Pump, “that’s where old Mother Grouch shot the Methodist.”

“You are in error,” said the Captain. “Such an incident as you describe would in no case call for special comment or regret. No, that spot is famous because a very badly brought up girl once lost a ribbon off a plait of black hair and somebody helped her to find it.”

“Has the other person been well brought up?” asked Pump, with a faint smile.

“No,” said Dalroy, staring at the sea. “He has been brought down.” Then, rousing himself again, he made a gesture toward a further part of the heath. “Do you know the remarkable history of that old wall, the one beyond the last gorge over there?”

“No,” replied the other, “unless you mean Dead Man’s Circus, and that happened further along.”

“I do not mean Dead Man’s Circus,” said the Captain. “The remarkable history of that wall is that somebody’s shadow once fell on it; and that shadow was more desirable than the substance of all other living things. It isthis,” he cried, almost violently, resuming his flippant tone, “it is this circumstance, Hump, and not the trivial and everyday incident of a dead man going to a circus to which you have presumed to compare it, it isthis historical event which Lord Ivywood is about to commemorate by rebuilding the wall with solid gold and Greek marbles stolen by the Turks from the grave of Socrates, enclosing a column of solid gold four hundred feet high and surmounted by a colossal equestrian statue of a bankrupt Irishman riding backwards on a donkey.”

He lifted one of his long legs over the animal, as if about to pose for the group; then swung back on both feet again, and again looked at the purple limit of the sea.

“Do you know, Hump,” he said, “I think modern people have somehow got their minds all wrong about human life. They seem to expect what Nature has never promised; and then try to ruin all that Nature has really given. At all those atheist chapels of Ivywood’s they’re always talking of Peace, Perfect Peace, and Utter Peace, and Universal Joy and souls that beat as one. But they don’t look any more cheerful than anyone else; and the next thing they do is to start smashing a thousand good jokes and good stories and good songs and good friendships by pulling down ‘The Old Ship.’” He gave a glance at the loose sign-post lying on the heath beside him, almost as if to reassure himself that it was not stolen. “Now it seems to me,” he went on, “that this is asking for too much and getting too little. I don’t know whether God means a man to have happiness in that All in All and Utterly Utter sense of happiness. But God does mean a man to have a little Fun; and I mean to go on having it. If I mustn’t satisfy my heart, I can gratify my humour. The cynical fellows who think themselves so damned clever have a sort of saying, ‘Be good and you will be happy; but you will not have a jolly time.’ The cynical fellows are quite wrong, as they generally are. They have got hold of the exact opposite of the truth. God knows I don’t set up to be good; but even a rascal sometimes has to fight the world in the same way as a saint. I think I have fought the world;et militavi non sine–what’s the Latin for having a lark? I can’t pretend to Peace and Joy, and all the rest of it, particularly in this original briar-patch. I haven’t been happy, Hump, but I have had a jolly time.”

The sunset stillness settled down again, save for the cropping of the donkey in the undergrowth; and Pump said nothing sympathetically; and it was Dalroy once more who took up his parable.

“So I think there’s too much of this playing on our emotions, Hump; as this place is certainly playing the cat and banjo with mine. Damn it all, there are other things to do with the rest of one’s life! I don’t like all this fuss about feeling things–it only makes people miserable. In my present frame of mind I’m in favour of doing things. All of which, Hump,” he said with a sudden lift of the voice that always went in him with a rushing, irrational return of merely animal spirits–“All of which I have put into a Song Against Songs, that I will now sing you.”

“I shouldn’t sing it here,” said Humphrey Pump, picking up his gun and putting it under his arm. “You look large in this open place; and you sound large. But I’ll take you to the Hole in Heaven you’ve been talking about so much, and hide you as I used to hide you from that tutor–I couldn’t catch his name–man who could only get drunk on Greek wine at Squire Wimpole’s.”

“Hump!” cried the Captain, “I abdicate the throne of Ithaca. You are far wiser than Ulysses. Here I have had my heart torn with temptations to ten thousand things between suicide and abduction, and all by the mere sight of that hole in the heath, where we used to have picnics. And all that time I’d forgotten we used to call it the Hole in Heaven. And, by God, what a good name–in both senses.”

“I thought you’d have remembered it, Captain,” said the innkeeper, “from the joke young Mr. Matthews made.”

“In the heat of some savage hand to hand struggle in Albania,” said Mr. Dalroy, sadly, passing his palm across his brow, “I must have forgotten for one fatal instant the joke young Mr. Matthews made.”

“It wasn’t very good,” said Mr. Pump, simply. “Ah, his aunt was the one for things like that. She went too far with old Gudgeon, though.”

With these words he jumped and seemed to be swallowed up by the earth. But they had merely strolled the few yards needed to bring them to the edge of the sand-pit on the heath of which they had been speaking. And it is one of the truths concealed by Heaven from Lord Ivywood, and revealed by Heaven to Mr. Pump, that a hiding-place can be covered when you are close to it; and yet be open and visible from some spot of vantage far off. From the side by which they approached it, the sudden hollow of sand, a kind of collapsed chamber in the heath, seemed covered with a natural curve of fern and furze, and flashed out of sight like a fairy.

“It’s all right,” he called out from under a floor or roof of leaves. “You’ll remember it all when you get here. This is the place to sing your song, Captain. Lord bless me, Captain, don’t I remember your singing that Irish song you made up at college–bellowing it like a bull of Bashan–all about hearts and sleeves or some such things–and her ladyship and the tutor never heard a breath, because that bank of sand breaks everything. It’s worth knowing all this, you know. It’s a pity it’s not part of a young gentleman’s education. Now you shall sing me the song in favour of having no feelings, or whatever you call it.”

Dalroy was staring about him at the cavern of his old picnics, so forgotten and so startlingly familiar. He seemed to have lost all thought of singing anything, and simply to be groping in the dark house of his own boyhood. There was a slight trickle from a natural spring in sandstone just under the ferns, and he remembered they used to try to boil the water in a kettle. He remembered a quarrel about who had upset the kettle which, in the morbidity of first love, had given him for days the tortures of the damned. When the energetic Pump broke once more through the rather thorny roof, on an impulse to accumulate their other eccentric possessions, Patrick remembered about a thorn in a finger, that made his heart stop with something that was pain and perfect music. When Pump returned with the rum-keg and the cheese and rolled them with a kick down the shelving sandy side of the hole, he remembered, with almost wrathful laughter, that in the old days he had rolled down that slope himself, and thought it a rather fine thing to do. He felt then as if he were rolling down a smooth side of the Matterhorn. He observed now that the height was rather less than that of the second storey of one of the stunted cottages he had noted on his return. He suddenly understood he had grown bigger; bigger in a bodily sense. He had doubts about any other.

“The Hole in Heaven!” he said. “What a good name! What a good poet I was in those days! The Hole in Heaven. But does it let one in, or let one out?”

In the last level shafts of the fallen sun the fantastic shadow of the long-eared quadruped, whom Pump had now tethered to a new and nearer pasture, fell across the last sunlit scrap of sand. Dalroy looked at the long exaggerated shadow of the ass; and laughed that short explosive laugh he had uttered when the doors of the harems had been closed after the Turkish war. He was normally a man much too loquacious; but he never explained those laughs.

Humphrey Pump plunged down again into the sunken nest, and began to broach the cask of rum in his own secret style, saying– “We can get something else somehow tomorrow. For tonight we can eat cheese and drink rum, especially as there’s water on tap, so to speak. And now, Captain, sing us the Song Against Songs.”

Patrick Dalroy drank a little rum out of a small medicine glass which the generally unaccountable Mr. Pump unaccountably produced from his waistcoat pocket; but Patrick’s colour had risen, his brow was almost as red as his hair; and he was evidently reluctant.

“I don’t see why I should sing all the songs,” he said. “Why the divil don’t you sing a song yourself? And now I come to think of it,” he cried, with an accumulating brogue, not, perhaps, wholly unaffected by the rum, which he had not, in fact, drunk for years, “and now I come to think of it, what about that song of yours? All me youth’s coming back in this blest and cursed place; and I remember that song of yours, that never existed nor ever will. Don’t ye remember now, Humphrey Pump, that night when I sang ye no less than seventeen songs of me own composition?”

“I remember it very well,” answered the Englishman, with restraint.

“And don’t ye remember,” went on the exhilarated Irishman, with solemnity, “that unless ye could produce a poetic lyric of your own, written and sung by yourself, I threatened to …”

“To sing again,” said the impenetrable Pump. “Yes, I know.”

He calmly proceeded to take out of his pockets, which were, alas, more like those of a poacher than an innkeeper, a folded and faded piece of paper.

“I wrote it when you asked me,” he said simply. “I have never tried to sing it. But I’ll sing it myself, when you’ve sung your song, against anybody singing at all.”

“All right,” cried the somewhat excited Captain, “to hear a song from you–why, I’ll sing anything. This is the Song Against Songs, Hump.”

And again he let his voice out like a bellow against the evening silence.

“The song of the sorrow of Melisande is a weary song and a dreary song,

The glory of Mariana’s grange had got into great decay,

The song of the Raven Never More has never been called a cheery song,

And the brightest things in Baudelaire are anything else but gay.

But who will write us a riding song,

Or a hunting song or a drinking song,

Fit for them that arose and rode,

When day and the wine were red?

But bring me a quart of claret out,

And I will write you a clinking song,

A song of war and a song of wine,

And a song to wake the dead.

“The song of the fury of Fragolette is a florid song and a torrid song,

The song of the sorrow of Tara is sung to a harp unstrung,

The song of the cheerful Shropshire Kid I consider a perfectly horrid song,

And the song of the happy Futurist is a song that can’t be sung.

But who will write us a riding song,

Or a fighting song or a drinking song,

Fit for the fathers of you and me,

That knew how to think and thrive?

But the song of Beauty and Art and Love

Is simply an utterly stinking song,

To double you up and drag you down,

And damn your soul alive.

“Take some more rum,” concluded the Irish officer, affably, “and let’s hear your song at last.”

With the gravity inseparable from the deep conventionality of country people, Mr. Pump unfolded the paper on which he had recorded the only antagonistic emotion that was strong enough in him to screw his infinite English tolerance to the pitch of song. He read out the title very carefully and in full.

“Song Against Grocers, by Humphrey Pump, sole proprietor of ‘The Old Ship,’ Pebblewick. Good Accommodation for Man and Beast. Celebrated as the House at which both Queen Charlotte and Jonathan Wilde put up on different occasions; and where the Ice-cream man was mistaken for Bonaparte. This song is written against Grocers.”

“God made the wicked Grocer,

For a mystery and a sign,

That men might shun the awful shops,

And go to inns to dine;

Where the bacon’s on the rafter

And the wine is in the wood,

And God that made good laughter

Has seen that they are good.

“The evil-hearted Grocer

Would call his mother ‘Ma’am,’

And bow at her and bob at her,

Her aged soul to damn;

And rub his horrid hands and ask,

What article was next;

Thoughmortis in articulo,

Should be her proper text.

“His props are not his children

But pert lads underpaid,

Who call out ‘Cash!’ and bang about,

To work his wicked trade;

He keeps a lady in a cage,

Most cruelly all day,

And makes her count and calls her ‘Miss,’

Until she fades away.

“The righteous minds of inn-keepers

Induce them now and then

To crack a bottle with a friend,

Or treat unmoneyed men;

But who hath seen the Grocer

Treat housemaids to his teas,

Or crack a bottle of fish-sauce,

Or stand a man a cheese?

“He sells us sands of Araby

As sugar for cash down,

He sweeps his shop and sells the dust,

The purest salt in town;

He crams with cans of poisoned meat

Poor subjects of the King,

And when they die by thousands

Why, he laughs like anything.

“The Wicked Grocer groces

In spirits and in wine,

Not frankly and in fellowship,

As men in inns do dine;

But packed with soap and sardines

And carried off by grooms,

For to be snatched by Duchesses,

And drunk in dressing-rooms.

“The hell-instructed Grocer

Has a temple made of tin,

And the ruin of good inn-keepers

Is loudly urged therein;

But now the sands are running out

From sugar of a sort,

The Grocer trembles; for his time

Just like his weight is short.”

Captain Dalroy was getting considerably heated with his nautical liquor, and his appreciation of Pump’s song was not merely noisy but active. He leapt to his feet and waved his glass. “Ye ought to be Poet Laureate, Hump–ye’re right, ye’re right; we’ll stand all this no longer!”

He dashed wildly up the sand slope and pointed with the sign-post towards the darkening shore, where the low shed of corrugated iron stood almost isolated.

“There’s your tin temple!” he said. “Let’s burn it!”

They were some way along the coast from the large watering-place of Pebblewick and between the gathering twilight and the rolling country it could not be clearly seen. Nothing was now in sight but the corrugated iron hall by the beach and three half-built red brick villas.

Dalroy appeared to regard the hall and the empty houses with great malevolence.

“Look at it!” he said. “Babylon!”

He brandished the inn-sign in the air like a banner, and began to stride towards the place, showering curses.

“In forty days,” he cried, “shall Pebblewick be destroyed. Dogs shall lap the blood of J. Leveson, Secretary, and Unicorns–”

“Come back Pat,” cried Humphrey, “you’ve had too much rum.”

“Lions shall howl in its high places,” vociferated the Captain.

“Donkeys will howl, anyhow,” said Pump. “But I suppose the other donkey must follow.”

And loading and untethering the quadruped, he began to lead him along.

CHAPTER VII: THE SOCIETY OF SIMPLE SOULS

UNDER sunset, at once softer and more sombre, under which the leaden sea took on a Lenten purple, a tint appropriate to tragedy, Lady Joan Brett was once more drifting moodily along the sea-front. The evening had been rainy and lowering; the watering-place season was nearly over; and she was almost alone on the shore; but she had fallen into the habit of restlessly pacing the place, and it seemed to satisfy some subconscious hunger in her rather mixed psychology. Through all her brooding her animal senses always remained abnormally active: she couldsmell the sea when it had ebbed almost to the horizon, and in the same way she heard, through every whisper of waves or wind, the swish or flutter of another woman’s skirt behind her. There is, she felt, something unmistakable about the movements of a lady who is generally very dignified and rather slow, and who happens to be in a hurry.

She turned to look at the lady who was thus hastening to overtake her; lifted her eyebrows a little and held out her hand. The interruption was known to her as Lady Enid Wimpole, cousin of Lord Ivywood; a tall and graceful lady who unbalanced her own elegance by a fashionable costume that was at once funereal and fantastic; her fair hair was pale but plentiful; her face was not only handsome and fastidious in the aquiline style, but when considered seriously was sensitive, modest, and even pathetic, but her wan blue eyes seemed slightly prominent, with that expression of cold eagerness that is seen in the eyes of ladies who ask questions at public meetings.

Joan Brett was herself, as she had said, a connection of the Ivywood family; but Lady Enid was Ivywood’s first cousin, and for all practical purposes his sister. For she kept house for him and his mother, who was now so incredibly old that she only survived to satisfy conventional opinion in the character of a speechless and uselesschaperon. And Ivywood was not the sort who would be likely to call out any activity in an old lady exercising that office. Nor, for that matter, was Lady Enid Wimpole; there seemed to shine on her face the same kind of inhuman, absent-minded common sense that shone on her cousin’s.

“Oh, I’m so glad I’ve caught you up,” she said to Joan. “Lady Ivywood wants youso much to come to us for the week-end or so, while Philip is still there. He always admired your sonnet on Cyprus so much, and he wants to talk to you about this policy of his in Turkey. Of course he’s awfully busy, but I shall be seeing him tonight after the meeting.”

“No living creature,” said Lady Joan, with a smile, “ever saw him except before or after a meeting.”

“Are you a Simple Soul?” asked Lady Enid, carelessly.

“Am I a simple soul?” asked Joan, drawing her black brows together. “Merciful Heavens, no! What can you mean?”

“Their meeting’s on tonight at the small Universal Hall, and Philip’s taking the chair,” explained the other lady. “He’s very annoyed that he has to leave early to get up to the House, but Mr. Leveson can take the chair for the last bit. They’ve got Misysra Ammon.”

“Got Mrs. Who?” asked Joan, in honest doubt.

“You make game of everything,” said Lady Enid, in cheerless amiability. “It’s the man everyone’s talking about–you know as well as I do. It’s really his influence that hasmade the Simple Souls.”

“Oh!” said Lady Joan Brett.

Then after a long silence, she added: “Who are the Simple Souls? I should be interested in them, if I could meet any.” And she turned her dark, brooding face on the darkening purple sea.

“Do you mean to say, my dear,” asked Lady Enid Wimpole, “that you haven’t met any of them yet?”

“No,” said Joan, looking at the last dark line of sea. “I never met but one simple soul in my life.”

“But you must come to the meeting!” cried Lady Enid, with frosty and sparkling gaiety. “You must come at once! Philip is certain to be eloquent on a subject like this, and of course Misysra Ammon isalways so wonderful.”

Without any very distinct idea of where she was going or why she was going there, Joan allowed herself to be piloted to a low lead or tin shed, beyond the last straggling hotels, out of the echoing shell of which she could prematurely hear a voice that she thought she recognised. When she came in Lord Ivywood was on his feet, in exquisite evening dress, but with a light overcoat thrown over the seat behind him. Beside him, in less tasteful but more obvious evening dress, was the little old man she had heard on the beach.

No one else was on the platform, but just under it, rather to Joan’s surprise, sat Miss Browning, her old typewriting friend in her old black dress, industriously taking down Lord Ivywood’s words in shorthand. A yard or two off, even more to her surprise, sat Miss Browning’s more domestic sister, also taking down the same words in shorthand.

“That is Misysra Ammon,” whispered Lady Enid, earnestly, pointing a delicate finger at the little old man beside the chairman.

“I know him,” said Joan. “Where’s the umbrella?”

“… at least evident,” Lord Ivywood was saying, “that one of those ancestral impossibilities is no longer impossible. The East and the West are one. The East is no longer East nor the West West; for a small isthmus has been broken, and the Atlantic and Pacific are a single sea. No man assuredly has done more of this mighty work of unity than the brilliant and distinguished philosopher to whom you will have the pleasure of listening tonight; and I profoundly wish that affairs more practical, for I will not call them more important, did not prevent my remaining to enjoy his eloquence, as I have so often enjoyed it before. Mr. Leveson has kindly consented to take my place, and I can do no more than express my deep sympathy with the aims and ideals which will be developed before you tonight. I have long been increasingly convinced that underneath a certain mask of stiffness which the Mahommedan religion has worn through certain centuries, as a somewhat similar mask has been worn by the religion of the Jews, Islam has in it the potentialities of being the most progressive of all religions; so that a century or two to come we may see the cause of peace, of science and of reform everywhere supported by Islam as it is everywhere supported by Israel. Not in vain, I think, is the symbol of that faith the Crescent, the growing thing. While other creeds carry emblems implying more or less of finality, for this great creed of hope its very imperfection is its pride, and men shall walk fearlessly in new and wonderful paths, following the increasing curve which contains and holds up before them the eternal promises of the orb.”

It was characteristic of Lord Ivywood that, though he was really in a hurry, he sat down slowly and gravely amid the outburst of applause. The quiet resumption of the speaker’s seat, like the applause itself, was an artistic part of the peroration. When the last clap or stamp had subsided, he sprang up alertly, his light great-coat over his arm, shook hands with the lecturer, bowed to the audience and slid quickly out of the hall. Mr. Leveson, the swarthy young man with the drooping double-eyeglass rather bashfully to the front, took the empty seat on the platform, and in a few words presented the eminent Turkish mystic Misysra Ammon, sometimes called the Prophet of the Moon.

Lady Joan found the Prophet’s English accent somewhat improved by good society, but he still elongated the letter “u” in the same bleating manner, and his remarks had exactly the same rabidly wrong-headed ingenuity as his lecture upon English inns. It appeared that he was speaking on the higher Polygamy; but he began with a sort of general defence of the Moslem civilisation, especially against the charge of sterility and worldly ineffectiveness.

“It iss joost in the practical tings,” he was saying, “it iss joost in the practical tings, if you could come to consider them in a manner quite equal, that our methods are better than your methods. My ancestors invented the curved swords, because one cuts better with a curved sword. Your ancestors possessed the straight swords out of some romantic fancy of being what you call straight; or, I will take a more plain example, of which I have myself experience. When I first had the honour of meeting Lord Ivywood, I was unused to your various ceremonies and had a little difficulty, joost a little difficulty, in entering Mr. Claridge’s hotel, where his lordship had invited me. A servant of the hotel was standing joost beside me on the doorstep. I stoo-ooped down to take off my boo-oots, and he asked me what I was dooing. I said to him: ‘My friend, I am taking off my boo-oots.’”

A smothered sound came from Lady Joan Brett, but the lecturer did not notice it and went on with a beautiful simplicity.

“I told him that in my country, when showing respect for any spot, we do not take off our hats; we take off our boo-oots. And because I would keep on my hat and take off my boo-oots, he suggested to me that I had been afflicted by Allah, in the head. Now was not that foony?”

“Very,” said Lady Joan, inside her handkerchief, for she was choking with laughter. Something like a faint smile passed over the earnest faces of the two or three most intelligent of the Simple Souls, but for the most part the Souls seemed very simple indeed, helpless looking people with limp hair and gowns like green curtains, and their dry faces were as dry as ever.

“But I explained to him. I explained to him for a long time, for a carefully occupied time, that it was more practical, more business-like, more altogether for utility, to take off the boo-oots than to remove the hat. ‘Let us,’ I said to him, ‘consider what many complaints are made against the footwear, what few complaints against the headwear. You complain if in your drawing-rooms is the marching about of muddy boo-oots. Are any of your drawing-rooms marked thus with the marching about of muddy hats? How very many of your husbands kick you with the boo-oot! Yet how few of your husbands on any occasion butt you with the hat?’”

He looked round with a radiant seriousness, which made Lady Joan almost as speechless for sympathy as she was for amusement. With all that was most sound in his too complicated soul she realised the presence of a man really convinced.

“The man on the doorstep, he would not listen to me,” went on Misysra Ammon, pathetically. “He said there would be a crowd if I stood on the doorstep, holding in my hand my boo-oots. Well, I do not know why, in your country you always send the young males to be the first of your crowds. They certainly were making a number of noises, the young males.”

Lady Joan Brett stood up suddenly and displayed enormous interest in the rest of the audience in the back parts of the hall. She felt that if she looked for one moment more at the serious face with the Jewish nose and the Persian beard, she would publicly disgrace herself; or, what was quite as bad (for she was the generous sort of aristocrat) publicly insult the lecturer. She had a feeling that the sight of all the Simple Souls in bulk might have a soothing effect. It had. It had what might have been mistaken for a depressing effect. Lady Joan resumed her seat with a controlled countenance.

“Now, why,” asked the Eastern philosopher, “do I tell so simple a little story of your London streets–a thing happening any day? The little mistake had no preju-udicial effect. Lord Ivywood came out, at the end. He made no attempt to explain the true view of so important matters to Mr. Claridge’s servant, though Mr. Claridge’s servant remained on the doorstep. But he commanded Mr. Claridge’s servant to restore to me one of my boo-oots, which had fallen down the front steps, while I was explaining this harmlessness of the hat in the home. So all was, for me, very well. But why do I tell such little tales?”

He spread out his hands again, in his fanlike eastern style. Then he clapped them together, so suddenly that Joan jumped, and looked instinctively for the entrance of five hundred negro slaves, laden with jewels. But it was only his emphatic gesture of eloquence. He went on with an excited thickening of the accent.

“Because, my friends, this is the best example I could give of the wrong and slanderous character of the charge that we fail in our domesticities. That we fail especially in our treatment of the womankind. I appeal to any lady, to any Christian lady. Is not the boo-oot more devastating, more dreaded in the home than the hat? The boot jumps, he bound, he run about, he break things, he leave on the carpet the earths of the garden. The hat, he remain quiet on his hat-peg. Look at him on his hat-peg; how quiet and good he remain! Why not let him remain quiet also on his head?”

Lady Joan applauded warmly, as did several other ladies, and the sage went on, encouraged.

“Can you not therefore trust, dear ladies, this great religion to understand you concerning other things, as it understands you regarding boo-oots? What is the common objection our worthy enemies make against our polygamy? That it is disdainful of the womanhood. But how can this be so, my friends, when it allows the womanhood to be present in so large numbers? When in your House of Commons you put a hundred English members and joost one little Welsh member, you do not say ‘The Welshman is on top; he is our Sultan; may he live for ever!’ If your jury contained eleven great large ladies and one leetle man you would not say ‘this is unfair to the great large ladies.’ Why should you shrink, then, ladies, from this great polygamical experiment which Lord Ivywood himself–”

Joan’s dark eyes were still fixed on the wrinkled, patient face of the lecturer, but every word of the rest of the lecture was lost to her. Under her glowing Spanish tint she had turned pale with extraordinary emotions, but she did not stir a hair.

The door of the hall stood open, and occasional sounds came even from that deserted end of the town. Two men seemed to be passing along the distant parade; one of them was singing. It was common enough for workmen to sing going home at night, and the voice, though a loud one, would have been too far off for Joan to hear the words. Only Joan happened to know the words. She could almost see them before her, written in a round swaggering hand on the pink page of an old school-girl album at home. She knew the words and the voice.

“I come from Castlepatrick and my heart is on my sleeve,

And any sword or pistol boy can hit ut with me leave,

It shines there for an epaulette, as golden as a flame,

As naked as me ancestors, as noble as me name.

For I come from Castlepatrick and my heart is on my sleeve,

But a lady stole it from me on St. Gallowglass’s Eve.”

Startlingly and with strong pain there sprang up before Joan’s eyes a patch of broken heath with a very deep hollow of white sand, blinding in the sun. No words, no name, only the place.

“The folks that live in Liverpool, their heart is in their boots;

They go to Hell like lambs, they do, because the hooter hoots.

Where men may not be dancin’, though the wheels may dance all day;

And men may not be smokin’, but only chimneys may.

But I come from Castlepatrick and my heart is on my sleeve,

But a lady stole it from me on St. Poleyander’s Eve.

“The folks that live in black Belfast, their heart is in their mouth;

They see us making murders in the meadows of the South;

They think a plough’s a rack they do, and cattle-calls are creeds,

And they think we’re burnin’ witches when we’re only burnin’ weeds.

But I come from Castlepatrick, and me heart is on me sleeve;

But a lady stole it from me on St. Barnabas’s Eve.”

The voice had stopped suddenly, but the last lines were so much more distinct that it was certain the singer had come nearer, and was not marching away.

It was only after all this, and through a sort of cloud, that Lady Joan heard the indomitable Oriental bringing his whole eloquent address to a conclusion.

“… And if you do not refu-use the sun that returns and rises in the East with every morning, you will not refu-use either this great social experiment, this great polygamical method which also arose out of the East, and always returns. For this is that Higher Polygamy which always comes, like the sun itself, out of the orient, but is only at its noontide splendour when the sun is high in heaven.”

She was but vaguely conscious of Mr. Leveson, the man with the dark face and the eyeglasses, acknowledging the entrancing lecture in suitable terms, and calling on any of the Simple Souls who might have questions to ask, to ask them. It was only when the Simple Souls had displayed their simplicity with the usual parade of well-bred reluctance and fussy self-effacement, that anyone addressed the chair. And it was only after somebody had been addressing the chair for some time that Joan gradually awoke to the fact that the address was somewhat unusual.

CHAPTER VIII: VOX POPULI VOX DEI

“I AM sure,” Mr. Leveson, the Secretary, had said, with a somewhat constrained smile, “that after the eloquent and epoch-making speech to which we have listened there will be some questions asked, and we hope to have a debate afterwards. I am sure somebody will ask a question.” Then he looked interrogatively at one weary looking gentleman in the fourth row and said, “Mr. Hinch?”

Mr. Hinch shook his head with a pallid passion of refusal, wonderful to watch, and said, “I couldn’t! I really couldn’t!”

“We should be very pleased,” said Mr. Leveson, “if any lady would ask a question.”

In the silence that followed it was somehow psychologically borne in on the whole audience that one particular great large lady (as the lecturer would say) sitting at the end of the second row was expected to ask a question. Her own wax-work immobility was witness both to the expectation and its disappointment. “Are there any other questions?” asked Mr. Leveson –as if there had been any yet. He seemed to speak with a slight air of relief.

There was a sort of stir at the back of the hall and half way down one side of it. Choked whispers could be heard of “Now then, Garge!”–“Go it Garge! Is there any questions! Gor!”

Mr. Leveson looked up with an alertness somewhat akin to alarm. He realised for the first time that a few quite common men in coarse, unclean clothes, had somehow strolled in through the open door. They were not true rustics, but the semi-rustic labourers that linger about the limits of the large watering-places. There was no “Mr.” among them. There was a general tendency to call everybody George.

Mr. Leveson saw the situation and yielded to it. He modelled himself on Lord Ivywood and did much what he would have done in all cases, but with a timidity Lord Ivywood would not have shown. And the same social training that made him ashamed to be with such men, made him ashamed to own his shame. The same modern spirit that taught him to loathe such rags, also taught him to lie about his loathing.

“I am sure we should be very glad,” he said, nervously, “if any friends from outside care to join in our inquiry. Of course, we’re all Democrats,” and he looked round at the grand ladies with a ghastly smile, “and believe in the Voice of the People and so on. If our friend at the back of the hall will put his question briefly, we need not insist, I think, on his putting it in writing?”

There were renewed hoarse encouragements to George (that rightly christened champion) and he wavered forward on legs tied in the middle with string. He did not appear to have had any seat since his arrival, and made his remarks standing half way down what we may call the central aisle.

“Well, I want to ask the proprietor,” he began.

“Questions,” said Mr. Leveson, swiftly seizing a chance for that construction of debate which is the main business of a modern chairman, “must be asked of the chair, if they are points of order. If they concern the address, they should be asked of the lecturer.”

“Well, I ask the lecturer,” said the patient Garge, “whether it ain’t right that when you ’ave the thing outside you should ’ave the thing inside.” (Hoarse applause at the back.)

Mr. Leveson was evidently puzzled and already suspicious that something was quite wrong. But the enthusiasm of the Prophet of the Moon sprang up instantly at any sort of question and swept the Chairman along with it.

“But it iss the essence of our who-ole message,” he cried, spreading out his arms to embrace the world, “that the outer manifestation should be one with the inner manifestation. My friendss, it iss this very tru-uth our friend has stated, that iss responsible for our apparent lack of symbolism in Islam! We appear to neglect the symbol because we insist on the satisfactory symbol. My friend in the middle will walk round all our mosques and say loudly, ‘Where is the statue of Allah?’ But can my friend in the middle really execute a complete and generally approved statue of Allah?”

Misysra Ammon sat down greatly satisfied with his answer, but it was doubted by many whether, he had conveyed the satisfaction to his friend in the middle. That seeker after truth wiped his mouth with the back of his hand with an unsatisfied air and said:

“No offence, sir. But ain’t it the Law, sir, that if you ’ave that outside we’re all right? I came in ’ere as natural as could be. But Gorlumme, I never see a place like this afore.” (Hoarse laughter behind.)

“No apology is needed, my friend,” cried the Eastern sage, eagerly, “I can conceive you are not perhaps du-uly conversant with such schools of truth. But the Law is All. The Law is Allah. The inmost u-unity of–”

“Well, ain’t it the Law?” repeated the dogged George, and every time he mentioned the Law the poor men who are its chief victims applauded loudly. “I’m not one to make a fuss. I never was one to make a fuss. I’m a law-abidin’ man, I am. (More applause.) Ain’t it the Law that if so be such is your sign and such is your profession, you ought to serve us?”

“I fear I not quite follow,” cried the eager Turk. “I ought?”

“To serve us,” shouted a throng of thick voices from the back of the hall, which was already much more crowded than before.

“Serve you!” cried Misysra, leaping up like a spring released, “The Holy Prophet came from Heaven to serve you! The virtue and valour of a thousand years, my friends, has had no hunger but to serve you! We are of all faiths, the most the faith of service. Our highest prophet is no more than the servant of God, as I am, as you all are. Even for our symbol we choose a satellite, and honour the Moon because it only serves the Earth, and does not pretend to be the Sun.”

“I’m sure,” cried Mr. Leveson, jumping up with a tactful grin, “that the lecturer has answered this last point in a most eloquent and effective way, and the motor cars are waiting for some of the ladies who have come from some distance, and I really think the proceedings–”

All the artistic ladies were already getting on their wraps, with faces varying from bewilderment to blank terror. Only Lady Joan lingered, trembling with unexplained excitement. The hitherto speechless Hinch had slid up to the Chairman’s seat and whispered to him:

“You must get all the ladies away. I can’t imagine what’s up, but something’s up.”

“Well?” repeated the patient George. “So be it’s the Law, where is it?”

“Ladies and Gentlemen,” said Mr. Leveson, in his most ingratiating manner, “I think we have had a most delightful evening, and–”

“No, we ain’t,” cried a new and nastier voice from a corner of the room. “Where is it?”

“That’s what we got a right to know,” said the law-abiding George. “Where is it?”

“Where is what?” cried the nearly demented secretary in the chair. “What do you want?”

The law-abiding Mr. George made a half turn and a gesture towards the man in the corner and said:

“What’s yours, Jim?”

“I’ll ’ave a drop of Scotch,” said the man in the corner.

Lady Enid Wimpole, who had lingered a little in loyalty to Joan, the only other lady still left, caught both her wrists and cried in a thrilling whisper,

“Oh, we must go to the car, dear! They’re using the most awful language!”

Away on the wettest edge of the sands by the sea the prints of two wheels and four hoofs were being slowly washed away by a slowly rising tide; which was, indeed, the only motive of the man Humphrey Pump, leading the donkey cart, in leading it almost ankle deep in water.

“I hope you’re sober again now,” he said with some seriousness to his companion, a huge man walking heavily and even humbly with a straight sword swinging to and fro at his hip–“for honestly it was a mug’s game to go and stick up the old sign before that tin place. I haven’t often spoken to you like this, Captain, but I don’t believe any other man in the county could get you out of the hole as I can. But to go down there and frighten the ladies–why there’s been nothing so silly here since Bishop’s Folly. You could hear the ladies screaming before we left.”

“I heard worse than that long before we left,” said the large man, without lifting his head. “I heard one of them laugh… Christ, do you think I shouldn’t hear her laugh?”

There was a silence. “I didn’t mean to speak sharp,” said Humphrey Pump with that incorruptible kindliness which was the root of his Englishry, and may yet save the soul of the English. “But it’s the truth I was pretty well bothered about how to get out of this business. You’re braver than I am, you see, and I own I was frightened about both of us. If I hadn’t known my way to the lost tunnel, I should be fairly frightened still.”

“Known your way to what?” asked the Captain, lifting his red head for the first time.

“Oh, you know all about No More Ivywood’s lost tunnel,” said Pump, carelessly. “Why, we all used to look for it when we were boys. Only I happened to find it.”

“Have mercy on an exile,” said Dalroy, humbly. “I don’t know which hurt him most, the things he forgets or the things he remembers.”

Mr. Pump was silent for a little while and then said, more seriously than usual, “Well, the people from London say you must put up placards and statues and subscriptions and epitaphs and the Lord knows what, to the people who’ve found some new trick and made it come off. But only a man that knows his own land for forty miles round, knows what a lot of people, and clever people too, there were who found new tricks, and had to hide them because they didn’t come off. There was Dr. Boone, up by Gill-in-Hugby, who held out against Dr. Collison and the vaccination. His treatment saved sixty patients who had got small-pox; and Dr. Collison’s killed ninety-two patients who hadn’t got anything. But Boone had to keep it dark; naturally, because all his lady patients grew mustaches. It was a result of the treatment. But it wasn’t a result he wishes to dwell on. Then there was old Dean Arthur, who discovered balloons if ever a man did. He discovered them long before they were discovered. But people were suspicious about such things just then–there was a revival of the witch business in spite of all the parsons –and he had to sign a paper saying where he’d got the notion. Well, it stands to reason, you wouldn’t like to sign a paper saying you’d got it from the village idiot when you were both blowing soap-bubbles; and that’s all he could have signed, for he was an honest gentleman, the poor old Dean. Then there was Jack Arlingham and the diving bell–but you remember all about that. Well, it was just the same with the man that made this tunnel–one of the mad Ivywoods. There’s many a man, Captain, that has a statue in the great London squares for helping to make the railway trains. There’s many a man has his name in Westminster Abbey for doing something in discovering steamboats. Poor old Ivywood discovered both at once; and had to be put under control. He had a notion that a railway train might be made to rush right into the sea and turn into a steamboat; and it seemed all right, according as he worked it out. But his family were so ashamed of the thing, that they didn’t like the tunnel even mentioned. I don’t think anybody knows where it is but me and Bunchy Robinson. We shall be there in a minute or two. They’ve thrown the rocks about at this end; and let the thick plantation grow at the other, but I’ve got a race horse through before now, to save it from Colonel Chepstow’s little games, and I think I can manage this donkey. Honestly, I think it’s the only place we’ll be safe in after what we’ve left behind us at Pebblewick. But it’s the best place in the world, there’s no doubt, for lying low and starting afresh. Here we are. You think you can’t get behind that rock, but you can. In fact, you have.”

Dalroy found himself, with some bewilderment, round the corner of a rock and in a long bore or barrel of blackness that ended in a very dim spot of green. Hearing the hoofs of the ass and the feet of his friend behind him, he turned his head, but could see nothing but the pitch darkness of a closed coal cellar. He turned again to the dim green speck, and marching forward was glad to see it grow larger and brighter, like a big emerald, till he came out on a throng of trees, mostly thin, but growing so thickly and so close to the cavernous entrance of the tunnel that it was quite clear the place was meant to be choked up by forests and forgotten. The light that came glimmering through the trees was so broken and tremulous that it was hard to tell whether it was daybreak or moonrise.

“I know there’s water here,” said Pump. “They couldn’t keep it out of the stone-work when they made the tunnel, and old Ivywood hit the hydraulic engineer with a spirit level. With the bit of covert here and the sea behind us we ought to be able to get food of one kind or another, when the cheese has given out, and donkeys can eat anything. By the way,” he added with some embarrassment, “you don’t mind my saying it, Captain, but I think we’d better keep that rum for rare occasions. It’s the best rum in England, and may be the last, if these mad games are going on. It’ll do us good to feel it’s there, so we can have it when we want it. The cask’s still nearly full.”

Dalroy put out his hand and shook the other’s. “Hump,” he said, seriously, “you’re right. It’s a sacred trust for Humanity; and we’ll only drink it ourselves to celebrate great victories. In token of which I will take a glass now, to celebrate our glorious victory over Leveson and his tin tabernacle.”

He drained one glass and then sat down on the cask, as if to put temptation behind him. His blue ruminant bull’s eye seemed to plunge deeper and deeper into the emerald twilight of the trees in front of him, and it was long before he spoke again.

At last he observed, “I think you said, Hump, that a friend of yours–a gentleman named Bunchy Robinson, I think–was also ahabitué here.”

“Yes, he knew the way,” answered Pump, leading the donkey to the most suitable patch of pasturage.

“May we, do you think, have the pleasure of a visit from Mr. Robinson?” inquired the Captain.

“Not unless they’re jolly careless up in Blackstone Gaol,” replied Pump. And he moved the cheese well into the arch of the tunnel. Dalroy still sat with his square chin on his hand, staring at the mystery of the little wood.

“You seem absent-minded, Captain,” remarked Humphrey.

“The deepest thoughts are all commonplaces,” said Dalroy. “That is why I believe in Democracy, which is more than you do, you foul blood-stained old British Tory. And the deepest commonplace of all is that Vanitas Vanitatem, which is not pessimism but is really the opposite of pessimism. It is man’s futility that makes us feel he must be a god. And I think of this tunnel, and how the poor old lunatic walked about on this grass, watching it being built, the soul in him on fire with the future. And he saw the whole world changed and the seas thronged with his new shipping; and now,” and Dalroy’s voice changed and broke, “now there is good pasture for the donkey and it is very quiet here.”

“Yes,” said Pump, in some way that conveyed his knowledge that the Captain was thinking of other things also. The Captain went on dreamily:

“And I think about another Lord Ivywood recorded in history who also had a great vision. For it is a great vision after all, and though the man is a prig, he is brave. He also wants to drive a tunnel–between East and West–to make the Indian Empire more British; to effect what he calls the orientation of England, and I call the ruin of Christendom. And I am wondering just now whether the clear intellect and courageous will of a madman will be strong enough to burst and drive that tunnel, as everything seems to show at this moment that it will. Or whether there be indeed enough life and growth in your England to leave it at last as this is left, buried in English forests and wasted by an English sea.”

The silence fell between them again, and again there was only the slight sound the animal made in eating. As Dalroy had said, it was very quiet there.

But it was not quiet in Pebblewick that night; when the Riot Act was read, and all the people who had seen the sign-board outside fought all the people who hadn’t seen the sign-board outside; or when babies and scientists next morning, seeking for shells and other common objects of the sea-shore, found that their study included fragments of the outer clothing of Leveson and scraps of corrugated iron.

CHAPTER IX: THE HIGHER CRITICISM AND MR. HIBBS

PEBBLEWICK boasted an enterprising evening paper of its own, called “The Pebblewick Globe,” and it was the great vaunt of the editor’s life that he had got out an edition announcing the mystery of the vanishing sign-board, almost simultaneously with its vanishing. In the rows that followed sandwich men found no little protection from the blows indiscriminately given them behind and before, in the large wooden boards they carried inscribed:

CHAPTER X: THE CHARACTER OF QUOODLE

THERE lay about in Lord Ivywood’s numerous gardens, terraces, outhouses, stable yards and similar places, a dog that came to be called by the name of Quoodle. Lord Ivywood did not call him Quoodle. Lord Ivywood was almost physically incapable of articulating such sounds. Lord Ivywood did not care for dogs. He cared for the Cause of dogs, of course; and he cared still more for his own intellectual self-respect and consistency. He would never have permitted a dog in his house to be physically ill-treated; nor, for that matter, a rat; nor, for that matter, even a man. But if Quoodle was not physically ill-treated, he was at least socially neglected, and Quoodle did not like it. For dogs care for companionship more than for kindness itself.

Lord Ivywood would probably have sold the dog, but he consulted experts (as he did on everything he didn’t understand and many things that he did), and the impression he gathered from them was that the dog, technically considered, would fetch very little; mostly, it seemed, because of the mixture of qualities that it possessed. It was a sort of mongrel bull-terrier, but with rather too much of the bull-dog; and this fact seemed to weaken its price as much as it strengthened its jaw. His Lordship also gained a hazy impression that the dog might have been valuable as a watch-dog if it had not been able to follow game like a pointer; and that even in the latter walk of life it would always be discredited by an unfortunate talent for swimming as well as a retriever. But Lord Ivywood’s impressions may very well have been slightly confused, as he was probably thinking about the Black stone of Mecca, or some such subject at the moment. The victim of this entanglement of virtues, therefore, still lay about in the sunlight of Ivywood, exhibiting no general result of that entanglement except the most appalling ugliness.

Now Lady Joan Brett did appreciate dogs. It was the whole of her type and a great deal of her tragedy that all that was natural in her was still alive under all that was artificial; and she could smell hawthorn or the sea as far off as a dog can smell his dinner. Like most aristocrats she would carry cynicism almost to the suburbs of the city of Satan; she was quite as irreligious as Lord Ivywood, or rather more. She could be quite equally frigid or supercilious when she felt inclined. And in the great social talent of being tired, she could beat him any day of the week. But the difference remained in spite of her sophistries and ambitions; that her elemental communications were not cut, and his were. For her the sunrise was still the rising of a sun, and not the turning on of a light by a convenient cosmic servant. For her the Spring was really the Season in the country, and not merely the Season in town. For her cocks and hens were natural appendages to an English house; and not (as Lord Ivywood had proved to her from an encyclopaedia) animals of Indian origin, recently imported by Alexander the Great. And so for her a dog was a dog, and not one of the higher animals, nor one of the lower animals, nor something that had the sacredness of life, nor something that ought to be muzzled, nor something that ought not to be vivisected. She knew that in every practical sense proper provision would be made for the dog; as, indeed, provision was made for the yellow dogs in Constantinople by Abdul Hamid, whose life Lord Ivywood was writing for theProgressive Potentates series. Nor was she in the least sentimental about the dog or anxious to turn him into a pet. It simply came natural to her in passing to rub all his hair the wrong way and call him something which she instantly forgot.

The man who was mowing the garden lawn looked up for a moment, for he had never seen the dog behave in exactly that way before. Quoodle arose, shook himself, and trotted on in front of the lady, leading her up an iron side staircase, of which, as it happened, she had never made use before. It was then, most probably, that she first took any special notice of him; and her pleasure, like that which she took in the sublime prophet from Turkey, was of a humorous character. For the complex quadruped had retained the bow legs of the bull-dog; and, seen from behind, reminded her ridiculously of a swaggering little Major waddling down to his Club.

The dog and the iron stairway between them led her into a series of long rooms, one opening into the other. They formed part of what she had known in earlier days as the disused Wing of Ivywood House, which had been neglected or shut up, probably because it bore some defacements from the fancies of the mad ancestor, the memory of whom the present Lord Ivywood did not think helpful to his own political career. But it seemed to Joan that there were indications of a recent attempt to rehabilitate the place. There was a pail of whitewash in one of the empty rooms, a step-ladder in another, here and there a curtain rod, and at last, in the fourth room a curtain. It hung all alone on the old woodwork, but it was a very gorgeous curtain, being a kind of orange-gold relieved with wavy bars of crimson, which somehow seemed to suggest the very spirit and presence of serpents, though they had neither eyes nor mouths among them.

In the next of the endless series of rooms she came upon a kind of ottoman, striped with green and silver standing alone on the bare floor. She sat down on it from a mixed motive of fatigue and of impudence, for she dimly remembered a story which she had always thought one of the funniest in the world, about a lady only partly initiated in Theosophy who had been in the habit of resting on a similar object, only to discover afterward that it was a Mahatma, covered with his eastern garment and prostrate and rigid in ecstasy. She had no hopes of sitting on a Mahatma herself, but the very thought of it made her laugh, because it would make Lord Ivywood look such a fool. She was not sure whether she liked or disliked Lord Ivywood, but she felt quite certain that it would gratify her to make him look a fool. The moment she had sat down on the ottoman, the dog, who had been trotting beside her, sat down also, and on the edge of her skirt.

After a minute or two she rose (and the dog rose), and she looked yet farther down that long perspective of large rooms, in which men like Philip Ivywood forget that they are only men. The next was more ornate and the next yet more so; it was plain that the scheme of decoration that was in progress had been started at the other end. She could now see that the long lane ended in rooms that from afar off looked like the end of a kaleidoscope, rooms like nests made only from humming birds or palaces built of fixed fireworks. Out of this furnace of fragmentary colours she saw Ivywood advancing toward her, with his black suit and his white face accented by the contrast. His lips were moving, for he was talking to himself, as many orators do. He did not seem to see her, and she had to strangle a subconscious and utterly senseless cry, “He is blind!”

The next moment he was welcoming her intrusion with the well-bred surprise and rather worldly simplicity suitable to such a case, and Joan fancied she understood why his face had seemed a little bleaker and blinder than usual. It was by contrast. He was carrying clutched to his forefinger, as his ancestors might have carried a falcon clutched to the wrist, a small bright coloured semi-tropical bird, the expression of whose head, neck and eye was the very opposite of his own. Joan thought she had never seen a living creature with a head so lively and insulting. Its provocative eye and pointed crest seemed to be offering to fight fifty game-cocks. It was no wonder (she told herself) that by the side of this gaudy gutter-snipe with feathers Ivywood’s faint-coloured hair and frigid face looked like the hair and face of a corpse walking.

“You’ll never know what this is,” said Ivywood, in his most charming manner. “You’ve heard of him a hundred times and never had a notion of what he was. This is the Bulbul.”

“I never knew,” replied Joan. “I am afraid I never cared. I always thought it was something like a nightingale.”

“Ah, yes,” answered Ivywood, “but this is the real Bulbul peculiar to the East,Pycnonotus Haemorrhous. You are thinking ofDaulias Golzii.”

“I suppose I am,” replied Lady Joan with a faint smile. “It is an obsession. When shall I not be thinking of Daulias Galsworthy? Was it Galsworthy?” Then feeling quite touched by the soft austerity of her companion’s face, she caressed the gaudy and pugnacious bird with one finger and said, “It’s a dear little thing.”

The quadruped intimately called Quoodle did not approve of all this at all. Like most dogs, he liked to be with human beings when they were silent, and he extended a magnificent toleration to them as long as they were talking to each other. But conversational attention paid to any other animal at all remote from a mongrel bull-terrier wounded Mr. Quoodle in his most sensitive and gentlemanly feelings. He emitted a faint growl. Joan, with all the instincts that were in her, bent down and pulled his hair about once more, and felt the instant necessity of diverting the general admiration fromPycnonotus Haemorrhous. She turned it to the decoration at the end of the refurnished wing; for they had already come to the last of the long suite of rooms, which ended in some unfinished but exquisite panelling in white and coloured woods, inlaid in the oriental manner. At one corner the whole corridor ended by curving into a round turret chamber overlooking the landscape; and which Joan, who had known the house in childhood, was sure was an innovation. On the other hand a black gap, still left in the lower left-hand corner of the oriental woodwork, suddenly reminded her of something she had forgotten.

“Surely,” she said (after much mere aesthetic ecstasy), “there used to be a staircase there, leading to the old kitchen garden, or the old chapel or something.”

Ivywood nodded gravely. “Yes,” he said, “it did lead to the ruins of a Mediaeval Chapel, as you say. The truth is it led to several things that I cannot altogether consider a credit to the family in these days. All that scandal and joking about the unsuccessful tunnel (your mother may have told you of it), well, it did us no good in the County, I’m afraid; so as it’s a mere scrap of land bordering on the sea, I’ve fenced it off and let it grow wild. But I’m boarding up the end of the room here for quite another reason. I want you to come and see it.”

He led her into the round corner turret in which the new architecture ended, and Joan, with her thirst for the beautiful, could not stifle a certain thrill of beatitude at the prospect. Five open windows of a light and exquisite Saracenic outline looked out over the bronze and copper and purple of the Autumn parks and forests to the peacock colours of the sea. There was neither house nor living thing in sight, and, familiar as she had been with that coast, she knew she was looking out from a new angle of vision on a new landscape of Ivywood.

“You can write sonnets?” said Ivywood with something more like emotion in his voice than she had ever heard in it. “What comes first into your mind with these open windows?”

“I know what you mean,” said Joan after a silence. “The same hath oft …”

“Yes,” he said. “That is how I felt … of perilous seas in fairy lands forlorn.”

There was another silence and the dog sniffed round and round the circular turret chamber.

“I want it to be like that,” said Ivywood in a low and singularly moved intonation. “I want this to be the end of the house. I want this to be the end of the world. Don’t you feel that is the real beauty of all this eastern art; that it is coloured like the edges of things, like the little clouds of morning and the islands of the blest? Do you know,” and he lowered his voice yet more, “it has the power over me of making me feel as if I were myself absent and distant; some oriental traveller who was lost and for whom men were looking. When I see that greenish lemon yellow enamel there let into the white, I feel that I am standing thousands of leagues from where I stand.”

“You are right,” said Joan, looking at him with some wonder, “I have felt like that myself.”

“This art,” went on Ivywood as in a dream, “does indeed take the wings of the morning and abide in the uttermost parts of the sea. They say it contains no form of life, but surely we can read its alphabet as easily as the red hieroglyphics of sunrise and sunset which are on the fringes of the robe of God.”

“I never heard you talk like that before,” said the lady, and again stroked the vivid violet feathers of the small eastern bird.

Mr. Quoodle could stand it no longer. He had evidently formed a very low opinion of the turret chamber and of oriental art generally, but seeing Joan’s attention once more transferred to his rival, he trotted out into the longer room, and finding the gap in the woodwork which was soon to be boarded up, but which still opened on an old dark staircase, he went “galumphing” down the stairs.

Lord Ivywood gently placed the bird on the girl’s own finger, and went to one of the open windows, leaning out a little.

“Look here,” he said, “doesn’t this express what we both feel? Isn’t this the sort of fairy-tale house that ought to hang on the last wall of the world?”

And he motioned her to the window-sill, just outside which hung the bird’s empty cage, beautifully wrought in brass or some of the yellow metals.

“Why that is the best of all!” cried Lady Joan. “It makes one feel as if it really were the Arabian Nights. As if this were a tower of the gigantic Genii with turrets up to the moon; and this were an enchanted Prince caged in a golden palace suspended by the evening star.”

Something stirred in her dim but teeming subconsciousness, something like a chill or change like that by which we half know that weather has altered, or distant and unnoticed music suddenly ceased.

“Where is the dog?” she asked suddenly.

Ivywood turned with a mild, grey eye.

“Was there a dog here?” he asked.

“Yes,” said Lady Joan Brett, and gave him back the bird, which he restored carefully to its cage.

The dog after whom she inquired had in truth trundled down a dark, winding staircase and turned into the daylight, into a part of the garden he had never seen before; nor, indeed, had anybody else for some time past. It was altogether tangled and overgrown with weeds, and the only trace of human handiwork, the wreck of an old Gothic Chapel, stood waist high in numberless nettles and soiled with crawling fungoids. Most of these merely discoloured the grey crumbling stone with shades of bronze or brown; but some of them, particularly on the side farthest from the house, were of orange or purple tints almost bright enough for Lord Ivywood’s oriental decoration. Some fanciful eyes that fell on the place afterward found something like an allegory in those graven and broken saints or archangels feeding such fiery and ephemeral parasites as those toadstools like blood or gold. But Mr. Quoodle had never set himself up as an allegorist, and he merely trotted deeper and deeper into the grey-green English jungle. He grumbled very much at the thistles and nettles, much as a city man will grumble at the jostling of a crowd. But he continued to press forward, with his nose near the ground, as if he had already smelt something that interested him. And, indeed, he had smelt something in which a dog, except on special occasions, is much more interested than he is in dogs. Breaking through a last barrier of high and hoary purple thistles he came out on a semicircle of somewhat clearer ground, dotted with slender trees, and having, by way of back scene, the brown brick arch of an old tunnel. The tunnel was boarded up with a very irregular fence or mask made of motley wooden lathes, and looked, somehow, rather like a pantomime cottage. In front of this a sturdy man in very shabby shooting clothes was standing attending to a battered old frying-pan which he held over a rather irregular flame which, small as it was, smelt strongly of burnt rum. In the frying-pan, and also on the top of a cask or barrel that served for a table hard by, were a number of the grey, brown, and even orange fungi which were plastered over the stone angels and dragons of the fallen chapel.

“Hullo, old man,” said the person in the shooting jacket with tranquillity and without looking up from his cooking. “Come to pay us a visit? Come along then.” He flashed one glance at the dog and returned to the frying pan. “If your tail were two inches shorter, you’d be worth a hundred pounds. Had any breakfast?”

The dog trotted across to him and began nosing and sniffing round his dilapidated leather gaiters. The man did not interrupt his cookery, on which his eyes were fixed and both his hands were busy; but he crooked his knee and foot so as to caress the quadruped in a nerve under the angle of the jaw, the stimulation of which (as some men of science have held) is for a dog what a good cigar is for a man. At the same moment a huge voice like on ogre’s came from within the masked tunnel, calling out, “And who are ye talking to?”

A very crooked kind of window in the upper part of the pantomime cottage burst open and an enormous head, with erect, startling, and almost scarlet hair and blue eyes as big as a bullfrog’s, was thrust out above the scene.

“Hump,” cried the ogre. “Me moral counsels have been thrown away. In the last week I’ve sung you fourteen and a half songs of me own composition; instead of which you go about stealing dogs. You’re following in the path of Parson Whats-his-name in every way, I’m afraid.”

“No,” said the man with the frying pan, impartially, “Parson Whitelady struck a very good path for doubling on Pebblewick, that I was glad to follow. But I think he was quite silly to steal dogs. He was young and brought up pious. I know too much about dogs to steal one.”

“Well,” asked the large red-haired man, “and how do you get a dog like that?”

“I let him steal me,” said the person stirring the pan. And indeed the dog was sitting erect and even arrogant at his feet, as if he was a watch-dog at a high salary, and had been there before the building of the tunnel.

CHAPTER XI: VEGETARIANISM IN THE DRAWING-ROOM

THE Company that assembled to listen to the Prophet of the Moon, on the next occasion of his delivering any formal address, was much more select than the comparatively mixed and middle-class society of the Simple Souls. Miss Browning and her sister, Mrs. Mackintosh, were indeed present; for Lord Ivywood had practically engaged them both as private secretaries, and kept them pretty busy, too. There was also Mr. Leveson, because Lord Ivywood believed in his organizing power; and also Mr. Hibbs, because Mr. Leveson believed in his political judgment, whenever he could discover what it was. Mr. Leveson had straight, dark hair, and looked nervous. Mr. Hibbs had straight, fair hair, and also looked nervous. But the rest of the company were more of Ivywood’s own world, or the world of high finance with which it mixes both here and on the continent. Lord Ivywood welcomed, with something approaching to warmth, a distinguished foreign diplomatist, who was, indeed, none other than that silent German representative who had sat beside him in that last conference on the Island of the Olives. Dr. Gluck was no longer in his quiet, black suit, but wore an ornate, diplomatic uniform with a sword and Prussian, Austrian or Turkish Orders; for he was going on from Ivywood to a function at Court. But his curl of red lips, his screw of black mustache, and his unanswering almond eyes had no more changed than the face of a wax figure in a barber’s shop window.

The Prophet had also effected an improvement in his dress. When he had orated on the sands his costume, except for the fez, was the shabby but respectable costume of any rather unsuccessful English clerk. But now that he had come among aristocrats who petted their souls as they did their senses, there must be no such incongruity. He must be a proper, fresh-picked oriental tulip or lotus. So–he wore long, flowing robes of white, relieved here and there by flame-coloured threads of tracery, and round his head was a turban of a kind of pale golden green. He had to look as if he had come flying across Europe on the magic carpet, or fallen a moment before from his paradise in the moon.

The ladies of Lord Ivywood’s world were much as we have already found them. Lady Enid Wimpole still overwhelmed her earnest and timid face with a tremendous costume, that was more like a procession than a dress. It looked rather like the funeral procession of Aubrey Beardsley. Lady Joan Brett still looked like a very beautiful Spaniard with no illusions left about her castle in Spain. The large and resolute lady who had refused to ask any questions at Misysra’s earlier lecture, and who was known as Lady Crump, the distinguished Feminist, still had the air of being so full and bursting with questions fatal to Man as to have passed the speaking and reached the speechless stage of hostility. Throughout the proceedings she contributed nothing but bursting silence and a malevolent eye. And old Lady Ivywood, under the oldest and finest lace and the oldest and finest manners, had a look like death on her, which can often be seen in the parents of pure intellectuals. She had that face of a lost mother that is more pathetic than the face of a lost child.

“And what are you going to delight us with today?” Lady Enid was asking of the Prophet.

“My lecture,” answered Misysra, gravely, “is on the Pig.”

It was part of a simplicity really respectable in him that he never saw any incongruity in the arbitrary and isolated texts or symbols out of which he spun his thousand insane theories. Lady Enid endured the impact of this singular subject for debate without losing that expression of wistful sweetness which she wore on principle when talking to such people.

“The Pig, he is a large subject,” continued the Prophet, making curves in the air, as if embracing some particularly prize specimen. “He includes many subjects. It is to me very strange that the Christians should so laugh and be surprised because we hold ourselves to be defiled by pork; we and also another of the Peoples of the Book. But, surely, you Christians yourselves consider the pig as a manner of pollution; since it is your most usual expression of your despising, of your very great dislike. You say ‘swine,’ my dear lady; you do not say animals far more unpopular, such as the alligator.”

“I see,” said the lady, “how wonderful!”

“If you are annoyed,” went on the encouraged and excited gentleman, “if you are annoyed with anyone, with a–what you say?–a lady’s maid, you do not say to her ‘Horse.’ You do not say to her ‘Camel.’”

“Ah, no,” said Lady Enid, earnestly.

“‘Pig of a lady’s maid,’ you say in your colloquial English,” continued the Prophet, triumphantly. “And yet this great and awful Pig, this monster whose very name, when whispered, you think will wither all your enemies, you allow, my dear lady, to approach yet closer to you. You incorporate this great Pig in the substance of your own person.”

Lady Enid Wimpole was looking a little dazed at last, at this description of her habits, and Joan gave Lord Ivywood a hint that the lecturer had better be transferred to his legitimate sphere of lecturing. Ivywood led the way into a larger room that was full of ranked chairs, with a sort of lectern at the other end, and flanked on all four sides with tables laden with all kinds of refreshments. It was typical of the strange, half-fictitious enthusiasm and curiosity of that world, that one long table was set out entirely with vegetarian foods, especially of an eastern sort (like a table spread in the desert for a rather fastidious Indian hermit); but that tables covered with game patties, lobster and champagne were equally provided, and very much more frequented. Even Mr. Hibbs, who would honestly have thought entering a public-house more disgraceful than entering a brothel, could not connect any conception of disgrace with Lord Ivywood’s champagne.

For the purpose of the lecture was not wholly devoted to the great and awful Pig, and the purpose of the meeting even less. Lord Ivywood, the white furnace of whose mind was always full of new fancies hardening into ambitions, wanted to have a debate on the diet of East and West, and felt that Misysra might very appropriately open with an account of the Moslem veto on pork or other coarse forms of flesh food. He reserved it to himself to speak second.

The Prophet began, indeed, with some of his dizziest flights. He informed the Company that they, the English, had always gone in hidden terror and loathing of the Pig, as a sacred symbol of evil. He proved it by the common English custom of drawing a pig with one’s eyes shut. Lady Joan smiled, and yet she asked herself (in a doubt that had been darkening round her about many modern things lately) whether it was really much more fanciful than many things the scientists told her: as, the traces of Marriage by Capture which they found in that ornamental and even frivolous being, the Best Man.

He said that the dawn of greater enlightenment is shown in the use of the word “gammon,” which still expresses disgust at “the porcine image,” but no longer fear of it, but rather a rational disdain and disbelief. “Rowley,” said the Prophet, solemnly, and then after a long pause, “Powley,Gammon and Spinach.”

Lady Joan smiled again, but again asked herself if it was much more farfetched than a history book she had read, which proved the unpopularity of Catholicism in Tudor times from the word “hocus pocus.”

He got into a most amazing labyrinth of philology between the red primeval sins of the first pages of Genesis and the Common English word “ham.” But, again, Joan wondered whether it was much wilder than the other things she had heard said about Primitive Man by people who had never seen him.

He suggested that the Irish were set to keep pigs because they were a low and defiled caste, and the serfs of the pig-scorning Saxon; and Joan thought it was about as sensible as what the dear old Archdeacon had said about Ireland years ago; which had caused an Irishman of her acquaintance to play “the Shan Van Voght” and then smash the piano.

Joan Brett had been thoughtful for the last few days. It was partly due to the scene in the turret, where she had struck a sensitive and artistic side of Philip Ivywood she had never seen before, and partly to disturbing news of her mother’s health, which, though not menacing, made her feel hypothetically how isolated she was in the world. On all previous occasions she had merely enjoyed the mad lecturer now at the reading-desk. Today she felt a strange desire to analyse him, and imagine how a man could be so connected and so convinced and yet so wildly wide of the mark. As she listened carefully, looking at the hands in her lap, she began to think she understood.

The lecturer did really try to prove that the “porcine image” had never been used in English history or literature, except in contempt. And the lecturer really did know a very great deal about English history and literature: much more than she did; much more than the aristocrats round her did. But she noted that in every case what he knew was a fragmentary fact. In every case what he did not know was the truth behind the fact. What he did not know was the atmosphere. What he did not know was the tradition. She found herself ticking off the cases like counts in an indictment.

Misysra Ammon knew, what next to none of the English present knew, that Richard III was called a “boar” by an eighteenth century poet and a “hog” by a fifteenth century poet. What he did not know was the habit of sport and of heraldry. He did not know (what Joan knew instantly, though she had never thought of it before in her life) that beasts courageous and hard to kill are noble beasts, by the law of chivalry. Therefore, the boar was a noble beast, and a common crest for great captains. Misysra tried to show that Richard had only been called a pig after he was cold pork at Bosworth.

Misysra Ammon knew, what next to none of the English present knew, that there never was such a person as Lord Bacon. The phrase is a falsification of what should be Lord Verulam or Lord St. Albans. What he did not know was exactly what Joan did know (though it had never crossed her mind till that moment) that when all is said and done, a title is a sort of joke, while a surname is a serious thing. Bacon was a gentleman, and his name was Bacon; whatever titles he took. But Misysra seriously tried to prove that “Bacon” was a term of abuse applied to him during his unpopularity or after his fall.

Misysra Ammon knew, what next to none of the English present knew, that the poet Shelley had a friend called Hogg, who treated him on one occasion with grave treachery. He instantly tried to prove that the man was only called “Hogg” because he had treated Shelley with grave treachery. And he actually adduced the fact that another poet, practically contemporary, was called “Hogg” as completing the connection with Shelley. What he did not know was just what Joan had always known without knowing it: the kind of people concerned, the traditions of aristocrats like the Shelleys or of Borderers like the Ettrick Shepherd.

The lecturer concluded with a passage of impenetrable darkness about pig-iron and pigs of lead, which Joan did not even venture to understand. She could only say that if it did not mean that some day our diet might become so refined that we ate lead and iron, she could form no fancy of what it did mean.

“Can Philip Ivywood believe this kind of thing?” she asked herself; and even as she did so, Philip Ivywood rose.

He had, as Pitt and Gladstone had, an impromptu classicism of diction, his words wheeling and deploying into their proper places like a well-disciplined army in its swiftest advance. And it was not long before Joan perceived that the last phase of the picture, obscure and monstrous as it seemed, gave Ivywood exactly the opening he wanted. Indeed, she felt, no doubt, that he had arranged for it beforehand.

“It is within my memory,” said Lord Ivywood, “though it need in no case have encumbered yours, that when it was my duty to precede the admired lecturer whom I now feel it a privilege even to follow, I submitted a suggestion which, however simple, would appear to many paradoxical. I affirmed or implied the view that the religion of Mahomet was, in a peculiar sense, a religion of progress. This is so contrary, not only to historical convention but to common platitude, that I shall find no ground either of surprise or censure if it takes a perceptible time before it sinks into the mind of the English public. But I think, ladies and gentlemen, that this period is notably abbreviated by the remarkable exposition which we have heard today. For this question of the attitude of Islam toward food affords as excellent an example of its special mode of progressive purification as the more popular example of its attitude toward drink. For it illustrates that principle which I have ventured to call the principle of the Crescent: the principle of perpetual growth toward an implied and infinite perfection.

“The great religion of Islam does not of itself forbid the eating of flesh foods. But, in accordance with that principle of growth which is its life, it has pointed the way to a perfection not yet perhaps fully attainable by our nature; it has taken a plain and strong example of the dangers of meat-eating; and hung up the repellent carcass as a warning and a sign. In the gradual emergence of mankind from a gross and sanguinary mode of sustenance, the Semite has led the way. He has laid, as it were, a symbolic embargo upon the beast typical, the beast of beasts. With the instinct of the true mystic, he selected for exemption from such cannibal feasts the creature which appeals to both sides of the higher vegetarian ethic. The pig is at once the creature whose helplessness most moves our pity and whose ugliness most repels our taste.

“It would be foolish to affirm that no difficulty arises out of the different stages of moral evolution in which the different races find themselves. Thus it is constantly said, and such things are not said without some excuse in document or incident, that followers of the Prophet have specialised in the arts of war and have come into a contact, not invariably friendly, with those Hindoos of India who have specialised in the arts of Peace. In the same way the Hindoos, it must be confessed, have been almost as much in advance of Islam in the question of meat as Islam is in advance of Christianity in the matter of drink. It must be remembered again and again, ladies and gentlemen, that every allegation we have of any difference between Hindoo and Moslem comes through a Christian channel, and is therefore tainted evidence. But in this matter, even, can we not see the perils of disregarding such plain danger signals as the veto on pork? Did not an Empire nearly slip out of our hands because our hands were greased with cow-fat? And did not the well of Cawnpore brim with blood instead of water because we would not listen to the instinct of the Oriental about the shedding of sacred blood?

“But if it be proposed, with whatever graduation, to approach that repudiation of flesh food which Buddhism mainly and Islam partly recommends, it will always be asked by those who hate the very vision of Progress–‘Where do you draw the line? May I eat oysters? May I eat eggs? May I drink milk?’ You may. You may eat or drink anything essential to your stage of evolution, so long as you are evolving toward a clearer and cleaner ideal of bodily life. If,” he said gravely, “I may employ a phrase of flippancy, I would say that you may eat six dozen oysters today, but I should strongly advise five dozen oysters tomorrow. For how else has all progress in public or private manners been achieved? Would not the primitive cannibals be surprised at the strange distinction we draw between men and beasts? All historians pay high honour to the Huguenots, and the great Huguenot Prince, Henri Quatre. None need deny that his aspiration that every Frenchman should have a chicken in his pot was, for his period, a high aspiration. It is no disrespect to him that we, mounting to higher levels, and looking down longer perspectives, consider the chicken. And this august march of discovery passes figures higher than that of Henry of Navarre. I shall always give a high place, as Islam has always given a high place, to that figure, mythical or no, which we find presiding over the foundations of Christianity. I cannot doubt that the fable, incredible and revolting otherwise, which records the rush of swine into the sea, was an allegory of his early realisation that a spirit, evil indeed, does reside in all animals in so far as they tempt us to devour them. I cannot doubt that the Prodigal leaving his sins among the swine is another illustration of the great thesis of the Prophet of the Moon. But here, also, progress and relativity are relentless in their advance; and not a few of us may have risen today to the point of regretting that the joyful sounds around the return of the Prodigal should be marred by the moaning of a calf.

“For the rest, he who asks us whither we go knows not the meaning of Progress. If we come at last to live on light, as men said of the chameleon, if some cosmic magic closed to us now, as radium was but recently closed, allows us to transmute the very metals into flesh without breaking into the bloody house of life, we shall know these things when we have achieved them. It is enough for us now if we have reached a spiritual station, in which at least the living head we lop has not eyes to reproach us; and the herbs we gather cannot cry against our cruelty like the mandrake.”

Lord Ivywood resumed his seat, his colourless lips still moving. By some previous arrangement, probably, Mr. Leveson rose to move a motion about Vegetarianism. Mr. Leveson was of opinion that the Jewish and Moslem veto on pork had been the origin of Vegetarianism. He thought it was a great step, and showed how progressive the creed could be. He thought the persecution of the Hindoos by Moslems had probably been much exaggerated; he thought our experience in the Indian Mutiny showed we considered the feeling of Easterners too little in such matters. He thought Vegetarianism in some ways an advance on orthodox Christianity. He thought we must be ready for yet further advances; and he sat down. And as he had said precisely, clause by clause, everything that Lord Ivywood had said, it is needless to say that that nobleman afterward congratulated him on the boldness and originality of his brilliant speech.

At a similar sort of preconcerted signal, Hibbs However rose rather vaguely to his feet to second the motion. He rather prided himself on being a man of few words, in the vocal sense; he was no orator, as Brutus was. It was only with pen in hand, in an office lined with works of reference, that he could feel that sense of confused responsibility that was the one pleasure of his life. But on this occasion he was brighter than usual; partly because he liked being in a lord’s house; partly because he had never tasted champagne before, and he felt as if it agreed with him; partly because he saw in the subject of Progress an infinite opportunity of splitting hairs.

“Whatever,” said Hibbs, with a solemn cough, “whatever we may think of the old belief that Moslems have differed from Buddhism in a regrettable way, there can be no doubt the responsibility lay with the Christian Churches. Had the Free Churches put their foot down and met Messrs. Opalstein’s demand, we should have heard nothing of these old differences between one belief and another.” As it was, it reminded him of Napoleon. He gave his own opinion for what it was worth, but he was not afraid to say at any cost, even there and in that company, that this business of Asiatic vegetation had occupied less of the time of the Wesleyan Conference than it should have done. He would be the last to say, of course, that anyone was in any sense to blame. They all knew Dr. Coon’s qualifications. They all knew as well as he did, that a more strenuous social worker than Charles Chadder had never rallied the forces of progress. But that which was not really an indiscretion might be represented as an indiscretion, and perhaps we had had enough of that just lately. It was all very well to talk about Coffe but it should be remembered, with no disrespect to those in Canada to whom we owe so much, that all that happened before 1891. No one had less desire to offend our Ritualistic friends than he did, but he had no hesitation in saying that the question was a question that could be asked, and though no doubt, from one point of view the goat’s–.

Lady Joan moved sharply in her chair, as if gripped by sudden pain. And, indeed, she had suddenly felt the chronic and recurrent pain of her life. She was brave about bodily pain, as are most women, even luxurious women: but the torment that from time to time returned and tore her was one to which many philosophical names have been given, but no name so philosophical as Boredom.

She felt she could not stand a minute more of Mr. Hibbs. She felt she would die if she heard about the goats–from one or any point of view. She slipped from her chair and somehow slid round the corner, in pretence of seeking one of the tables of refreshment in the new wing. She was soon among the new oriental apartments, now almost completed; but she took no refreshments, though attenuated tables could still be found here and there. She threw herself on an ottoman and stared toward the empty and elfin turret chambers in which Ivywood had made her understand that he, also, could thirst for beauty and desire to be at peace. He certainly had a poetry of his own, after all; a poetry that never touched earth; the poetry of Shelley rather than Shakespeare. His phrase about the fairy turret was true: it did look like the end of the world. It did seem to teach her that there is always some serene limit at last.

She started and half rose on her elbow with a small laugh. A dog of ludicrous but familiar appearance came shuffling toward her and she lifted herself in the act of lifting him. She also lifted her head, and saw something that seemed to her, in a sense more Christian and catastrophic, very like the end of the world.

CHAPTER XII: VEGETARIANISM IN THE FOREST

HUMPHREY PUMP’S cooking of a fungus in an old frying-pan (which he had found on the beach) was extremely typical of him. He was, indeed, without any pretence of book-learning, a certain kind of scientific man that science has really been unfortunate in losing. He was the old-fashioned English Naturalist like Gilbert White or even Isaac Walton, who learned things not academically like an American Professor, but actually, like an American Indian. And every truth a man has found out as a man of science is always subtly different from any truth he has found out as a man, because a man’s family, friends, habits and social type have always got well under way before he has thoroughly learned the theory of anything. For instance, any eminent botanist at aSoirée of the Royal Society could tell you, of course, that other edible fungi exist, as well as mushrooms and truffles. But long before he was a botanist, still less an eminent botanist, he had begun, so to speak, on a basis of mushrooms and truffles. He felt, in a vague way, that these were really edible, that mushrooms were a moderate luxury, proper to the middle classes, while truffles were a much more expensive luxury, more suitable to the Smart Set. But the old English Naturalists, of whom Isaac Walton was perhaps the first, and Humphrey Pump perhaps the last, had in many cases really begun at the other end, and found by experience (often most disastrous experience) that some fungi are wholesome and some are not; but the wholesome ones are, on a whole, the majority. So a man like Pump was no more afraid of a fungus as such than he was of an animal as such. He no more started with the supposition that a grey or purple growth on a stone must be a poisonous growth than he started with the supposition that the dog who came to him out of the wood must be a mad dog. Most of them he knew; those he did not know he treated with rational caution, but to him, as a whole race, these weird-hued and one-legged goblins of the forests were creatures friendly to man.

“You see,” he said to his friend the Captain, “eating vegetables isn’t half bad, so long as you know what vegetables there are and eat all of them that you can. But there are two ways where it goes wrong among the gentry. First, they’ve never had to eat a carrot or a potato because it was all there was in the house; so they’ve never learnt how to be really hungry for carrots, as that donkey might be. They only know the vegetables that are meant to help the meat. They know you take duck and peas; and when they turn vegetarian they can only think of the peas without the duck. They know you take lobster in a salad; and when they turn vegetarian they can only think of the salad without the lobster. But the other reason is worse. There’s plenty of good people even round here, and still more in the north, who get meat very seldom. But then, when they do get it, they gobble it up like good ’uns. But the trouble with the gentry is different. The trouble is, the same sort of gentry that don’t want to eat meat don’t really want to eat anything. The man called a Vegetarian who goes to Ivywood House is generally like a cow trying to live on a blade of grass a day. You and I, Captain, have pretty well been vegetarians for some time, so as not to break into the cheese, and we haven’t found it so difficult, because we eat as much as we can.”

“It’s not so difficult as being teetotallers,” answered Dalroy, “so as not to break into the cask. But I’ll never deny that I feel the better for that, too, on the whole. But only because I could leave off being one whenever I chose. And, now I come to think of it,” he cried, with one of his odd returns of animal energy, “if I’m to be a vegetarian why shouldn’t I drink? Why shouldn’t I have a purely vegetarian drink? Why shouldn’t I take vegetables in their highest form, so to speak? The modest vegetarians ought obviously to stick to wine or beer, plain vegetarian drinks, instead of filling their goblets with the blood of bulls and elephants, as all conventional meat-eaters do, I suppose. What is the matter?”

“Nothing,” answered Pump. “I was looking out for somebody who generally turns up about this time. But I think I’m fast.”

“I should never have thought so from the look of you,” answered the Captain, “but what I’m saying is that the drinking of decent fermented liquor is just simply the triumph of vegetarianism. Why, it’s an inspiring idea! I could write a sort of song about it. As, for instance–

“You will find me drinking rum

Like a sailor in a slum,

You will find me drinking beer like a Bavarian;

You will find me drinking gin

In the lowest kind of inn,

Because I am a rigid Vegetarian.”

Why, it’s a vista of verbal felicity and spiritual edification! It has I don’t know how many hundred aspects! Let’s see; how could the second verse go? Something like–

“So I cleared the inn of wine,

And I tried to climb the Sign;

And I tried to hail the constable as ‘Marion’;

But he said I couldn’t speak,

And he bowled me to the Beak,

Because I was a Happy Vegetarian.”

“I really think something instructive to the human race may come out of all this … Hullo! Is that what you were looking for?”

The quadruped Quoodle came in out of the woods a whole minute later than the usual time and took his seat beside Humphrey’s left foot with a preoccupied air.

“Good old boy,” said the Captain. “You seem to have taken quite a fancy to us. I doubt, Hump, if he’s properly looked after up at the house. I particularly don’t want to talk against Ivywood, Hump. I don’t want his soul to be able in all eternity to accuse my soul of a mean detraction. I want to be fair to him, because I hate him like hell, and he has taken from me all for which I lived. But I don’t think, with all this in my mind, I don’t think I say anything beyond what he would own himself (for his brain is clear) when I say that he could never understand an animal. And so he could never understand the animal side of a man. He doesn’t know to this day, Hump, that your sight and hearing are sixty times quicker than his. He doesn’t know that I have a better circulation. That explains the extraordinary people he picks up and acts with; he never looks at them as you and I look at that dog. There was a fellow calling himself Gluck who was (mainly by Ivywood’s influence, I believe) his colleague on the Turkish Conferences, being supposed to represent Germany. My dear Hump, he was a man that a great gentleman like Ivywood ought not to have touched with a barge-pole. It’s not the race he was–if it was one race–it’s the Sort he was. A coarse, common, Levantine nark and eaves-dropper–but you mustn’t lose your temper, Hump. I implore you, Hump, to control this tendency to lose your temper when talking at any length about such people. Have recourse, Hump, to that consoling system of versification which I have already explained to you.

“Oh I knew a Doctor Gluck,

And his nose it had a hook,

And his attitudes were anything but Aryan;

So I gave him all the pork

That I had, upon a fork;

Because I am myself a Vegetarian.”

“If you are,” said Humphrey Pump, “You’d better come and eat some vegetables. The White Hat can be eaten cold–or raw, for that matter. But Bloodspots wants some cooking.”

“You are right, Hump,” said Dalroy, seating himself with every appearance of speechless greed. “I will be silent. As the poet says–

“I am silent in the Club,

I am silent in the pub,

I am silent on a bally peak in Darien;

For I stuff away for life,

Shoving peas in with a knife,

Because I am at heart a Vegetarian.”

He fell to his food with great gusto, dispatched a good deal of it in a very short time, threw a glance of gloomy envy at the cask, and then sprang to his feet again. He caught up the inn-sign from where it leant against the Pantomime Cottage, and planted it like a pike in the ground beside him. Then he began to sing again, in an even louder voice than before.

“O, Lord Ivywood may lop,

And his privilege is sylvan and riparian;

And is also free to top,

But–.”

“Do you know,” said Hump, also finishing his lunch, “that I’m rather tired of that particular tune?”

“Tired, is it?” said the indignant Irishman, “then I’ll sing you a longer song, to an even worse tune, about more and more vegetarians, and you shall see me dance as well; and I will dance till you burst into tears and offer me the half of your kingdom; and I shall ask for Mr. Leveson’s head on the frying-pan. For this, let me tell you, is a song of oriental origin, celebrating the caprices of an ancient Babylonian Sultan and should be performed in palaces of ivory with palm trees and a bulbul accompaniment.”

And he began to bellow another and older lyric of his own on vegetarianism.

“Nebuchadnezzar, the King of the Jews,

Suffered from new and original views,

He crawled on his hands and knees it’s said,

With grass in his mouth and a crown on his head,

With a wowtyiddly, etc.

“Those in traditional paths that trod,

Thought the thing was a curse from God;

But a Pioneer men always abuse,

Like Nebuchadnezzar the King of the Jews.”

Dalroy, as he sang this, actually began to dance about like a ballet girl, an enormous and ridiculous figure in the sunlight, waving the wooden sign around his head. Quoodle opened his eyes and pricked up his ears and seemed much interested in these extraordinary evolutions. Suddenly, with one of those startling changes that will transfigure the most sedentary dogs, Quoodle decided that the dance was a game, and began to bark and bound round the performer, sometimes leaping so far into the air as almost to threaten the man’s throat. But, though the sailor naturally knew less about dogs than the countryman, he knew enough about them (as about many other things) not to be afraid, and the voice he sang with might have drowned the baying of a pack.

“Black Lord Foulon the Frenchmen slew,

Thought it a Futurist thing to do;

He offered them grass instead of bread,

So they stuffed him with grass when they cut off his head.

With a wowtyiddly, etc.

“For the pride of his soul he perished then,

But of course it is always of Pride that men

A Man in Advance of his Age accuse

Like Nebuchadnezzar the King of the Jews.

“Simeon Scudder of Styx, in Maine,

Thought of the thing and was at it again;

He gave good grass and water in pails

To a thousand Irishmen hammering rails,

With a wowtyiddly, etc.

“Appetites differ, and tied to a stake,

He was tarred and feathered for Conscience Sake;

But stoning the prophets is ancient news,

Like Nebuchadnezzar the King of the Jews.”

In an abandon, unusual even for him, he had danced his way down through the thistles into the jungle of weeds risen round the sunken Chapel. And the dog, now fully convinced that it was not only a game but an expedition, perhaps a hunting expedition, ran barking in front of him, along the path that his own dog’s paws had already burst through the tangle. Before Patrick Dalroy well knew what he was doing, or even remembered that he still carried the ridiculous sign-board in his hand, he found himself outside the open porch of a sort of narrow tower at the angle of a building which, to the best of his recollection, he had never seen before. Quoodle instantly ran up four or five steps in the dark staircase inside, and then, lifting his ears again, looked back for his companion.

There is, perhaps, such a thing as asking too much of a man. If there is, it was asking too much of Patrick Dalroy to ask him not to accept so eccentric an invitation. Hurriedly plunging his unwieldy wooden ensign upright in the thick of thistles and grass, he bent his gigantic neck and shoulders to enter the porch, and proceeded to climb the stairs. It was quite dark, and it was only after at least two twists of the stone spiral that he saw light ahead of him, and then it was a sort of rent in the wall that seemed to him as ragged as the mouth of a Cornish cave. It was also so low that he had some difficulty in squeezing his bulk through it, but the dog had jumped through with an air of familiarity, and once more looked back to see him follow.

If he had found himself inside any ordinary domestic interior, he would instantly have repented his escapade and gone back. But he found himself in surroundings which he had never seen before, or even, in one sense, believed possible.

His first feeling was that he was walking in the most sealed and secret suite of apartments in the castle of a dream. All the chambers had that air of perpetually opening inwards which is the soul of the Arabian Nights. And the ornament was of the same tradition; gorgeous and flamboyant, yet featureless and stiff. A purple mansion seemed to be built inside a green mansion and a golden mansion inside that. And the quaintly cut doorways or fretted lattices all had wavy lines like a dancing sea, and for some reason (sea-sickness for all he knew) this gave him a feeling as if the place were beautiful but faintly evil: as if it were bored and twisted for the fallen palace of the Worm.

But he had also another sensation which he could not analyze; for it reminded him of being a fly on the ceiling or the wall. Was it the Hanging Gardens of Babylon coming back to his imagination; or the Castle East of the Sun and West of the Moon? Then he remembered that in some boyish illness he had stared at a rather Moorish sort of wall paper, which was like rows and rows of brightly coloured corridors, empty and going on forever. And he remembered that a fly was walking along one of the parallel lines; and it seemed to his childish fancy that the corridors were all dead in front of the fly, but all came to life as he passed.

“By George!” he cried, “I wonder whether that’s the real truth about East and West! That the gorgeous East offers everything needed for adventures except the man to enjoy them. It would explain the tradition of the Crusades uncommonly well. Perhaps that’s what God meant by Europe and Asia. We dress the characters and they paint the scenery. Well, anyhow, three of the least Asiatic things in the world are lost in this endless Asiatic palace–a good dog, a straight sword, and an Irishman.”

But as he went down this telescope of tropical colours he really felt something of that hard fatalistic freedom of the heroes (or should we say villains?) in the Arabian Nights. He was prepared for any impossibility. He would hardly have been surprised if from under the lid of one of the porcelain pots standing in a corner had come a serpentine string of blue or yellow smoke, as if some wizard’s oil were within. He would hardly have been surprised if from under the curtains or closed doors had crawled out a snaky track of blood, or if a dumb negro dressed in white had come out with a bow string, having done his work. He would not have been surprised if he had walked suddenly into the still chamber of some Sultan asleep, whom to wake was a death in torments. And yet he was very much more surprised by what he did see, and when he saw it, he was certain at last that he was only wandering in the labyrinth of his own brain. For what he saw was what was really in the core of all his dreams.

What he saw, indeed, was more appropriate to that inmost eastern chamber than anything he had imagined. On a divan of blood-red and orange cushions lay a startlingly beautiful woman, with a skin almost swarthy enough for an Arab’s, and who might well have been the Princess proper to such an Arabian tale. But in truth it was not her appropriateness to the scene, but rather her inappropriateness, that made his heart bound. It was not her strangeness but her familiarity that made his big feet suddenly stop.

The dog ran on yet more rapidly, and the princess on the sofa welcomed him warmly, lifting him on his short hind legs. Then she looked up, and seemed turned to stone.

“Bismillah,” said the oriental traveller, affably, “may your shadow never grow less–or more, as the ladies would say. The Commander of the Faithful has deputed his least competent slave to bring you back a dog. Owing to temporary delay in collecting the fifteen largest diamonds in the moon, he has been compelled to send the animal without any collar. Those responsible for the delay will instantly be beaten to death, with the tails of dragons–”

The frightful shock, which had not yet left the lady’s face, brought him back to responsible speech.

“In short,” he said, “in the name of the Prophet, dog. I say, Joan, I wish this wasn’t a dream.”

“It isn’t,” said the girl, speaking for the first time, “and I don’t know yet whether I wish it was.”

“Well,” argued the dreamer, rationally, “what are you, anytime, if you’re not a dream–or a vision? And what are all these rooms, if they aren’t a dream –or rather a nightmare?”

“This is the new wing of Ivywood House,” said the lady addressed as Joan, speaking with great difficulty. “Lord Ivywood has fitted them up in the eastern style; he is inside conducting a most interesting debate in defence of Eastern Vegetarianism. I only came out because the room was rather hot.”

“Vegetarian!” cried Dalroy, with abrupt and rather unreasonable exasperation. “That table seems to fall a bit short of Vegetarianism.” And he pointed to one of the long, narrow tables, laid somewhere in almost all the central rooms, and loaded with elaborate cold meats and expensive wines.

“He must be liberal-minded,” cried Joan, who seemed to be on the verge of something, possibly temper. “He can’t expect people suddenly to begin being Vegetarians when they’ve never been before.”

“It has been done,” said Dalroy, tranquilly, walking across to look at the table. “I say, your ascetical friends seem to have made a pretty good hole in the champagne. You may not believe it, Joan, but I haven’t touched what you call alcohol for a month.”

With which words he filled with champagne a large tumbler intended for claret cup and swallowed it at a draught.

Lady Joan Brett stood up straight but trembling.

“Now that’s really wrong, Pat,” she cried. “Oh, don’t be silly–you know I don’t care about the alcohol or all that. But you’re in the man’s house, uninvited, and he doesn’t know. That wasn’t like you.”

“He shall know, all right,” said the large man, quietly. “I know the exact price of a tumbler of that champagne.”

And he scribbled some words in pencil on the back of a bill of fare on the table, and then carefully laid three shillings on top of it.

“And there you do Philip the worst wrong of all,” cried Lady Joan, flaming white. “You know as well as I do, anyhow, that he would not take your money.” Patrick Dalroy stood looking at her for some seconds with an expression on his broad and unusually open face which she found utterly puzzling.

“Curiously enough,” he observed, at last, and with absolutely even temper, “curiously enough, it is you who are doing Philip Ivywood a wrong. I think him quite capable of breaking England or Creation. But I do honestly think he would never break his word. And what is more, I think the more arbitrary and literal his word had been, the more he would keep it. You will never understand a man like that, till you understand that he can have devotion to a definition; even a new definition. He can really feel about an amendment to an Act of Parliament, inserted at the last moment, as you feel about England or your mother.”

“Oh, don’t philosophise,” cried Joan suddenly. “Can’t you see this has been a shock?”

“I only want you to see the point,” he replied. “Lord Ivywood clearly told me, with his own careful lips, that I might go in and pay for fermented liquor in any place displaying a public sign outside. And he won’t go back on that definition or on any definition. If he finds me here, he may quite possibly put me in prison on some other charge, as a thief or a vagabond, or what not. But he will not grudge the champagne. And he will accept the three shillings. And I shall honour him for his glorious consistency.”

“I don’t understand,” said Joan, “one word of what you are talking about. Which way did you come? How can I get you away? You don’t seem to grasp that you’re in Ivywood House.”

“You see there’s a new name outside the gate,” observed Patrick, conversationally, and led the lady to the end of the corridor by which he had entered and into its ultimate turret chamber.

Following his indications, Lady Joan peered a little over the edge of the window where hung the brilliant purple bird in its brilliant golden cage. Almost immediately below, outside the entrance to the half-closed stairway, stood a wooden tavern sign, as solid and still as if it had been there for centuries.

“All back at the sign of ‘The Old Ship,’ you see,” said the Captain. “Can I offer you anything in a lady-like way?”

There was a vast impudence in the slight, hospitable movement of his hand, that disturbed Lady Joan’s features with an emotion other than any that she desired to show.

“Well!” cried Patrick, with a wild geniality, “I’ve made you laugh again, my dear.”

He caught her to him as in a whirlwind, and then vanished from the fairy turret like a blast, leaving her standing with her hand up to her wild black hair.

CHAPTER XIII: THE BATTLE OF THE TUNNEL

WHAT Joan Brett really felt, as she went back from the second tête-à-tête she had experienced in the turret, it is doubtful if anyone will ever know. But she was full of the pungent feminine instinct to “drive at practice,” and what she did clearly realise was the pencil writing Dalroy had left on the back of Lord Ivywood’smenu. Heaven alone knew what it was, and (as it pleased her profane temper to tell herself) she was not satisfied with Heaven alone knowing. She went swiftly back, with swishing skirts, to the table where it had been left. But her skirts fell more softly and her feet trailed slower and more in her usual manner as she came near the table. For standing at it was Lord Ivywood, reading the card with tranquil lowered eyelids, that set off perfectly the long and perfect oval of his face. He put down the card with a quite natural action; and, seeing Joan, smiled at her in his most sympathetic way.

“So you’ve come out too,” he said. “So have I; it’s really too hot for anything. Dr. Gluck is making an uncommonly good speech, but I couldn’t stop even for that. Don’t you think my eastern decorations are rather a success after all? A sort of Vegetarianism in design, isn’t it?”

He led her up and down the corridors, pointing out lemon-coloured crescents or crimson pomegranates in the scheme of ornament, with such utter detachment that they twice passed the open mouth of the hall of debate, and Joan could distinctly hear the voice of the diplomatic Gluck saying:

“Indeed, we owe our knowledge of the pollution of the pork primarily to the Jewth and not the Mothlemth. I do not thare that prejudithe against the Jewth, which ith too common in my family and all the arithtocratic and military Prutthian familieth. I think we Prutthian arithtocrats owe everything to the Jewth. The Jewth have given to our old Teutonic rugged virtueth, jutht that touch of refinement, jutht that intellectual thuperiority which–.”

And then the voice would die away behind, as Lord Ivywood lectured luxuriantly, and very well, on the peacock tail in decoration, or some more extravagant eastern version of the Greek Key. But the third time they turned, they heard the noise of subdued applause and the breaking up the meeting; and people came pouring forth.

With stillness and swiftness, Ivywood pitched on the people he wanted and held them. He button-holed Leveson and was evidently asking him to do something which neither of the two liked doing.

“If your lordship insists,” she heard Leveson whispering, “of course I will go myself; but there is a great deal to be done here with your lordship’s immediate matters. And if there were anyone else–.”

If Philip, Lord Ivywood, had ever looked at a human being in his life, he would have seen that J. Leveson, Secretary, was suffering from a very ancient human malady, excusable in all men and rather more excusable in one who has had his top-hat smashed over his eyes and has run for his life. As it was, he saw nothing, but merely said, “Oh, well, get someone else. What about your friend Hibbs?”

Leveson ran across to Hibbs, who was drinking another glass of champagne at one of the innumerable buffets.

“Hibbs,” said Leveson, rather nervously, “will you do Lord Ivywood a favour? He says you have so much tact. It seems possible that a man may be hanging about the grounds just below that turret there. He is a man it would certainly be Lord Ivywood’s public duty to put into the hands of the police, if he is there. But then, again, he is quite capable of not being there at all–I mean of having sent his message from somewhere else and in some other way. Naturally, Lord Ivywood doesn’t want to alarm the ladies and perhaps turn the laugh against himself, by getting up a sort of police raid about nothing. He wants some sensible, tactful friend of his to go down and look round the place–it’s a sort of disused garden–and report if there’s anyone about. I’d go myself, but I’m wanted here.”

Hibbs nodded, and filled another glass.

“But there’s a further difficulty,” went on Leveson. “He’s a clever brute, it seems, a ‘remarkable and a dangerous man,’ were his lordship’s words; and it looks as if he’d spotted a very good hiding-place, a disused tunnel leading to the sands, just beyond the disused garden and chapel. It’s a smart choice, you see, for he can bolt into the woods if anyone comes from the shore, or on to the shore if anyone comes from the woods. But it would take a good time even to get the police here, and it would take ten times longer to get ’em round to the sea end of the tunnel, especially as the sea comes up to the cliffs once or twice between here and Pebblewick. So we mustn’t frighten him away, or he’ll get a start. If you meet anyone down there talk to him quite naturally, and come back with the news. We won’t send for the police till you come. Talk as if you were just wandering like himself. His lordship wishes your presence to appear quite accidental.”

“Wishes my presence to appear quite accidental,” repeated Hibbs, gravely.

When the feverish Leveson had flashed off satisfied, Hibbs took a glass or two more of wine; feeling that he was going on a great diplomatic mission to please a lord. Then he went through the opening, picked his way down the stair, and somehow found his way out into the neglected garden and shrubbery.

It was already evening, and an early moon was brightening over the sunken chapel with its dragon-coloured scales of fungus. The night breeze was very fresh and had a marked effect on Mr. Hibbs. He found himself taking a meaningless pleasure in the scene; especially in one fungus that was white with brown spots. He laughed shortly, to think that it should be white with brown spots. Then he said, with carefully accurate articulation, “His lordship wishes my presence to appear quite accidental.” Then he tried to remember something else that Leveson had said.

He began to wade through the waves of weed and thorn past the Chapel, but he found the soil much more uneven and obstructive than he had supposed.

He slipped, and sought to save himself by throwing one arm round a broken stone angel at a corner of the heap of Gothic fragments; but it was loose and rocked in its socket.

Mr. Hibbs presented for a moment the appearance of waltzing with the Angel in the moonlight, in a very amorous and irreverent manner. Then the statue rolled over one way and he rolled over the other, and lay on his face in the grass, making inaudible remarks. He might have lain there for some time, or at least found some difficulty in rising, but for another circumstance. The dog Quoodle, with characteristic officiousness, had followed him down the dark stairs and out of the doorway, and, finding him in this unusual posture, began to bark as if the house were on fire.

This brought a heavy human footstep from the more hidden parts of the copse; and in a minute or two the large man with the red hair was looking down at him in undisguised wonder. Hibbs said, in a muffled voice which came obscurely from under his hidden face, “Wish my presence to appear quite accidental.”

“It does,” said the Captain, “can I help you up? Are you hurt?”

He gently set the prostrate gentleman on his feet, and looked genuinely concerned. The fall had somewhat sobered Lord Ivywood’s representative; and he really had a red graze on the left cheek that looked more ugly than it was.

“I am so sorry,” said Patrick Dalroy, cordially, “come and sit down in our camp. My friend Pump will be back presently, and he’s a capital doctor.”

His friend Pump may or may not have been a capital doctor, but the Captain himself was certainly a most inefficient one. So small was his talent for diagnosing the nature of a disease at sight, that having given Mr. Hibbs a seat on a fallen tree by the tunnel, he proceeded to give him (in mere automatic hospitality) a glass of rum.

Mr. Hibbs’s eyes awoke again, when he had sipped it, but they awoke to a new world.

“Wharever may be our invidual pinions,” he said, and looked into space with an expression of humorous sagacity.

He then put his hand hazily in his pocket, as if to find some letter he had to deliver. He found nothing but his old journalistic note book, which he often carried when there was a chance of interviewing anybody. The feel of it under his fingers changed the whole attitude of his mind. He took it out and said:

“And wha’ would you say of Vegetarianism, Colonel Pump?”

“I think it palls,” replied the recipient of this complex title, staring.

“Sha’ we say,” asked Hibbs brightly, turning a leaf in his note book, “sha’ we say long been strong vegetarian by conviction?”

“No; I have only once been convicted,” answered Dalroy, with restraint, “and I hope to lead a better life when I come out.”

“Hopes lead better life,” murmured Hibbs, writing eagerly, with the wrong end of his pencil. “And wha’ would you shay was best vegable food for really strong vegetarian by conviction?”

“Thistles,” said the Captain, wearily. “But I don’t know much about it, you know.”

“Lord Ivywoo’ strong veg’tarian by conviction,” said Mr. Hibbs, shaking his head with unction. “Lord Ivywoo’ says tact. Talk to him naturally. And so I do. That’s what I do. Talk to him naturally.”

Humphrey Pump came through the clearer part of the wood, leading the donkey, who had just partaken of the diet recommended to a vegetarian by conviction; the dog sprang up and ran to them. Pump was, perhaps, the most naturally polite man in the world, and said nothing. But his eyes had accepted, with one snap of surprise, the other fact, also not unconnected with diet, which had escaped Dalroy’s notice when he administered rum as a restorative.

“Lord Ivywoo’ says,” murmured the journalistic diplomatist. “Lord Ivywoo’ says, ‘talk as if you were just wandering.’ That’s it. That’s tact. That’s what I’ve got to do–talk as if I was just wandering. Long way round to other end tunnel; sea and cliffs. Don’ sphose they can swim.” He seized his note book again and looked in vain for his pencil. “Good subjec’ correspondence. Can policem’n swim?”

“Policemen?” said Dalroy, in a dead silence. The dog looked up, and the innkeeper did not.

“Get to Ivywoo’ one thing,” reasoned the diplomatist. “Get policemen beach other end other thing. No good do one thing no’ do other thing, ’no goo’ do other thing no’ do other thing. Wish my presence appear quite accidental. Haw!”

“I’ll harness the donkey,” said Pump.

“Will he go through that door?” asked Dalroy, with a gesture toward the entrance of the rough boarding with which they had faced the tunnel, “or shall I smash it all at once?”

“He’ll go through all right,” answered Pump. “I saw to that when I made it. And I think I’ll get him to the safe end of the tunnel before I load him up. The best thing you can do is to pull up one of those saplings to bar the door with. That’ll delay them a minute or two; though I think we’ve got warning in pretty easy time.”

He led his donkey to the cart, and carefully harnessed the donkey; like all men cunning in the old healthy sense he knew that the last chance of leisure ought to be leisurely, in order that it may be lucid. Then he led the whole equipment through the temporary wooden door of the tunnel, the inquisitive Quoodle, of course, following at his heels.

“Excuse me if I take a tree,” said Dalroy, politely, to his guest, like a man reaching across another man for a match. And with that he rent up a young tree by its roots, as he had done in the Island of the Olives, and carried it on his shoulder, like the club of Hercules.

CHAPTER XIV: THE CREATURE THAT MAN FORGETS

DESPITE the natural hubbub round the wound of Lord Ivywood and the difficulties of the police in finding their way to the shore, the fugitives of the Flying Inn must almost certainly have been captured but for a curious accident, which also flowed, as it happened, from the great Ivywood debate on Vegetarianism.

The comparatively late hour at which Lord Ivywood had made his discovery had been largely due to a very long speech which Joan had not heard, and which was delivered immediately before the few concluding observations she had heard from Dr. Gluck. The speech was made by an eccentric, of course. Most of those who attended, and nearly all of those who talked, were eccentric in one way or another. But he was an eccentric of great wealth and good family, an M.P., a J.P., a relation of Lady Enid, a man well known in art and letters; in short, a personality who could not be prevented from being anything he chose, from a revolutionist to a bore. Dorian Wimpole had first become famous outside his own class under the fanciful title of the Poet of the Birds. A volume of verse, expanding the several notes or cries of separate song-birds into fantastic soliloquies of these feathered philosophers, had really contained a great deal of ingenuity and elegance. Unfortunately, he was one of those who always tend to take their own fancies seriously, and in whose otherwise legitimate extravagance there is too little of the juice of jest. Hence, in his later works, when he explained “The Fable of the Angel,” by trying to prove that the fowls of the air were creatures higher than man or the anthropoids, his manner was felt to be too austere; and when he moved an amendment to Lord Ivywood’s scheme for the model village called Peaceways, urging that its houses should all follow the more hygienic architecture of nests hung in trees, many regretted that he had lost his light touch. But, when he went beyond birds and filled his poems with conjectural psychology about all the Zoological Gardens, his meaning became obscure; and Lady Susan had even described it as his bad period. It was all the more uncomfortable reading because he poured forth the imaginary hymns, love-songs and war-songs of the lower animals, without a word of previous explanation. Thus, if someone seeking for an ordinary drawing-room song came on lines that were headed “A Desert Love Song,” and which began–

“Her head is high against the stars,

Her hump is heaved in pride,”

the compliment to the lady would at first seem startling, until the reader realised that all the characters in the idyll were camels. Or, if he began a poem simply entitled, “The March of Democracy,” and found in the first lines–

“Comrades, marching evermore,

Fix your teeth in floor and door,”

he might be doubtful about such a policy for the masses; until he discovered that it was supposed to be addressed by an eloquent and aspiring rat to the social solidarity of his race. Lord Ivywood had nearly quarrelled with his poetic relative over the uproarious realism of the verses called “A Drinking Song,” until it was carefully explained to him that the drink was water, and that the festive company consisted of bisons. His vision of the perfect husband, as it exists in the feelings of the young female walrus, is thoughtful and suggestive; but would doubtless receive many emendations from anyone who had experienced those feelings. And in his sonnet called “Motherhood” he has made the young scorpion consistent and convincing, yet somehow not wholly lovable. In justice to him, however, it should be remembered that he attacked the most difficult cases on principle, declaring that there was no earthly creature that a poet should forget.

He was of the blond type of his cousin, with flowing fair hair and mustache, and a bright blue, absent-minded eye; he was very well dressed in the carefully careless manner, with a brown velvet jacket and the image on his ring of one of those beasts men worshipped in Egypt.

His speech was graceful and well worded and enormously long, and it was all about an oyster. He passionately protested against the suggestion of some humanitarians who were vegetarians in other respects, but maintained that organisms so simple might fairly be counted as exceptions. Man, he said, even at his miserable best, was always trying to excommunicate some one citizen of the cosmos, to forget some one creature that he should remember. Now, it seemed that creature was the oyster. He gave a long account of the tragedy of the oyster, a really imaginative and picturesque account; full of fantastic fishes, and coral crags crawling and climbing, and bearded creatures streaking the seashore and the green darkness in the cellars of the sea.

“What a horrid irony it is,” he cried, “that this is the only one of the lower creatures whom we call a Native! We speak of him, and of him alone as if he were a native of the country. Whereas, indeed, he is an exile in the universe. What can be conceived more pitiful than the eternal frenzy of the impotent amphibian? What is more terrible than the tear of an oyster? Nature herself has sealed it with the hard seal of eternity. The creature man forgets bears against him a testimony that cannot be forgotten. For the tears of widows and of captives are wiped away at last like the tears of children. They vanish like the mists of morning or the small pools after a flood. But the tear of the oyster is a pearl.”

The Poet of the Birds was so excited with his own speech that, after the meeting, he walked out with a wild eye to the motor car, which had been long awaiting him, the chauffeur giving some faint signs of relief.

“Toward home, for the present,” said the poet, and stared at the moon with an inspired face.

He was very fond of motoring, finding it fed him with inspirations; and he had been doing it from an early hour that morning, having enjoyed a slightly lessened sleep. He had scarcely spoken to anybody until he spoke to the cultured crowd at Ivywood. He did not wish to speak to anyone for many hours yet. His ideas were racing. He had thrown on a fur coat over his velvet jacket, but he let it fly open, having long forgotten the coldness in the splendour of the moonstruck night. He realised only two things: the swiftness of his car and the swiftness of his thoughts. He felt, as it were, a fury of omniscience; he seemed flying with every bird that sped or spun above the woods, with every squirrel that had leapt and tumbled within them, with every tree that had swung under and sustained the blast.

Yet in a few moments he leaned forward and tapped the glass frontage of the car, and the chauffeur suddenly squaring his shoulders, jarringly stopped the wheels. Dorian Wimpole had just seen something in the clear moonlight by the roadside, which appealed both to this and to the other side of his tradition; something that appealed to Wimpole as well as to Dorian.

Two shabby looking men, one in tattered gaiters and the other in what looked like the remains of fancy dress with the addition of hair, of so wild a red that it looked like a wig, were halted under the hedge, apparently loading a donkey cart. At least two rounded, rudely cylindrical objects, looking more or less like tubs, stood out in the road beside the wheels, along with a sort of loose wooden post that lay along the road beside them. As a matter of fact, the man in the old gaiters had just been feeding and watering the donkey, and was now adjusting its harness more easily. But Dorian Wimpole naturally did not expect that sort of thing from that sort of man. There swelled up in him the sense that his omnipotence went beyond the poetical; that he was a gentleman, a magistrate, an M.P. and J.P., and so on. This callousness or ignorance about animals should not go on while he was a J.P.; especially since Ivywood’s last Act. He simply strode across to the stationary cart and said:

“You are overloading that animal, and it is forfeited. And you must come with me to the police station.”

Humphrey Pump, who was very considerate to animals, and had always tried to be considerate to gentlemen, in spite of having put a bullet into one of their legs, was simply too astounded and distressed to make any answer at all. He moved a step or two backward and stared with brown, blinking eyes at the poet, the donkey, the cask, the cheese, and the sign-board lying in the road.

But Captain Dalroy, with the quicker recovery of his national temperament, swept the poet and magistrate a vast fantastic bow and said with agreeable impudence, “interested in donkeys, no doubt?”

“I am interested in all things men forget,” answered the poet, with a fine touch of pride, “but mostly in those like this, that are most easily forgotten.”

Somehow from those two first sentences Pump realised that these two eccentric aristocrats had unconsciously recognised each other. The fact that it was unconscious seemed, somehow, to exclude him all the more. He stirred a little the moonlit dust of the road with his rather dilapidated boots and eventually strolled across to speak to the chauffeur.

“Is the next police station far from here?” he asked.

The chauffeur answered with one syllable of which the nearest literal rendering is “dno.” Other spellings have been attempted, but the sentiment expressed is that of agnosticism.

But something of special brutality of abbreviation made the shrewd, and therefore sensitive, Mr. Pump look at the man’s face. And he saw it was not only the moonlight that made it white.

With that dumb delicacy that was so English in him, Pump looked at the man again, and saw he was leaning heavily on the car with one arm, and saw that the arm was shaking. He understood his countrymen enough to know that whatever he said he must say in a careless manner.

“I hope it’s nearer to your place. You must be a bit done up.”

“Oh hell!” said the driver and spat on the road.

Pump was sympathetically silent, and Mr. Wimpole’s chauffeur broke out incoherently, as if in another place.

“Blarsted beauties o’ dibrike and no breakfast. Blarsted lunch Hivywood and no lunch. Blarsted black everlastin’ hours artside while ’e ’as ’is cike an’ champine. And then it’s a dornkey.”

“You don’t mean to say,” said Pump in a very serious voice, “that you’ve had no food today?”

“Ow no!” replied the cockney, with the irony of the deathbed. “Ow, of course not.”

Pump strolled back into the road again, picked up the cheese in his left hand, and landed it on the seat beside the driver. Then his right hand went to one of his large loose equivocal pockets, and the blade of a big jack-knife caught and recaught the steady splendours of the moon.

The driver stared for several instants at the cheese, with the knife shaking in his hand. Then he began to hack it, and in that white witchlike light the happiness of his face was almost horrible.

Pump was wise in all such things, and knew that just as a little food will sometimes prevent sheer intoxication, so a little stimulant will sometimes prevent sudden and dangerous indigestion. It was practically impossible to make the man stop eating cheese. It was far better to give him a very little of the rum, especially as it was very good rum, and better than anything he could find in any of the public-houses that were still permitted. He walked across the road again and picked up the small cask, which he put on the other side of the cheese and from which he filled, in his own manner, the little cup he carried in his pocket.

But at the sight of this the cockney’s eyes lit at once with terror and desire.

“But yer cawnt do it,” he whispered hoarsely, “its the pleece. It’s gile for that, with no doctor’s letter nor sign-board nor nothink.”

Mr. Humphrey Pump made yet another march back into the road. When he got there he hesitated for the first time, but it was quite clear from the attitude of the two insane aristocrats who were arguing and posturing in the road that they would notice nothing except each other. He picked the loose post off the road and brought it to the car, humorously propping it erect in the aperture between keg and cheese.

The little glass of rum was wavering in the poor chauffeur’s hand exactly as the big knife had done, but when he looked up and actually saw the wooden sign above him, he seemed not so much to pluck up his courage, but rather to drag up some forgotten courage from the foundations of some unfathomable sea. It was indeed the forgotten courage of the people.

He looked once at the bleak, black pinewoods around him and took the mouthful of golden liquid at a gulp, as if it were a fairy potion. He sat silent; and then, very slowly, a sort of stony glitter began to come into his eyes. The brown and vigilant eyes of Humphrey Pump were studying him with some anxiety or even fear. He did look rather like a man enchanted or turned to stone. But he spoke very suddenly.

“The blighter!” he said. “I’ll give ’im ’ell. I’ll give ’im bleeding ’ell. I’ll give ’im somethink wot ’e don’t expect.”

“What do you mean?” asked the inn-keeper.

“Why,” answered the chauffeur, with abrupt composure, “I’ll give ’im a little dornkey.”

Mr. Pump looked troubled. “Do you think,” he observed, affecting to speak lightly, “that he’s fit to be trusted even with a little donkey?”

“Ow, yes,” said the man. “He’s very amiable with donkeys, and donkeys we is to be amiable with ’im.”

Pump still looked at him doubtfully, appearing or affecting not to follow his meaning. Then he looked equally anxiously across at the other two men; but they were still talking. Different as they were in every other way, they were of the sort who forget everything, class, quarrel, time, place and physical facts in front of them, in the lust of lucid explanation and equal argument.

Thus, when the Captain began by lightly alluding to the fact that after all it was his donkey, since he had bought it from a tinker for a just price, the police station practically vanished from Wimpole’s mind–and I fear the donkey-cart also. Nothing remained but the necessity of dissipating the superstition of personal property.

“I own nothing,” said the poet, waving his hands outward, “I own nothing save in the sense that I own everything. All depends whether wealth or power be used for or against the higher purposes of the cosmos.”

“Indeed,” replied Dalroy, “and how does your motor car serve the higher purposes of the cosmos?”

“It helps me,” said Mr. Wimpole, with honourable simplicity, “to produce my poems.”

“And if it could be used for some higher purpose (if such a thing could be), if some new purpose had come into the cosmos’s head by accident,” inquired the other, “I suppose it would cease to be your property.”

“Certainly,” replied the dignified Dorian. “I should not complain. Nor have you any title to complain when the donkey ceases to be yours when you depress it in the cosmic scale.”

“What makes you think,” asked Dalroy, “that I wanted to depress it?”

“It is my firm belief,” replied Dorian Wimpole, sternly, “that you wanted to ride on it” (for indeed the Captain had once repeated his playful gesture of putting his large leg across). “Is not that so?”

“No,” answered the Captain, innocently, “I never ride on a donkey. I’m afraid of it.”

“Afraid of a donkey!” cried Wimpole, incredulously.

“Afraid of an historical comparison,” said Dalroy.

There was a short pause, and Wimpole said coolly enough, “Oh, well, we’ve outlived those comparisons.”

“Easily,” answered the Irish Captain. “It is wonderful how easily one outlives someone else’s crucifixion.”

“In this case,” said the other grimly, “I think it is the donkey’s crucifixion.”

“Why, you must have drawn that old Roman caricature of the crucified donkey,” said Patrick Dalroy, with an air of some wonder. “How well you have worn; why, you look quite young! Well, of course, if this donkey is crucified, he must be uncrucified. But are you quite sure,” he added, very gravely, “that you know how to uncrucify a donkey? I assure you it’s one of the rarest of human arts. All a matter of knack. It’s like the doctors with the rare diseases, you know; the necessity so seldom arises. Granted that, by the higher purposes of the cosmos, I am unfit to look after this donkey, I must still feel a faint shiver of responsibility in passing him on to you. Will you understand this donkey? He is a delicate-minded donkey. He is a complex donkey. How can I be certain that, on so short an acquaintance, you will understand every shade of his little likes and dislikes?”

The dog Quoodle, who had been sitting as still as the sphinx under the shadow of the pine trees, waddled out for an instant into the middle of the road and then returned. He ran out when a slight noise as of rotatory grinding was heard; and ran back when it had ceased. But Dorian Wimpole was much too keen on his philosophical discovery to notice either dog or wheel.

“I shall not sit on its back, anyhow,” he said proudly, “but if that were all it would be a small matter. It is enough for you that you have left it in the hands of the only person who could really understand it; one who searches the skies and seas so as not to neglect the smallest creature.”

“This is a very curious creature,” said the Captain, anxiously, “he has all sorts of odd antipathies. He can’t stand a motor car, for instance, especially one that throbs like that while it’s standing still. He doesn’t mind a fur coat so much, but if you wear a brown velvet jacket under it, he bites you. And you must keep him out of the way of a certain kind of people. I don’t suppose you’ve met them; but they always think that anybody with less than two hundred a year is drunk and very cruel, and that anybody with more than two thousand a year is conducting the Day of Judgment. If you will keep our dear donkey from the society of such persons–Hullo! Hullo! Hullo!”

He turned in genuine disturbance, and dashed after the dog, who had dashed after the motor car and jumped inside. The Captain jumped in after the dog, to pull him out again. But before he could do so, he found the car was flying along too fast for any such leap. He looked up and saw the sign of “The Old Ship” erect in the front like a rigid banner; and Pump, with his cask and cheese, sitting solidly beside the driver.

The thing was more of an earthquake and transformation to him even than to any of the others; but he rose waveringly to his feet and shouted out to Wimpole.

“You’ve left it in the right hands. I’ve never been cruel to a motor.”

In the moonlight of the magic pine-wood far behind, Dorian and the donkey were left looking at each other.

To the mystical mind, when it is a mind at all (which is by no means always the case), there are no two things more impressive and symbolical than a poet and a donkey. And the donkey was a very genuine donkey, and the poet was a very genuine poet; however lawfully he might be mistaken for the other animal at times. The interest of the donkey in the poet will never be known. The interest of the poet in the donkey was perfectly genuine; and survived even that appalling private interview in the owlish secrecy of the woods.

But I think even the poet would have been enlightened if he had seen the white, set, frantic face of the man on the driver’s seat of his vanishing motor. If he had seen it he might have remembered the name, or, perhaps, even begun to understand the nature of a certain animal which is neither the donkey nor the oyster; but the creature whom man has always found it easiest to forget, since the hour he forgot God in a Garden.

CHAPTER XV: THE SONGS OF THE CAR CLUB

MORE than once as the car flew through black and silver fairylands of fir wood and pine wood, Dalroy put his head out of the side window and remonstrated with the chauffeur without effect. He was reduced at last to asking him where he was going.

“I’m goin’ ’ome,” said the driver in an undecipherable voice. “I’m a goin’ ’ome to my mar.”

“And where does she live?” asked Dalroy, with something more like diffidence than he had ever shown before in his life.

“Wiles,” said the man, “but I ain’t seen ’er since I was born. But she’ll do.”

“You must realise,” said Dalroy, with difficulty, “that you may be arrested–it’s the man’s own car; and he’s left behind with nothing to eat, so to speak.”

“’E’s got ’is dornkey,” grunted the man. “Let the stinker eat ’is dornkey, with thistle sauce. ’E would if ’e was as ’ollow as I was.”

Humphrey Pump opened the glass window that separated him from the rear part of the car, and turned to speak to his friend over his square elbow and shoulder.

“I’m afraid,” he said, “he won’t stop for anything just yet. He’s as mad as Moody’s aunt, as they say.”

“Do they say it?” asked the Captain, with a sort of anxiety. “They never said it in Ithaca.”

“Honestly, I think you’d better leave him alone,” answered Pump, with his sagacious face. “He’d just run us into a Scotch Express like Dandy Mutton did, when they said he was driving carelessly. We can send the car back to Ivywood somehow later on, and really, I don’t think it’ll do the gentleman any harm to spend a night with a donkey. The donkey might teach him something, I tell you.”

“It’s true he denied the Principle of Private Property,” said Dalroy, reflectively, “but I fancy he was thinking of a plain house fixed on the ground. A house on wheels, such as this, he might perhaps think a more permanent possession. But I never understand it;” and again he passed a weary palm across his open forehead. “Have you ever noticed, Hump, what is really odd about those people?”

The car shot on amid the comfortable silence of Pump, and then the Irishman said again:

“That poet in the pussy-cat clothes wasn’t half bad. Lord Ivywood isn’t cruel; but he’s inhuman. But that man wasn’t inhuman. He was ignorant, like most cultured fellows. But what’s odd about them is that they try to be simple and never clear away a single thing that’s complicated. If they have to choose between beef and pickles, they always abolish the beef. If they have to choose between a meadow and a motor, they forbid the meadow. Shall I tell you the secret? These men only surrender the things that bind them to other men. Go and dine with a temperance millionaire and you won’t find he’s abolished thehors d’oeuvres or the five courses or even the coffee. What he’s abolished is the port and sherry, because poor men like that as well as rich. Go a step farther, and you won’t find he’s abolished the fine silver forks and spoons, but he’s abolished the meat, because poor men like meat–when they can get it. Go a step farther, and you won’t find he goes without gardens or gorgeous rooms, which poor men can’t enjoy at all. But you will find he boasts of early rising, because sleep is a thing poor men can still enjoy. About the only thing they can still enjoy. Nobody ever heard of a modern philanthropist giving up petrol or typewriting or troops of servants. No, no! What he gives up must be some simple and universal thing. He will give up beef or beer or sleep–because these pleasures remind him that he is only a man.”

Humphrey Pump nodded, but still answered nothing; and the voice of the sprawling Dalroy took one of its upward turns of a sort of soaring flippancy; which commonly embodied itself in remembering some song he had composed.

“Such,” he said, “was the case of the late Mr. Mandragon, so long popular in English aristocratic society as a bluff and simple democrat from the West, until he was unfortunately sand-bagged by six men whose wives he had had shot by private detectives, on his incautiously landing on American soil.

“Mr. Mandragon the Millionaire, he wouldn’t have wine or wife,

He couldn’t endure complexity; he lived the simple life;

He ordered his lunch by megaphone in manly, simple tones,

And used all his motors for canvassing voters, and twenty telephones;

Besides a dandy little machine,

Cunning and neat as ever was seen,

With a hundred pulleys and cranks between,

Made of iron and kept quite clean,

To hoist him out of his healthful bed on every day of his life,

And wash him and brush him and shave him and dress him to live the Simple Life.

“Mr. Mandragon was most refined and quietly, neatly dressed,

Say all the American newspapers that know refinement best;

Quiet and neat the hair and hat, and the coat quiet and neat,

A trouser worn upon either leg, while boots adorned the feet;

And not, as anyone might expect,

A Tiger Skin, all striped and specked,

And a Peacock Hat with the tail erect,

A scarlet tunic with sunflowers decked–

That might have had a more marked effect,

And pleased the pride of a weaker man that yearned for wine or wife;

But fame and the flagon for Mr. Mandragon obscured the Simple Life.

“Mr. Mandragon the Millionaire, I am happy to say, is dead.

He enjoyed a quiet funeral in a crematorium shed,

And he lies there fluffy and soft and grey and certainly quite refined,

When he might have rotted to flowers and fruit with Adam and all mankind.

Or been eaten by bears that fancy blood,

Or burnt on a big tall tower of wood,

In a towering flame as a heathen should,

Or even sat with us here at food,

Merrily taking twopenny rum and cheese with a pocket knife,

But these were luxuries lost for him that lived for the Simple Life.”

Mr. Pump had made many attempts to arrest this song, but they were as vain as all attempts to arrest the car. The angry chauffeur seemed, indeed, rather inspired to further energy by the violent vocal noises behind; and Pump again found it best to fall back on conversation.

“Well, Captain,” he said, amicably. “I can’t quite agree with you about those things. Of course, you can trust foreigners too much as poor Thompson did; but then you can go too far the other way. Aunt Sarah lost a thousand pounds that way. I told her again and again he wasn’t a nigger, but she wouldn’t believe me. And, of course, that was just the kind of thing to offend an ambassador if he was an Austrian. It seems to me, Captain, you aren’t quite fair to these foreign chaps. Take these Americans, now! There were many Americans went by Pebblewick, you may suppose. But in all the lot there was never a bad lot; never a nasty American, nor a stupid American–nor, well, never an American that I didn’t rather like.”

“I know,” said Dalroy, “you mean there was never an American who did not appreciate ‘The Old Ship.’”

“I suppose I do mean that,” answered the inn-keeper, “and somehow, I feel ‘The Old Ship’ might appreciate the American too.”

“You English are an extraordinary lot,” said the Irishman, with a sudden and sombre quietude. “I sometimes feel you may pull through after all.”

After another silence he said, “You’re always right, Hump, and one oughtn’t to think of Yankees like that. The rich are the scum of the earth in every country. And a vast proportion of the real Americans are among the most courteous, intelligent, self-respecting people in the world. Some attribute this to the fact that a vast proportion of the real Americans are Irishmen.”

Pump was still silent, and the Captain resumed in a moment.

“All the same,” he said, “it’s very hard for a man, especially a man of a small country like me, to understand how it must feel to be an American; especially in the matter of nationality. I shouldn’t like to have to write the American National Anthem, but fortunately there is no great probability of the commission being given. The shameful secret of my inability to write an American patriotic song is one that will die with me.”

“Well, what about an English one,” said Pump, sturdily. “You might do worse, Captain.”

“English, you bloody tyrant,” said Patrick, indignantly. “I could no more fancy a song by an Englishman than you could one by that dog.”

Mr. Humphrey Pump gravely took the paper from his pocket, on which he had previously inscribed the sin and desolation of grocers, and felt in another of his innumerable pockets for a pencil.

“Hullo,” cried Dalroy. “Are you going to have a shy at the Ballad of Quoodle?”

Quoodle lifted his ears at his name. Mr. Pump smiled a slight and embarrassed smile. He was secretly proud of Dalroy’s admiration for his previous literary attempts and he had some natural knack for verse as a game, as he had for all games; and his reading, though desultory, had not been merely rustic or low.

“On condition,” he said, deprecatingly, “that you write a song for the English.”

“Oh, very well,” said Patrick, with a huge sigh that really indicated the very opposite of reluctance. “We must do something till the thing stops, I suppose, and this seems a blameless parlour game. ‘Songs of the Car Club.’ Sounds quite aristocratic.”

And he began to make marks with a pencil on the fly-leaf of a little book he had in his pocket–Wilson’sNoctes Ambrosianae. Every now and then, however, he looked up and delayed his own composition by watching Pump and the dog, whose proceedings amused him very much. For the owner of “The Old Ship” sat sucking his pencil and looking at Mr. Quoodle with eyes of fathomless attention. Every now and then he slightly scratched his brown hair with the pencil, and wrote down a word. And the dog Quoodle, with that curious canine power of either understanding or most brazenly pretending to understand what is going on, sat erect with his head at an angle, as if he were sitting for his portrait.

Hence it happened that though Pump’s poem was a little long, as are often the poems of inexperienced poets, and though Dalroy’s poem was very short (being much hurried toward the end) the long poem was finished some time before the short one.

Therefore it was that there was first produced for the world the song more familiarly known as “No Noses,” or more correctly called “The Song of Quoodle.” Part of it ran eventually thus:

“They haven’t got no noses

The fallen sons of Eve,

Even the smell of roses

Is not what they supposes,

But more than mind discloses,

And more than men believe.

“They haven’t got no noses,

They cannot even tell

When door and darkness closes

The park a Jew encloses,

Where even the Law of Moses

Will let you steal a smell;

“The brilliant smell of water,

The brave smell of a stone,

The smell of dew and thunder

And old bones buried under,

Are things in which they blunder

And err, if left alone.

“The wind from winter forests,

The scent of scentless flowers,

The breath of bride’s adorning,

The smell of snare and warning,

The smell of Sunday morning,

God gave to us for ours.”

---

“And Quoodle here discloses

All things that Quoodle can;

They haven’t got no noses,

They haven’t got no noses,

And goodness only knowses

The Noselessness of Man.”

This poem also shows traces of haste in its termination, and the present editor (who has no aim save truth) is bound to confess that parts of it were supplied in the criticisms of the Captain, and even enriched (in later and livelier circumstances) by the Poet of the Birds himself. At the actual moment the chief features of this realistic song about dogs was a crashing chorus of “Bow-wow, wow,” begun by Mr. Patrick Dalroy; but immediately imitated (much more successfully) by Mr. Quoodle. In the face of all this Dalroy suffered some real difficulty in fulfilling the bargain by reading out his much shorter poem about what he imagined an Englishman might feel. Indeed there was something very rough and vague in his very voice as he read it out; as of one who had not found the key to his problem. The present compiler (who has no aim save truth) must confess that the verses ran as follows:

“St. George he was for England,

And before he killed the dragon

He drank a pint of English ale

Out of an English flagon.

For though he fast right readily

In hair-shirt or in mail,

It isn’t safe to give him cakes

Unless you give him ale.

“St. George he was for England,

And right gallantly set free

The lady left for dragon’s meat

And tied up to a tree;

But since he stood for England

And knew what England means,

Unless you give him bacon,

You mustn’t give him beans.

“St. George he was for England,

And shall wear the shield he wore

When we go out in armour,

With the battle-cross before;

But though he is jolly company

And very pleased to dine,

It isn’t safe to give him nuts

Unless you give him wine.

“Very philosophical song that,” said Dalroy, shaking his head solemnly, “full of deep thought. I really think that is about the truth of the matter, in the case of the Englishman. Your enemies say you’re stupid, and you boast of being illogical–which is about the only thing you do that really is stupid. As if anybody ever made an Empire or anything else by saying that two and two make five. Or as if anyone was ever the stronger fornot understanding anything–if it were only tip-cat or chemistry. But thisis true about you Hump. You English are supremely an artistic people, and therefore you go by associations, as I said in my song. You won’t have one thing without the other thing that goes with it. And as you can’t imagine a village without a squire and parson, or a college without port and old oak, you get the reputation of a Conservative people. But it’s because you’re sensitive, Hump, not because you’re stupid, that you won’t part with things. It’s lies, lies and flattery they tell you, Hump, when they tell you you’re fond of compromise. I tell ye, Hump, every real revolution is a compromise. D’ye think Wolfe Tone or Charles Stuart Parnell never compromised? But it’s just because you’re afraid of a compromise that you won’t have a revolution. If you really overhauled ‘The Old Ship’–or Oxford–you’d have to make up your mind what to take and what to leave, and it would break your heart, Humphrey Pump.”

He stared in front of him with a red and ruminant face, and at length added, somewhat more gloomily,

“This aesthetic way we have, Hump, has only two little disadvantages which I will now explain to you. The first is exactly what has sent us flying in this contraption. When the beautiful, smooth, harmonious thing you’ve made is worked by a new type, in a new spirit, then I tell you it would be better for you a thousand times to be living under the thousand paper constitutions of Condorcet and Sieyès. When the English oligarchy is run by an Englishman who hasn’t got an English mind–then you have Lord Ivywood and all this nightmare, of which God could only guess the end.”

The car had beaten some roods of dust behind it, and he ended still more darkly:

“And the other disadvantage, my amiable aesthete, is this. If ever, in blundering about the planet, you come on an island in the Atlantic–Atlantis, let us say–which won’t acceptall your pretty picture–to which you can’t give everything–why you will probably decide to give nothing. You will say in your hearts: ‘Perhaps they will starve soon’; and you will become, for that island, the deafest and the most evil of all the princes of the earth.”

It was already daybreak, and Pump, who knew the English boundaries almost by intuition, could tell even through the twilight that the tail of the little town they were leaving behind was of a new sort, the sort to be seen in the western border. The chauffeur’s phrase about his mother might merely have been a music-hall joke; but certainly he had driven darkly in that direction.

White morning lay about the grey stony streets like spilt milk. A few proletarian early risers, wearier at morning than most men at night, seemed merely of opinion that it was no use crying over it. The two or three last houses, which looked almost too tired to stand upright, seemed to have moved the Captain into another sleepy explosion.

“There are two kinds of idealists, as everybody knows–or must have thought of. There are those who idealize the real and those who (precious seldom) realise the ideal. Artistic and poetical people like the English generally idealize the real. This I have expressed in a song, which–”

“No, really,” protested the innkeeper, “really now, Captain–”

“This I have expressed in a song,” repeated Dalroy, in an adamantine manner, “which I will now sing with every circumstance of leisure, loudness, or any other–”

He stopped because the flying universe seemed to stop. Charging hedgerows came to a halt, as if challenged by the bugle. The racing forests stood rigid. The last few tottering houses stood suddenly at attention. For a noise like a pistol-shot from the car itself had stopped all that race, as a pistol-shot might start any other.

The driver clambered out very slowly, and stood about in various tragic attitudes round the car. He opened an unsuspected number of doors and windows in the car, and touched things and twisted things and felt things.

“I must back as best I can to that there garrige, sir,” he said, in a heavy and husky tone they had not heard from him before.

Then he looked round on the long woods and the last houses, and seemed to gnaw his lip, like a great general who has made a great mistake. His brow seemed as black as ever, yet his voice, when he spoke again, had fallen many further degrees toward its dull and daily tone.

“Yer see, this is a bit bad,” he said. “It’ll be a beastly job even at the best plices, if I’m gettin’ back at all.”

“Getting back,” repeated Dalroy, opening the blue eyes of a bull. “Back where?”

“Well, yer see,” said the chauffeur, reasonably, “I was bloody keen to show ’im it was me drove the car and not ’im. By a bit o’ bad luck, I done damage to ’is car. Well–ifyou can stick in ’is car–”

Captain Patrick Dalroy sprang out of the car so rapidly that he almost reeled and slipped upon the road. The dog sprang after him, barking furiously.

“Hump,” said Patrick, quietly. “I’ve found out everything about you. I know what always bothered me about the Englishman.”

Then, after an instant’s silence, he said, “That Frenchman was right who said (I forget how he put it) that you march to Trafalgar Square to rid yourself of your temper; not to rid yourself of your tyrant. Our friend was quite ready to rebel, rushing away. To rebel sitting still was too much for him. Do you readPunch? I am sure you do. Pump andPunch must be almost the only survivors of the Victorian Age. Do you remember an old joke in an excellent picture, representing two ragged Irishmen with guns, waiting behind a stone wall to shoot a landlord? One of the Irishmen says the landlord is late, and adds, ‘I hope no accident’s happened to the poor gentleman.’ Well, it’s all perfectly true; I knew that Irishman intimately, but I want to tell you a secret about him. He was an Englishman.”

The chauffeur had backed with breathless care to the entrance of the garage, which was next door to a milkman’s or merely separated from it by a black and lean lane, looking no larger than the crack of a door. It must, however, have been larger than it looked, because Captain Dalroy disappeared down it.

He seemed to have beckoned the driver after him; at any rate that functionary instantly followed. The functionary came out again in an almost guilty haste, touching his cap and stuffing loose papers into his pocket. Then the functionary returned yet again from what he called the “garrige,” carrying larger and looser things over his arm.

All this did Mr. Humphrey Pump observe, not without interest. The place, remote as it was, was evidently arendez-vous for motorists. Otherwise a very tall motorist, throttled and masked in the most impenetrable degree, would hardly have strolled up to speak to him. Still less would the tall motorist have handed him a similar horrid disguise of wraps and goggles, in a bundle over his arm. Least of all would any motorist, however tall, have said to him from behind the cap and goggles, “Put on these things, Hump, and then we’ll go into the milk shop. I’m waiting for the car. Which car, my seeker after truth? Why the car I’m going to buy for you to drive.”

The remorseful chauffeur, after many adventures, did actually find his way back to the little moonlit wood where he had left his master and the donkey. But his master and the donkey had vanished.

CHAPTER XVI: THE SEVEN MOODS OF DORIAN

THAT timeless clock of all lunatics, which was so bright in the sky that night, may really have had some elfin luck about it, like a silver penny. Not only had it initiated Mr. Hibbs into the mysteries of Dionysius, and Mr. Bullrose into the arboreal habits of his ancestors, but one night of it made a very considerable and rather valuable change in Mr. Dorian Wimpole, the Poet of the Birds. He was a man neither foolish nor evil, any more than Shelley; only a man made sterile by living in a world of indirectness and insincerity, with words rather than with things. He had not had the smallest intention of starving his chauffeur; he did not realise that there was worse spiritual murder in merely forgetting him. But as hour after hour passed over him, alone with the donkey and the moon, he went through a raging and shifting series of frames of mind, such as his cultured friends would have described as moods.

The First Mood, I regret to say, was one of black and grinding hatred. He had no notion of the chauffeur’s grievance, and could only suppose he had been bribed or intimidated by the demonic donkey-torturers. But Mr. Wimpole was much more capable at that moment of torturing a chauffeur than Mr. Pump had ever been of torturing a donkey; for no sane man can hate an animal. He kicked the stones in the road, sending them flying into the forest, and wished that each one of them was a chauffeur. The bracken by the roadside he tore up by the roots, as representing the hair of the chauffeur, to which it bore no resemblance. He hit with his fist such trees, as, I suppose, seemed in form and expression most reminiscent of the chauffeur; but desisted from this, finding that in this apparently one-sided contest the tree had rather the best of it. But the whole wood and the whole world had become a kind of omnipresent and pantheistic chauffeur, and he hit at him everywhere.

The thoughtful reader will realise that Mr. Wimpole had already taken a considerable upward stride in what he would have called the cosmic scale. The next best thing to really loving a fellow creature is really hating him: especially when he is a poorer man separated from you otherwise by mere social stiffness. The desire to murder him is at least an acknowledgment that he is alive. Many a man has owed the first white gleams of the dawn of Democracy in his soul to a desire to find a stick and beat the butler. And we have it on the unimpeachable local authority of Mr. Humphrey Pump that Squire Merriman chased his librarian through three villages with a horse-pistol; and was a Radical ever after.

His rage also did him good merely as a relief, and he soon passed into a second and more positive mood of meditation.

“The damnable monkeys go on like this,” he muttered, “and then they call a donkey one of the Lower Animals. Ride on a donkey would he? I’d like to see the donkey riding on him for a bit. Good old man.”

The patient ass turned mild eyes on him when he patted it, and Dorian Wimpole discovered, with a sort of subconscious surprise, that he really was fond of the donkey. Deeper still in his subliminal self he knew that he had never been fond of an animal before. His poems about fantastic creatures had been quite sincere, and quite cold. When he said he loved a shark, he meant he saw no reason for hating a shark, which was right enough. There is no reason for hating a shark, however much reason there may be for avoiding one. There is no harm in a craken if you keep it in a tank–or in a sonnet.

But he also realised that his love of creatures had been turned round and was working from the other end. The donkey was a companion, and not a monstrosity. It was dear because it was near, not because it was distant. The oyster had attracted him because it was utterly unlike a man; unless it be counted a touch of masculine vanity to grow a beard. The fancy is no idler than that he had himself used, in suggesting a sort of feminine vanity in the permanence of a pearl. But in that maddening vigil among the mystic pines, he found himself more and more drawn toward the donkey, because it was more like a man than anything else around him; because it had eyes to see, and ears to hear–and the latter even unduly developed.

“He that hath ears to hear, let him hear,” he said, scratching those grey hairy flappers with affection. “Haven’t you lifted your ears toward Heaven? And will you be the first to hear the Last Trumpet?”

The ass rubbed his nose against him with what seemed almost like a human caress. And Dorian caught himself wondering how a caress from an oyster could be managed. Everything else around him was beautiful, but inhuman. Only in the first glory of anger could he really trace in a tall pine-tree the features of an ex-taxi-cabman from Kennington. Trees and ferns had no living ears that they could wag nor mild eyes that they could move. He patted the donkey again.

But the donkey had reconciled him to the landscape, and in his third mood he began to realise how beautiful it was. On a second study, he was not sure it was so inhuman. Rather he felt that its beauty at least was half human; that the aureole of the sinking moon behind the woods was chiefly lovely because it was like the tender-coloured aureole of an early saint; and that the young trees were, after all, noble because they held up their heads like virgins. Cloudily there crowded into his mind ideas with which it was imperfectly familiar, especially an idea which he had heard called “The Image of God.” It seemed to him more and more that all these things, from the donkey to the very docks and ferns by the roadside, were dignified and sanctified by their partial resemblance to something else. It was as if they were baby drawings: the wild, crude sketches of Nature in her first sketch-books of stone.

He had flung himself on a pile of pine-needles to enjoy the gathering darkness of the pinewoods as the moon sank behind them. There is nothing more deep and wonderful than really impenetrable pinewoods where the nearer trees show against the more shadowy; a tracery of silver upon grey and of grey upon black.

It was by this time, in pure pleasure and idleness that he picked up a pine-needle to philosophise about it.

“Think of sitting on needles!” he said. “Yet, I suppose this is the sort of needle that Eve, in the old legend, used in Eden. Aye, and the old legend was right, too! Think of sitting on all the needles in London! Think of sitting on all the needles in Sheffield! Think of sitting on any needles, except on all the needles of Paradise! Oh, yes, the old legend was right enough. The very needles of God are softer than the carpets of men.”

He took a pleasure in watching the weird little forest animals creeping out from under the green curtains of the wood. He reminded himself that in the old legend they had been as tame as the ass, as well as being as comic. He thought of Adam naming the animals, and said to a beetle, “I should callyou Budger.”

The slugs gave him great entertainment, and so did the worms. He felt a new and realistic interest in them which he had not known before; it was, indeed, the interest that a man feels in a mouse in a dungeon; the interest of any man tied by the leg and forced to see the fascination of small things. Creatures of the wormy kind, especially, crept out at very long intervals; yet he found himself waiting patiently for hours for the pleasure of their acquaintance. One of them rather specially arrested his eye, because it was a little longer than most worms and seemed to be turning its head in the direction of the donkey’s left foreleg. Also, it had a head to turn, which most worms have not.

Dorian Wimpole did not know much about exact Natural History, except what he had once got up very thoroughly from an encyclopaedia for the purposes of a sympatheticvilanelle. But as this information was entirely concerned with the conjectural causes of laughter in the Hyena, it was not directly helpful in this case. But though he did not know much Natural History, he knew some. He knew enough to know that a worm ought not to have a head, and especially not a squared and flattened head, shaped like a spade or a chisel. He knew enough to know that a creeping thing with a head of that pattern survives in the English country sides, though it is not common. In short, he knew enough to step across the road and set a sharp and savage boot-heel on the neck and spine of the creature, breaking it into three black bits that writhed once more before they stiffened.

Then he gave out a great explosive sigh. The donkey, whose leg had been in such danger, looked at the dead adder with eyes that had never lost their moony mildness. Even Dorian, himself, looked at it for a long time, and with feelings he could neither arrest nor understand, before he remembered that he had been comparing the little wood to Eden.

“And even in Eden,” he said at last; and then the words of Fitzgerald failed upon his lips.

And while he was warring with such words and thoughts, something happened about him and behind him; something he had written about a hundred times and read about a thousand; something he had never seen in his life. It flung faintly across the broad foliage a wan and pearly light far more mysterious than the lost moonshine. It seemed to enter through all the doors and windows of the woodland, pale and silent but confident, like men that keep a tryst; soon its white robes had threads of gold and scarlet: and the name of it was morning.

For some time past, loud and in vain, all the birds had been singing to the Poet of the Birds. But when that minstrel actually saw broad daylight breaking over wood and road, the effect on him was somewhat curious. He stood staring at it in gaping astonishment, until it had fulfilled the fulness of its shining fate; and the pine-cones and the curling ferns and the live donkey and the dead viper were almost as distinct as they could be at noon, or in a Preraphaelite picture. And then the Fourth Mood fell upon him like a bolt from the blue, and he strode across and took the donkey’s bridle, as if to lead it along.

“Damn it all,” he cried, in a voice as cheerful as the cockcrow that rang recently from the remote village, “it’s not everybody who’s killed a snake.” Then he added, reflectively, “I bet Dr. Gluck never did. Come along, donkey, let’s have some adventures.”

The finding and fighting of positive evil is the beginning of all fun–and even of all farce. All the wild woodland looked jolly now the snake was killed. It was one of the fallacies of his literary clique to refer all natural emotions to literary names, but it might not untruly be said that he had passed out of the mood of Maeterlinck into the mood of Whitman, and out of the mood of Whitman into the mood of Stevenson. He had not been a hypocrite when he asked for gilded birds of Asia or purple polypi out of the Southern Seas; he was not a hypocrite now, when he asked for mere comic adventures along a common English road. It was his misfortune and not his fault if his first adventure was his last; and was much too comic to laugh at.

Already the wan morning had warmed into a pale blue and was spotted with those little plump pink clouds which must surely have been the origin of the story that pigs might fly. The insects of the grass chattered so cheerfully that every green tongue seemed to be talking. The skyline on every side was broken only by objects that encouraged such swashbucklering comedy. There was a windmill that Chaucer’s Miller might have inhabited or Cervantes’s champion charged. There was an old leaden church spire that might have been climbed by Robert Clive. Away toward Pebblewick and the sea, there were the two broken stumps of wood which Humphrey Pump declares to this day to have been the stands for an unsuccessful children’s swing; but which tourists always accept as the remains of the antique gallows. In the gaiety of such surroundings, it is small wonder if Dorian and the donkey stepped briskly along the road. The very donkey reminded him of Sancho Panza.

He did not wake out of this boisterous reverie of the white road and the wind till a motor horn had first hooted and then howled, till the ground had shaken with the shock of a stoppage, and till a human hand fell heavily and tightly on his shoulder. He looked up and saw the complete costume of a Police Inspector. He did not worry about the face. And there fell on him the Fifth, or Unexpected Mood, which is called by the vulgar Astonishment.

In despair he looked at the motor car itself that had anchored so abruptly under the opposite hedge. The man at the steering wheel was so erect and unresponsive that Dorian felt sure he was feasting his eyes on yet another policeman. But on the seat behind was a very different figure, a figure that baffled him all the more because he felt certain he had seen it somewhere. The figure was long and slim, with sloping shoulders, and the costume, which was untidy, yet contrived to give the impression that it was tidy on other occasions. The individual had bright yellow hair, one lock of which stuck straight up and was exalted, like the little horn in his favourite scriptures. Another tuft of it, in a bright but blinding manner, fell across and obscured the left optic, as in literal fulfilment of the parable of a beam in the eye. The eyes, with or without beams in them, looked a little bewildered, and the individual was always nervously resettling his necktie. For the individual went by the name of Hibbs, and had only recently recovered from experiences wholly new to him.

“What on earth do you want?” asked Wimpole of the policeman.

His innocent and startled face, and perhaps other things about his appearance, evidently caused the Inspector to waver.

“Well, it’s about this ’ere donkey, sir,” he said.

“Do you think I stole it?” cried the indignant aristocrat. “Well, of all the mad worlds! A pack of thieves steal my Limousine, I save their damned donkey’s life at the risk of my own–andI’m run in for stealing.”

The clothes of the indignant aristocrat probably spoke louder than his tongue; the officer dropped his hand, and after consulting some papers in his hand, walked across to consult with the unkempt gentleman in the car.

“That seems to be a similar cart and donkey,” Dorian heard him saying, “but the clothes don’t seem to fit your description of the men you saw.”

Now, Mr. Hibbs had extremely vague and wild recollections of the men he saw; he could not even tell what he had done and what he had merely dreamed. If he had spoken sincerely, he would have described a sort of green nightmare of forests, in which he found himself in the power of an ogre about twelve feet high, with scarlet flames for hair and dressed rather like Robin Hood. But a long course of what is known as “keeping the party together” had made it as unnatural to him to tell anyone (even himself) what he really thought about anything, as it would have been to spit–or to sing. He had at present only three motives and strong resolves: (1) not to admit that he had been drunk; (2) not to let anyone escape whom Lord Ivywood might possibly want to question; and (3) not to lose his reputation for sagacity and tact.

“This party has a brown velvet suit, you see, and a fur overcoat,” the Inspector continued, “and in the notes I have from you, you say the man wore a uniform.”

“When we say uniform,” said Mr. Hibbs, frowning intellectually, “when we sayuniform, of course–we must distinguish some of our friends who don’t quite see eye to eye with us, you know,” and he smiled with tender leniency, “some of our friends wouldn’t like it called auniform perhaps. But–of course–well, it wasn’t a police uniform, for instance. Ha! Ha!”

“I should hope not,” said the official, shortly.

“So–in a way–however,” said Hibbs, clutching his verbal talisman at last, “it might be brown velvet in the dark.”

The Inspector replied to this helpful suggestion with some wonder. “But it was a moon, like limelight,” he protested.

“Yars, yars,” cried Hibbs, in a high tone that can only be described as a hasty drawl. “Yars–discolours everything of course. The flowers and things–”

“But look here,” said the Inspector, “you said the principal man’s hair was red.”

“A blond type! A blond type!” said Hibbs, waving his hand with a solemn lightness. “Reddish, yellowish, brownish sort of hair, you know.” Then he shook his head and said with the heaviest solemnity the word was capable of carrying, “Teutonic, purely Teutonic.”

The Inspector began to feel some wonder that, even in the confusion following on Lord Ivywood’s fall, he had been put under the guidance of this particular guide. The truth was that Leveson, once more masking his own fears under his usual parade of hurry, had found Hibbs at a table by an open window, with wild hair and sleepy eyes, picking himself up with some sort of medicine. Finding him already fairly clear-headed in a dreary way, he had not scrupled to use the remains of his bewilderment to despatch him with the police in the first pursuit. Even the mind of a semi-recovered drunkard, he thought, could be trusted to recognise anyone so unmistakable as the Captain.

But, though the diplomatist’s debauch was barely over, his strange, soft fear and cunning were awake. He felt fairly certain the man in the fur coat had something to do with the mystery, as men with fur coats do not commonly wander about with donkeys. He was afraid of offending Lord Ivywood, and at the same time, afraid of exposing himself to a policeman.

“You have large discretion,” he said, gravely. “Very right you should have large discretion in the interests of the public. I think you would be quite authorised, for the present, in preventing the man’s escape.”

“And the other man?” inquired the officer, with knitted brow. “Do you suppose he has escaped?”

“Theother man,” repeated Hibbs However, regarding the distant windmill through half-closed lids, as if this were a new fine shade introduced into an already delicate question.

“Well, hang it all,” said the police officer, “you must know whether there were two men or one.”

Gradually it dawned, in a grey dawn of horror, over the brain of Hibbs that this was what he specially couldn’t know. He had always heard, and read in comic papers, that a drunken man “sees double” and beholds two lamp-posts, one of which is (as the Higher Critic would have said) purely subjective. For all he knew (being a mere novice) inebriation might produce the impression of the two men of his dream-like adventure, when in truth there had only been one.

“Two men, you know–one man,” he said with a sort of moody carelessness. “Well we can go into their numbers later; they can’t have a very large following.” Here he shook his head very firmly. “Quite impossible. And as the late Lord Goschen used to say, ‘You can prove anything by statistics.’”

And here came an interruption from the other side of the road.

“And how long am I to wait here for you and your Goschens, you silly goat,” were the intemperate wood-notes issuing from the Poet of the Birds. “I’m shot if I’ll stand this! Come along, donkey, and let’s pray for a better adventure next time. These are very inferior specimens of your own race.”

And seizing the bridle of the ass again, he strode past them swiftly, and almost as if urging the animal to a gallop.

Unfortunately this disdainful dash for liberty was precisely what was wanting to weigh down the rocking intelligence of the Inspector on the wrong side. If Wimpole had stood still a minute or two longer, the official, who was no fool, might have ended in disbelieving Hibbs’s story altogether. As it was, there was a scuffle, not without blows on both sides, and eventually the Honourable Dorian Wimpole, donkey and all, was marched off to the village, in which there was a Police Station; in which was a temporary cell; in which a Sixth Mood was experienced.

His complaints, however, were at once so clamorous and so convincing, and his coat was so unquestionably covered with fur, that after some questioning and cross purposes they agreed to take him in the afternoon to Ivywood House, where there was a magistrate incapacitated by a shot only recently extracted from his leg.

They found Lord Ivywood lying on a purple ottoman, in the midst of his Chinese puzzle of oriental apartments. He continued to look away as they entered, as if expecting, with Roman calm, the entrance of a recognised enemy. But Lady Enid Wimpole, who was attending to the wants of the invalid, gave a sharp cry of astonishment; and the next moment the three cousins were looking at each other. One could almost have guessed they were cousins, all being (as Mr. Hibbs subtly put it) a blond type. But two of the blond types expressed amazement, and one blond type merely rage.

“I am sorry, Dorian,” said Ivywood, when he had heard the whole story. “These fanatics are capable of anything, I fear, and you very rightly resent their stealing your car–”

“You are wrong, Philip,” answered the poet, emphatically. “I do not even faintly resent their stealing my car. What I do resent is the continued existence on God’s earth of this Fool” (pointing to the serious Hibbs) “and of that Fool” (pointing to the Inspector) “and–yes, by thunder, ofthat Fool, too” (and he pointed straight at Lord Ivywood). “And I tell you frankly, Philip, if there really are, as you say, two men who are bent on smashing your schemes and making your life a hell–I am very happy to put my car at their disposal. And now I’m off.”

“You’ll stop to dinner?” inquired Ivywood, with frigid forgiveness.

“No, thanks,” said the disappearing bard, “I’m going up to town.”

The Seventh Mood of Dorian Wimpole had a grand finale at the Café Royal, and consisted largely of oysters.

CHAPTER XVII: THE POET IN PARLIAMENT

DURING the singular entrance and exit of Dorian Wimpole, M.P., J.P., etc., Lady Joan was looking out of the magic casements of that turret room which was now literally, and not only poetically, the last limit of Ivywood House. The old broken hole and black staircase up which the lost dog Quoodle used to come and go, had long ago been sealed up and cemented with a wall of exquisite Eastern workmanship. All through the patterns Lord Ivywood had preserved and repeated the principle that no animal shape must appear. But, like all lucid dogmatists, he perceived all the liberties his dogma allowed him. And he had irradiated this remote end of Ivywood with sun and moon and solar and starry systems, with the Milky Way for a dado and a few comets for comic relief. The thing was well done of its kind (as were all the things that Philip Ivywood got done for him); and if all the windows of the turret were closed with their peacock curtains, a poet with anything like a Hibbsian appreciation of the family champagne might almost fancy he was looking out across the sea on a night crowded with stars. And (what was yet more important) even Misysra (that exact thinker) could not call the moon a live animal without falling into idolatry.

But Joan, looking out of real windows on a real sky and sea, thought no more about the astronomical wall-paper than about any other wall-paper. She was asking herself in sullen emotionalism, and for the thousandth time, a question she had never been able to decide. It was the final choice between an ambition and a memory. And there was this heavy weight in the scale: that the ambition would probably materialise, and the memory probably wouldn’t. It has been the same weight in the same scale a million times since Satan became the prince of this world. But the evening stars were strengthening over the old sea-shore, and they also wanted weighing like diamonds.

As once before at the same stage of brooding, she heard behind her the swish of Lady Enid’s skirts, that never came so fast save for serious cause.

“Joan! Please do come! Nobody but you, I do believe, could move him.” Joan looked at Lady Enid and realised that the lady was close on crying. She turned a trifle pale and asked quietly for the question. “Philip says he’s going to London now, with that leg and all,” cried Enid, “and he won’t let us say a word.”

“But how did it all happen?” asked Joan.

Lady Enid Wimpole was quite incapable of explaining how it all happened, so the task must for the moment devolve on the author. The simple fact was that Ivywood in the course of turning over magazines on his sofa, happened to look at a paper from the Midlands.

“The Turkish news,” said Mr. Leveson, rather nervously, “is on the other side of the page.”

But Lord Ivywood continued to look at the side of the paper that did not contain the Turkish news, with the same dignity of lowered eyelids and unconscious brow with which he had looked at the Captain’s message when Joan found him by the turret.

On the page covered merely with casual, provincial happenings was a paragraph, “Echo of Pebblewick Mystery. Reported Reappearance of the Vanishing Inn.” Underneath was printed, in smaller letters:

“An almost incredible report from Wyddington announces that the mysterious ‘Sign of the Old Ship’ has once more been seen in this country; though it has long been relegated by scientific investigators to the limbo of old rustic superstitions. According to the local version, Mr. Simmons, a dairyman of Wyddington, was serving in his shop when two motorists entered, one of them asking for a glass of milk. They were in the most impenetrable motoring panoply, with darkened goggles and waterproof collars turned up, so that nothing can be recalled of them personally, except that one was a person of unusual stature. In a few moments, this latter individual went out of the shop again and returned with a miserable specimen out of the street, one of the tattered loafers that linger about our most prosperous towns, tramping the streets all night and even begging in defiance of the police. The filth and disease of the creature were so squalid that Mr. Simmons at first refused to serve him with the glass of milk which the taller motorist wished to provide for him. At length, however, Mr. Simmons consented, and was immediately astonished by an incident against which he certainly had a more assured right to protest.

“The taller motorist, saying to the loafer, ‘but, man, you’re blue in the face,’ made a species of signs to the smaller motorist, who thereupon appears to have pierced a sort of cylindrical trunk or chest that seemed to be his only luggage, and drawn from it a few drops of a yellow liquid which he deliberately dropped into the ragged creature’s milk. It was afterward discovered to be rum, and the protests of Mr. Simmons may be imagined. The tall motorist, however, warmly defended his action, having apparently some wild idea that he was doing an act of kindness. ‘Why, I found the man nearly fainting,’ he said. ‘If you’d picked him off a raft, he couldn’t be more collapsed with cold and sickness; and if you’d picked him off a raft you’d have given him rum–yes, by St. Patrick, if you were a bloody pirate and made him walk the plank afterward.’ Mr. Simmons replied with dignity, that he did not know how it was with rafts, and could not permit such language in his shop. He added that he would lay himself open to a police prosecution if he permitted the consumption of alcohol in his shop; since he did not display a sign. The motorist then made the amazing reply, ‘But youdo display a sign, you jolly old man. Did you think I couldn’t find my way to the sign of The Old Ship, you sly boots?’ Mr. Simmons was now fully convinced of the intoxication of his visitors, and refusing a glass of rum rather boisterously offered him, went outside his shop to look round for a policeman. To his surprise he found the officer engaged in dispersing a considerable crowd, which was staring up at some object behind him. On looking round (he states in his deposition) he ‘saw what was undoubtedly one of the low tavern signs at one time common in England.’ He was wholly unable to explain its presence outside his premises, and as it undoubtedly legalised the motorist’s action, the police declined to move in the matter.

“Later. The two motorists have apparently left the town, unmolested, in a small second-hand two-seater. There is no clue to their destination, except it be indicated by a single incident. It appears that when they were waiting for the second glass of milk, one of them drew attention to a milk can of a shape seemingly unfamiliar to him, which was, of course, the Mountain Milk now so much recommended by doctors. The taller motorist (who seemed in every way strangely ignorant of modern science and social life) asked his companion where it came from, receiving, of course, the reply that it is manufactured in the model village of Peaceways, under the personal superintendence of its distinguished and philanthropic inventor, Dr. Meadows. Upon this the taller person, who appeared highly irresponsible, actually bought the whole can; observing, as he tucked it under his arm, that it would help him to remember the address.

“Later. Our readers will be glad to hear that the legend of ‘The Old Ship’ sign has once more yielded to the wholesome scepticism of science. Our representative reached Wyddington after the practical jokers, or whatever they were, had left; but he searched the whole frontage of Mr. Simmons’s shop, and we are in a position to assure the public that there is no trace of the alleged sign.”

Lord Ivywood laid down the newspaper and looked at the rich and serpentine embroideries on the wall with the expression that a great general might have if he saw a chance of really ruining his enemy, if he would also ruin all his previous plan of campaign. His pallid and classic profile was as immovable as a cameo; but anyone who had known him at all would have known that his brain was going like a motor car that has broken the speed limit long ago.

Then he turned his head and said, “Please tell Hicks to bring round the long blue car in half an hour; it can be fitted up for a sofa. And ask the gardener to cut a pole of about four feet nine inches, and put a cross-piece for a crutch. I’m going up to London to-night.”

Mr. Leveson’s lower jaw literally fell with astonishment.

“The Doctor said three weeks,” he said. “If I may ask it, where are you going?”

“St. Stephens, Westminster,” answered Ivywood.

“Surely,” said Mr. Leveson, “I could take a message.”

“You could take a message,” assented Ivywood, “I’m afraid they would not allow you to make a speech.”

It was a moment or two afterward that Enid Wimpole had come into the room, and striven in vain to shake his decision. Then it was that Joan had been brought out of the turret and saw Philip standing, sustained upon a crutch of garden timber; and admired him as she had never admired him before. While he was being helped downstairs, while he was being propped in the car with such limited comfort as was possible, she did really feel in him something worthy of his ancient roots, worthy of such hills and of such a sea. For she felt God’s wind from nowhere which is called the Will; and is man’s only excuse upon this earth. In the small toot of the starting motor she could hear a hundred trumpets, such as might have called her ancestors and his to the glories of the Third Crusade.

Such imaginary military honours were not, at least in the strategic sense, undeserved. Lord Ivywood really had seen the whole map of the situation in front of him, and swiftly formed a plan to meet it, in a manner not unworthy of Napoleon. The realities of the situation unrolled themselves before him, and his mind was marking them one by one as with a pencil.

First, he knew that Dalroy would probably go to the Model Village. It was just the sort of place he would go to. He knew Dalroy was almost constitutionally incapable of not kicking up some kind of row in a place of that kind.

Second, he knew that if he missed Dalroy at this address, it was very likely to be his last address; he and Mr. Pump were quite clever enough to leave no more hints behind.

Third, he guessed, by careful consideration of map and clock, that they could not get to so remote a region in so cheap a car under something like two days, nor do anything very conclusive in less than three. Thus, he had just time to turn round in.

Fourth, he realised that ever since that day when Dalroy swung round the sign-board and smote the policeman into the ditch, Dalroy had swung round the Ivywood Act on Lord Ivywood. He (Lord Ivywood) had thought, and might well have thought rightly, that by restricting the old sign-posts to a few places so select that they can afford to be eccentric, and forbidding such artistic symbols to all other places, he could sweep fermented liquor for all practical purposes out of the land. The arrangement was exactly that at which all such legislation is consciously or unconsciously aiming. A sign-board could be a favour granted by the governing class to itself. If a gentleman wished to claim the liberties of a Bohemian, the path would be open. If a Bohemian wished to claim the liberties of a gentleman, the path would be shut. So, gradually, Lord Ivywood had thought, the old signs which can alone sell alcohol, will dwindle down to mere curiosities, like Audit Ale or the Mead that may still be found in the New Forest. The calculation was by no means unstatesmanlike. But, like many other statesmanlike calculations, it did not take into account the idea of dead wood walking about. So long as his flying foes might set up their sign anywhere, it mattered little whether the result was enjoyment or disappointment for the populace. In either case it must mean constant scandal or riot. If there was one thing worse than the appearance of “The Old Ship” it was its disappearance.

He realised that his own law was letting them loose every time; for the local authorities hesitated to act on the spot, in defiance of a symbol now so exclusive and therefore impressive. He realised that the law must be altered. Must be altered at once. Must be altered, if possible, before the fugitives broke away from the Model Village of Peaceways.

He realised that it was Thursday. This was the day on which any private member of Parliament could introduce any private bill of the kind called “non-contentious,” and pass it without a division, so long as no particular member made any particular fuss. He realised that it was improbable that any particular member would make any particular fuss about Lord Ivywood’s own improvement on Lord Ivywood’s own Act.

Finally, he realised that the whole case could be met by so slight an improvement as this. Change the words of the Act (which he knew by heart, as happier men might know a song): “If such sign be present liquids containing alcohol can be sold on the premises,” to these other words: “Liquids containing alcohol can be sold, if previously preserved for three days on the premises”; it was mate in a few moves. Parliament could never reject or even examine so slight an emendation. And the revolution of “The Old Ship” and the late King of Ithaca would be crushed for ever.

It does undoubtedly show, as we have said, something Napoleonic in the man’s mind that the whole of this excellent and even successful plan was complete long before he saw the great glowing clock on the towers of Westminster; and knew he was in time.

It was unfortunate, perhaps, that about the same time, or not long after, another gentleman of the same rank, and indirectly of the same family, having left the restaurant in Regent Street and the tangle of Piccadilly, had drifted serenely down Whitehall, and had seen the same great golden goblin’s eye on the tall tower of St. Stephen.

The Poet of the Birds, like most aesthetes, had known as little of the real town as he had of the real country. But he had remembered a good place for supper; and as he passed certain great cold clubs, built of stone and looking like Assyrian Sarcophagi, he remembered that he belonged to many of them. And so when he saw afar off, sitting above the river, what has been very erroneously described as the best club in London, he suddenly remembered that he belonged to that too. He could not at the moment recall what constituency in South England it was that he sat for; but he knew he could walk into the place if he wanted to. He might not so have expressed the matter, but he knew that in an oligarchy things go by respect for persons and not for claims; by visiting cards and not by voting cards. He had not been near the place for years, being permanently paired against a famous Patriot who had accepted an important government appointment in a private madhouse. Even in his silliest days, he had never pretended to feel any respect for modern politics, and made all haste to put his “leaders” and the mad patriot’s “leaders” on the well selected list of the creatures whom man forgets. He had made one really eloquent speech in the House (on the subject of gorillas), and then found he was speaking against his party. It was an indescribable sort of place, anyhow. Even Lord Ivywood did not go to it except to do some business that could be done nowhere else; as was the case that night.

Ivywood was what is called a peer by courtesy; his place was in the Commons, and for the time being on the Opposition side. But, though he visited the House but seldom, he knew far too much about it to go into the Chamber itself. He limped into the Smoking Room (though he did not smoke), procured a needless cigarette and a much-needed sheet of note-paper, and composed a curt but careful note to the one member of the government whom he knew must be in the House. Having sent it up to him, he waited.

Outside, Mr. Dorian Wimpole also waited, leaning on the parapet of Westminster Bridge and looking down the river. He was becoming one with the oysters in a more solemn and solid sense than he had hitherto conceived possible, and also with a strictly Vegetarian beverage which bears the noble and starry name of Nuits. He felt at peace with all things, even in a manner with politics. It was one of those magic hours of evening when the red and golden lights of men are already lit along the river, and look like the lights of goblins, but daylight still lingers in a cold and delicate green. He felt about the river something of that smiling and glorious sadness which two Englishmen have expressed under the figure of the white wood of an old ship fading like a phantom; Turner, in painting, and Henry Newbolt, in poetry. He had come back to earth like a man fallen from the moon; he was at bottom not only a poet but a patriot, and a patriot is always a little sad. Yet his melancholy was mixed up with that immutable yet meaningless faith which few Englishmen, even in modern times, fail to feel at the unexpected sight either of Westminster or of that height on which stands the temple of St. Paul.

“While flows the sacred river,

While stands the sacred hill,”

he murmured in some schoolboy echo of the ballad of Lake Regillus,

“While flows the sacred river,

While stands the sacred hill,

The proud old pantaloons and nincompoops,

Who yawn at the very length of their own lies

in that accursed sanhedrim where

people put each other’s hats on in a poisonous

room with no more windows than hell

Shall have such honour still.”

Relieved by this rendering of Macaulay in the style known among his cultured friends asvers libre, or poesy set free from the shackles of formal metre, he strolled toward the members’ entrance and went in.

Lacking Lord Ivywood’s experience, he strolled into the Common’s Chamber itself and sat down on a green bench, under the impression that the House was not sitting. He was, however, gradually able to distinguish some six or eight drowsy human forms from the seats on which they sat; and to hear a senile voice with an Essex accent, saying, all on one note, and without beginning or end, in a manner which it is quite impossible to punctuate,

“… no wish at all that this proposal should be regarded except in the right way and have tried to put it in the right way and cannot think the honourable member was altogether adding to his reputation in putting it in what those who think with me must of course consider the wrong way and I for one am free to say that if in his desire to settle this great question he takes this hasty course and this revolutionary course about slate pencils he may not be able to prevent the extremists behind him from applying it to lead pencils and while I should be the last to increase the heat and the excitement and the personalities of this debate if I could possibly help it I must confess that in my opinion the honourable gentleman has himself encouraged that heat and personality in a manner that he now doubtless regrets I have no desire to use abusive terms indeed you Mr. Speaker would not allow me of course to use abusive terms but I must tell the honourable member face to face that the perambulators with which he has twitted me cannot be germane to this discussion I should be the last person…”

Dorian Wimpole had softly risen to go, when he was arrested by the sight of someone sliding into the House and handing a note to the solitary young man with heavy eyelids who was at that moment governing all England from the Treasury Bench. Seeing him go out, Dorian had a sickening sweetness of hope (as he might have said in his earlier poems), that something intelligible might happen after all, and followed him out almost with alacrity.

The solitary and sleepy governor of Great Britain went down into the lower crypts of its temple of freedom and turned into an apartment where Wimpole was astonished to see his cousin Ivywood sitting at a little table with a large crutch leaning beside him, as serene as Long John Silver. The young man with the heavy eyelids sat down opposite him and they had a conversation which Wimpole, of course, did not hear. He withdrew into an adjoining room where he managed to procure coffee and a liqueur; an excellent liqueur which he had forgotten and of which he had more than one glass.

But he had so posted himself that Ivywood could not come out without passing him, and he waited for what might happen with exquisite patience. The only thing that seemed to him queer was that every now and then a bell rang in several rooms at once. And whenever the bell rang, Lord Ivywood nodded, as if he were part of the electrical machinery. And whenever Lord Ivywood nodded the young man turned and sped upstairs like a mountaineer, returning in a short time to resume the conversation. On the third occasion the poet began to observe that many others from the other rooms could be heard running upstairs at the sound of this bell, and returning with the slightly less rapid step which expresses relief after a duty done. Yet did he not know that this duty was Representative Government; and that it is thus that the cry of Cumberland or Cornwall can come to the ears of an English King.

Suddenly the sleepy young man sprang erect, uninspired by any bell, and strode out once more. The poet could not help hearing him say as he left the table, jotting down something with a pencil: “Alcohol can be sold if previously preserved for three days on the premises. I think we can do it, but you can’t come on for half an hour.”

Saying this, he darted upstairs again, and when Dorian saw Ivywood come out laboriously, afterward, on his large country crutch, he had exactly the same revulsion in his favour that Joan had had. Jumping up from his table, which was in one of the private dining-rooms, he touched the other on the elbow and said:

“I want to apologise to you, Philip, for my rudeness this afternoon. Honestly, I am sorry. Pinewoods and prison-cells try a man’s temper, but I had no rag of excuse for not seeing that for neither of them were you to blame. I’d no notion you were coming up to town tonight; with your leg and all. You mustn’t knock yourself up like this. Do sit down a minute.”

It seemed to him that the bleak face of Philip softened a little; how far he really softened will never be known until such men as he are understood by their fellows. It is certain that he carefully unhooked himself from his crutch and sat down opposite his cousin. Whereupon his cousin struck the table so that it rang like a dinner-bell and called out, “Waiter!” as if he were in a crowded restaurant. Then, before Lord Ivywood could protest, he said:

“It’s awfully jolly that we’ve met. I suppose you’ve come up to make a speech. Ishould like to hear it. We haven’t always agreed; but, by God, if there’s anything good left in literature it’s your speeches reported in a newspaper. That thing of yours that ended, ‘death and the last shutting of the iron doors of defeat’–Why you must go back to Strafford’s last speech for such English. Do let me hear your speech! I’ve got a seat upstairs, you know.”

“If you wish it,” said Ivywood hurriedly, “but I shan’t make much of a speech to-night.” And he looked at the wall behind Wimpole’s head with thunderous wrinkles thickening on his brow. It was essential to his brilliant and rapid scheme, of course, that the Commons should make no comment at all on his little alteration in the law.

An attendant hovered near in response to the demand for a waiter, and was much impressed by the presence and condition of Lord Ivywood. But as that exalted cripple resolutely refused anything in the way of liquor, his cousin was so kind as to have a little more himself, and resumed his remarks.

“It’s about this public-house affair of yours, I suppose. I’d like to hear you speak on that. P’raps I’ll speak myself. I’ve been thinking about it a good deal all day, and a good deal of last night, too. Now, here’s what I should say to the House, if I were you. To begin with, can you abolish the public-house? Are youimportant enough now to abolish the public-house? Whether it’s right or wrong, can you in the long run prevent haymakers having ale any more than you can prevent me having this glass of Chartreuse?”

The attendant, hearing the word, once more drew near; but heard no further order; or, rather, the orders he heard were such as he was less able to cope with.

“Remember the curate!” said Dorian, abstractedly shaking his head at the functionary, “remember the sensible little High-Church curate, who when asked for a Temperance Sermon preached on the text ‘Suffer us not to be overwhelmed in the water-floods.’ Indeed, indeed, Philip, you are in deeper waters than you know.You will abolish ale!You will make Kent forget hop-poles, and Devonshire forget cider! The fate of the Inn is to be settled in that hot little room upstairs! Take care its fate and yours are not settled in the Inn. Take care Englishmen don’t sit in judgment on you as they do on many another corpse at an inquest–at a common public-house! Take care that the one tavern that is really neglected and shut up and passed like a house of pestilence is not the tavern in which I drink to-night, and that merely because it is the worst tavern on the King’s highway. Take care this place where we sit does not get a name like any pub where sailors are hocussed or girls debauched. That is what I shall say to them,” said he, rising cheerfully, “that’s what I shall say. See you to it,” he cried with sudden passion and apparently to the waiter, “see you to it if the sign that is destroyed is not the sign of ‘The Old Ship’ but the sign of the Mace and Bauble, and, in the words of a highly historical brewer, if we see a dog bark at your going.”

Lord Ivywood was observing him with a deathly quietude; another idea had come into his fertile mind. He knew his cousin, though excited, was not in the least intoxicated; he knew he was quite capable of making a speech and even a good one. He knew that any speech, good or bad, would wreck his whole plan and send the wild inn flying again. But the orator had resumed his seat and drained his glass, passing a hand across his brow. And he remembered that a man who keeps a vigil in a wood all night and drinks wine on the following evening is liable to an accident that is not drunkenness, but something much healthier.

“I suppose your speech will come on pretty soon,” said Dorian, looking at the table. “You’ll let me know when it does, of course. Really and truly, I don’t want to miss it. And I’ve forgotten all the ways here, and feel pretty tired. You’ll let me know?”

“Yes,” said Lord Ivywood.

Stillness fell along all the rooms until Lord Ivywood broke it by saying:

“Debate is a most necessary thing; but there are times when it rather impedes than assists parliamentary government.”

He received no reply. Dorian still sat as if looking at the table, but his eyelids had lightly fallen; he was asleep. Almost at the same moment the Member of Government, who was nearly asleep, appeared at the entrance of the long room and made some sort of weary signal.

Philip Ivywood raised himself on his crutch and stood for a moment looking at the sleeping man. Then he and his crutch trailed out of the long room, leaving the sleeping man behind. Nor was that the only thing that he left behind. He also left behind an unlighted cigarette and his honour and all the England of his father’s; everything that could really distinguish that high house beside the river from any tavern for the hocussing of sailors. He went upstairs and did his business in twenty minutes in the only speech he had ever delivered without any trace of eloquence. And from that hour forth he was the naked fanatic; and could feed on nothing but the future.

CHAPTER XVIII: THE REPUBLIC OF PEACEWAYS

IN a hamlet round about Windermere, let us say, or somewhere in Wordsworth’s country, there could be found a cottage, in which could be found a cottager. So far all is as it should be; and the visitor would first be conscious of a hearty and even noisy elderly man, with an apple face and a short white beard. This person would then loudly proffer to the visitor the opportunity of seeing his father, a somewhat more elderly man, with a somewhat longer white beard, but still “up and about.” And these two together would then initiate the neophyte into the joys of the society of a grandfather, who was more than a hundred years old, and still very proud of the fact.

This miracle, it seemed, had been worked entirely on milk. The subject of this diet the oldest of the three men continued to discuss in enormous detail. For the rest, it might be said that his pleasures were purely arithmetical. Some men count their years with dismay, and he counted his with a juvenile vanity. Some men collect stamps or coins, and he collected days. Newspaper men interviewed him about the historic times through which he had lived, without eliciting anything whatever; except that he had apparently taken to an exclusive milk diet at about the age when most of us leave it off. Asked if he was alive in 1815, he said that was the very year he found it wasn’t any milk, but must be Mountain Milk, like Dr. Meadows says. Nor would his calculating creed of life have allowed him to understand you if you had said that in a meadowland oversea that lies before the city of Brussels, boys of his old school in that year gained the love of the gods and died young.

It was the philanthropic Dr. Meadows, of course, who discovered this deathless tribe, and erected on it the whole of his great dietetic philosophy, to say nothing of the houses and dairies of Peaceways. He attracted many pupils and backers among the wealthy and influential; young men who were, so to speak, training for extreme old age, infant old men, embryo nonagenarians. It would be an exaggeration to say that they watched joyfully for the first white hair as Fascination Fledgeby watched for his first whisker; but it is quite true to say that they seemed to have scorned the beauty of woman and the feasting of friends and, above all, the old idea of death with glory; in comparison with this vision of the sports of second childhood.

Peaceways was in its essential plan much like what we call a Garden City; a ring of buildings where the work people did their work, with a pretty ornamental town in the centre, where they lived in the open country outside. This was no doubt much healthier than the factory system in the great towns and may have partly accounted for the serene expression of Dr. Meadows and his friends, if any part of the credit can be spared from the splendours of Mountain Milk. The place lay far from the common highways of England, and its inhabitants were enabled to enjoy their quiet skies and level woods almost undisturbed, and fully absorb whatever may be valuable in the Meadows method and view; until one day a small and very dirty motor drove into the middle of their town. It stopped beside one of those triangular islets of grass that are common at forked roads, and two men in goggles, one tall and the other short, got out and stood on the central space of grass, as if they were buffoons about to do tricks. As, indeed, they were.

Before entering the town they had stopped by a splendid mountain stream quickening and thickening rapidly into a river; unhelmed and otherwise eased themselves, eaten a little bread bought at Wyddington and drank the water of the widening current which opened on the valley of Peaceways.

“I’m beginning quite to like water,” said the taller of the two knights. “I used to think it a most dangerous drink. In theory, of course, it ought only to be given to people who are fainting. It’s really good for them, much better than brandy. Besides, think of wasting good brandy on people who are fainting! But I don’t go so far as I did; I shouldn’t insist on a doctor’s prescription before I allow people water. That was the too severe morality of youth; that was my innocence and goodness. I thought that if I fell once, water-drinking might become a habit. But I do see the good side of water now. How good it is when you’re really thirsty, how it glitters and gurgles! How alive it is! After all, it’s the best of drinks, after the other. As it says in the song:

“Feast on wine or fast on water,

And your honour shall stand sure;

God Almighty’s son and daughter,

He the valiant, she the pure.

If an angel out of heaven

Brings you other things to drink,

Thank him for his kind intentions,

Go and pour them down the sink.

“Tea is like the East he grows in,

A great yellow Mandarin,

With urbanity of manner,

And unconsciousness of sin;

All the women, like a harem,

At his pig-tail troop along,

And, like all the East he grows in,

He is Poison when he’s strong.

“Tea, although an Oriental,

Is a gentleman at least;

Cocoa is a cad and coward,

Cocoa is a vulgar beast;

Cocoa is a dull, disloyal,

Lying, crawling cad and clown,

And may very well be grateful

To the fool that takes him down.

“As for all the windy waters,

They were rained like trumpets down,

When good drink had been dishonoured

By the tipplers of the town.

When red wine had brought red ruin,

And the death-dance of our times,

Heaven sent us Soda Water

As a torment for our crimes.”

“Upon my soul, this water tastes quite nice. I wonder what vintage now?” and he smacked his lips with solemnity. “It tastes just like the year 1881 tasted.”

“You can fancy anything in the tasting way,” returned his shorter companion. “Mr. Jack, who was always up to his tricks, did serve plain water in those little glasses they drink liqueurs out of, and everyone swore it was a delicious liqueur, and wanted to know where they could get it–all except old Admiral Guffin, who said it tasted too strong of olives. But water’s much the best for our game, certainly.”

Patrick nodded, and then said:

“I doubt if I could do it, if it weren’t for the comfort of looking at that,” and he kicked the rum-keg, “and feeling we shall have a good swig at it some day. It feels like a fairy-tale, carrying that about–as if rum were a pirate’s treasure, as if it were molten gold. Besides, we can have such fun with it with other people –what was that joke I thought of this morning? Oh, I remember! Where’s that milk can of mine?”

For the next twenty minutes he was industriously occupied with his milk can and the cask; Pump watching him with an interest amounting to anxiety. Lifting his head, however, at the end of that time, he knotted his red brows and said, “What’s that?”

“What’s what?” asked the other traveller.

“That!” said Captain Patrick Dalroy, and pointed to a figure approaching on the road parallel to the river, “I mean, what’s it for?”

The figure had a longish beard and very long hair falling far below its shoulders. It had a serious and steadfast expression. It was dressed in what the inexperienced Mr. Pump at first took to be its nightgown; but afterward learned to be its complete goats’ hair tunic, unmixed even with a thread of the destructive and deadly wool of the sheep. It had no boots on its feet. It walked very swiftly to a particular turn of the stream and then turned very sharply (since it had accomplished its constitutional), and walked back toward the perfect town of Peaceways.

“I suppose it’s somebody from that milk place,” said Humphrey Pump, indulgently. “They seem to be pretty mad.”

“I don’t mind that so much,” said Dalroy, “I’m mad myself sometimes. But a madman has only one merit and last link with God. A madman is always logical. Now what is the logical connection between living on milk and wearing your hair long? Most of us lived on milk when we had no hair at all. How do they connect it up? Are there any heads even for a synopsis? Is it, say, ‘milk–water–shaving-water– shaving–hair?’ Is it ‘milk–kindness–unkindness–convicts–hair?’ What is the logical connection between having too much hair and having far too few boots? Whatcan it be? Is it ‘hair–hair-trunk– leather-trunk–leather-boots?’ Is it ‘hair–beard–oysters– seaside–paddling–no boots?’ Man is liable to err–especially when every mistake he makes is called a movement–but why should all the lunacies live together?”

“Because all the lunatics should live together,” said, Humphrey, “and if you’d seen what happened up at Crampton, with the farming-out idea, you’d know. It’s all very well, Captain; but if people can prevent a guest of great importance being buried up to the neck in farm manure, they will. They will, really.” He coughed almost apologetically. He was about to attempt a resumption of the conversation, when he saw his companion slap the milk can and keg back into the car, and get into it himself. “You drive,” he said, “drive me where those things live; you know, Hump.”

They did not, however, arrive in the civic centre of such things without yet another delay. They left the river and followed the man with the long hair and the goatskin frock; and he stopped as it happened at a house on the outskirts of the village. The adventurers stopped also, out of curiosity, and were at first relieved to see the man almost instantly reappear, having transacted his business with a quickness that seemed incredible. A second glance showed them it was not the man, but another man dressed exactly like him. A few minutes more of inquisitive delay, showed them many of the kilty and goatish sect going in and out of this particular place, each clad in his innocent uniform.

“This must be the temple and chapel,” muttered Patrick, “it must be here they sacrifice a glass of milk to a cow, or whatever it is they do. Well, the joke is pretty obvious, but we must wait for a lull in the crowding of the congregation.”

When the last long-haired phantom had faded up the road, Dalroy sprang from the car and drove the sign-board deep into the earth with savage violence, and then very quietly knocked at the door.

The apparent owner of the place, of whom the two last of the long-haired and bare-footed idealists were taking a rather hurried farewell, was a man curiously ill-fitted for the part he seemed cast for in the only possible plot.

Both Pump and Dalroy thought they had never seen a man look so sullen. His face was of the rubicund sort that does not suggest jollity, but merely a stagnant indigestion in the head. His mustache hung heavy and dark, his brows yet heavier and darker. Dalroy had seen something of the sort on the faces of defeated people disgracefully forced into submission, but he could not make head or tail of it in connection with the priggish perfections of Peaceways. It was all the odder because he was manifestly prosperous; his clothes were smartly cut in something of the sporting manner, and the inside of his house was at least four times grander than the outside.

But what mystified them most was this, that he did not so much exhibit the natural curiosity of a gentleman whose private house is entered by strangers, but rather an embarrassed and restless expectation. During Dalroy’s eager apologies and courteous inquiries about the direction and accommodations of Peaceways, his eye (which was of the boiled gooseberry order) perpetually wandered from them to the cupboard and then again to the window, and at last he got up and went to look out into the road.

“Oh, yes, sir; very healthy place, Peaceways,” he said, peering through the lattice. “Very … dash it, what do they mean? … Very healthy place. Of course they have their little ways.”

“Only drink pure milk, don’t they?” asked Dalroy.

The householder looked at him with a rather wild eye and grunted.

“Yes; so they say,” and he went again to the window.

“I’ve bought some of it,” said Patrick, patting his pet milk can, which he carried under his arm, as if unable to be separated from Dr. Meadows’s discovery. “Have a glass of milk, sir.”

The man’s boiled eye began to bulge in anger–or some other emotion.

“What do you want?” he muttered, “are you ’tecs or what?”

“Agents and Distributors of the Meadows’s Mountain Milk,” said the Captain, with simple pride, “taste it?”

The dazed householder took a glass of the blameless liquid and sipped it; and the change on his face was extraordinary.

“Well, I’m jiggered,” he said, with a broad and rather coarse grin. “That’s a queer dodge. You’re in the joke, I see.” Then he went again restlessly to the window; and added, “but if we’re all friends, why the blazes don’t the others come in? I’ve never known trade so slow before.”

“Who are the others?” asked Mr. Pump.

“Oh, the usual Peaceways people,” said the other. “They generally come here before work. Dr. Meadows don’t work them for very long hours, that wouldn’t be healthy or whatever he calls it; but he’s particular about their being punctual. I’ve seen ’em running, with all their pure-minded togs on, when the hooter gave the last call.”

Then he abruptly opened the front door and called out impatiently, but not loudly:

“Come along in if you’re coming. You’ll give the show away if you play the fool out there.”

Patrick looked out also and the view of the road outside was certainly rather singular. He was used to crowds, large and small, collecting outside houses which he had honoured with the sign of “The Old Ship,” but they generally stared up at it in unaffected wonder and amusement. But outside this open door, some twenty or thirty persons in what Pump had called their night-gowns were moving to and fro like somnambulists, apparently blind to the presence of the sign; looking at the other side of the road, looking at the horizon, looking at the clouds of morning; and only occasionally stopping to whisper to each other. But when the owner of the house called to one of these ostentatiously abstracted beings and asked him hoarsely what the devil was the matter, it was natural for the milk-fed one to turn his feeble eye toward the sign. The gooseberry eyes followed his, and the face to which they belonged was a study in apoplectic astonishment.

“What the hell have you done to my house?” he demanded. “Of course they can’t come in if this thing’s here.”

“I’ll take it down, if you like,” said Dalroy, stepping out and picking it up like a flower from the front garden (to the amazement of the men in the road, who thought they had strayed into a nursery fairy-tale), “but I wish, in return, you’d give me some idea of what the blazes all this means.”

“Wait till I’ve served these men,” replied his host.

The goat-garbed persons went very sheepishly (or goatishly) into the now signless building, and were rapidly served with raw spirits, which Mr. Pump suspected to be of no very superior quality. When the last goat was gone, Captain Dalroy said:

“I mean that all this seems to me topsy-turvy. I understood that as the law stands now, if there’s a sign they are allowed to drink and if there isn’t they aren’t.”

“The Law!” said the man, in a voice thick with scorn. “Do you think these poor brutes are afraid of the Law as they are of the Doctor?”

“Why should they be afraid of the Doctor?” asked Dalroy, innocently. “I always heard that Peaceways was a self-governing republic.”

“Self-governing be damned,” was the illiberal reply. “Don’t he own all the houses and could turn ’em out in a snow storm? Don’t ’e pay all the wages and could starve ’em stiff in a month? The Law!” And he snorted. A moment after he squared his elbows on the table and began to explain more fully.

“I was a brewer about here and had the biggest brewery in these parts. There were only two houses which didn’t belong to me, and the magistrates took away their licenses after a time. Ten years ago you could see Hugby’s Ales written beside every sign in the county. Then came these cursed Radicals, and our leader, Lord Ivywood, must go over to their side about it, and let this Doctor buy all the land under some new law that there shan’t be any pubs at all. And so my business is ruined so that he can sell his milk. Luckily I’d done pretty well before and had some compensation, of course; and I still do a fair trade on the Q.T., as you see. But of course that don’t amount to half the old one, for they’re afraid of old Meadows finding out. Snuffling old blighter!”

And the gentleman with the good clothes spat on the carpet.

“I am a Radical myself,” said the Irishman, rather coldly, “for all information on the Conservative party I must refer you to my friend, Mr. Pump, who is, of course, in the inmost secrets of his leaders. But it seems to me very rum sort of Radicalism to eat and drink at the orders of a master who is a madman, merely because he’s also a millionaire. 0 Liberty, what very complicated and even unsatisfactory social developments are committed in thy name! Why don’t they kick the old ass round the town a bit? No boots? Is that why they’re allowed no boots? Oh, roll him down hill in a milk can: he can’t object to that.”

“I don’t know,” said Pump, in his ruminant way, “Master Christian’s aunt did, but ladies are more particular, of course.”

“Look here!” cried Dalroy, in some excitement, “if I stick up that sign outside, and stay here to help, will you defy them? You’d be strictly within the law, and any private coercion I can promise you they shall repent. Plant the sign and sell the stuff openly like a man, and you may stand in English history like a deliverer.”

Mr. Hugby, of Hugby’s Ales, only looked gloomily at the table. His was not the sort of drinking nor the sort of drink-selling on which the revolutionary sentiment flourishes.

“Well,” said the Captain, “will you come with me and say ‘Hear, hear!’ and ‘How true!’–‘What matchless eloquence!’ if I make a speech in the market-place? Come along! There’s room in our car.”

“Well, I’ll come with you, if you like,” replied Mr. Hugby, heavily. “It’s true if yours is allowed we might get our trade back, too.” And putting on a silk hat he followed the Captain and the innkeeper out to their little car. The model village was not an appropriate background for Mr. Hugby’s silk hat. Indeed, the hat somehow seemed to bring out by contrast all that was fantastic in the place.

It was a superb morning, some hours after sunrise. The edges of the sky touching the ring of dim woods and distant hills were still jewelled with the tiny transparent clouds of daybreak, delicate red and green or yellow. But above the vault of Heaven rose through turquoise into a torrid and solid blue in which the other clouds, the colossal cumuli, tumbled about like a celestial pillow-fight. The bulk of the houses were as white as the clouds, so that it looked (to use another simile) as if some of the whitewashed cottages were flying and falling about the sky. But most of the white houses were picked out here and there with bright colours, here an ornament in orange or there a stripe of lemon yellow, as if by the brush of a baby giant. The houses had no thatching (thatching is not hygienic) but were mostly covered with a sort of peacock green tiles bought cheap at a Preraphaelite Bazaar; or, less frequently, by some still more esoteric sort of terra cotta bricks. The houses were not English, nor homelike, nor suited to the landscape; for the houses had not been built by free men for themselves, but at the fancy of a whimsical lord. But considered as a sort of elfin city in a pantomime it was a really picturesque background for pantomimic proceedings.

I fear Mr. Dalroy’s proceedings from the first rather deserved that name. To begin with, he left the sign, the cask, and the keg all wrapped and concealed in the car, but removed all the wraps of his own disguise, and stood on the central patch of grass in that green uniform that looked all the more insolent for being as ragged as the grass. Even that was less ragged than his red hair, which no red jungle of the East could imitate. Then he took out, almost tenderly, the large milk can, and deposited it, almost reverently, on the island of turf. Then he stood beside it, like Napoleon beside a gun, with an expression of tremendous seriousness and even severity. Then he drew his sword, and with that flashing weapon, as with a flail, lashed and thrashed the echoing metal can till the din was deafening, and Mr. Hugby hastily got out of the car and withdrew to a slight distance, stopping his ears. Mr. Pump sat solidly at the steering wheel, well knowing it might be necessary to start in some haste.

“Gather, gather, gather, Peaceways,” shouted Patrick, still banging on the can and lamenting the difficulties of adapting “Macgregor’s Gathering” to the name and occasion, “We’re landless,landless, landless, Peaceways!”

Two or three of the goat-clad, recognising Mr. Hugby with a guilty look, drew near with great caution, and the Captain shouted at them as if they were an army covering Salisbury Plain.

“Citizens,” he roared, saying anything that came into his head, “try the only original unadulterated Mountain Milk, for which alone Mahomet came to the mountain. The original milk of the land flowing with milk and honey; the high quality of which could alone have popularised so unappetising a combination. Try our milk! None others are genuine! Who can do without milk. Even whales can’t do without milk. If any lady or gentleman keeps a favourite whale at home, now’s their chance! The early whale catches the milk. Just look at our milk! If you say you can’t look at the milk, because it’s in the can–well, look at the can! You must look at the can! You simply must! When Duty whispers low ‘Thou Must!’” he bellowed at the top of his voice in a highly impromptu peroration, “When Duty whispers low ‘Thou Must,’ the Youth replies, ‘I can!’” And with the word “Can” he hit the can with a shocking and shattering noise, like a peal of demoniac bells of steel.

This introductory speech is open to criticism from those who regard it as intended for the study rather than the stage. The present chronicler (who has no aim save truth) is bound to record that for its own unscrupulous purpose it was extremely successful: a great mass of the citizens of Peaceways having been attracted by the noise of one man shouting like a crowd. There are crowds who do not care to revolt; but there are no crowds who do not like someone else to do it for them; a fact which the safest oligarchs may be wise to learn.

But Dalroy’s ultimate triumph (I regret to say) consisted in actually handing to a few of the foremost of his audience some samples of his blameless beverage. The fact was certainly striking. Some were paralysed with surprise. Some were abruptly broken double with laughter. Many chuckled. Some cheered. All looked radiantly toward the eccentric orator.

And yet the radiance died quietly and suddenly from their faces. And only because one little old man had joined the group; a little old man in white linen with a white pointed beard and a white powder-puff of hair like thistledown: a man whom almost every man present could have killed with the left arm.

CHAPTER XIX: THE HOSPITALITY OF THE CAPTAIN

DR. MOSES MEADOWS, whether that was his name or an Anglicised version of it, had certainly come in the first instance from a little town in Germany and his first two books were written in German. His first two books were his best, for he began with a genuine enthusiasm for physical science, and this was adulterated with nothing worse than a hatred of what he thought was superstition, and what many of us think is the soul of the state. The first enthusiasm was most notable in the first book, which was concerned to show that “in the female not upsprouting of the whiskers was from the therewith increasing arrested mentality derived.” In his second book he came more to grips with delusions, and for some time he was held to have proved (to everyone who agreed with him already) that the Time Ghost had been walking particularly “rapidly, lately; and that the Christus Mythus was by the alcoholic mind’s trouble explained.” Then, unfortunately, he came across the institution called Death, and began to argue with it. Not seeing any rational explanation of this custom of dying, so prevalent among his fellow-citizens, he concluded that it was merely traditional (which he thought meant “effete”), and began to think of nothing but ways of evading or delaying it. This had a rather narrowing effect on him, and he lost much of that acrid ardour which had humanised the atheism of his youth, when he would almost have committed suicide for the pleasure of taunting God with not being there. His later idealism grew more and more into materialism and consisted of his changing hypotheses and discoveries about the healthiest foods. There is no need to detain the reader over what has been called his Oil Period; his Sea-weed Period has been authoritatively expounded in Professor Nym’s valuable little work; and on the events of his Glue Period it is, perhaps, not very generous to dwell. It was during his prolonged stay in England that he chanced on the instance of the longevity of milk consumers, and built on it a theory which was, at the beginning at least, sincere. Unfortunately it was also successful: wealth flowed in to the inventor and proprietor of Mountain Milk, and he began to feel a fourth and last enthusiasm, which, also, can come late in life and have a narrowing effect on the mind.

In the altercation which naturally followed on his discovery of the antics of Mr. Patrick Dalroy, he was very dignified, but naturally not very tolerant; for he was quite unused to anything happening in spite of him, or anything important even happening without him, in the land that lay around. At first he hinted severely that the Captain had stolen the milk can from the milk-producing premises, and sent several workmen to count the cans in each shed; but Dalroy soon put him right about that.

“I bought it in a shop at Wyddington,” he said, “and since then I have used no other. You’ll hardly believe me” he said, with some truth, “but when I went into that shop I was quite a little man. I had one glass of your Mountain Milk; and look at me now.”

“You have no right to sell the milk here,” said Dr. Meadows, with the faintest trace of a German accent. “You are not in my employment; I am not responsible for your methods. You are not a representative of the business.”

“I’m an Advertisement,” said the Captain. “We advertise you all over England. You see that lean, skimpy, little man over there,” pointing to the indignant Mr. Pump, “He’s Before Taking Meadows’s Mountain Milk. I’m After,” added Mr. Dalroy, with satisfaction.

“You shall laugh at the magistrate,” said the other, with a thickening accent.

“I shall,” agreed Patrick. “Well, I’ll make a clean breast of it, sir. The truth is it isn’t your milk at all. It has quite a different taste. These gentlemen will tell you so.”

A smothered giggle sent all the blood to the eminent capitalist’s face.

“Then, either you have stolen my can and are a thief,” he said, stamping, “or you have introduced inferior substances into my discovery and are an adulterer–er–”

“Try adulteratist,” said Dalroy, kindly. “Prince Albert always said ‘adulteratarian.’ Dear old Albert! It seems like yesterday! But it is, of course, today. And it’s as true as daylight that this stuff tastes different. I can’t tell you what the taste is” (subdued guffaws from the outskirts of the crowd). “It’s something between the taste of your first sugar-stick and the fag-end of your father’s cigar. It’s as innocent as Heaven and as hot as hell. It tastes like a paradox. It tastes like a prehistoric inconsistency–I trust I make myself clear. The men who taste it most are the simplest men that God has made, and it always reminds them of the salt, because it is made out of sugar. Have some!”

And with a gesture of staggering hospitality, he shot out his long arm with the little glass at the end of it. The despotic curiosity in the Prussian overcame even his despotic dignity. He took a sip of the liquid, and his eyes stood out from his face.

“You’ve been mixing something with the milk,” were the first words that came to him.

“Yes,” answered Dalroy, “and so have you, unless you’re a swindler. Why is your milk advertised as different from everyone else’s milk, if you haven’t made the difference? Why does a glass of your milk cost threepence, and a glass of ordinary milk, a penny, if you haven’t put twopennorth of something into it? Now, look here, Dr. Meadows. The Public Analyst who would judge this, happens to be an honest man. I have a list of the twenty-one and a half honest men still employed in such posts. I make you a fair offer. He shall decide what it is I add to the milk, if you let him decide what it is you add to the milk. You must add something to the milk, or what can all these wheels and pumps and pulleys be for? Will you tell me, here and now, what you add to the milk which makes it so exceedingly Mountain?”

There was a long silence, full of the same sense of submerged mirth in the mob. But the philanthropist had fallen into a naked frenzy in the sunlight, and shaking his fists aloft in a way unknown to all the English around him, he cried out:

“Ach! but I know what you add! I know what you add! It is the Alcohol! And you have no sign and you shall laugh at a magistrate.”

Dalroy, with a bow, retired to the car, removed a number of wrappings and produced the prodigious wooden sign-post of “The Old Ship,” with its blue three-decker and red St. George’s cross conspicuously displayed. This he planted on his narrow territory of turf and looked round serenely.

“In this old oak-panelled inn of mine,” he said, “I will laugh at a million magistrates. Not that there’s anything unhygienic about this inn. No low ceilings or stuffiness here. Windows open everywhere, except in the floor. And as I hear some are saying there ought always to be food sold with fermented liquor, why, my dear Dr. Meadows, I’ve got a cheese here that will make another man of you. At least, we’ll hope so. We can but try.”

But Dr. Meadows was long past being merely angry. The exhibition of the sign had put him into a serious difficulty. Like most sceptics, like even the most genuine sceptics such as Bradlaugh, he was as legal as he was sceptical. He had a profound fear, which also had in it something better than fear, of being ultimately found in the wrong in a police court or a public inquiry. And he also suffered the tragedy of all such men living in modern England; that he must always be certain to respect the law, while never being certain of what it was. He could only remember generally that Lord Ivywood, when introducing or defending the great Ivywood Act on this matter, had dwelt very strongly on the unique and significant nature of the sign. And he could not be certain that if he disregarded it altogether, he might not eventually be cast in heavy damages–or even go to prison, in spite of his success in business. Of course he knew quite well that he had a thousand answers to such nonsense: that a patch of grass in the road couldn’t be an inn; that the sign wasn’t even produced when the Captain began to hand round the rum. But he also knew quite well that in the black peril we call British law that is not the point. He had heard points quite as obvious urged to a judge and urged in vain. At the bottom of his mind he found this fact: rich as he was, Lord Ivywood had made him–and on which side would Lord Ivywood be?

“Captain,” said Humphrey Pump, speaking for the first time, “we’d better be getting away. I feel it in my bones.”

“Inhospitable innkeeper!” cried the Captain, indignantly. “And after I have gone out of the way to license your premises! Why, this is the dawn of peace in the great city of Peaceways. I don’t despair of Dr. Meadows tossing off another bumper before we’ve done. For the moment, Brother Hugby will engage.”

As he spoke, he served out milk and rum at random; and still the Doctor had too much terror of our legal technicalities to make a final interference. But when Mr. Hugby, of Hugby’s Ales, heard his name called, he first of all jumped so as almost to dislodge the silk hat, then he stood quite still. Then he accepted a glass of the new Mountain Milk; and then his very face became full of speech, before he had spoken a word.

“There’s a motor coming along the road from the far hills,” said Humphrey, quietly. “It’ll be across the last bridge down stream in ten minutes and come up on this side.”

“Well,” said the Captain, impatiently, “I suppose you’ve seen a motor before.”

“Not in this valley all this morning,” answered Pump.

“Mr. Chairman,” said Mr. Hugby, feeling a dim disposition to say “Mr. Vice,” in memory of old commercial banquets, “I’m sure we’re all law-abiding people here, and wish to remain friends, especially with our good friend the Doctor; may he never want a friend or a bottle–that is in short, anything he wants, as we go up the hill of prosperity, and so on. But, as our friend here with the sign-board seems to be within his rights, well, I think the time’s come when we can look at these things more broadly, so to speak. Now I know it’s quite true those dirty little pubs do a lot of harm to a property, and you get a lot of ignorant people there who are just like pigs; and I don’t say our friend the Doctor hasn’t done good by clearing ’em away. But a big, well-managed business with plenty of capital behind it is quite another thing. Well, friends, you all know that I was originally in the Trade; though I have, of course, left off selling under the new regulations.” Here the goats looked rather guiltily at their cloven hoofs. “But I’ve got my little bit and I wouldn’t mind putting it into this ‘Old Ship’ here, if our friend would allow it to be run on business lines. And especially if he’d enlarge the premises a bit. Ha! ha! And if our good friend, the Doctor–”

“You rascal fellow!” spluttered Meadows, “your goot friend the doctor will make you dance before a magistrate.”

“Now, don’t be unbusinesslike,” reasoned the brewer. “It won’t hurt your sales. It’s quite a different public, don’t you see? Do talk like a business man.”

“I am not a business man,” said the scientist, with fiery eyes, “I am a servant of humanity.”

“Then,” said Dalroy, “why do you never do what your master tells you?”

“The motor has crossed the river,” said Humphrey Pump.

“You would undo all my works,” cried the Doctor, with sincere passion. “When I have built this town myself, when I have made it sober and healthful myself, when I am awake and about before anyone in the town myself, watching over its interests–you would ruin all to sell your barbaric and fundamentally beastly beer. And then you call me a goot friend. I am not a goot friend!”

“That I can’t say,” growled Hugby, “but if it comes to that–aren’t you trying to sell–”

A motor car drove up with a white explosion of dust, and about six very dusty people got out of it. Even through the densest disguise of the swift motorist, Pump perceived in many of them the peculiar style and bodily carriage of the police. The most evident exception was a long and more slender figure, which, on removing its cap and goggles, disclosed the dark and drooping features of J. Leveson, Secretary. He walked across to the little, old millionaire, who instantly recognized him and shook hands. They confabulated for some little time, turning over some official documents. Dr. Meadows cleared his throat and said to the whole crowd.

“I am very glad to be able to announce to you all that this extraordinary outrage has been too late attempted. Lord Ivywood, with the promptitude he so invariably shows, has immediately communicated to places of importance such as this a most just and right alteration of the law, which exactly meets the present case.

“We shall sleep in jail tonight,” said Humphrey, Pump. “I know it in my bones.”

“It is enough to say,” proceeded the millionaire, “that by the law as it now stands, any innkeeper, even if he display a sign, is subject to imprisonment if he sells alcohol on premises where it has not been previously kept for three days.”

“I thought it would be something like that,” muttered Pump. “Shall we give up, Captain, or shall we try a bolt for it?”

Even the impudence of Dalroy appeared for the instant dazed and stilled. He was staring forlornly up into the abyss of sky above him, as if, like Shelley, he could get inspiration from the last and purest clouds and the perfect hues of the ends of Heaven.

At last he said, in a soft and meditative voice, the single syllable,

“Sells!”

Pump looked at him sharply with a remarkable expression growing on his grim face. But the Doctor was far too rabidly rejoicing in his triumph to understand the Captain’s meaning.

“Sells alcohol, are the exact words,” he insisted, brandishing the blue oblong of the new Act of Parliament.

“So far as I am concerned they are inexact words,” said Captain Dalroy, with polite indifference. “I have not been selling alcohol, I have been giving it away. Has anybody here paid me money? Has anybody here seen anybody else pay me money? I’m a philanthropist just like Dr. Meadows. I’m his living image!”

Mr. Leveson and Dr. Meadows looked across at each other, and on the face of the first was consternation, and on the second a full return of all his terrors of the complicated law.

“I shall remain here for several weeks,” continued the Captain, leaning elegantly on the can, “and shall give away, gratis, such supplies of this excellent drink as may be demanded by the citizens. It appears that there is no such supply at present in this district, and I feel sure that no person present can object to so strictly legal and highly charitable an arrangement.”

In this he was apparently in error; for several persons present seemed to object to it. But curiously enough it was not the withered and fanatical face of the philanthropist Meadows, nor the dark and equine face of the official Leveson, which stood out most vividly as a picture of protest. The face most strangely unsympathetic with this form of charity was that of the ex-proprietor of Hugby’s Ales. His gooseberry eyes were almost dropping from his head and his words sprang from his lips before he could stop them.

“And you blooming well think you can come here like a big buffoon, you beast, and take away all my trade–”

Old Meadows turned on him with the swiftness of an adder.

“And what is your trade, Mr. Hugby?” he asked.

The brewer bubbled with a sort of bursting anger. The goats all looked at the ground as is, according to a Roman poet, the habit of the lower animals. Man (in the character of Mr. Patrick Dalroy) taking advantage of a free but fine translation of the Latin passage, “looked aloft, and with uplifted eyes beheld his own hereditary skies.”

“Well, all I can say is,” roared Mr. Hugby, “if the police come all this way and can’t lock up a dirty loafer whose coat’s all in rags, there’s an end of me paying these fat infernal taxes and–”

“Yes,” said Dalroy, in a voice that fell like an axe, “there is an end of you, please God. It’s brewers like you that have made the inns stink with poison, till even good men asked for no inns at all. And you are worse than the teetotallers, for you prevented what they never knew. And as for you, eminent man of science, great philanthropist, idealist and destroyer of inns, let me give one cold fact for your information. You are not respected. You are obeyed. Why should I or anyone respect you particularly? You say you built this town and get up at daybreak to watch this town. You built it for money and you watch it for more money. Why should I respect you because you are fastidious about food, that your poor old digestion may outlive the hearts of better men? Why should you be the god of this valley, whose god is your belly, merely because you do not even love your god, but only fear him? Go home to your prayers, old man; for all men shall die. Read the Bible, if you like, as they do in your German home; and I suppose you once read it to pick texts as you now read it to pick holes. I don’t read it myself, I’m afraid, but I remember some words in old Mulligan’s translation; and I leave them with you. ‘Unless God,’” and he made a movement with his arm, so natural and yet so vast that for an instant the town really looked like a toy of bright coloured cardboard at the feet of the giant; “‘unless God build the city, their labour is but lost that build it; unless God keep the city, the watchman watcheth in vain. It is lost labour that you rise up early in the morning and eat the bread of carefulness; while He giveth His beloved sleep.’ Try and understand what that means, and never mind whether it’s Elohistic. And now, Hump, we’ll away and away. I’m tired of the green tiles over there. Come, fill up my cup,” and he banged down the cask in the car, “come saddle my horses and call out my men. And tremble, gay goats, in the midst of your glee; for you’ve no’ seen the last of my milk can and me.”

This song was joyously borne away with Mr. Dalroy in the disappearing car; and the motorists were miles beyond pursuit from Peaceways before they thought of halting again. But they were still beside the bank of that noble and enlarging river; and in a place of deep fern and fairy-ribboned birches with the glowing and gleaming water behind them, Patrick asked his friend to stop the car.

“By the way,” said Humphrey, suddenly, “there was one thing I didn’t understand. Why was he so afraid of the Public Analyst? What poison and chemicals does he put in the milk?”

“H20,” answered the Captain, “I take it without milk myself.”

And he bent over as if to drink of the stream, as he had done at daybreak.

CHAPTER XX: THE TURK AND THE FUTURISTS

MR. ADRIAN CROOKE was a successful chemist whose shop was in the neighbourhood of Victoria, but his face expressed more than is generally required in a successful chemist. It was a curious face, prematurely old and like parchment, but acute and decisive, with real headwork in every line of it. Nor was his conversation, when he did converse, out of keeping with this: he had lived in many countries, and had a rich store of anecdote about the more quaint and sometimes the more sinister side of his work, visions of the vapour of eastern drugs or guesses at the ingredients of Renascence poisons. He himself, it need hardly be said, was a most respectable and reliable apothecary, or he would not have had the custom of families, especially among the upper classes; but he enjoyed as a hobby, the study of the dark days and lands where his science had lain sometimes on the borders of magic and sometimes upon the borders of murder. Hence it often happened that persons, who in their serious senses were well aware of his harmless and useful habits, would leave his shop on some murky and foggy night, with their heads so full of wild tales of the eating of hemp or the poisoning of roses, they could hardly help fancying that the shop, with its glowing moon of crimson or saffron, like bowls of blood and sulphur, was really a house of the Black Art.

It was doubtless for such conversational pleasures, in part, that Hibbs However entered the shop; as well as for a small glass of the same restorative medicine which he had been taking when Leveson found him by the open window. But this did not prevent Hibbs from expressing considerable surprise and some embarrassment when Leveson entered the same chemist’s and asked for the same chemical. Indeed, Leveson looked harassed and weary enough to want it.

“You’ve been out of town, haven’t you?” said Leveson. “No luck. They got away again on some quibble. The police wouldn’t make the arrest; and even old Meadows thought it might be illegal. I’m sick of it. Where are you going?”

“I thought,” said Mr. Hibbs, “of dropping in at this Post-Futurist exhibition. I believe Lord Ivywood will be there; he is showing it to the Prophet. I don’t pretend to know much about art, but I hear it’s very fine.”

There was a long silence and Mr. Leveson said, “People always prejudiced against new ideas.”

Then there was another long silence and Mr. Hibbs said, “After all, they said the same of Whistler.”

Refreshed by this ritual, Mr. Leveson became conscious of the existence of Crooke, and said to him, cheerfully, “That’s so in your department, too, isn’t it? I suppose the greatest pioneers in chemistry were unpopular in their own time.”

“Look at the Borgias,” said Mr. Crooke. “They got themselves quite disliked.”

“You’re very flippant, you know,” said Leveson, in a fatigued way. “Well, so long. Are you coming, Hibbs?”

And the two gentlemen, who were both attired in high hats and afternoon callers’ coats, betook themselves down the street. It was a fine, sunny day, the twin of the day before that had shone so brightly on the white town of Peaceways; and their walk was a pleasant one, along a handsome street with high houses and small trees that overlooked the river all the way. For the pictures were exhibited in a small but famous gallery, a rather rococo building of which the entrance steps almost descended upon the Thames. The building was girt on both sides and behind with gaudy flower-beds, and on the top of the steps, in front of the Byzantine doorway, stood their old friend, Misysra Ammon, smiling broadly, and in an unusually sumptuous costume. But even the sight of that fragrant eastern flower did not seem to revive altogether the spirits of the drooping Secretary.

“You have coome,” said the beaming Prophet, “to see the decoration? It is approo-ooved. I haf approo-ooved it.”

“We came to see the Post-Futurist pictures,” began Hibbs; but Leveson was silent.

“There are no pictures,” said the Turk, simply, “if there had been I could not haf approo-ooved. For those of our Religion pictures are not goo-ood; they are Idols, my friendss. Loo-ook in there,” and he turned and darted a solemn forefinger just under his nose toward the gates of the gallery; “Loo-ook in there and you will find no Idols. No Idols at all. I have most carefully loo-ooked into every one of the frames. Every one I have approo-ooved. No trace of ze Man form. No trace of ze Animal form. All decoration as goo-ood as the goo-oodest of carpets; it harms not. Lord Ivywood smile of happiness; for I tell him Islam indeed progresses. Ze old Moslems allow to draw the picture of the vegetable. Here I hunt even for the vegetable. And there is no vegetable.”

Hibbs, whose trade was tact, naturally did not think it wise that the eminent Misysra should go on lecturing from a tall flight of steps to the whole street and river, so he had slipped past with a general proposal to go in and see. The Prophet and the Secretary followed; and all entered the outer hall where Lord Ivywood stood with the white face of a statue. He was the only statue the New Moslems were allowed to worship.

On a sofa like a purple island in the middle of the sea of floor sat Enid Wimpole, talking eagerly to her cousin, Dorian; doing, in fact, her best to prevent the family quarrel, which threatened to follow hard on the incident at Westminster. In the deeper perspective of the rooms Lady Joan Brett was floating about. And if her attitude before the Post-Futurist pictures could not be called humble, or even inquiring, it is but just to that school to say that she seemed to be quite as bored with the floor that she walked on, and the parasol she held. Bit by bit other figures or groups of that world drifted through the Exhibition of the Post-Futurists. It is a very small world, but it is just big enough and just small enough to govern a country–that is, a country with no religion. And it has all the vanity of a mob; and all the reticence of a secret society.

Leveson instantly went up to Lord Ivywood, pulled papers from his pocket and was plainly telling him of the escape from Peaceways. Ivywood’s face hardly changed; he was, or felt, above some things; and one of them was blaming a servant before the servant’s social superiors. But no one could say he looked less like cold marble than before.

“I made all possible inquiries about their subsequent route,” the Secretary was heard saying, “and the most serious feature is that they seem to have taken the road for London.”

“Quite so,” replied the statue, “they will be easier to capture here.”

Lady Enid, by a series of assurances (most of which were, I regret to say, lies) had succeeded in preventing the scandal of her cousin, Dorian, actually cutting her cousin, Philip. But she knew very little of the masculine temper if she really thought she had prevented the profound intellectual revolt of the poet against the politician. Ever since he heard Mr. Hibbs say, “Yars! Yars!”, and order his arrest by a common policeman, the feelings of Dorian Wimpole had flowed for some four days and nights in a direction highly contrary to the ideals of Mr. Hibbs, and the sudden appearance of that blameless diplomatist quickened the mental current to a cataract. But as he could not insult Hibbs, whom socially he did not even know; and could not insult Ivywood, with whom he had just had a formal reconciliation, it was absolutely necessary that he should insult something else instead. All watchers for the Dawn will be deeply distressed to know that the Post-Futurist School of Painting received the full effects of this perverted wrath. In vain did Mr. Leveson affirm from time to time, “People always prejudiced against new ideas.” Vainly did Mr. Hibbs say at the proper intervals, “After all, they said the same of Whistler.” Not by such decent formalities was the frenzy of Dorian to be appeased.

“That little Turk has more sense than you have,” he said, “he passes it as a good wall-paper. I should say it was a bad wall-paper; the sort of wall-paper that gives a sick man fever when he hasn’t got it. But to call it pictures–you might as well call it seats for the Lord Mayor’s Show. A seat isn’t a seat if you can’t see the Lord Mayor’s Show. A picture isn’t a picture if you can’t see any picture. You can sit down at home more comfortably than you can at a procession. And you can walk about at home more comfortably than you can at a picture gallery. There’s only one thing to be said for a street show or a picture show–and that is whether there is anything to be shown. Now, then! Show me something!”

“Well,” said Lord Ivywood, good humouredly, motioning toward the wall in front of him, “let me show you the ‘Portrait of an Old Lady.’”

“Well,” said Dorian, stolidly, “which is it?”

Mr. Hibbs made a hasty gesture of identification, but was so unfortunate as to point to the picture of “Rain in the Apennines,” instead of the “Portrait of an Old Lady,” and his intervention increased the irritation of Dorian Wimpole. Most probably, as Mr. Hibbs afterward explained, it was because a vivacious movement of the elbow of Mr. Wimpole interfered with the exact pointing of the forefinger of Mr. Hibbs. In any case, Mr. Hibbs was sharply and horridly fixed by embarrassment; so that he had to go away to the refreshment bar and eat three lobster-patties, and even drink a glass of that champagne that had once been his ruin. But on this occasion he stopped at one glass, and returned with a full diplomatic responsibility.

He returned to find that Dorian Wimpole had forgotten all the facts of time, place, and personal pride, in an argument with Lord Ivywood, exactly as he had forgotten such facts in an argument with Patrick Dalroy, in a dark wood with a donkey-cart. And Philip Ivywood was interested also; his cold eyes even shone; for though his pleasure was almost purely intellectual, it was utterly sincere.

“And I do trust the untried; I do follow the inexperienced,” he was saying quietly, with his fine inflections of voice. “You say this is changing the very nature of Art. I want to change the very nature of Art. Everything lives by turning into something else. Exaggeration is growth.”

“But exaggeration of what?” demanded Dorian. “I cannot see a trace of exaggeration in these pictures; because I cannot find a hint of what it is they want to exaggerate. You can’t exaggerate the feathers of a cow or the legs of a whale. You can draw a cow with feathers or a whale with legs for a joke–though I hardly think such jokes are in your line. But don’t you see, my good Philip, that even then the joke depends on its looking like a cow and not only like a thing with feathers. Even then the joke depends on the whale as well as the legs. You can combine up to a certain point; you can distort up to a certain point; after that you lose the identity; and with that you lose everything. A Centaur is so much of a man with so much of a horse. The Centaur must not be hastily identified with the Horsy Man. And the Mermaid must be maidenly; even if there is something fishy about her social conduct.”

“No,” said Lord Ivywood, in the same quiet way, “I understand what you mean, and I don’t agree. I should like the Centaur to turn into something else, that is neither man nor horse.”

“But not something that has nothing of either?” asked the poet.

“Yes,” answered Ivywood, with the same queer, quiet gleam in his colourless eyes, “something that has nothing of either.”

“But what’s the good?” argued Dorian. “A thing that has changed entirely has not changed at all. It has no bridge of crisis. It can remember no change. If you wake up tomorrow and you simplyare Mrs. Dope, an old woman who lets lodgings at Broadstairs –well, I don’t doubt Mrs. Dope is a saner and happier person than you are. But in what way haveyou progressed? What part ofyou is better? Don’t you see this prime fact of identity is the limit set on all living things?”

“No,” said Philip, with suppressed but sudden violence, “I deny that any limit is set upon living things.”

“Why, then I understand,” said Dorian, “why, though you make such good speeches, you have never written any poetry.”

Lady Joan, who was looking with tedium at a rich pattern of purple and green in which Misysra attempted to interest her (imploring her to disregard the mere title, which idolatrously stated it as “First Communion in the Snow”), abruptly turned her full face to Dorian. It was a face to which few men could feel indifferent, especially when thus suddenly shown them.

“Why can’t he write poetry?” she asked. “Do you mean he would resent the limits of metre and rhyme and so on?”

The poet reflected for a moment and then said, “Well, partly; but I mean more than that too. As one can be candid in the family, I may say that what everyone says about him is that he has no humour. But that’s not my complaint at all. I think my complaint is that he has no pathos. That is, he does not feel human limitations. That is, he will not write poetry.”

Lord Ivywood was looking with his cold, unconscious profile into a little black and yellow picture called “Enthusiasm”; but Joan Brett leaned across to him with swarthy eagerness and cried quite provocatively,

“Dorian says you’ve no pathos. Have you any pathos? He says it’s a sense of human limitations.”

Ivywood did not remove his gaze from the picture of “Enthusiasm,” but simply said “No; I have no sense of human limitations.” Then he put up his elderly eyeglass to examine the picture better. Then he dropped it again and confronted Joan with a face paler than usual.

“Joan,” he said, “I would walk where no man has walked; and find something beyond tears and laughter. My road shall be my road indeed; for I will make it, like the Romans. And my adventures shall not be in the hedges and the gutters, but in the borders of the ever advancing brain. I will think what was unthinkable until I thought it; I will love what never lived until I loved it–I will be as lonely as the First Man.”

“They say,” she said, after a silence, “that the first man fell.”

“You mean the priests?” he answered. “Yes, but even they admit that he discovered good and evil. So are these artists trying to discover some distinction that is still dark to us.”

“Oh,” said Joan, looking at him with a real and unusual interest, “then you don’tsee anything in the pictures, yourself?”

“I see the breaking of the barriers,” he answered, “beyond that I see nothing.”

She looked at the floor for a little time and traced patterns with her parasol, like one who has really received food for thought. Then she said, suddenly,

“But perhaps the breaking of barriers might be the breaking of everything.”

The clear and colourless eyes looked at her quite steadily.

“Perhaps,” said Lord Ivywood.

Dorian Wimpole made a sudden movement a few yards off, where he was looking at a picture, and said, “Hullo! What’s this?” Mr. Hibbs was literally gaping in the direction of the entrance.

Framed in that fine Byzantine archway stood a great big, bony man in threadbare but careful clothes, with a harsh, high-featured, intelligent face, to which a dark beard under the chin gave something of the Puritanic cast. Somehow his whole personality seemed to be pulled together and explained when he spoke with a North Country accent.

“Weel, lards,” he said, genially, “t’hoose be main great on t’pictures. But I coom for suthin’ in a moog. Haw! Haw!”

Leveson and Hibbs looked at each other. Then Leveson rushed from the room. Lord Ivywood did not move a finger; but Mr. Wimpole, with a sort of poetic curiosity, drew nearer to the stranger, and studied him.

“It’s perfectly awful,” cried Enid Wimpole, in a loud whisper, “the man must be drunk.”

“Na, lass,” said the man with gallantry, “a’ve not been droonk, nobbut at Hurley Fair, these years and all; a’m a decent lad and workin’ ma way back t’Wharfdale. No harm in a moog of ale, lass.”

“Are you quite sure,” asked Dorian Wimpole, with a singular sort of delicate curiosity, “are you quitesure you’re not drunk.”

“A’m not droonk,” said the man, jovially.

“Even if these were licensed premises,” began Dorian, in the same diplomatic manner.

“There’s t’sign on t’hoose,” said the stranger.

The black, bewildered look on the face of Joan Brett suddenly altered. She took four steps toward the doorway, and then went back and sat on the purple ottoman. But Dorian seemed fascinated with his inquiry into the alleged decency of the lad who was working his way to Wharfdale.

“Even if these were licensed premises,” he repeated, “drink could be refused you if you were drunk. Now, are youreally sure you’re not drunk. Would you know if it was raining, say?”

“Aye,” said the man, with conviction.

“Would you know any common object of your countryside,” inquired Dorian, scientifically, “a woman –let us say an old woman.”

“Aye,” said the man, with good humour.

“What on earth are you doing with the creature?” whispered Enid, feverishly.

“I am trying,” answered the poet, “to prevent a very sensible man from smashing a very silly shop. I beg your pardon, sir. As I was saying, would you know these things in a picture, now? Do you know what a landscape is and what a portrait is? Forgive my asking; you see we are responsible while we keep the place going.”

There soared up into the sky like a cloud of rooks the eager vanity of the North.

“We collier lads are none so badly educated, lad,” he said. “In the town a’ was born in there was a gallery of pictures as fine as Lunnon. Aye, and a’ knew ’em, too.”

“Thank you,” said Wimpole, pointing suddenly at the wall. “Would you be so kind, for instance, as to look at those two pictures. One represents an old woman and the other rain in the hills. It’s a mere formality. You shall have your drink when you’ve said which is which.”

The northerner bowed his huge body before the two frames and peered into them patiently. The long stillness that followed seemed to be something of a strain on Joan, who rose in a restless manner, first went to look out of a window and then went out of the front door.

At length the art-critic lifted a large, puzzled but still philosophical face.

“Soomehow or other,” he said, “a’ mun be droonk after all.”

“You have testified,” cried Dorian with animation. “You have all but saved civilization. And by God, you shall have your drink.”

And he brought from the refreshment table a huge bumper of the Hibbsian champagne, and declined payment by the rapid method of running out of the gallery on to the steps outside.

Joan was already standing there. Out the little side window she had seen the incredible thing she expected to see; which explained the ludicrous scene inside. She saw the red and blue wooden flag of Mr. Pump standing up in the flower-beds in the sun, as serenely as if it were a tall and tropical flower; and yet, in the brief interval between the window and the door it had vanished, as if to remind her it was a flying dream. But two men were in a little motor outside, which was in the very act of starting. They were in motoring disguise, but she knew who they were. All that was deep in her, all that was sceptical, all that was stoical, all that was noble, made her stand as still as one of the pillars of the porch; but a dog, bearing the name of Quoodle, sprang up in the moving car, and barked with joy at the mere sight of her, and though she had borne all else, something in that bestial innocence of an animal suddenly blinded her with tears.

It could not, however, blind her to the extraordinary fact that followed. Mr. Dorian Wimpole, attired in anything but motoring costume, dressed in that compromise between fashion and art which seems proper to the visiting of picture-galleries, did not by any means stand as still as one of the pillars of the porch. He rushed down the steps, ran after the car and actually sprang into it, without disarranging his Whistlerian silk hat.

“Good afternoon,” he said to Dalroy, pleasantly. “You owe me a motor-ride, you know.”

CHAPTER XXI: THE ROAD TO ROUNDABOUT

PATRICK DALROY looked at the invader with a heavy and yet humorous expression, and merely said, “I didn’t steal your car; really, I didn’t.”

“Oh, no,” answered Dorian, “I’ve heard all about it since, and as you’re rather the persecuted party, so to speak, it wouldn’t be fair not to tell you that I don’t agree much with Ivywood about all this. I disagree with him; or rather, to speak medically, he disagrees with me. He has, ever since I woke up after an oyster supper and found myself in the House of Commons with policemen calling out, ‘Who goes home?’”

“Indeed,” inquired Dalroy, drawing his red bushy eyebrows together. “Do the officials in Parliament say, ‘Who goes home?’”

“Yes,” answered Wimpole, indifferently, “it’s a part of some old custom in the days when Members of Parliament might be attacked in the street.”

“Well,” inquired Patrick, in a rational tone, “why aren’t they attacked in the street?”

There was a silence. “It is a holy mystery,” said the Captain at last. “But, ‘Who goes home?’–that is uncommonly good.”

The Captain had received the poet into the car with all possible expressions of affability and satisfaction, but the poet, who was keen-sighted enough about people of his own sort, could not help thinking that the Captain was a little absent-minded. As they flew thundering through the mazes of South London (for Pump had crossed Westminster Bridge and was making for the Surrey hills), the big blue eyes of the big red-haired man rolled perpetually up and down the streets; and, after longer and longer silences, he found expression for his thoughts.

“Doesn’t it strike you that there are a very large number of chemists in London nowadays?”

“Are there?” asked Wimpole, carelessly. “Well, there certainly are two very close to each other just over there.”

“Yes, and both the same name,” replied Dalroy, “Crooke. And I saw the same Mr. Crooke chemicalizing round the corner. He seems to be a highly omnipresent deity.”

“A large business, I suppose,” observed Dorian Wimpole.

“Too large for its profits, I should say,” said Dalroy. “What can people want with two chemists of the same sort within a few yards of each other? Do they put one leg into one shop and one into the other and have their corns done in both at once? Or, do they take an acid in one shop and an alkali in the next, and wait for the fizz? Or, do they take the poison in the first shop and the emetic in the second shop? It seems like carrying delicacy too far. It almost amounts to living a double life.”

“But, perhaps,” said Dorian, “he is an uproariously popular chemist, this Mr. Crooke. Perhaps there’s a rush on some specialty of his.”

“It seems to me,” said the Captain, “that there are certain limitations to such popularity in the case of a chemist. If a man sells very good tobacco, people may smoke more and more of it from sheer self-indulgence. But I never heard of anybody exceeding in cod-liver oil. Even castor-oil, I should say, is regarded with respect rather than true affection.”

After a few minutes of silence, he said, “Is it safe to stop here for an instant, Pump?”

“I think so,” replied Humphrey, “if you’ll promise me not to have any adventures in the shop.”

The motor car stopped before yet a fourth arsenal of Mr. Crooke and his pharmacy, and Dalroy went in. Before Pump and his companion could exchange a word, the Captain came out again, with a curious expression on his countenance, especially round the mouth.

“Mr. Wimpole,” said Dalroy, “will you give us the pleasure of dining with us this evening? Many would consider it an unceremonious invitation to an unconventional meal; and it may be necessary to eat it under a hedge or even up a tree; but you are a man of taste, and one does not apologise for Hump’s rum or Hump’s cheese to persons of taste. We will eat and drink of our best tonight. It is a banquet. I am not very certain whether you and I are friends or enemies, but at least there shall be peace tonight.”

“Friends, I hope,” said the poet, smiling, “but why peace especially tonight?”

“Because there will be war tomorrow,” answered Patrick Dalroy, “whichever side of it you may be on. I have just made a singular discovery.”

And he relapsed into his silence as they flew out of the fringe of London into the woods and hills beyond Croydon. Dalroy remained in the same mood of brooding, Dorian was brushed by the butterfly wing of that fleeting slumber that will come on a man hurried, through the air, after long lounging in hot drawing rooms; even the dog Quoodle was asleep at the bottom of the car. As for Humphrey Pump, he very seldom talked when he had anything else to do. Thus it happened that long landscapes and perspectives were shot past them like suddenly shifted slides, and long stretches of time elapsed before any of them spoke again. The sky was changing from the pale golds and greens of evening to the burning blue of a strong summer night, a night of strong stars. The walls of woodland that flew past them like long assegais, were mostly, at first, of the fenced and park-like sort; endless oblong blocks of black pinewood shut in by boxes of thin grey wood. But soon fences began to sink, and pinewoods to straggle, and roads to split and even to sprawl. Half an hour later Dalroy had begun to realise something romantic and even faintly reminiscent in the roll of the country, and Humphrey Pump had long known he was on the marches of his native land.

So far as the difference could be defined by a detail, it seemed to consist not so much in the road rising as in the road perpetually winding. It was more like a path; and even where it was abrupt or aimless, it seemed the more alive. They appeared to be ascending a big, dim hill that was built of a crowd of little hills with rounded tops; it was like a cluster of domes. Among these domes the road climbed and curled in multitudinous curves and angles. It was almost impossible to believe that it could turn itself and round on itself so often without tying itself in a knot and choking.

“I say,” said Dalroy, breaking the silence suddenly, “this car will get giddy and fall down.”

“Perhaps,” said Dorian, beaming at him, “my car, as you may have noticed, was much steadier.”

Patrick laughed, but not without a shade of confusion. “I hope you got back your car all right,” he said. “This is really nothing for speed; but it’s an uncommonly good little climber, and it seems to have some climbing to do just now. And even more wandering.”

“The roads certainly seem to be very irregular,” said Dorian, reflectively.

“Well,” cried Patrick, with a queer kind of impatience, “you’re English and I’m not. You ought to know why the road winds about like this. Why, the Saints deliver us!” he cried, “it’s one of the wrongs of Ireland that she can’t understand England. England won’t understand herself, England won’t tell us why these roads go wriggling about. Englishmen won’t tell us! You won’t tell us!”

“Don’t be too sure,” said Dorian, with a quiet irony.

Dalroy, with an irony far from quiet emitted a loud yell of victory.

“Right,” he shouted. “More songs of the car club! We’re all poets here, I hope. Each shall write something about why the road jerks about so much. So much as this, for example,” he added, as the whole vehicle nearly rolled over in a ditch.

For, indeed, Pump appeared to be attacking such inclines as are more suitable for a goat than a small motor car. This may have been exaggerated in the emotions of his companions, who had both, for different reasons, seen much of mere flat country lately. The sensation was like a combination of trying to get into the middle of the maze at Hampton Court, and climbing the spiral staircase to the Belfry at Bruges.

“This is the right way to Roundabout,” said Dalroy, cheerfully, “charming place; salubrious spot. You can’t miss it. First to the left and right and straight on round the corner and back again. That’ll do for my poem. Get on, you slackers; why aren’t you writing your poems?”

“I’ll try one if you like,” said Dorian, treating his flattered egotism lightly. “But it’s too dark to write; and getting darker.”

Indeed they had come under a shadow between them and the stars, like the brim of a giant’s hat; only through the holes and rents in which the summer stars could now look down on them. The hill, like a cluster of domes, though smooth and even bare in its lower contours was topped with a tangle of spanning trees that sat above them like a bird brooding over its nest. The wood was larger and vaguer than the clump that is the crown of the hill at Chanctonbury, but was rather like it and held much the same high and romantic position. The next moment they were in the wood itself, and winding in and out among the trees by a ribbon of paths. The emerald twilight between the stems, combined with the dragon-like contortions of the great grey roots of the beeches, had a suggestion of monsters and the deep sea; especially as a long litter of crimson and copper-coloured fungi, which might well have been the more gorgeous types of anemone or jelly-fish, reddened the ground like a sunset dropped from the sky. And yet, contradictorily enough, they had also a strong sense of being high up; and even near to heaven; and the brilliant summer stars that stared through the chinks of the leafy roof might almost have been white starry blossoms on the trees of the wood.

But though they had entered the wood as if it were a house, their strongest sensation still was the rotatory; it seemed as if that high green house went round and round like a revolving lighthouse or the whiz-gig temple in the old pantomimes. The stars seemed, to circle over their heads; and Dorian felt almost certain he had seen the same beech-tree twice.

At length they came to a central place where the hill rose in a sort of cone in the thick of its trees, lifting its trees with it. Here Pump stopped the car, and clambering up the slope, came to the crawling colossal roots of a very large but very low beech-tree. It spread out to the four quarters of heaven more in the manner of an octopus than a tree, and within its low crown of branches there was a kind of hollow, like a cup, into which Mr. Humphrey Pump, of “The Old Ship,” Pebblewick, suddenly and entirely disappeared.

When he appeared it was with a kind of rope ladder, which he politely hung over the side for his companions to ascend by, but the Captain preferred to swing himself onto one of the octopine branches with a whirl of large wild legs worthy of a chimpanzee. When they were established there, each propped in the hollow against a branch, almost as comfortably as in an arm chair, Humphrey himself descended once more and began to take out their simple stores. The dog was still asleep in the car.

“An old haunt of yours, Hump, I suppose,” said the Captain. “You seem quite at home.”

“I am at home,” answered Pump, with gravity, “at the sign of ‘The Old Ship.’” And he stuck the old blue and red sign-board erect among the toadstools, as if inviting the passer-by to climb the trees for a drink.

The tree just topped the mound or clump of trees, and from it they could see the whole champaign of the country they had passed, with the silver roads roaming about in it like rivers. They were so exalted they could almost fancy the stars would burn them.

“Those roads remind me of the songs you’ve all promised,” said Dalroy at last. “Let’s have some supper, Hump, and then recite.”

Humphrey had hung one of the motor lanterns onto a branch above him, and proceeded by the light of it to tap the keg of rum and hand round the cheese.

“What an extraordinary thing,” exclaimed Dorian Wimpole, suddenly. “Why, I’m quite comfortable! Such a thing has never happened before, I should imagine. And how holy this cheese tastes.”

“It has gone on a pilgrimage,” answered Dalroy, “or rather a Crusade. It’s a heroic, a fighting cheese. ‘Cheese of all Cheeses, Cheeses of all the world,’ as my compatriot, Mr. Yeats, says to the Something-or-other of Battle. It’s almost impossible that this cheese can have come out of such a coward as a cow. I suppose,” he added, wistfully, “I suppose it wouldn’t do to explain that in this case Hump had milked the bull. That would be classed by scientists among Irish legends–those that have the Celtic glamour and all that. No, I think this cheese must have come from that Dun Cow of Dunsmore Heath, who had horns bigger than elephant’s tusks, and who was so ferocious that one of the greatest of the old heroes of chivalry was required to do battle with it. The rum’s good, too. I’ve earned this glass of rum–earned it by Christian humility. For nearly a month I’ve lowered myself to the beasts of the field, and gone about on all fours like a teetotaller. Hump, circulate the bottle–I mean the cask–and let us have some of this poetry you’re so keen about. Each poem must have the same title, you know; it’s a rattling good title. It’s called ‘An Inquiry into the Causes geological, historical, agricultural, psychological, psychical, moral, spiritual and theological of the alleged cases of double, treble, quadruple and other curvature in the English Road, conducted by a specially appointed secret commission in a hole in a tree, by admittedly judicious and academic authorities specially appointed by themselves to report to the Dog Quoodle, having power to add to their number and also to take away the number they first thought of; God save the King.’” Having delivered this formula with blinding rapidity, he added rather breathlessly, “that’s the note to strike, the lyric note.”

For all his rather formless hilarity, Dalroy still impressed the poet as being moredistrait than the others, as if his mind were labouring with some bigger thing in the background. He was in a sort of creative trance; and Humphrey Pump, who knew him like his own soul, knew well that it was not mere literary creation. Rather it was a kind of creation which many modern moralists would call destruction. For Patrick Dalroy was, not a little to his misfortune, what is called a man of action; as Captain Dawson realised when he found his entire person a bright pea-green. Fond as he was of jokes and rhymes, nothing he could write or even sing ever satisfied him like something he could do.

Thus it happened that his contribution to the metrical inquiry into the crooked roads was avowedly hasty and flippant. While Dorian who was of the opposite temper, the temper that receives impressions instead of pushing out to make them, found his artist’s love of beauty fulfilled as it had never been before in that noble nest; and was far more serious and human than usual. Patrick’s verses ran:

“Some say that Guy of Warwick,

The man that killed the Cow,

And brake the mighty Boar alive,

Beyond the Bridge at Slough,

Went up against a Loathly Worm

That wasted all the Downs,

And so the roads they twist and squirm

(If I may be allowed the term)

From the writhing of the stricken Worm

That died in seven towns.

I see no scientific proof

That this idea is sound,

And I should say they wound about

To find the town of Roundabout,

The merry town of Roundabout

That makes the world go round.

“Some say that Robin Goodfellow,

Whose lantern lights the meads,

(To steal a phrase Sir Walter Scott

In heaven no longer needs)

Such dance around the trysting-place

The moonstruck lover leads;

Which superstition I should scout;

There is more faith in honest doubt,

(As Tennyson has pointed out)

Than in those nasty creeds.

But peace and righteousness (St. John)

In Roundabout can kiss,

And since that’s all that’s found about

The pleasant town of Roundabout,

The roads they simply bound about

To find out where it is.

“Some say that when Sir Lancelot

Went forth to find the Grail,

Grey Merlin wrinkled up the roads

For hope that he should fail;

All roads led back to Lyonesse

And Camelot in the Vale;

I cannot yield assent to this

Extravagant hypothesis,

The plain, shrewd Briton will dismiss

Such rumours (Daily Mail).

But in the streets of Roundabout

Are no such factions found,

Or theories to expound about

Or roll upon the ground about,

In the happy town of Roundabout

That makes the world go round.”

Patrick Dalroy relieved his feelings by finishing with a shout, draining a stiff glass of his sailor’s wine, turning restlessly on his elbow and looking across the landscape toward London.

Dorian Wimpole had been drinking golden rum and strong starlight and the fragrance of forests; and, though his verses, too, were burlesque, he read them more emotionally than was his wont.

“Before the Roman came to Rye or out to Severn strode,

The rolling English drunkard made the rolling English road.

A reeling road, a rolling road, that rambles round the shire,

And after him the parson ran, the sexton and the squire.

A merry road, a mazy road, and such as we did tread

That night we went to Birmingham by way of Beachy Head.

“I knew no harm of Bonaparte and plenty of the Squire,

And for to fight the Frenchmen I did not much desire;

But I did bash their baggonets because they came arrayed

To straighten out the crooked road an English drunkard made,

Where you and I went down the lane with ale-mugs in our hands

The night we went to Glastonbury by way of Goodwin Sands.

“His sins they were forgiven him; or why do flowers run

Behind him; and the hedges all strengthening in the sun?

The wild thing went from left to right and knew not which was which,

But the wild rose was above him when they found him in the ditch.

God pardon us, nor harden us; we did not see so clear

The night we went to Bannockburn by way of Brighton Pier.

“My friends, we will not go again or ape an ancient rage,

Or stretch the folly of our youth to be the shame of age,

But walk with clearer eyes and ears this path that wandereth,

And see undrugged in evening light the decent inn of death;

For there is good news yet to hear and fine things to be seen

Before we go to Paradise by way of Kensal Green.”

“Have you written one, Hump?” asked Dalroy. Humphrey, who had been scribbling hard under the lamp, looked up with a dismal face.

“Yes,” he said. “But I write under a great disadvantage. You see, I know why the road curves about.” And he read very rapidly, all on one note:

“The road turned first toward the left

Where Pinker’s quarry made the cleft;

The path turned next toward the right

Because the mastiff used to bite;

Then left, because of Slippery Height,

And then again toward the right.

We could not take the left because

It would have been against the laws;

Squire closed it in King William’s day

Because it was a Right of Way.

Still right; to dodge the ridge of chalk

Where Parson’s Ghost it used to walk,

Till someone Parson used to know

Met him blind drunk in Callao.

Then left, a long way round, to skirt

The good land where old Doggy Burt

Was owner of the Crown and Cup,

And would not give his freehold up;

Right, missing the old river-bed,

They tried to make him take instead

Right, since they say Sir Gregory

Went mad and let the Gypsies be,

And so they have their camp secure.

And, though not honest, they are poor,

And that is something; then along

And first to right–no, I am wrong!

Second to right, of course; the first

Is what the holy sisters cursed,

And none defy their awful oaths

Since the policeman lost his clothes

Because of fairies; right again,

What used to be High Toby Lane,

Left by the double larch and right

Until the milestone is in sight,

Because the road is firm and good

From past the milestone to the wood;

And I was told by Dr. Lowe

Whom Mr. Wimpole’s aunt would know,

Who lives at Oxford writing books,

And ain’t so silly as he looks;

The Romans did that little bit

And we’ve done all the rest of it;

By which we hardly seem to score;

Left, and then forward as before

To where they nearly hanged Miss Browne,

Who told them not to cut her down,

But loose the rope or let her swing,

Because it was a waste of string;

Left once again by Hunker’s Cleft,

And right beyond the elm, and left,

By Pill’s right by Nineteen Nicks

And left–”

“No! No! No’! Hump! Hump! Hump!” cried Dalroy in a sort of terror. “Don’t be exhaustive! Don’t be a scientist, Hump, and lay waste fairyland! How long does it go on? Is there a lot more of it?”

“Yes,” said Pump, in a stony manner. “There is a lot more of it.”

“And it’s all true?” inquired Dorian Wimpole, with interest.

“Yes,” replied Pump with a smile, “it’s all true.”

“My complaint, exactly,” said the Captain. “What you want is legends. What you want is lies, especially at this time of night, and on rum like this, and on our first and our last holiday. What do you think about rum?” he asked Wimpole.

“About this particular rum, in this particular tree, at this particular moment,” answered Wimpole, “I think it is the nectar of the younger gods. If you ask me in a general, synthetic sense what I think of rum–well, I think it’s rather rum.”

“You find it a trifle sweet, I suppose,” said Dalroy, with some bitterness. “Sybarite! By the way,” he said abruptly, “what a silly word that word ‘Hedonist’ is! The really self-indulgent people generally like sour things and not sweet; bitter things like caviar and curries or what not. It’s the Saints who like the sweets. At least I’ve known at least five women who were practically saints, and they all preferred sweet champagne. Look here, Wimpole! Shall I tell you the ancient oral legend about the origin of rum? I told you what you wanted was legends. Be careful to preserve this one, and hand it on to your children; for, unfortunately, my parents carelessly neglected the duty of handing it on to me. After the words ‘A Farmer had three sons …’ all that I owe to tradition ceases. But when the three boys last met in the village market-place, they were all sucking sugar-sticks. Nevertheless, they were all discontented, and, on that day parted for ever. One remained on his father’s farm, hungering for his inheritance. One went up to London to seek his fortune, as fortunes are found today in that town forgotten of God. The third ran away to sea. And the first two flung away their sugar-sticks in shame; and he on the farm was always drinking smaller and sourer beer for the love of money; and he that was in town was always drinking richer and richer wines, that men might see that he was rich. But he who ran away to sea actually ran on board with the sugar-stick in his mouth; and St. Peter or St. Andrew, or whoever is the patron of men in boats, touched it and turned it into a fountain for the comfort of men upon the sea. That is the sailor’s theory of the origin of rum. Inquiry addressed to any busy Captain with a new crew in the act of shipping an unprecedented cargo, will elicit a sympathetic agreement.”

“Your rum at least,” said Dorian, good-humouredly, “may well produce a fairy-tale. But, indeed, I think all this would have been a fairy-tale without it.”

Patrick raised himself from his arboreal throne, and leaned against his branch with a curious and sincere sense of being rebuked.

“Yours was a good poem,” he said, with seeming irrelevance, “and mine was a bad one. Mine was bad, partly because I’m not a poet as you are; but almost as much because I was trying to make up another song at the same time. And it went to another tune, you see.”

He looked out over the rolling roads and said almost to himself:

“In the city set upon slime and loam

They cry in their parliament ‘Who goes home?’

And there is no answer in arch or dome,

For none in the city of graves goes home.

Yet these shall perish and understand,

For God has pity on this great land.

Men that are men again; who goes home?

Tocsin and trumpeter! Who goes home?

For there’s blood on the field and blood on the foam,

And blood on the body when man goes home.

And a voice valedictory–Who is for Victory?

Who is for Liberty? Who goes home?”

Softly and idly as he had said this second rhyme, there were circumstances about his attitude that must have troubled or interested anyone who did not know him well.

“May I ask,” asked Dorian, laughing, “why it is necessary to draw your sword at this stage of the affair?”

“Because we have left the place called Roundabout,” answered Patrick, “and we have come to a place called Rightabout.”

And he lifted his sword toward London, and the grey glint upon it came from a low, grey light in the east.

CHAPTER XXII: THE CHEMISTRY OF MR. CROOKE

WHEN the celebrated Hibbs next visited the shop of Crooke, that mystic and criminologist chemist, he found the premises were impressively and even amazingly enlarged with decorations in the eastern style. Indeed, it would not have been too much to say that Mr. Crooke’s shop occupied the whole of one side of a showy street in the West End; the other side being a blank façade of public buildings. It would be no exaggeration to say that Mr. Crooke was the only shopkeeper for some distance round. Mr. Crooke still served in his shop, however; and politely hastened to serve his customer with the medicine that was customary. Unfortunately, for some reason or other, history was, in connection with this shop, only too prone to repeat itself. And after a vague but soothing conversation with the chemist (on the subject of vitriol and its effects on human happiness), Mr. Hibbs experienced the acute annoyance of once more beholding his most intimate friend, Mr. Joseph Leveson, enter the same fashionable emporium. But, indeed, Leveson’s own annoyance was much too acute for him to notice any on the part of Hibbs.

“Well,” he said, stopping dead in the middle of the shop, “here is a fine confounded kettle of fish!”

It is one of the tragedies of the diplomatic that they are not allowed to admit either knowledge or ignorance; so Hibbs looked gloomily wise; and said, pursing his lips, “you mean thegeneral situation.”

“I mean the situation about this everlasting business of the inn-signs,” said Leveson, impatiently. “Lord Ivywood went up specially, when his leg was really bad, to get it settled in the House in a small non-contentious bill, providing that the sign shouldn’t be enough if the liquor hadn’t been on the spot three days.”

“Oh, but,” said Hibbs, sinking his voice to a soft solemnity, as being one of the initiate, “a thing likethat can be managed, don’t you know.”

“Of course it can,” said the other, still with the same slightly irritable air. “It was. But it doesn’t seem to occur to you, any more than it did to his lordship, that there is rather a weak point after all in this business of passing acts quietly because they’re unpopular. Has it ever occurred to you that if a law is really kept too quiet to be opposed, it may also be kept too quiet to be obeyed. It’s not so easy to hush it up from a big politician without running the risk of hushing it up even from a common policeman.”

“But surely that can’t happen, by the nature of things?”

“Can’t it, by God,” said J. Leveson, appealing to a less pantheistic authority.

He unfolded a number of papers from his pocket, chiefly cheap local newspapers, but some of them letters and telegrams.

“Listen to this!” he said. “A curious incident occurred in the village of Poltwell in Surrey yesterday morning. The baker’s shop of Mr. Whiteman was suddenly besieged by a knot of the looser types of the locality, who appear to have demanded beer instead of bread; basing their claim on some ornamental object erected outside the shop; which object they asserted to be a sign-board within the meaning of the act. There, you see, they haven’t even heard of the new act! What do you think of this, from theClapton Conservator. ‘The contempt of Socialists for the law was well illustrated yesterday, when a crowd, collected round some wooden ensign of Socialism set up before Mr. Dugdale’s Drapery Stores, refused to disperse, though told that their action was contrary to the law. Eventually the malcontents joined the procession following the wooden emblem.’ And what do you say to this? ‘Stop-press news. A chemist in Pimlico has been invaded by a huge crowd, demanding beer; and asserting the provision of it to be among his duties. The chemist is, of course, well acquainted with his immunities in the matter, especially under the new act; but the old notion of the importance of the sign seems still to possess the populace and even, to a certain extent, to paralyze the police.’ What do you say to that? Isn’t it as plain as Monday morning that this Flying Inn has flown a day in front of us, as all such lies do?” There was a diplomatic silence.

“Well,” asked the still angry Leveson of the still dubious Hibbs, “what do you make of all that?”

One ill-acquainted with that relativity essential to all modern minds, might possibly have fancied that Mr. Hibbs could not make much of it. However that may be, his explanations or incapacity for explanations, were soon tested with a fairly positive test. For Lord Ivywood actually walked into the shop of Mr. Crooke.

“Good day, gentlemen,” he said, looking at them with an expression which they both thought baffling and even a little disconcerting. “Good morning, Mr. Crooke. I have a celebrated visitor for you.” And he introduced the smiling Misysra. The Prophet had fallen back on a comparatively quiet costume this morning, a mere matter of purple and orange or what not; but his aged face was now perennially festive.

“The Cause progresses,” he said. “Everywhere the Cause progresses. You heard his lordship’s beau-uti-ful speech?”

“I have heard many,” said Hibbs, gracefully, “that can be so described.”

“The Prophet means what I was saying about the Ballot Paper Amendment Act,” said Ivywood, casually. “It seems to be the alphabet of statesmanship to recognise now that the great oriental British Empire has become one corporate whole with the occidental one. Look at our universities, with their Mohammedan students; soon they may be a majority. Now are we,” he went on, still more quietly, “are we to rule this country under the forms of representative government? I do not pretend to believe in democracy, as you know, but I think it would be extremely unsettling and incalculable to destroy representative government. If we are to give Moslem Britain representative government, we must not make the mistake we made about the Hindoos and military organization–which led to the Mutiny. We must not ask them to make a cross on their ballot papers; for though it seems a small thing, it may offend them. So I brought in a little bill to make it optional between the old-fashioned cross and an upward curved mark that might stand for a crescent–and as it’s rather easier to make, I believe it will be generally adopted.”

“And so,” said the radiant old Turk, “the little, light, easily made, curly mark is substituted for the hard, difficult, double-made, cutting both ways mark. It is the more good for hygi-e-ene. For you must know, and indeed our good and wise Chemist will tell you, that the Saracenic and the Arabian and the Turkish physicians were the first of all physicians; and taught all medicals to the barbarians of the Frankish territories. And many of the moost modern, the moost fashionable remedies, are thus of the oriental origin.”

“Yes, that is quite true,” said Crooke, in his rather cryptic and unsympathetic way, “the powder called Arenine, lately popularised by Mr. Boze, now Lord Helvellyn, who tried it first on birds, is made of plain desert sand. And what you see in prescriptions asCannabis Indiensis is what our lively neighbours of Asia describe more energetically as bhang.”

“And so-o–in the sa-ame way,” said Misysra, making soothing passes with his brown hand like a mesmerist, “in the sa-ame way the making of the crescent is hy-gienic; the making of the cross is non-hy-gienic. The crescent was a little wave, as a leaf, as a little curling feather,” and he waved his hand with real artistic enthusiasm toward the capering curves of the new Turkish decoration which Ivywood had made fashionable in many of the fashionable shops. “But when you make the cross you must make the one lineso-o,” and he swept the horizon with the brown hand, “and then you must go back and make the other line so-o,” and he made an upward gesture suggestive of one constrained to lift a pine-tree. “And then you become very ill.”

“As a matter of fact, Mr. Crooke,” said Ivywood, in his polite manner, “I brought the Prophet here to consult you as the best authority on the very point you have just mentioned–the use of hashish or the hemp-plant. I have it on my conscience to decide whether these oriental stimulants or sedatives shall come under the general veto we are attempting to impose on the vulgar intoxicants. Of course one has heard of the horrible and voluptuous visions, and a kind of insanity attributed to the Assassins and the Old Man of the Mountain. But, on the one hand, we must clearly discount much for the illimitable pro-Christian bias with which the history of these eastern tribes is told in this country. Would you say the effect of hashish was extremely bad?” And he turned first to the Prophet.

“You will see mosques,” said that seer with candour, “many mosques–more mosques–taller and taller mosques till they reach the moon and you bear a dreadful voice in the very high mosque calling the muezzin; and you will think it is Allah. Then you will see wives–many, many wives–more wives than you yet have. Then you will be rolled over and over in a great pink and purple sea–which is still wives. Then you will go to sleep. I have only done it once,” he concluded mildly.

“And what do you think about hashish, Mr. Crooke?” asked Ivywood, thoughtfully.

“I think it’s hemp at both ends,” said the Chemist.

“I fear,” said Lord Ivywood, “I don’t quite understand you.”

“A hempen drink, a murder, and a hempen rope. That’s my experience in India,” said Mr. Crooke.

“It is true,” said Ivywood, yet more reflectively, “that the thing is not Moslem in any sense in its origin. There is that against the Assassins always. And, of course,” he added, with a simplicity that had something noble about it, “their connection with St. Louis discredits them rather.”

After a space of silence, he said suddenly, looking at Crooke, “So it isn’t the sort of thing you chiefly sell?”

“No, my lord, it isn’t what I chiefly sell,” said the Chemist. He also looked steadily, and the wrinkles of his young-old face were like hieroglyphics.

“The Cause progress! Everywhere it progress!” cried Misysra, spreading his arms and relieving a momentary tension of which he was totally unaware. “The hygienic curve of the crescent will soon superimpose himself for your plus sign. You already use him for the short syllables in your dactyl; which is doubtless of oriental origin. You see the new game?”

He said this so suddenly that everyone turned round, to see him produce from his purple clothing a brightly coloured and highly polished apparatus from one of the grand toy-shops; which, on examination, seemed to consist of a kind of blue slate in a red and yellow frame; a number of divisions being already marked on the slate, about seventeen slate pencils with covers of different colours, and a vast number of printed instructions, stating that it was but recently introduced from the remote East, and was called Naughts and Crescents.

Strangely enough, Lord Ivywood, with all his enthusiasm, seemed almost annoyed at the emergence of this Asiatic discovery; more especially as he really wanted to look at Mr. Crooke, as hard as Mr. Crooke was looking at him.

Hibbs coughed considerately and said, “Of course all our things came from the East, and”–and he paused, being suddenly unable to remember anything but curry; to which he was very rightly attached. He then remembered Christianity, and mentioned that too. “Everything from the East is good, of course,” he ended, with an air of light omniscience.

Those who in later ages and other fashions failed to understand how Misysra had ever got a mental hold on men like Lord Ivywood, left out two elements in the man, which are very attractive, especially to other men. One was that there wasno subject on which the little Turk could not instantly produce a theory. The other was that though the theories were crowded, they were consistent. He was never known to accept an illogical compliment.

“You are in error,” he said, solemnly, to Hibbs, “because you say all things from the East are good. There is the east wind. I do not like him. He is not good. And I think very much that all the warmth and all the wealthiness and the colours and the poems and the religiousness that the East was meant to give you have been much poisoned by this accident, this east wind. When you see the green flag of the Prophet, you do not think of a green field in Summer, you think of a green wave in your seas of Winter; for you think it blown by the east wind. When you read of the moon-faced houris you think not of our moons like oranges but of your moons like snowballs–”

Here a new voice contributed to the conversation. Its contribution, though imperfectly understood, appeared to be “Nar! Why sh’d I wite for a little Jew in ’is dressin’ gown? Little Jews in their dressin’ gowns ’as their drinks, and we ’as our drinks. Bitter, miss.”

The speaker, who appeared to be a powerful person of the plastering occupation, looked round for the unmarried female he had ceremonially addressed; and seemed honestly abashed that she was not present.

Ivywood looked at the man with that expression of one turned to stone, which his physique made so effective in him. But J. Leveson, Secretary, could summon no such powers of self-petrification. Upon his soul the slaughter red of that unhallowed eve arose when first the Ship and he were foes; when he discovered that the poor are human beings, and therefore are polite and brutal within a comparatively short space of time. He saw that two other men were standing behind the plastering person, one of them apparently urging him to counsels of moderation; which was an ominous sign. And then he lifted his eyes and saw something worse than any omen.

All the glass frontage of the shop was a cloud of crowding faces. They could not be clearly seen, since night was closing in on the street; and the dazzling fires of ruby and amethyst which the lighted shop gave to its great globes of liquid, rather veiled than revealed them. But the foremost actually flattened and whitened their noses on the glass, and the most distant were nearer than Mr. Leveson wanted them. Also he saw a shape erect outside the shop; the shape of an upright staff and a square board. He could not see what was on the board. He did not need to see.

Those who saw Lord Ivywood at such moments understood why he stood out so strongly in the history of his time, in spite of his frozen face and his fanciful dogmas. He had all the negative nobility that is possible to man. Unlike Nelson and most of the great heroes, he knew not fear. Thus he was never conquered by a surprise, but was cold and collected when other men had lost their heads even if they had not lost their nerve.

“I will not conceal from you, gentlemen,” said Lord Ivywood, “that I have been expecting this. I will not even conceal from you that I have been occupying Mr. Crooke’s time until it occurred. So far from excluding the crowd, I suggest it would be an excellent thing if Mr. Crooke could accommodate them all in this shop. I want to tell, as soon as possible, as large a crowd as possible that the law is altered and this folly about the Flying Inn has ceased. Come in, all of you! Come in and listen!”

“Thank yer,” said a man connected in some way with motor buses, who lurched in behind the plasterer.

“Thanky, sir,” said a bright little clock-mender from Croydon, who immediately followed him.

“Thanks,” said a rather bewildered clerk from Camberwell, who came next in the rather bewildered procession.

“Thank you,” said Mr. Dorian Wimpole, who entered, carrying a large round cheese.

“Thank you,” said Captain Dalroy, who entered carrying a large cask of rum.

“Thank you very much,” said Mr. Humphrey Pump, who entered the shop carrying the sign of “The Old Ship.”

I fear it must be recorded that the crowd which followed them dispensed with all expressions of gratitude. But though the crowd filled the shop so that there was no standing room to spare, Leveson still lifted his gloomy eyes and beheld his gloomy omen. For, though there were very many more people standing in the shop, there seemed to be no less people looking in at the window.

“Gentlemen,” said Ivywood, “all jokes come to an end. This one has gone so far as to be serious; and it might have become impossible to correct public opinion, and expound to law-abiding citizens the true state of the law, had I not been able to meet so representative an assembly in so central a place. It is not pertinent to my purpose to indicate what I think of the jest which Captain Dalroy and his friends have been playing upon you for the last few weeks. But I think Captain Dalroy will himself concede that I am not jesting.”

“With all my heart,” said Dalroy, in a manner that was unusually serious and even sad. Then he added with a sigh, “And as you truly say, my jest has come to an end.”

“That wooden sign,” said Ivywood, pointing at the queer blue ship, “can be cut up for firewood. It shall lead decent citizens a devil’s dance no more. Understand it once and for all, before you learn it from policemen or prison warders. You are under a new law. That sign is the sign of nothing. You can no more buy and sell alcohol by having that outside your house, than if it were a lamp-post.”

“D’you meanter say, guv’ner,” said the plasterer, with a dawn of intelligence on his large face which was almost awful to watch, “that I ain’t to ’ave a glass o’ bitter?”

“Try a glass of rum,” said Patrick.

“Captain Dalroy,” said Lord Ivywood, “if you give one drop from that cask to that man, you are breaking the law and you shall sleep in jail.”

“Are you quite sure?” asked Dalroy, with a strange sort of anxiety. “I might escape.”

“I am quite sure,” said Ivywood. “I have posted the police with full powers for the purpose, as you will find. I mean that this business shall end here tonight.”

“If I find that pleeceman what told me I could ’ave a drink just now, I’ll knock ’is ’elmet into a fancy necktie, I will,” said the plasterer. “Why ain’t people allowed to know the law?”

“They ain’t got no right to alter the law in the dark like that,” said the clock-mender. “Damn the new law.”

“What is the new law?” asked the clerk.

“The words inserted by the recent Act,” said Lord Ivywood, with the cold courtesy of the Conqueror, “are to the effect that alcohol cannot be sold, even under a lawful sign, unless alcoholic liquors have been kept for three days on the premises. Captain Dalroy, that cask of yours has not, I think, been three days on these premises. I command you to seal it up and take it away.”

“Surely,” said Patrick, with an innocent air, “the best remedy would be to wait till ithas been three days on the premises. We might all get to know each other better.” And he looked round at the ever-increasing multitude with hazy benevolence.

“You shall do nothing of the kind,” said his lordship, with sudden fierceness.

“Well,” answered Patrick, wearily, “now I come to think of it, perhaps I won’t. I’ll have one drink here and go home to bed like a good little boy.”

“And the constables shall arrest you,” thundered Ivywood.

“Why, nothing seems to suit you,” said the surprised Dalroy. “Thank you, however, for explaining the new law so clearly–‘unless alcoholic liquors have been three days on the premises’ I shall remember it now. You always explain such things so clearly. You only made one legal slip. The constables will not arrest me.”

“And why not?” demanded the nobleman, white with passion.

“Because,” cried Patrick Dalroy; and his voice lifted itself like a lonely trumpet before the charge, “because I shall not have broken the law. Because alcoholic liquorshave been three days on these premises. Three months more likely. Because this is a common grog-shop, Philip Ivywood. Because that man behind the counter lives by selling spirits to all the cowards and hypocrites who are rich enough to bribe a bad doctor.”

And he pointed suddenly at the small medicine glass on the counter by Hibbs and Leveson.

“What is that man drinking?” he demanded.

Hibbs put out his hand hastily for his glass, but the indignant clock-mender had snatched it first and drained it at a gulp.

“Scortch,” he said, and dashed the glass to atoms on the floor. “Right you are too,” roared the plasterer, seizing a big medicine bottle in each hand. “We’re goin’ to ’ave a little of the fun now, we are. What’s in that big red bowl up there–I reckon it’s port. Fetch it down, Bill.”

Ivywood turned to Crooke and said, scarcely moving his lips of marble, “This is a lie.”

“It is the truth,” answered Crooke, looking back at him with equal steadiness. “Do you think you made the world, that you should make it over again so easily?”

“The world was made badly,” said Philip, with a terrible note in his voice, “andI will make it over again.”

Almost as he spoke the glass front of the shop fell inward, shattered, and there was wreckage among the moonlike, coloured bowls; almost as if spheres of celestial crystal cracked at his blasphemy. Through the broken windows came the roar of that confused tongue that is more terrible than the elements; the cry that the deaf kings have heard at last; the terrible voice of mankind. All the way down the long, fashionable street, lined with the Crooke plate-glass, that glass was crashing amid the cries of a crowd. Rivers of gold and purple wines sprawled about the pavement.

“Out in the open!” shouted Dalroy, rushing out of the shop, sign-board in hand, the dog Quoodle barking furiously at his heels, while Dorian with the cheese and Humphrey with the keg followed as rapidly as they could. “Goodnight, my lord.

“Perhaps our meeting next may fall,

At Tomworth in your castle hall.

“Come along, friends, and form up. Don’t waste time destroying property. We’re all to start now.”

“Where are we all going to?” asked the plasterer.

“We’re all going into Parliament,” answered the Captain, as he went to the head of the crowd.

The marching crowd turned two or three corners, and at the end of the next long street, Dorian Wimpole, who was toward the tail of the procession, saw again the grey Cyclops tower of St. Stephens, with its one great golden eye, as he had seen it against that pale green sunset that was at once quiet and volcanic on the night he was betrayed by sleep and by a friend. Almost as far off, at the head of the procession, he could see the sign with the ship and the cross going before them like an ensign, and hear a great voice singing–

“Men that are men again, Who goes home?

Tocsin and trumpeter! Who goes home?

The voice valedictory–who is for Victory?

Who is for Liberty? Who goes home?”

CHAPTER XXIII: THE MARCH ON IVYWOOD

THAT storm-spirit, or eagle of liberty, which is the sudden soul in a crowd, had descended upon London after a foreign tour of some centuries in which it had commonly alighted upon other capitals. It is always impossible to define the instant and the turn of mood which makes the whole difference between danger being worse than endurance and endurance being worse than danger. The actual outbreak generally has a symbolic or artistic, or, what some would call whimsical cause. Somebody fires off a pistol or appears in an unpopular uniform, or refers in a loud voice to a scandal that is never mentioned in the newspapers; somebody takes off his hat, or somebody doesn’t take off his hat; and a city is sacked before midnight. When the ever-swelling army of revolt smashed a whole street full of the shops of Mr. Crooke, the chemist, and then went on to Parliament, the Tower of London and the road to the sea, the sociologists hiding in their coal-cellars could think (in that clarifying darkness) of many material and spiritual explanations of such a storm in human souls; but of none that explained it quite enough. Doubtless there was a great deal of sheer drunkenness when the urns and goblets of Aesculapius were reclaimed as belonging to Bacchus: and many who went roaring down that road were merely stored with rich wines and liqueurs which are more comfortably and quietly digested at a City banquet or a West End restaurant. But many of these had been blind drunk twenty times without a thought of rebellion; you could not stretch the material explanation to cover a corner of the case. Much more general was a savage sense of the meanness of Crooke’s wealthy patrons, in keeping a door open for themselves which they had wantonly shut on less happy people. But no explanation can explain it; and no man can say when it will come.

Dorian Wimpole was at the tail of the procession, which grew more and more crowded every moment. For one space of the march he even had the misfortune to lose it altogether; owing to the startling activity which the rotund cheese when it escaped from his hands showed, in descending a somewhat steep road toward the river. But in recent days he had gained a pleasure in practical events which was like a second youth. He managed to find a stray taxi-cab; and had little difficulty in picking up again the trail of the extraordinary cortège. Inquiries addressed to a policeman with a black eye outside the House of Commons informed him sufficiently of the rebels’ line of retreat or advance, or whatever it was; and in a very short time he beheld the unmistakable legion once more. It was unmistakable, because in front of it there walked a red-headed giant, apparently carrying with him a wooden portion of some public building; and also because so big a crowd had never followed any man in England for a long time past. But except for such things the unmistakable crowd might well have been mistaken for another one. Its aspect had been altered almost as much as if it had grown horns or tusks; for many of the company walked with outlandish weapons like iron teeth or horns, bills and pole axes, and spears with strangely shaped heads. What was stranger still, whole rows and rows of them had rifles, and even marched with a certain discipline; and yet again, others seemed to have snatched up household or work-shop tools, meat axes, pick axes, hammers and even carving knives. Such things need be none the less deadly because they are domestic. They have figured in millions of private murders before they appeared in any public war.

Dorian was so fortunate as to meet the flame-haired Captain almost face to face, and easily fell into step with him at the head of the march. Humphrey Pump walked on the other side, with the celebrated cask suspended round his neck by something resembling braces, as if it were a drum. Mr. Wimpole had himself taken the opportunity of his brief estrangement to carry the cheese somewhat more easily in a very large, loose, waterproof knapsack on his shoulders. The effect in both cases was to suggest dreadful deformities in two persons who happened to be exceptionally cleanly built. The Captain, who seemed to be in tearing and towering spirits, gained great pleasure from this. But Dorian had his sources of amusement too.

“What have you been doing with yourselves since you lost my judicious guidance?” he asked, laughing, “and why are parts of you a dull review and parts of you a fancy dress ball? What have you been up to?”

“We’ve been shopping,” said Mr. Patrick Dalroy, with some pride. “We are country cousins. I know all about shopping; let us see, what are the phrases about it? Look at those rifles now! We got them quite at a bargain. We went to all the best gunsmiths in London, and we didn’t pay much. In fact, we didn’t pay anything. That’s what is called a bargain, isn’t it? Surely, I’ve seen in those things they send to ladies something about ‘giving them away.’ Then we went to a remnant sale. At least, it was a remnant sale when we left. And we bought that piece of stuff we’ve tied round the sign. Surely, it must be what ladies called chiffon?”

Dorian lifted his eyes and perceived that a very coarse strip of red rag, possibly collected from a dust bin, had been tied round the wooden sign-post by way of a red flag of revolution.

“Not what ladies call chiffon?” inquired the Captain with anxiety. “Well, anyhow, it is whatchiffoniers call it. But as I’m going to call on a lady shortly, I’ll try to remember the distinction.”

“Is your shopping over, may I ask?” asked Mr. Wimpole.

“All but one thing,” answered the other. “I must find a music shop–you know what I mean. Place where they sell pianos and things of that sort.”

“Look here,” said Dorian, “this cheese is pretty heavy as it is. Have I got to carry a piano, too?”

“You misunderstand me,” said the Captain, calmly. And as he had never thought of music shops until his eye had caught one an instant before, he darted into the doorway. Returning almost immediately with a long parcel under his arm, he resumed the conversation.

“Did you go anywhere else,” asked Dorian, “except to shops?”

“Anywhere else!” cried Patrick, indignantly, “haven’t you got any country cousins? Of course we went to all the right places. We went to the Houses of Parliament. But Parliament isn’t sitting; so there are no eggs of the quality suitable for elections. We went to the Tower of London–you can’t tire country cousins like us. We took away some curiosities of steel and iron. We even took away the halberds from the Beef-eaters. We pointed out that for the purpose of eating beef (their only avowed public object) knives and forks had always been found more convenient. To tell the truth, they seemed rather relieved to be relieved of them.”

“And may I ask,” said the other with a smile, “where you are off to now?”

“Another beauty spot!” cried the Captain, boisterously, “no tiring the country cousin! I am going to show my young friends from the provinces what is perhaps the finest old country house in England. We are going to Ivywood, not far from that big watering place they call Pebblewick.”

“I see,” said Dorian; and for the first time looked back with intelligent trouble on his face, on the marching ranks behind him.

“Captain Dalroy,” said Dorian Wimpole, in a slightly altered tone, “there is one thing that puzzles me. Ivywood talked about having set the police to catch us; and though this is a pretty big crowd, I simply cannot believe that the police, as I knew them in my youth, could not catch us. But where are the police? You seem to have marched through half London with much (if you’ll excuse me) of the appearance of carrying murderous weapons. Lord Ivywood threatened that the police would stop us. Well, why didn’t they stop us?”

“Your subject,” said Patrick, cheerfully, “divides itself into three heads.”

“I hope not,” said Dorian.

“There really are three reasons why the police should not be prominent in this business; as their worst enemy cannot say that they were.”

He began ticking off the three on his own huge fingers; and seemed to be quite serious about it.

“First,” he said, “you have been a long time away from town. Probably you do not know a policeman when you see him. They do not wear helmets, as our line regiments did after the Prussians had won. They wear fezzes, because the Turks have won. Shortly, I have little doubt, they will wear pigtails, because the Chinese have won. It is a very interesting branch of moral science. It is called Efficiency.

“Second,” explained the Captain, “you have, perhaps, omitted to notice that a very considerable number of those wearing such fezzes are walking just behind us. Oh, yes, it’s quite true. Don’t you remember that the whole French Revolution really began because a sort of City Militia refused to fire on their own fathers and wives; and even showed some slight traces of a taste for firing on the other side? You’ll see lots of them behind; and you can tell them by their revolver belts and their walking in step; but don’t look back on them too much. It makes them nervous.”

“And the third reason?” asked Dorian.

“For the real reason,” answered Patrick, “I am not fighting a hopeless fight. People who have fought in real fights don’t, as a rule. But I noticed something singular about the very point you mention. Why are there no more police? Why are there no more soldiers? I will tell you. There really are very few policemen or soldiers left in England today.”

“Surely, that,” said Wimpole, “is an unusual complaint.”

“But very clear,” said the Captain, gravely, “to anyone who has ever seen sailors or soldiers. I will tell you the truth. Our rulers have come to count on the bare bodily cowardice of a mass of Englishmen, as a sheep dog counts on the cowardice of a flock of sheep. Now, look here, Mr. Wimpole, wouldn’t a shepherd be wise to limit the number of his dogs if he could make his sheep pay by it? At the end you might find millions of sheep managed by a solitary dog. But that is because they are sheep. Suppose the sheep were turned by a miracle into wolves. There are very few dogs they could not tear in pieces. But, what is my practical point, there are really very few dogs to tear.”

“You don’t mean,” said Dorian, “that the British Army is practically disbanded?”

“There are the sentinels outside Whitehall,” replied Patrick, in a low voice. “But, indeed, your question puts me in a difficulty. No; the army is not entirely disbanded, of course. But theBritish army–. Did you ever hear, Wimpole, of the great destiny of the Empire?”

“I seem to have heard the phrase,” replied his companion.

“It is in four acts,” said Dalroy. “Victory over barbarians. Employment of barbarians. Alliance with barbarians. Conquest by barbarians. That is the great destiny of Empire.”

“I think I begin to see what you mean,” returned Dorian Wimpole. “Of course Ivywood and the authorities do seem very prone to rely on the sepoy troops.”

“And other troops as well,” said Patrick. “I think you will be surprised when you see them.”

He tramped on for a while in silence and then said, with some air of abruptness, which yet did not seem to be entirely a changing of the subject,

“Do you know the man who lives now on the estate next to Ivywood?”

“No,” replied Dorian, “I am told he keeps himself very much to himself.”

“And his estate, too,” said Patrick, rather gloomily. “If you would climb his garden-wall, Wimpole, I think you would find an answer to a good many of your questions. Oh, yes, the right honourable gentlemen are making full provision for public order and national defence–in a way.”

He fell into an almost sullen silence again; and several villages had been passed before he spoke again.

They tramped through the darkness; and dawn surprised them somewhere in the wilder and more wooded parts where the roads began to rise and roam. Dalroy gave an exclamation of pleasure and pointed ahead, drawing the attention of Dorian to the distance. Against the silver and scarlet bars of the daybreak could be seen afar a dark purple dome, with a crown of dark green leaves; the place they had called Roundabout.

Dalroy’s spirit seemed to revive at the sight, with the customary accompaniment of the threat of vocalism.

“Been making any poems lately?” he asked of Wimpole.

“Nothing particular,” replied the poet.

“Then,” said the Captain, portentously, clearing his throat, “you shall listen to one of mine, whether you like it or not–nay, the more you dislike it the longer and longer it will be. I begin to understand why soldiers want to sing when on the march; and also why they put up with such rotten songs.

“The Druids waved their golden knives

And danced around the Oak,

When they had sacrificed a man;

But though the learnèd search and scan

No single modern person can

Entirely see the joke;

But though they cut the throats of men

They cut not down the tree,

And from the blood the saplings sprang

Of oak-woods yet to be.

But Ivywood, Lord Ivywood,

He rots the tree as ivy would,

He clings and crawls as ivy would

About the sacred tree.

“King Charles he fled from Worcester fight

And hid him in an Oak;

In convent schools no man of tact

Would trace and praise his every act,

Or argue that he was in fact

A strict and sainted bloke;

But not by him the sacred woods

Have lost their fancies free,

And though he was extremely big,

He did not break the tree.

But Ivywood, Lord Ivywood,

He breaks the tree as ivy would

And eats the woods as ivy would

Between us and the sea.

“Great Collingwood walked down the glade

And flung the acorns free,

That oaks might still be in the grove

As oaken as the beams above

When the great Lover sailors love

Was kissed by Death at sea.

But though for him the oak-trees fell

To build the oaken ships,

The woodman worshipped what he smote

And honoured even the chips.

But Ivywood, Lord Ivywood,

He hates the tree as ivy would,

As the dragon of the ivy would,

That has us in his grips.”

They were ascending a sloping road, walled in on both sides by solemn woods, which somehow seemed as watchful as owls awake. Though daybreak was going over them with banners, scrolls of scarlet and gold, and with a wind like trumpets of triumph, the dark woods seemed to hold their secret like dark, cool cellars; nor was the strong sunlight seen in them, save in one or two brilliant shafts, that looked like splintered emeralds.

“I should not wonder,” said Dorian, “if the ivy does not find the tree knows a thing or two also.”

“The tree does,” assented the Captain. “The trouble was that until a little while ago the tree did not know that it knew.”

There was a silence; and as they went up the incline grew steeper and steeper, and the tall trees seemed more and more to be guarding something from sight, as with the grey shields of giants.

“Do you remember this road, Hump?” asked Dalroy of the innkeeper.

“Yes,” answered Humphrey Pump, and said no more; but few have ever heard such fulness in an affirmative.

They marched on in silence and about two hours afterward, toward eleven o’clock, Dalroy called a halt in the forest, and said that everybody had better have a few hours’ sleep. The impenetrable quality in the woods and the comparative softness of the carpet of beech-mast, made the spot as appropriate as the time was inappropriate. And if anyone thinks that common people, casually picked up in a street, could not follow a random leader on such a journey or sleep at his command in such a spot, given the state of the soul, then someone knows no history.

“I’m afraid,” said Dalroy, “you’ll have to have your supper for breakfast. I know an excellent place for having breakfast, but it’s too exposed for sleep. And sleep you must have; so we won’t unpack the stores just now. We’ll lie down like Babes in the Wood, and any bird of an industrious disposition is free to start covering me with leaves. Really, there are things coming, before which you will want sleep.”

When they resumed the march it was nearly the middle of the afternoon; and the meal which Dalroy insisted buoyantly on describing as breakfast was taken about that mysterious hour when ladies die without tea. The steep road had consistently grown steeper and steeper; and steeper; and at last, Dalroy said to Dorian Wimpole,

“Don’t drop that cheese again just here, or it will roll right away down into the woods. I know it will. No scientific calculations of grades and angles are necessary; because I have seen it do so myself. In fact, I have run after it.”

Wimpole realised they were mounting to the sharp edge of a ridge, and in a few moments he knew by the oddness in the shape of the trees what it had been that the trees were hiding.

They had been walking along a swelling, woodland path beside the sea. On a particular high plateau, projecting above the shore, stood some dwarfed and crippled apple-trees, of whose apples no man alive would have eaten, so sour and salt they must be. All the rest of the plateau was bald and featureless, but Pump looked at every inch of it, as if at an inhabited place.

“This is where we’ll have breakfast,” he said, pointing to the naked grassy waste. “It’s the best inn in England.”

Some of his audience began to laugh, but somehow suddenly ceased doing so, as Dalroy strode forward and planted the sign of “The Old Ship” on the desolate sea-shore.

“And now,” he said, “you have charge of the stores we brought, Hump, and we will picnic. As it said in a song I once sang,

“The Saracen’s Head out of Araby came,

King Richard riding in arms like flame,

And where he established his folk to be fed

He set up his spear, and the Saracen’s Head.”

It was nearly dusk before the mob, much swelled by the many discontented on the Ivywood estates, reached the gates of Ivywood House. Strategically, and for the purposes of a night surprise, this might have done credit to the Captain’s military capacity. But the use to which he put it actually was what some might call eccentric. When he had disposed his forces, with strict injunctions of silence for the first few minutes, he turned to Pump, and said,

“And now, before we do anything else, I’m going to make a noise.”

And he produced from under brown paper what appeared to be a musical instrument.

“A summons to parley?” inquired Dorian, with interest, “a trumpet of defiance, or something of that kind?”

“No,” said Patrick, “a serenade.”

CHAPTER XXIV: THE ENIGMAS OF LADY JOAN

ON an evening when the sky was clear and only its fringes embroidered with the purple arabesques of the sunset, Joan Brett was walking on the upper lawn of the terraced garden at Ivywood, where the peacocks trail themselves about. She was not unlike one of the peacocks herself in beauty, and some might have said, in inutility; she had the proud head and the sweeping train; nor was she, in these days, devoid of the occasional disposition to scream. For, indeed, for some time past she had felt her existence closing round her with an incomprehensible quietude; and that is harder for the patience than an incomprehensible noise. Whenever she looked at the old yew hedges of the garden they seemed to be higher than when she saw them last; as if those living walls could still grow to shut her in. Whenever from the turret windows she had a sight of the sea, it seemed to be farther away. Indeed, the whole closing of the end of the turret wing with the new wall of eastern woodwork seemed to symbolise all her shapeless sensations. In her childhood the wing had ended with a broken-down door and a disused staircase. They led to an uncultivated copse and an abandoned railway tunnel, to which neither she nor anyone else ever wanted to go. Still, she knew what they led to. Now it seemed that this scrap of land had been sold and added to the adjoining estate; and about the adjoining estate nobody seemed to know anything in particular. The sense of things closing in increased upon her. All sorts of silly little details magnified the sensation. She could discover nothing about this new landlord next door, so to speak, since he was, it seemed, an elderly man who preferred to live in the greatest privacy. Miss Browning, Lord Ivywood’s secretary, could give her no further information than that he was a gentleman from the Mediterranean coast; which singular form of words seemed to have been put into her mouth. As a Mediterranean gentleman might mean anything from an American gentleman living in Venice to a black African on the edge of the Atlas, the description did not illuminate; and probably was not intended to do so. She occasionally saw his liveried servants going about; and their liveries were not like English liveries. She was also, in her somewhat morbid state, annoyed by the fact that the uniforms of the old Pebblewick militia had been changed, under the influence of the Turkishprestige in the recent war. They wore fezzes like the French Zouaves, which were certainly much more practical than the heavy helmets they used to wear. It was a small matter, but it annoyed Lady Joan, who was, like so many clever women, at once subtle and conservative. It made her feel as if the whole world was being altered outside, and she was not allowed to know about it.

But she had deeper spiritual troubles also, while, under the pathetic entreaties of old, Lady Ivywood and her own sick mother, she stayed on week after week at Ivywood House. If the matter be stated cynically (as she herself was quite capable of stating it) she was engaged in the established feminine occupation of trying to like a man. But the cynicism would have been false; as cynicism nearly always is; for during the most crucial days of that period, she had really liked the man.

She had liked him when he was brought in with Pump’s bullet in his leg; and was still the strongest and calmest man in the room. She had liked him when the hurt took a dangerous turn, and when he bore pain to admiration. She had liked him when he showed no malice against the angry Dorian; she had liked him with something like enthusiasm on the night he rose rigid on his rude crutch, and, crushing all remonstrance, made his rash and swift rush to London. But, despite the queer closing-in-sensations of which we have spoken, she never liked him better than that evening when he lifted himself laboriously on his crutch up the terraces of the old garden and came to speak to her as she stood among the peacocks. He even tried to pat a peacock in a hazy way, as if it were a dog. He told her that these beautiful birds were, of course, imported from the East–by the semi-eastern empire of Macedonia. But, all the same, Joan had a dim suspicion that he had never noticed before that there were any peacocks at Ivywood. His greatest fault was a pride in the faultlessness of his mental and moral strength; but, if he had only known, something faintly comic in the unconscious side of him did him more good with the woman than all the rest.

“They were said to be the birds of Juno,” he said, “but I have little doubt that Juno, like so much else of the Homeric mythology, has also an Asiatic origin.”

“I always thought,” said Joan, “that Juno was rather too stately for the seraglio.”

“You ought to know,” replied Ivywood, with a courteous gesture, “for Inever saw anyone who looked so like Juno as you do. But, indeed, there is a great deal of misunderstanding about the Arabian or Indian view of women. It is, somehow, too simple and solid for our paradoxical Christendom to comprehend. Even the vulgar joke against the Turks, that they like their brides fat, has in it a sort of distorted shadow of what I mean. They do not look so much at the individual, as at Womanhood and the power of Nature.”

“I sometimes think,” said Joan, “that these fascinating theories are a little strained. Your friend Misysra told me the other day that women had the highest freedom in Turkey; as they were allowed to wear trousers.”

Ivywood smiled his rare and dry smile. “The Prophet has something of a simplicity often found with genius,” he answered. “I will not deny that some of the arguments he has employed have seemed to me crude and even fanciful. But he is right at the root. There is a kind of freedom that consists in never rebelling against Nature; and I think they understand it in the Orient better than we do in the West. You see, Joan, it is all very well to talk about love in our narrow, personal, romantic way; but there is something higher than the love of a lover or the love of love.”

“What is that?” asked Joan, looking down.

“The love of Fate,” said Lord Ivywood, with something like spiritual passion in his eyes. “Doesn’t Nietzsche say somewhere that the delight in destiny is the mark of the hero? We are mistaken if we think that the heroes and saints of Islam say ‘Kismet’ with bowed heads and in sorrow. They say ‘Kismet’ with a shout of joy. That which is fitting–that is what they really mean. In the Arabian tales, the most perfect prince is wedded to the most perfect princess–because it is fitting. The spiritual giants, the Genii, achieve it–that is, the purposes of Nature. In the selfish, sentimental European novels, the loveliest princess on earth might have run away with her middle-aged drawing-master. These things are not in the Path. The Turk rides out to wed the fairest queen of the earth; he conquers empires to do it; and he is not ashamed of his laurels.”

The crumpled violet clouds around the edge of the silver evening looked to Lady Joan more and more like vivid violet embroideries hemming some silver curtain in the closed corridor at Ivywood. The peacocks looked more lustrous and beautiful than they ever had before; but for the first time she really felt they came out of the land of the Arabian Nights.

“Joan,” said Philip Ivywood, very softly, in the twilight, “I am not ashamed of my laurels, I see no meaning in what these Christians call humility. I will be the greatest man in the world if I can; and I think I can. Therefore, something that is higher than love itself, Fate and what is fitting, make it right that I should wed the most beautiful woman in the world. And she stands among the peacocks and is more beautiful and more proud than they.”

Joan’s troubled eyes were on the violet horizon and her troubled lips could utter nothing but something like “don’t.”

“Joan,” said Philip, again, “I have told you, you are the woman one of the great heroes could have desired. Let me now tell you something I could have told no one to whom I had not thus spoken of love and betrothal. When I was twenty years old in a town in Germany, pursuing my education, I did what the West calls falling in love. She was a fisher-girl from the coast; for this town was near the sea. My story might have ended there. I could not have entered diplomacy with such a wife, but I should not have minded then. But a little while after, I wandered into the edges of Flanders, and found myself standing above some of the last grand reaches of the Rhine. And things came over me but for which I might be crying stinking fish to this day. I thought how many holy or lovely nooks that river had left behind, and gone on. It might anywhere in Switzerland have spent its weak youth in a spirit over a high crag, or anywhere in the Rhinelands lost itself in a marsh covered with flowers. But it went on to the perfect sea, which is the fulfilment of a river.”

Again, Joan could not speak; and again it was Philip who went on.

“Here is yet another thing that could not be said, till the hand of the prince had been offered to the princess. It may be that in the East they carry too far this matter of infant marriages. But look round on the mad young marriages that go to pieces everywhere! And ask yourself whether you don’t wish they had been infant marriages! People talk in the newspapers of the heartlessness of royal marriages. But you and I do not believe the newspapers, I suppose. We know there is no King in England; nor has been since his head fell before Whitehall. You know that you and I and the families are the Kings of England; and our marriages are royal marriages. Let the suburbs call them heartless. Let us say they need the brave heart that is the only badge of aristocracy. Joan,” he said, very gently, “perhaps you have been near a crag in Switzerland, or a marsh covered with flowers. Perhaps you have known–a fisher-girl. But there is something greater and simpler than all that; something you find in the great epics of the East–the beautiful woman, and the great man, and Fate.”

“My lord,” said Joan, using the formal phrase by an unfathomable instinct, “will you allow me a little more time to think of this? And let there be no notion of disloyalty, if my decision is one way or the other?”

“Why, of course,” said Ivywood, bowing over his crutch; and he limped off, picking his way among the peacocks.

For days afterward Joan tried to build the foundations of her earthly destiny. She was still quite young, but she felt as if she had lived thousands of years, worrying over the same question. She told herself again and again, and truly, that many a better woman than she had taken a second-best which was not so first-class a second-best. But there was something complicated in the very atmosphere. She liked listening to Philip Ivywood at his best, as anyone likes listening to a man who can really play the violin; but the great trouble always is that at certain awful moments you cannot be certain whether it is the violin or the man.

Moreover, there was a curious tone and spirit in the Ivywood household, especially after the wound and convalescence of Ivywood, about which she could say nothing except that it annoyed her somehow. There was something in it glorious–but also languorous. By an impulse by no means uncommon among intelligent, fashionable people, she felt a desire to talk to a sensible woman of the middle or lower classes; and almost threw herself on the bosom of Miss Browning for sympathy.

But Miss Browning, with her curling, reddish hair and white, very clever face, struck the same indescribable note. Lord Ivywood was assumed as a first principle; as if he were Father Time, or the Clerk of the Weather. He was called “He.” The fifth time he was called “He,” Joan could not understand why she seemed to smell the plants in the hot conservatory.

“You see,” said Miss Browning, “we mustn’t interfere with his career; that is the important thing. And, really, I think the quieter we keep about everything the better. I am sure he is maturing very big plans. You heard what the Prophet said the other night?”

“The last thing the Prophet said to me,” said the darker lady, in a dogged manner, “was that when we English see the English youth, we cry out ‘He is crescent!’ But when we see the English aged man, we cry out ‘He is cross!’”

A lady with so clever a face could not but laugh faintly; but she continued on a determined theme, “The Prophet said, you know, that all real love had in it an element of fate. And I am sure that is his view, too. People cluster round a centre as little stars do round a star; because a star is a magnet. You are never wrong when destiny blows behind you like a great big wind; and I think many things have been judged unfairly that way. It’s all very well to talk about the infant marriages in India.”

“Miss Browning,” said Joan, “are you interested in the infant marriages in India?”

“Well–” said Miss Browning.

“Is your sister interested in them? I’ll run and ask her,” cried Joan, plunging across the room to where Mrs. Mackintosh was sitting at a table scribbling secretarial notes.

“Well,” said Mrs. Mackintosh, turning up a rich-haired, resolute head, more handsome than her sister’s, “I believe the Indian way is the best. When people are left to themselves in early youth, any of them might marry anything. We might have married a nigger or a fish-wife or–a criminal.”

“Now, Mrs. Mackintosh,” said Joan, with black-browed severity, “you well know you would never have married a fish-wife. Where is Enid?” she ended suddenly.

“Lady Enid,” said Miss Browning, “is looking out music in the music room, I think.”

Joan walked swiftly through several long salons, and found her fair-haired and pallid relative actually at the piano.

“Enid,” cried Joan, “you know I’ve always been fond of you. For God’s sake tell me what is the matter with this house? I admire Philip as everybody does. But what is the matter with the house? Why do all these rooms and gardens seem to be shutting me in and in and in? Why does everything look more and more the same? Why does everybody say the same thing? Oh, I don’t often talk metaphysics; but there is a purpose in this. That’s the only way of putting it; there is a purpose. And I don’t know what it is.”

Lady Enid Wimpole played a preliminary bar or two on the piano. Then she said,

“Nor do I, Joan. I don’t indeed. I know exactly what you mean. But it’s just because there is a purpose that I have faith in him and trust him.” She began softly to play a ballad tune of the Rhineland; and perhaps the music suggested her next remark. “Suppose you were looking at some of the last reaches of the Rhine, where it flows–”

“Enid!” cried Joan, “if you say ‘into the North Sea,’ I shall scream. Scream, do you hear, louder than all the peacocks together.”

“Well,” expostulated Lady Enid, looking up rather wildly, “The Rhinedoes flow into the North Sea, doesn’t it?”

“I dare say,” said Joan, recklessly, “but the Rhine might have flowed into the Round Pond, before you would have known or cared, until–”

“Until what?” asked Enid; and her music suddenly ceased. “Until something happened that I cannot understand,” said Joan, moving away.

“You are something I cannot understand,” said Enid Wimpole. “But I will play something else, if this annoys you.” And she fingered the music again with an eye to choice.

Joan walked back through the corridor of the music room, and restlessly resumed her seat in the room with the two lady secretaries.

“Well,” asked the red-haired and good-humoured Mrs. Mackintosh, without looking up from her work of scribbling, “have you discovered anything?”

For some moments Joan appeared to be in a blacker state of brooding than usual; then she said, in a candid and friendly tone, which somehow contrasted with her knit and swarthy brows– “No, really. At least I think I’ve only found out two things; and they are only things about myself. I’ve discovered that I do like heroism, but I don’t like hero worship.”

“Surely,” said Miss Browning, in the Girton manner, “the one always flows from the other.”

“I hope not,” said Joan.

“But what else can you do with the hero?” asked Mrs. Mackintosh, still without looking up from her writing, “except worship him?”

“You might crucify him,” said Joan, with a sudden return of savage restlessness, as she rose from her chair. “Things seem to happen then.”

“Aren’t you tired?” asked the Miss Browning who had the clever face.

“Yes,” said Joan, “and the worst sort of tiredness; when you don’t even know what you’re tired of. To tell the honest truth, I think I’m tired of this house.”

“It’s very old, of course, and parts of it are still dismal,” said Miss Browning, “but he has enormously improved it. The decoration, with the moon and stars, down in the wing with the turret is really–”

Away in the distant music room, Lady Enid, having found the music she preferred, was fingering its prelude on the piano. At the first few notes of it, Joan Brett stood up, like a tigress.

“Thanks–” she said, with a hoarse softness, “that’s it, of course! and that’s just what we all are! She’s found the right tune now.”

“What tune is it?” asked the wondering secretary.

“The tune of harp, sackbut, psaltery, dulcimer and all kinds of music,” said Joan, softly and fiercely, “when we shall bow down and worship the Golden Image that Nebuchadnezzar the King has set up. Girls! Women! Do you know what this place is? Do you know why it is all doors within doors and lattice behind lattice; and everything is curtained and cushioned; and why the flowers that are so fragrant here are not the flowers of our hills?”

From the distant and slowly darkening music room, Enid Wimpole’s song came thin and clear:

“Less than the dust beneath thy chariot wheel,

Less than the rust that never stained thy sword–”

“Do you know what we are?” demanded Joan Brett, again. “We are a Harem.”

“Why, what can you mean?” cried the younger girl, in great agitation. “Why, Lord Ivywood has never–”

“I know he has never. I am not sure,” said Joan, “even whether he would ever. I shall never understand that man, nor will anybody else. But I tell you that is the spirit. That is what weare. And this room stinks of polygamy as certainly as it smells of tube-roses.”

“Why, Joan,” cried Lady Enid, entering the room like a well-bred ghost, “what on earth is the matter with you. You all look as white as sheets.”

Joan took no heed of her but went on with her own obstinate argument.

“And, besides,” she said, “if there’s one thing we do know about him it is that he believes on principle in doing things slowly. He calls it evolution and relativity and the expanding of an idea into larger ideas. How do we know he isn’t doing that slowly; getting us accustomed to living like this, so that it may be the less shock when he goes further–steeping us in the atmosphere before he actually introduces,” and she shuddered, “the institution. Is it any more calmly outrageous a scheme than any other of Ivywood’s schemes; than a sepoy commander-in-chief, or Misysra preaching in Westminster Abbey, or the destruction of all the inns in England? I will not wait and expand. I will not be evolved. I will not develop into something that is not me. My feet shall be outside these walls if I walk the roads for it afterward; or I will scream as I would scream trapped in any den by the Docks.”

She swept down the rooms toward the turret, with a sudden passion for solitude; but as she passed the astronomical wood-carving that had closed up the end of the old wing, Enid saw her strike it with her clinched hand.

It was in the turret that she had a strange experience. She was again, later on, using its isolation to worry out the best way of having it out with Philip, when he should return from his visit to London; for to tell old Lady Ivywood what was on her mind would be about as kind and useful as describing Chinese tortures to a baby. The evening was very quiet, of the pale grey sort, and all that side of Ivywood lay before her eyes, undisturbed. She was the more surprised when her dreaming took note of a sort of stirring in the grey-purple dusk of the bushes; of whisperings; and of many footsteps. Then the silence settled down again; and then it was startlingly broken by a big voice singing in the dark distance. It was accompanied by faint sounds that might have been from the fingering of some lute or viol:

“Lady, the light is dying in the skies,

Lady, and let us die when honour dies,

Your dear, dropped glove was like a gauntlet flung,

When you and I were young.

For something more than splendour stood; and ease was not the only good

About the woods in Ivywood when you and I were young.

“Lady, the stars are falling pale and small,

Lady, we will not live if life be all

Forgetting those good stars in heaven hung

When all the world was young,

For more than gold was in a ring, and love was not a little thing

Between the trees in Ivywood when all the world was young.”

The singing ceased; and the bustle in the bushes could hardly be called more than a whisper. But sounds of the same sort and somewhat louder seemed wafted round corners from other sides of the house; and the whole night seemed full of something that was alive, but was more than a single man.

She heard a cry behind her, and Enid rushed into the room as white as one of the lilies.

“What awful thing is happening?” she cried. “The courtyard is full of men shouting, and there are torches everywhere and–”

Joan heard a tramp of men marching and heard, afar off, another song, sung on a more derisive note, something like–

“But Ivywood, Lord Ivywood,

He rots the tree as ivy would.”

“I think,” said Joan, thoughtfully, “it is the End of the World.”

“But where are the police?” wailed her cousin. “They don’t seem to be anywhere about since they wore those fezzes. We shall be murdered or–”

Three thundering and measured blows shook the decorative wood panelling at the end of the wing; as if admittance were demanded with the club of a giant. Enid remembered that she had thought Joan’s little blow energetic, and shuddered. Both the girls stared at the stars and moons and suns blazoned on that sacred wall that leapt and shuddered under the strokes of the doom.

Then the sun fell from Heaven, and the moon and stars dropped down and were scattered about the Persian carpet; and by the opening of the end of the world, Patrick Dalroy came in, carrying a mandolin.

CHAPTER XXV: THE FINDING OF THE SUPERMAN

“I’VE brought you a little dog,” said Mr. Dalroy, introducing the rampant Quoodle. “I had him brought down here in a large hamper labelled ‘Explosives,’ a title which appears to have been well selected.”

He had bowed to Lady Enid on entering and taken Joan’s hand with the least suggestion that he wanted to do something else with it; but he resolutely resumed his conversation, which was on the subject of dogs.

“People who bring back dogs,” he said, “are always under a cloud of suspicion. Sometimes it is hideously hinted that the citizen who brings the dog back with him is identical with the citizen who took the dog away with him. In my case, of course, such conduct is inconceivable. But the returners of dogs, that prosperous and increasing class, are also accused,” he went on, looking straight at Joan, with blank blue eyes, “of coming back for a Reward. There is more truth in this charge.”

Then, with a change of manner more extraordinary than any revolution, even the revolution that was roaring round the house, he took her hand again and kissed it, saying, with a confounding seriousness,

“I know at least that you will pray for my soul.”

“You had better pray for mine, if I have one,” answered Joan, “but why now?”

“Because,” said Patrick, “you will hear from outside, you may even see from that turret window something which in brute fact has never been seen in England since Poor Monmouth’s army went down. In spirit and in truth it has not happened since Saladin and Coeur de Lion crashed together. I only add one thing, and that you know already. I have lived loving you and I shall die loving you. It is the only dimension of the Universe in which I have not wandered and gone astray. I leave the dog to guard you;” and he disappeared down the old broken staircase.

Lady Enid was much mystified that no popular pursuit assailed this stair or invaded the house. But Lady Joan knew better. She had gone, on the suggestion she most cared about, into the turret room and looked out of its many windows on to the abandoned copse and tunnel, which were now fenced off with high walls, the boundary of the mysterious property next door. Across that high barrier she could not even see the tunnel, and barely the tops of the tallest trees which hid its entrance from sight. But in an instant she knew that Dalroy was not hurling his forces on Ivywood at all, but on the house and estate beyond it.

And then followed a sight that was not an experience but rather a revolving vision. She could never describe it afterward, nor could any of those involved in so violent and mystical a wheel. She had seen a huge wall of a breaker wash all over the parade at Pebblewick; and wondered that so huge a hammer could be made merely of water. She had never had a notion of what it is like when it is made of men.

The palisade, put up by the new landlord in front of the old tangled ground by the tunnel, she had long regarded as something as settled and ordinary as one of the walls of the drawing room. It swung and split and sprang into a thousand pieces under the mere blow of human bodies bursting with rage; and the great wave crested the obstacle more clearly than she had ever seen any great wave crest the parade. Only, when the fence was broken, she saw behind it something that robbed her of reason; so that she seemed to be living in all ages and all lands at once. She never could describe the vision afterward; but she always denied it was a dream. She said it was worse; it was something more real than reality. It was a line of real soldiers, which is always a magnificent sight. But they might have been the soldiers of Hannibal or of Attila, they might have been dug up from the cemeteries of Sidon and Babylon, for all Joan had to do with them. There, encamped in English meadows, with a hawthorn-tree in front of them and three beeches behind, was something that has never been in camp nearer than some leagues south of Paris, since that Carolus called The Hammer broke it backward at Tours.

There flew the green standard of that great faith and strong civilization which has so often almost entered the great cities of the West; which long encircled Vienna, which was barely barred from Paris; but which had never before been seen in arms on the soil of England. At one end of the line stood Philip Ivywood, in a uniform of his own special creation, a compromise between the Sepoy and the Turkish uniform. The compromise worked more and more wildly in Joan’s mind. If any impression remained it was merely that England had conquered India and Turkey had conquered England. Then she saw that Ivywood, for all his uniform, was not the Commander of these forces, for an old man, with a great scar on his face, which was not a European face, set himself in the front of the battle, as if it had been a battle in the old epics, and crossed swords with Patrick Dalroy. He had come to return the scar upon his forehead; and he returned it with many wounds, though at last it was he who sank under the sword thrust. He fell on his face; and Dalroy looked at him with something that is much more great than pity. Blood was flowing from Patrick’s wrist and forehead, but he made a salute with his sword. As he was doing so, the corpse, as it appeared, laboriously lifted a face, with feeble eyelids. And, seeming to understand the quarters of the sky by instinct, Oman Pasha dragged himself a foot or so to the left; and fell with his face toward Mecca.

After that the turret turned round and round about Joan and she knew not whether the things she saw were history or prophecy. Something in that last fact of being crushed by the weapons of brown men and yellow, secretly entrenched in English meadows, had made the English what they had not been for centuries. The hawthorn-tree was twisted and broken, as it was at the Battle of Ashdown, when Alfred led his first charge against the Danes. The beech-trees were splashed up to their lowest branches with the mingling of brave heathen and brave Christian blood. She knew no more than that when a column of the Christian rebels, led by Humphrey of the Sign of the Ship, burst through the choked and forgotten tunnel and took the Turkish regiment in the rear, it was the end.

That violent and revolving vision became something beyond the human voice or human ear. She could not intelligently hear even the shots and shouts round the last magnificent rally of the Turks. It was natural, therefore, that she should not hear the words Lord Ivywood addressed to his next-door neighbour, a Turkish officer, or rather to himself. But his words were:

“I have gone where God has never dared to go. I am above the silly supermen as they are above mere men. Where I walk in the Heavens, no man has walked before me; and I am alone in a garden. All this passing about me is like the lonely plucking of garden flowers. I will have this blossom, I will have that.”

The sentence ended so suddenly that the officer looked at him, as if expecting him to speak. But he did not speak.

But Patrick and Joan, wandering together in a world made warm and fresh again, as it can be for few in a world that calls courage frenzy and love superstition, feeling every branching tree as a friend with arms open for the man, or every sweeping slope as a great train trailing behind the woman, did one day climb up to the little white cottage that was now the home of the Superman.

He sat playing with a pale, reposeful face, with scraps of flower and weed put before him on a wooden table. He did not notice them, nor anything else around him; scarcely even Enid Wimpole, who attended to all his wants.

“He is perfectly happy,” she said quietly.

Joan, with the glow on her dark face, could not prevent herself from replying, “And we are so happy.”

“Yes,” said Enid, “but his happiness will last,” and she wept.

“I understand,” said Joan, and kissed her cousin, not without tears of her own.

CHAPTER I: A SERMON ON INNS

THE sea was a pale elfin green and the afternoon had already felt the fairy touch of evening as a young woman with dark hair, dressed in a crinkly copper-coloured sort of dress of the artistic order, was walking rather listlessly along the parade of Pebblewick-on-Sea, trailing a parasol and looking out upon the sea’s horizon. She had a reason for looking instinctively out at the sea-line; a reason that many young women have had in the history of the world. But there was no sail in sight.

On the beach below the parade were a succession of small crowds, surrounding the usual orators of the seaside; whether niggers or socialists, whether clowns or clergymen. Here would stand a man doing something or other with paper boxes; and the holiday makers would watch him for hours in the hope of some time knowing what it was that he was doing with them. Next to him would be a man in a top hat with a very big Bible and a very small wife, who stood silently beside him, while he fought with his clenched fist against the heresy of Milnian Sublapsarianism so wide-spread in fashionable watering-places. It was not easy to follow him, he was so very much excited; but every now and then the words “our Sublapsarian friends” would recur with a kind of wailing sneer. Next was a young man talking of nobody knew what (least of all himself), but apparently relying for public favour mainly on having a ring of carrots round his hat. He had more money lying in front of him than the others. Next were niggers. Next was a children’s service conducted by a man with a long neck who beat time with a little wooden spade. Farther along there was an atheist, in a towering rage, who pointed every now and then at the children’s service and spoke of Nature’s fairest things being corrupted with the secrets of the Spanish Inquisition–by the man with the little spade, of course. The atheist (who wore a red rosette) was very withering to his own audience as well. “Hypocrites!” he would say; and then they would throw him money. “Dupes and dastards!” and then they would throw him more money. But between the atheist and the children’s service was a little owlish man in a red fez, weakly waving a green gamp umbrella. His face was brown and wrinkled like a walnut, his nose was of the sort we associate with Judaea, his beard was the sort of black wedge we associate rather with Persia. The young woman had never seen him before; he was a new exhibit in the now familiar museum of cranks and quacks. The young woman was one of those people in whom a real sense of humour is always at issue with a certain temperamental tendency to boredom or melancholia; and she lingered a moment, and leaned on the rail to listen.

It was fully four minutes before she could understand a word the man was saying; he spoke English with so extraordinary an accent that she supposed at first that he was talking in his own oriental tongue. All the noises of that articulation were odd; the most marked was an extreme prolongation of the short “u” into “oo”; as in “poo-oot” for “put.” Gradually the girl got used to the dialect, and began to understand the words; though some time elapsed even then before she could form any conjecture of their subject matter. Eventually it appeared to her that he had some fad about English civilisation having been founded by the Turks; or, perhaps by the Saracens after their victory in the Crusades. He also seemed to think that Englishmen would soon return to this way of thinking; and seemed to be urging the spread of teetotalism as an evidence of it. The girl was the only person listening to him.

“Loo-ook,” he said, wagging a curled brown finger, “loo-ook at your own inns” (which he pronounced as “ince”). “Your inns of which you write in your boo-ooks! Those inns were not poo-oot up in the beginning to sell ze alcoholic Christian drink. They were put up to sell ze non-alcoholic Islamic drinks. You can see this in the names of your inns. They are eastern names, Asiatic names. You have a famous public house to which your omnibuses go on the pilgrimage. It is called the Elephant and Castle. That is not an English name. It is an Asiatic name. You will say there are castles in England, and I will agree with you. There is the Windsor Castle. But where,” he cried sternly, shaking his green umbrella at the girl in an angry oratorical triumph, “where is the Windsor Elephant? I have searched all Windsor Park. No elephants.”

The girl with the dark hair smiled, and began to think that this man was better than any of the others. In accordance with the strange system of concurrent religious endowment which prevails at watering-places, she dropped a two shilling piece into the round copper tray beside him. With honourable and disinterested eagerness, the old gentleman in the red fez took no notice of this, but went on warmly, if obscurely, with his argument.

“Then you have a place of drink in this town which you call The Bool!”

“We generally call it The Bull,” said the interested young lady, with a very melodious voice.

“You have a place of drink, which you call The Bool,” he reiterated in a sort of abstract fury, “and surely you see that this is all vary ridiculous!”

“No, no!” said the girl, softly, and in deprecation.

“Why should there be a Bull?” he cried, prolonging the word in his own way. “Why should there be a Bull in connection with a festive locality? Who thinks about a Bull in gardens of delight? What need is there of a Bull when we watch the tulip-tinted maidens dance or pour the sparkling sherbert? You yourselves, my friends?” And he looked around radiantly, as if addressing an enormous mob. “You yourselves have a proverb, ‘It is not calculated to promote prosperity to have a Bull in a china shop.’ Equally, my friends, it would not be calculated to promote prosperity to have a Bull in a wine shop. All this is clear.”

CAPITOLO I: UNA PREDICA SULLE OSTERIE

Il mare era di un verde pallido e fatato, e il pomeriggio aveva già sentito il tocco fatato della sera quando una giovane donna dai capelli scuri, vestita con un abito artistico di colore rame e dall’aspetto frusciante, camminava piuttosto svogliatamente lungo la passeggiata di Pebblewick-on-Sea, trascinando un ombrello e guardando verso l’orizzonte del mare. Aveva una ragione per guardare istintivamente verso la linea del mare; una ragione che molte giovani donne hanno avuto nella storia del mondo. Ma non c’era alcuna vela in vista.

Sulla spiaggia sotto il lungomare si susseguivano piccoli gruppi di persone che circondavano gli oratori abituali della località balneare: fossero negri o socialisti, pagliacci o uomini di chiesa. Qui c’era un uomo che faceva qualcosa con delle scatole di cartone; e i turisti lo osservavano per ore nella speranza che prima o poi capissero cosa stesse facendo con quelle. Accanto a lui c’era un uomo in cilindro con una Bibbia molto grande e una moglie molto piccola, che stava in silenzio accanto a lui mentre combatteva con il pugno chiuso contro l’eresia del sublapsarianesimo milniano così diffuso nei locali di moda. Non era facile seguirlo, tanto era agitato; ma ogni tanto le parole “i nostri amici sublapsariani” tornavano con una specie di ghigno lamentoso. Poi c’era un giovane che parlava di chissà cosa (lui per primo non lo sapeva), ma apparentemente si affidava principalmente al favore del pubblico grazie a un cerchio di carote attorno al suo cappello. Aveva più soldi davanti a sé degli altri. Poi venivano i negri. Poi un servizio per bambini condotto da un uomo con il collo lungo che batteva il ritmo con una piccola paletta di legno. Più avanti c’era un ateo, in preda a una rabbia furiosa, che ogni tanto indicava il servizio per bambini e parlava dei più bei fiori della Natura corrotti dai segreti dell’[[]L07|Inquisizione spagnola]] - ovviamente da parte dell’uomo con la paletta. L’ateo (che portava una coccarda rossa) era molto sprezzante anche verso il proprio pubblico. “Ipocriti!” diceva; e allora gli lanciavano dei soldi. “Imbroglioni e codardi!” e allora gli lanciavano ancora più soldi. Ma tra l’ateo e il servizio per bambini c’era un ometto con un fez rosso, che agitava debolmente un ombrello verde. Il suo viso era bruno e rugoso come una noce, il naso era di quel tipo che associamo alla Giudea, la barba era quella specie di cuneo nero che piuttosto associamo alla Persia. La giovane donna non l’aveva mai visto prima; era una nuova attrazione nel museo ormai familiare dei pazzi e degli imbroglioni. La giovane donna era una di quelle persone in cui un vero senso dell’[[]L09|umorismo]] è sempre in conflitto con una certa tendenza temperamentale alla noia o alla malinconia; e rimase lì un momento, appoggiata al corrimano ad ascoltare.

Ci vollero ben quattro minuti prima che riuscisse a capire una sola parola di quello che l’uomo stava dicendo; parlava inglese con un accento così straordinario che all’inizio pensò che stesse parlando nella sua lingua orientale. Tutti i suoni di quell’articolazione erano insoliti; il più evidente era una prolungata trasformazione della breve “u” in “oo”; come in “poo-oot” per “put”. Gradualmente la ragazza si abituò al dialetto e cominciò a capire le parole, sebbene trascorresse ancora qualche tempo prima che potesse farsi un’idea del loro contenuto. Alla fine le sembrò di capire che aveva una fissazione sull’idea che la civiltà inglese fosse stata fondata dai Turchi; o forse dai Saraceni dopo la loro vittoria nelle Crociate. Sembrava anche pensare che gli inglesi sarebbero presto tornati a questo modo di pensare e sembrava insistere sulla diffusione del teetotalismo come prova di ciò. La ragazza era l’unica persona ad ascoltarlo.

“G-guardi”, disse, agitando un dito bruno ricurvo, “g-guardi le sue stesse osterie” (che pronunciava come “ince”). “Le sue osterie di cui scrive nei suoi l-libri! Queste osterie non furono m-messe su all’inizio per vendere la bevanda cristiana alcolica. Furono messe su per vendere le bevande islamiche non alcoliche. Può vederlo dai nomi delle sue osterie. Sono nomi orientali, asiatici. Ha una famosa taverna pubblica a cui i suoi autobus fanno pellegrinaggio. Si chiama l’Elefante e la rocca. Non è un nome inglese. È un nome asiatico. Dirà che ci sono rocche in Inghilterra, e sarò d’accordo con lei. C’è la rocca di Windsor. Ma dove”, gridò severamente, agitando il suo ombrello verde contro la ragazza in un trionfo oratorio arrabbiato, “dove è l’Elefante di Windsor? Ho cercato tutto il parco di Windsor. Nessun elefante.”

La ragazza dai capelli scuri sorrise e cominciò a pensare che quell’uomo fosse migliore di tutti gli altri. In conformità al singolare sistema di sovvenzioni religiose concorrenti che prevale nei luoghi di villeggiatura, lasciò una moneta da due scellini nel vassoio rotondo di rame accanto a lui. Con onorevole e disinteressata sollecitudine, il vecchio signore col fez rosso non diede alcuna importanza a ciò, ma continuò con calore, sebbene in modo oscuro, la sua argomentazione.

“Quindi avete un posto dove bere in questa città che chiamate The Bool!”

«In genere lo chiamiamo il Toro», disse la giovane interessata con una voce molto melodiosa.

«Avete un posto dove bere che chiamate The Bool», ripeté con una specie di furia astratta «e certamente vedete quanto tutto ciò sia davvero ridicolo!»

«No, no!», disse la ragazza dolcemente e con tono di rimprovero.

“Perché dovrebbe esserci un Bue?” esclamò, prolungando la parola alla sua maniera. “Perché dovrebbe esserci un Bue in relazione con un luogo festoso? Chi pensa a un Bue nei giardini del piacere? Che bisogno c’è di un Bue quando guardiamo le fanciulle dai colori dei tulipani danzare o versiamo lo sciroppo frizzante? Voi stessi, amici miei?” E guardò intorno raggiante, come se si rivolgesse a una folla enorme. “Voi stessi avete un proverbio: ‘Non è calcolato per promuovere la prosperità avere un Bue in una bottega di porcellane.’ Allo stesso modo, amici miei, non sarebbe calcolato per promuovere la prosperità avere un Bue in un’osteria. Tutto questo è chiaro.”

He stuck his umbrella upright in the sand and struck one finger against another, like a man getting to business at last.

“It iss as clear as the sun at noon,” he said solemnly. “It iss as clear as the sun at noon that this word Bull, which is devoid of restful and pleasurable associations, is but the corruption of another word, which possesses restful and pleasurable associations. The word is not Bull; it is the Bul-Bul!” His voice rose suddenly like a trumpet and he spread abroad his hands like the fans of a tropic palm-tree.

After this great effect he was a little more subdued and leaned gravely on his umbrella. “You will find the same trace of Asiatic nomenclature in the names of all your English inns,” he went on. “Nay, you will find it, I am almost certain, in all your terms in any way connected with your revelries and your reposes. Why, my good friends, the very name of that insidious spirit by which you make strong your drinks is an Arabic word: alcohol. It is obvious, is it not, that this is the Arabic article ‘Al,’ as in Alhambra, as in Algebra; and we need not pause here to pursue its many appearances in connection with your festive institutions, as in your Alsop’s beer, your Ally Sloper, and your partly joyous institution of the Albert Memorial. Above all, in your greatest feasting day–your Christmas day–which you so erroneously suppose to be connected with your religion, what do you say then? Do you say the names of the Christian Nations? Do you say, ‘I will have a little France. I will have a little Ireland. I will have a little Scotland. I will have a little Spain?’ No–o.” And the noise of the negative seemed to waggle as does the bleating of a sheep. “You say, ‘I will have a little Turkey,’ which is your name for the Country of the Servant of the Prophet!”

And once more he stretched out his arms sublimely to the east and west and appealed to earth and heaven. The young lady, looking at the sea-green horizon with a smile, clapped her grey gloved hands softly together as if at a peroration. But the little old man with the fez was far from exhausted yet.

“In reply to this you will object–” he began.

“O no, no,” breathed the young lady in a sort of dreamy rapture. “I don’t object. I don’t object the littlest bit!”

“In reply to this you will object–” proceeded her preceptor, “that some inns are actually named after the symbols of your national superstitions. You will hasten to point out to me that the Golden Cross is situated opposite Charing Cross, and you will expatiate at length on King’s Cross, Gerrard’s Cross and the many crosses that are to be found in or near London. But you must not forget,” and here he wagged his green umbrella roguishly at the girl, as if he was going to poke her with it, “none of you, my friends, must forget what a large number of Crescents there are in London! Denmark Crescent; Mornington Crescent! St. Mark’s Crescent! St. George’s Crescent! Grosvenor Crescent! Regent’s Park Crescent! Nay, Royal Crescent! And why should we forget Pelham Crescent? Why, indeed? Everywhere, I say, homage paid to the holy symbol of the religion of the Prophet! Compare with this network and pattern of crescents, this city almost consisting of crescents, the meagre array of crosses, which remain to attest the ephemeral superstition to which you were, for one weak moment, inclined.”

The crowds on the beach were rapidly thinning as tea-time drew nearer. The west grew clearer and clearer with the evening, till the sunshine seemed to have got behind the pale green sea and be shining through, as through a wall of thin green glass. The very transparency of sky and sea might have to this girl, for whom the sea was the romance and the tragedy, the hint of a sort of radiant hopelessness. The flood made of a million emeralds was ebbing as slowly as the sun was sinking: but the river of human nonsense flowed on for ever.

“I will not for one moment maintain,” said the old gentleman, “that there are no difficulties in my case; or that all the examples are as obviously true as those that I have just demonstrated. No-o. It is obvious, let us say, that the ‘Saracen’s Head’ is a corruption of the historic truth ‘The Saracen is Ahead’–I am far from saying it is equally obvious that the ‘Green Dragon’ was originally ‘the Agreeing Dragoman’; though I hope to prove in my book that it is so. I will only say here that it is su-urely more probable that one poo-ooting himself forward to attract the wayfarer in the desert, would compare himself to a friendly and persuadable guide or courier, rather than to a voracious monster. Sometimes the true origin is very hard to trace; as in the inn that commemorates our great Moslem Warrior, Amir Ali Ben Bhoze, whom you have so quaintly abbreviated into Admiral Benbow. Sometimes it is even more difficult for the seeker after truth. There is a place of drink near to here called ‘The Old Ship’–”

The eyes of the girl remained on the ring of the horizon as rigid as the ring itself; but her whole face had coloured and altered. The sands were almost emptied by now: the atheist was as non-existent as his God; and those who had hoped to know what was being done to the paper boxes had gone away to their tea without knowing it. But the young woman still leaned on the railing. Her face was suddenly alive; and it looked as if her body could not move.

“It shood be admitted–” bleated the old man with the green umbrella, “that there is no literally self-evident trace of the Asiatic nomenclature in the words ‘the old ship.’ But even here the see-eeker after Truth can poot himself in touch with facts. I questioned the proprietor of ‘The Old Ship’ who is, according to such notes as I have kept, a Mr. Pumph.”

The girl’s lip trembled.

Piantò l’ombrello dritto nella sabbia e batté un dito contro l’altro, come un uomo che finalmente si mette all’opera.

«È chiaaro come il sole a mezzogiorno», disse solennemente. «È chiaaro come il sole a mezzogiorno che questa parola Bull, la quale è priva di associazioni riposanti e piacevoli, non è se non la corruzione di un’altra parola, che possiede associazioni riposanti e piacevoli. La parola non è Bull; è il Bul-Bul!» La sua voce si levò d’un tratto come una tromba, ed egli allargò le mani come i ventagli di una palma tropicale.

Dopo questo grande effetto si fece un poco più sommesso e si appoggiò gravemente all’ombrello. «Troverete la stessa traccia di nomenclatura asiatica nei nomi di tutte le vostre locande inglesi», proseguì. «Anzi, la troverete, ne sono quasi certo, in tutti i vostri termini in qualche modo connessi con i vostri bagordi e i vostri riposi. Ma come, miei buoni amici, il nome stesso di quello spirito insidioso con cui rendete forti le vostre bevande è una parola araba: alcool. È evidente, non è vero, che questo è l’articolo arabo «Al», come in Alhambra, come in Algebra; e non occorre soffermarci qui a inseguirne le molte apparizioni in connessione con le vostre istituzioni festive, come nella vostra birra Alsop, nel vostro Ally Sloper, e nella vostra istituzione in parte gioiosa dell’Albert Memorial. Soprattutto, nel vostro più grande giorno di festa – il vostro giorno di Natale – che così erroneamente supponete essere connesso con la vostra religione, che cosa dite allora? Dite i nomi delle Nazioni cristiane? Dite: «Prenderò un po’ di Francia. Prenderò un po’ d’Irlanda. Prenderò un po’ di Scozia. Prenderò un po’ di Spagna»? No-o.» E il rumore della negazione pareva tentennare come fa il belato di una pecora. «Voi dite: «Prenderò un po’ di Turchia», che è il vostro nome per il Paese del Servo del Profeta!»

E ancora una volta tese sublimemente le braccia a oriente e a occidente e si appellò alla terra e al cielo. La giovane donna, guardando con un sorriso l’orizzonte verde-mare, batté piano le mani inguantate di grigio come a una perorazione. Ma il vecchietto col fez era ancora ben lungi dall’essere esausto.

«In risposta a ciò voi obietterete–» cominciò.

«Oh no, no», sussurrò la giovane donna in una sorta di sognante rapimento. «Non obietto. Non obietto nemmeno un pochino!»

«In risposta a ciò voi obietterete–» proseguì il suo precettore, «che alcune locande sono in effetti chiamate col nome dei simboli delle vostre superstizioni nazionali. Vi affretterete a farmi notare che la Golden Cross sorge di fronte a Charing Cross, e vi dilungherete a lungo su King’s Cross, Gerrard’s Cross e le molte croci che si trovano a Londra o presso di essa. Ma non dovete dimenticare», e qui agitò con malizia l’ombrello verde verso la ragazza, come se stesse per punzecchiarla, «nessuno di voi, amici miei, deve dimenticare quanto gran numero di Crescents vi siano a Londra! Denmark Crescent; Mornington Crescent! St. Mark’s Crescent! St. George’s Crescent! Grosvenor Crescent! Regent’s Park Crescent! Anzi, Royal Crescent! E perché dovremmo dimenticare Pelham Crescent? Perché mai? Ovunque, io dico, si rende omaggio al sacro simbolo della religione del Profeta! Comparate con questa rete e questo intreccio di mezzelune, questa città quasi tutta composta di mezzelune, la scarna schiera di croci, che restano ad attestare la effimera superstizione verso la quale foste, per un debole istante, inclini.»

Le folle sulla spiaggia si diradavano rapidamente man mano che si avvicinava l’ora del tè. L’occidente si faceva sempre più limpido con la sera, finché la luce del sole parve essersi collocata dietro il pallido mare verde e brillare attraverso di esso, come attraverso una parete di sottile vetro verde. La trasparenza stessa del cielo e del mare poteva forse offrire a questa fanciulla, per la quale il mare era il romanzo e la tragedia, il presagio di una sorta di raggiante disperazione. La marea fatta di un milione di smeraldi rifluiva lenta come il sole calava: ma il fiume dell’umana insensatezza scorreva senza fine.

«Non sosterrò neppure per un istante», disse il vecchio signore, «che non vi siano difficoltà nella mia tesi; o che tutti gli esempi siano tanto ovviamente veri quanto quelli che ho or ora dimostrato. No-o. È evidente, diciamo, che il «Saracen’s Head», la «Testa del Saraceno», è una corruzione della storica verità «il Saraceno è in Testa» – sono ben lontano dal dire che sia ugualmente evidente che il «Green Dragon», il «Drago Verde», fosse in origine «l’Accordante Dragomanno»; per quanto io speri di dimostrarlo nel mio libro. Dirò soltanto qui che è si-icuramente più probabile che colui il quale si spii-inge avanti per attrarre il viandante nel deserto, si paragoni a una guida o a un corriere amichevole e persuasibile, piuttosto che a un vorace mostro. Talvolta la vera origine è assai difficile da rintracciare; come nella locanda che commemora il nostro grande Guerriero Musulmano, Amir Ali Ben Bhoze, che voi avete così bizzarramente abbreviato in Admiral Benbow. Talvolta è persino più difficile per chi cerca la verità. Vi è un luogo di mescita qui vicino chiamato «La Vecchia Nave»–»

Gli occhi della fanciulla rimanevano fissi sull’anello dell’orizzonte, rigidi quanto l’anello stesso; ma tutto il suo volto si era acceso e trasformato. Le sabbie erano ormai quasi deserte: l’ateo era tanto inesistente quanto il suo Dio; e quanti avevano sperato di sapere che cosa si stesse facendo alle scatole di cartone se n’erano andati a prendere il tè senza saperlo. Ma la giovane donna era ancora appoggiata alla ringhiera. Il suo volto era d’un tratto vivo; e pareva che il suo corpo non potesse muoversi.

«Bisoogna ammettere–» belò il vecchio con l’ombrello verde, «che non vi è alcuna traccia letteralmente auto-evidente della nomenclatura asiatica nelle parole «la vecchia nave». Ma anche qui il cerca-atore della Verità può meettersi in contatto coi fatti. Ho interrogato il proprietario della «Vecchia Nave» che è, secondo gli appunti che ho conservato, un certo signor Pumph.»

Il labbro della fanciulla tremò.

“Poor old Hump!” she said. “Why, I’d forgotten about him. He must be very nearly as worried as I am! I hope this man won’t be too silly about this! I’d rather it weren’t about this!”

“And Mr. Pumph to-old me the inn was named by a vary intimate friend of his, an Irishman who had been a Captain in the Britannic Royal Navy, but had resigned his po-ost in anger at the treatment of Ireland. Though quitting the service, he retained joost enough of the superstition of your western sailors, to wish his friend’s inn to be named after his old ship. But as the name of the ship was ‘The United Kingdom–’”

His female pupil, if she could not exactly be said to be sitting at his feet, was undoubtedly leaning out very eagerly above his head. Amid the solitude of the sands she called out in a loud and clear voice, “Can you tell me the Captain’s name?”

The old gentleman jumped, blinked and stared like a startled owl. Having been talking for hours as if he had an audience of thousands, he seemed suddenly very much embarrassed to find that he had even an audience of one. By this time they seemed to be almost the only human creatures along the shore; almost the only living creatures, except the seagulls. The sun, in dropping finally, seemed to have broken as a blood orange might break; and lines of blood-red light were spilt along the split, low, level skies. This abrupt and belated brilliance took all the colour out of the man’s red cap and green umbrella; but his dark figure, distinct against the sea and the sunset, remained the same, save that it was more agitated than before.

“The name,” he said, “the Captain’s name. I–I understood it was Dalroy. But what I wish to indicate, what I wish to expound, is that here again the seeker after truth can find the connection of his ideas. It was explained to me by Mr. Pumph that he was rearranging the place of festivity, in no inconsiderable proportion because of the anticipated return of the Captain in question, who had, as it appeared, taken service in some not very large Navy, but had left it and was coming home. Now, mark all of you, my friends,” he said to the seagulls “that even here the chain of logic holds.”

He said it to the seagulls because the young lady, after staring at him with starry eyes for a moment and leaning heavily on the railing, had turned her back and disappeared rapidly into the twilight. After her hasty steps had fallen silent there was no other noise than the faint but powerful purring of the now distant sea, the occasional shriek of a sea-bird, and the continuous sound of a soliloquy.

“Mark, all of you,” continued the man flourishing his green umbrella so furiously that it almost flew open like a green flag unfurled, and then striking it deep in the sand, in the sand in which his fighting fathers had so often struck their tents, “mark all of you this marvellous fact! That when, being for a time, for a time, astonished-embarrassed–brought up as you would say short–by the absence of any absolute evidence of Eastern influence in the phrase ‘the old ship,’ I inquired from what country the Captain was returning, Mr. Pumph said to me in solemnity, ‘From Turkey.’ From Turkey! From the nearest country of the Religion! I know men say it is not our country; that no man knows where we come from, of what is our country. What does it matter where we come from if we carry a message from Paradise? With a great galloping of horses we carry it, and have no time to stop in places. But what we bring is the only creed that has regarded what you will call in your great words the virginity of a man’s reason, that has put no man higher than a prophet, and has respected the solitude of God.”

And again he spread his arms out, as if addressing a mass meeting of millions, all alone on the dark seashore.

«Povero vecchio Hump!» disse. «Ma guarda, me n’ero dimenticata. Dev’essere quasi tanto in pena quanto me! Spero che quest’uomo non voglia essere troppo sciocco a proposito di questo! Preferirei che non riguardasse proprio questo!»

«E il signor Pumph mi diss-e che la locanda fu battezzata da un suo amico assai in-timo, un irlandese che era stato Capitano nella Marina Reale britannica, ma aveva rassegnato il suo in-carico per sdegno del trattamento riservato all’Irlanda. Pur lasciando il servizio, conservò appena a suf-ficienza della superstizione dei vostri marinai d’occidente da desiderare che la locanda dell’amico portasse il nome della sua vecchia nave. Ma poiché il nome della nave era ‘Il Regno Unito—’»

La sua allieva, se non si poteva dire esattamente che sedesse ai suoi piedi, senza dubbio si sporgeva assai avidamente sopra il suo capo. In mezzo alla solitudine delle sabbie ella gridò con voce alta e chiara: «Sapete dirmi il nome del Capitano?»

Il vecchio signore sobbalzò, sbatté le palpebre e fissò come una civetta spaventata. Avendo parlato per ore come se avesse un uditorio di migliaia, parve d’un tratto assai imbarazzato di scoprire che aveva persino un uditorio di uno solo. A questo momento sembravano ormai le uniche creature umane lungo la riva; quasi le uniche creature viventi, salvo i gabbiani. Il sole, calando finalmente, pareva essersi spaccato come potrebbe spaccarsi un’arancia sanguigna; e linee di luce rosso-sangue si erano sparse lungo i cieli fessi, bassi e piatti. Questo brusco e tardivo splendore tolse ogni colore al berretto rosso e all’ombrello verde dell’uomo; ma la sua scura figura, netta contro il mare e il tramonto, restava la stessa, salvo che era più agitata di prima.

«Il nome», disse, «il nome del Capitano. Io… io ho inteso che fosse Dalroy. Ma ciò che desidero indicare, ciò che desidero esporre, è che anche qui il cercatore della verità può trovare la connessione delle sue idee. Mi fu spiegato dal signor Pumph ch’egli stava riordinando il luogo di festa, in proporzione non trascurabile a causa del previsto ritorno del Capitano in questione, il quale, a quanto pareva, aveva preso servizio in una Marina non molto grande, ma l’aveva lasciata e stava tornando a casa. Ora, notate bene, tutti voi, amici miei», disse ai gabbiani, «che anche qui la catena della logica tiene.»

Lo disse ai gabbiani perché la giovane dama, dopo averlo fissato un istante con occhi trasognati ed essersi appoggiata pesantemente alla ringhiera, gli aveva voltato le spalle ed era rapidamente scomparsa nel crepuscolo. Dopo che i suoi passi frettolosi si furono spenti, non vi fu altro rumore che il fievole ma possente fusciare del mare ormai lontano, l’occasionale strido di un uccello marino e il suono ininterrotto di un soliloquio.

«Notate, tutti voi», proseguì l’uomo agitando il suo ombrello verde così furiosamente che quasi si spalancò come una verde bandiera spiegata, e poi piantandolo a fondo nella sabbia, nella sabbia in cui i suoi padri guerrieri avevano così spesso piantato le loro tende, «notate tutti voi questo fatto meraviglioso! Che quando, essendo per un tempo, per un tempo, stupito-imbarazzato—colto, come direste voi, alla sprovvista—dall’assenza di qualsiasi prova assoluta di influenza orientale nella frase ‘la vecchia nave’, domandai da quale paese il Capitano stesse tornando, il signor Pumph mi disse con solennità: ‘Dalla Turchia.’ Dalla Turchia! Dal più vicino paese della Religione! So che gli uomini dicono che non è il nostro paese; che nessuno sa da dove veniamo, quale sia il nostro paese. Che importa da dove veniamo, se rechiamo un messaggio dal Paradiso? Con un gran galoppare di cavalli lo rechiamo, e non abbiamo tempo di fermarci nei luoghi. Ma ciò che portiamo è l’unico credo che abbia riguardato quella che voi chiamereste, con le vostre grandi parole, la verginità della ragione di un uomo, che non ha posto nessun uomo più in alto di un profeta, e ha rispettato la solitudine di Dio.»

E di nuovo spalancò le braccia, come rivolgendosi a un’adunata di milioni, tutto solo sull’oscura riva del mare.

CHAPTER II: THE END OF OLIVE ISLAND

THE great sea-dragon of the changing colours that wriggles round the world like a chameleon, was pale green as it washed on Pebblewick, but strong blue where it broke on the Ionian Isles. One of the innumerable islets, hardly more than a flat white rock in the azure expanse, was celebrated as the Isle of Olives; not because it was rich in such vegetation, but because, by some freak of soil or climate, two or three little olives grew there to an unparalleled height. Even in the full heat of the South it is very unusual for an olive tree to grow any taller than a small pear tree; but the three olives that stood up as signals on this sterile place might well be mistaken, except for the shape, for moderate sized pines or larches of the north. It was also connected with some ancient Greek legend about Pallas the patroness of the olive; for all that sea was alive with the first fairyland of Hellas; and from the platform of marble under the olive trees could be seen the grey outline of Ithaca.

On the island and under the trees was a table set in the open air and covered with papers and inkstands. At the table were sitting four men, two in uniform and two in plain black clothes. Aides-de-camps, equerries and such persons stood in a group in the background; and behind them a string of two or three silent battle-ships lay along the sea. For peace was being given to Europe.

There had just come to an end the long agony of one of the many unsuccessful efforts to break the strength of Turkey and save the small Christian tribes. There had been many other such meetings in the later phases of the matter as, one after another, the smaller nations gave up the struggle, or the greater nations came in to coerce them. But the interested parties had now dwindled to these four. For the Powers of Europe being entirely agreed on the necessity for peace on a Turkish basis, were content to leave the last negotiations to England and Germany, who could be trusted to enforce it; there was a representative of the Sultan, of course; and there was a representative of the only enemy of the Sultan who had not hitherto come to terms.

For one tiny power had alone carried on the war month after month, and with a tenacity and temporary success that was a new nine-days marvel every morning. An obscure and scarcely recognized prince calling himself the King of Ithaca had filled the Eastern Mediterranean with exploits that were not unworthy of the audacious parallel that the name of his island suggested. Poets could not help asking if it were Odysseus come again; patriotic Greeks, even if they themselves had been forced to lay down their arms, could not help feeling curious as to what Greek race or name was boasted by the new and heroic royal house. It was, therefore, with some amusement that the world at last discovered that the descendant of Ulysses was a cheeky Irish adventurer named Patrick Dalroy; who had once been in the English Navy, had got into a quarrel through his Fenian sympathies and resigned his commission. Since then he had seen many adventures in many uniforms; and always got himself or some one else into hot water with an extraordinary mixture of cynicism and quixotry. In his fantastic little kingdom, of course, he had been his own General, his own Admiral, his own Foreign Secretary and his own Ambassador; but he was always careful to follow the wishes of his people in the essentials of peace and war; and it was at their direction that he had come to lay down his sword at last. Besides his professional skill, he was chiefly famous for his enormous bodily strength and stature. It is the custom in newspapers nowadays to say that mere barbaric muscular power is valueless in modern military actions, but this view may be as much exaggerated as its opposite. In such wars as these of the Near East, where whole populations are slightly armed and personal assault is common, a leader who can defend his head often has a real advantage; and it is not true, even in a general way, that strength is of no use. This was admitted by Lord Ivywood, the English Minister, who was pointing out in detail to King Patrick the hopeless superiority of the light pattern of Turkish field gun; and the King of Ithaca, remarking that he was quite convinced, said he would take it with him, and ran away with it under his arm. It would be conceded by the greatest of the Turkish warriors, the terrifying Oman Pasha, equally famous for his courage in war and his cruelty in peace; but who carried on his brow a scar from Patrick’s sword, taken after three hours mortal combat–and taken without spite or shame, be it said, for the Turk is always at his best in that game. Nor would the quality be doubted by Mr. Hart, a financial friend of the German Minister, whom Patrick Dalroy, after asking him which of his front windows he would prefer to be thrown into, threw into his bedroom window on the first floor with so considerate an exactitude that he alighted on the bed, where he was in a position to receive any medical attention. But, when all is said, one muscular Irish gentleman on an island cannot fight all Europe for ever, and he came, with a kind of gloomy good humour, to offer the terms now dictated to him by his adopted country. He could not even knock all the diplomatists down (for which he possessed both the power and the inclination), for he realised, with the juster part of his mind, that they were only obeying orders, as he was. So he sat heavily and sleepily at the little table, in the green and white uniform of the Navy of Ithaca (invented by himself); a big bull of a man, monstrously young for his size, with a bull neck and two blue bull’s eyes for eyes, and red hair rising so steadily off his scalp that it looked as if his head had caught fire: as some said it had.

The most dominant person present was the great Oman Pasha himself, with his strong face starved by the asceticism of war, his hair and mustache seeming rather blasted with lightning than blanched with age; a red fez on his head, and between the red fez and mustache, a scar at which the King of Ithaca did not look. His eyes had an awful lack of expression.

CAPITOLO II: LA FINE DELL’ISOLA DEGLI ULIVI

Il grande drago marino dai colori cangianti che si contorce attorno al mondo come un camaleonte era di un verde pallido là dove lambiva Pebblewick, ma di un azzurro intenso là dove si frangeva sulle Isole Ionie. Uno degli innumerevoli isolotti, poco più di una piatta roccia bianca nella distesa cerulea, era celebre come l’Isola degli Ulivi; non perché fosse ricca di simile vegetazione, ma perché, per qualche capriccio del suolo o del clima, due o tre piccoli ulivi vi crescevano a un’altezza senza pari. Persino nel pieno calore del Sud è assai raro che un ulivo cresca più alto di un piccolo pero; ma i tre ulivi che si ergevano come segnali su quel luogo sterile avrebbero ben potuto essere scambiati, se non fosse per la forma, per pini o larici del nord di media grandezza. Era inoltre legata a qualche antica leggenda greca su Pallade, patrona dell’ulivo; poiché tutto quel mare era vivo del primo paese fatato dell’Ellade; e dalla piattaforma di marmo sotto gli ulivi si poteva scorgere il grigio profilo di Itaca.

Sull’isola e sotto gli alberi era disposto un tavolo all’aperto, coperto di carte e di calamai. Al tavolo sedevano quattro uomini, due in uniforme e due in semplici abiti neri. Aiutanti di campo, scudieri e persone simili stavano riuniti in gruppo sullo sfondo; e dietro di loro una fila di due o tre silenziose navi da guerra giaceva lungo il mare. Poiché si stava dando la pace all’Europa.

Era appena giunta al termine la lunga agonia di uno dei molti sforzi infruttuosi di spezzare la potenza della Turchia e salvare le piccole tribù cristiane. Vi erano stati molti altri incontri di questo genere nelle fasi più tarde della vicenda, man mano che, l’una dopo l’altra, le nazioni minori rinunciavano alla lotta, o le nazioni maggiori intervenivano per costringerle. Ma le parti interessate si erano ormai ridotte a queste quattro. Poiché le Potenze d’Europa, essendo interamente concordi sulla necessità di una pace su basi turche, si accontentavano di lasciare le ultime trattative all’Inghilterra e alla Germania, alle quali si poteva affidare il compito di imporla; c’era un rappresentante del Sultano, naturalmente; e c’era un rappresentante del solo nemico del Sultano che non fosse ancora venuto a patti.

Poiché una sola minuscola potenza aveva da sola condotto la guerra mese dopo mese, con una tenacia e un successo temporaneo che ogni mattina erano un nuovo prodigio di breve durata. Un oscuro e appena riconosciuto principe che si faceva chiamare il Re di Itaca aveva riempito il Mediterraneo orientale di imprese non indegne dell’audace parallelo suggerito dal nome della sua isola. I poeti non potevano fare a meno di chiedersi se non fosse Odisseo tornato di nuovo; i greci patrioti, anche se essi stessi erano stati costretti a deporre le armi, non potevano fare a meno di sentirsi curiosi di sapere quale stirpe o nome greco vantasse la nuova ed eroica casa reale. Fu dunque con un certo divertimento che il mondo scoprì infine che il discendente di Ulisse era uno sfacciato avventuriero irlandese di nome Patrick Dalroy; il quale era stato un tempo nella Marina inglese, si era cacciato in una lite a causa delle sue simpatie feniane e aveva rassegnato il proprio grado. Da allora aveva conosciuto molte avventure sotto molte uniformi; e sempre aveva cacciato sé stesso o qualcun altro in una brutta situazione con una straordinaria mescolanza di cinismo e donchisciottismo. Nel suo fantastico piccolo regno, naturalmente, era stato Generale di sé stesso, Ammiraglio di sé stesso, Ministro degli Esteri di sé stesso e Ambasciatore di sé stesso; ma aveva sempre cura di seguire i desideri del suo popolo negli aspetti essenziali della pace e della guerra; e fu per loro incarico che era venuto a deporre infine la sua spada. Oltre alla sua abilità professionale, era celebre soprattutto per la sua enorme forza fisica e statura. È usanza dei giornali oggigiorno affermare che la mera potenza muscolare barbarica sia priva di valore nelle azioni militari moderne, ma questa opinione può essere tanto esagerata quanto la sua opposta. In guerre come queste del Vicino Oriente, dove intere popolazioni sono armate alla leggera e l’assalto personale è comune, un capo che sappia difendere la propria testa ha spesso un vantaggio reale; e non è vero, nemmeno in senso generale, che la forza non serva a nulla. Ciò fu ammesso da Lord Ivywood, il Ministro inglese, il quale stava illustrando in dettaglio a Re Patrick la disperata superiorità del leggero modello di cannone da campo turco; e il Re di Itaca, osservando di esserne del tutto convinto, disse che se lo sarebbe portato via con sé, e fuggì tenendolo sotto il braccio. Ciò sarebbe stato riconosciuto dal più grande dei guerrieri turchi, il terrificante Oman Pascià, ugualmente famoso per il suo coraggio in guerra e per la sua crudeltà in pace; ma che portava sulla fronte una cicatrice inferta dalla spada di Patrick, avuta dopo tre ore di combattimento mortale — e avuta senza rancore né vergogna, sia detto, poiché il turco dà sempre il meglio di sé in quel gioco. Né la qualità sarebbe messa in dubbio dal signor Hart, un amico finanziere del Ministro tedesco, che Patrick Dalroy, dopo avergli chiesto in quale delle sue finestre anteriori preferisse essere scagliato, gettò nella finestra della sua camera da letto al primo piano con un’esattezza così premurosa che egli atterrò sul letto, dove si trovava in posizione di ricevere ogni cura medica. Ma, a conti fatti, un solo muscoloso gentiluomo irlandese su un’isola non può combattere tutta l’Europa in eterno, ed egli venne, con una sorta di cupo buon umore, a offrire i termini ora dettatigli dal suo paese d’adozione. Non poteva nemmeno atterrare tutti i diplomatici (cosa per cui possedeva sia il potere sia l’inclinazione), poiché comprendeva, con la parte più equa della sua mente, che essi non facevano che obbedire agli ordini, come lui. Così sedeva pesantemente e sonnolentemente al piccolo tavolo, nell’uniforme verde e bianca della Marina di Itaca (inventata da lui stesso); un uomo grosso come un toro, mostruosamente giovane per la sua mole, con un collo taurino e due occhi azzurri da toro per occhi, e capelli rossi che si drizzavano dal suo cranio con tale fermezza da sembrare che la sua testa avesse preso fuoco: come qualcuno diceva fosse accaduto.

La persona più imponente presente era il grande Oman Pascià in persona, con il suo volto forte scarnificato dall’ascetismo della guerra, i capelli e i baffi che parevano più folgorati dal fulmine che imbiancati dall’età; un fez rosso in capo, e tra il fez rosso e i baffi, una cicatrice che il Re di Itaca non guardava. I suoi occhi avevano una spaventosa mancanza di espressione.

Lord Ivywood, the English Minister, was probably the handsomest man in England, save that he was almost colourless both in hair and complexion. Against that blue marble sea he might almost have been one of its old marble statues that are faultless in line but show nothing but shades of grey or white. It seemed a mere matter of the luck of lighting whether his hair looked dull silver or pale brown; and his splendid mask never changed in colour or expression. He was one of the last of the old Parliamentary orators; and yet he was probably a comparatively young man; he could make anything he had to mention blossom into verbal beauty; yet his face remained dead while his lips were alive. He had little old-fashioned ways, as out of old Parliaments; for instance, he would always stand up, as in a Senate, to speak to those three other men, alone on a rock in the ocean.

In all this he perhaps appeared more personal in contrast to the man sitting next to him, who never spoke at all but whose face seemed to speak for him. He was Dr. Gluck, the German Minister, whose face had nothing German about it; neither the German vision nor the German sleep. His face was as vivid as a highly coloured photograph and altered like a cinema: but his scarlet lips never moved in speech. His almond eyes seemed to shine with all the shifting fires of the opal; his small, curled black mustache seemed sometimes almost to hoist itself afresh, like a live, black snake; but there came from him no sound. He put a paper in front of Lord Ivywood. Lord Ivywood took a pair of eyeglasses to read it, and looked ten years older by the act.

It was merely a statement of agenda; of the few last things to be settled at this last conference. The first item ran:

“The Ithacan Ambassador asks that the girls taken to harems after the capture of Pylos be restored to their families. This cannot be granted.” Lord Ivywood rose. The mere beauty of his voice startled everyone who had not heard it before.

“Your Excellencies and gentlemen,” he said, “a statement to whose policy I by no means assent, but to whose historic status I could not conceivably aspire, has familiarised you with a phrase about peace with honour. But when we have to celebrate a peace between such historic soldiers as Oman Pasha and His Majesty the King of Ithaca, I think we may say that it is peace with glory.”

He paused for half an instant; yet even the silence of sea and rock seemed full of multitudinous applause, so perfectly had the words been spoken.

“I think there is but one thought among us, whatever our many just objections through these long and harassing months of negotiations–I think there is but one thought now. That the peace may be as full as the war–that the peace may be as fearless as the war.”

Once more he paused an instant; and felt a phantom clapping, as it were, not from the hands but the heads of the men. He went on.

“If we are to leave off fighting, we may surely leave off haggling. A statute of limitations or, if you will, an amnesty, is surely proper when so sublime a peace seals so sublime a struggle. And if there be anything in which an old diplomatist may advise you, I would most strongly say this: that there should be no new disturbance of whatever amicable or domestic ties have been formed during this disturbed time. I will admit I am sufficiently old-fashioned to think any interference with the interior life of the family a precedent of no little peril. Nor will I be so illiberal as not to extend to the ancient customs of Islam what I would extend to the ancient customs of Christianity. A suggestion has been brought before us that we should enter into a renewed war of recrimination as to whether certain women have left their homes with or without their own consent. I can conceive no controversy more perilous to begin or more impossible to conclude. I will venture to say that I express all your thoughts, when I say that, whatever wrongs may have been wrought on either side, the homes, the marriages, the family arrangements of this great Ottoman Empire, shall remain as they are today.”

No one moved except Patrick Dalroy, who put his hand on his sword-hilt for a moment and looked at them all with bursting eyes; then his hand fell and he laughed out loud and sudden.

Lord Ivywood took no notice, but picked up the agenda paper again, and again fitted on the glasses that made him look older. He read the second item–needless to say, not aloud. The German Minister with the far from German face, had written this note for him:

“Both Coote and the Bernsteins insist there must be Chinese for the marble. Greeks cannot be trusted in the quarries just now.”

“But while,” continued Lord Ivywood, “we desire these fundamental institutions, such as the Moslem family, to remain as they are even at this moment, we do not assent to social stagnation. Nor do we say for one moment that the great tradition of Islam is capable alone of sustaining the necessities of the Near East. But I would seriously ask your Excellencies, why should we be so vain as to suppose that the only cure for the Near East is of necessity the Near West? If new ideas are needed, if new blood is needed, would it not be more natural to appeal to those most living, those most laborious civilisations which form the vast reserve of the Orient? Asia in Europe, if my friend Oman Pasha will allow me the criticism, has hitherto been Asia in arms. May we not yet see Asia in Europe and yet Asia in peace? These at least are the reasons which lead me to consent to a scheme of colonisation.”

Patrick Dalroy sprang erect, pulling himself out of his seat by clutching at an olive-branch above his head. He steadied himself by putting one hand on the trunk of the tree, and simply stared at them all. There fell on him the huge helplessness of mere physical power. He could throw them into the sea; but what good would that do? More men on the wrong side would be accredited to the diplomatic campaign; and the only man on the right side would be discredited for anything. He shook the branching olive tree above him in his fury. But he did not for one moment disturb Lord Ivywood, who had just read the third item on his private agenda (“Oman Pasha insists on the destruction of the vineyards”) and was by this time engaged in a peroration which afterwards became famous and may be found in many rhetorical text books and primers. He was well into the middle of it before Dalroy’s rage and wonder allowed him to follow the words.

Lord Ivywood, il ministro inglese, era probabilmente l’uomo più bello d’Inghilterra, se non fosse che era quasi privo di colore sia nei capelli sia nella carnagione. Contro quel mare di marmo azzurro avrebbe potuto quasi essere una di quelle antiche statue marmoree che sono impeccabili nella linea ma non mostrano se non sfumature di grigio o di bianco. Sembrava mera questione di fortuna della luce se i suoi capelli apparissero argento spento o bruno pallido; e la sua splendida maschera non mutava mai né di colore né d’espressione. Era uno degli ultimi tra i vecchi oratori parlamentari; eppure era probabilmente un uomo relativamente giovane; sapeva far sbocciare in bellezza verbale qualunque cosa avesse da menzionare; eppure il suo volto restava morto mentre le sue labbra erano vive. Aveva certe piccole maniere all’antica, come uscite dai vecchi Parlamenti; per esempio, si alzava sempre in piedi, come in un Senato, per parlare a quegli altri tre uomini, soli su uno scoglio in mezzo all’oceano.

In tutto questo egli appariva forse più personale in contrasto con l’uomo che gli sedeva accanto, il quale non parlava mai ma il cui volto pareva parlare per lui. Era il dottor Gluck, il ministro tedesco, il cui volto non aveva nulla di tedesco; né la visione tedesca né il sonno tedesco. Il suo volto era vivido come una fotografia dai colori accesi e mutava come un cinematografo: ma le sue labbra scarlatte non si muovevano mai a parlare. I suoi occhi a mandorla parevano brillare di tutti i fuochi cangianti dell’opale; i suoi piccoli baffi neri e arricciati parevano talvolta quasi rizzarsi di nuovo, come una nera serpe viva; ma da lui non veniva alcun suono. Pose un foglio davanti a Lord Ivywood. Lord Ivywood prese un paio di occhiali per leggerlo, e per quell’atto parve invecchiato di dieci anni.

Era semplicemente un elenco dell’ordine del giorno; delle poche ultime cose da definire in quest’ultima conferenza. Il primo punto recitava:

«L’ambasciatore itacese chiede che le fanciulle condotte negli harem dopo la presa di Pilo siano restituite alle loro famiglie. Ciò non può essere concesso.» Lord Ivywood si alzò. La sola bellezza della sua voce sorprese chiunque non l’avesse mai udita prima.

«Eccellenze e signori,» disse, «una dichiarazione alla cui politica in nessun modo aderisco, ma al cui rango storico non potrei concepibilmente aspirare, vi ha reso familiare una formula sulla pace con onore. Ma quando dobbiamo celebrare una pace tra soldati così storici come Oman Pascià e Sua Maestà il Re d’Itaca, penso che possiamo dire che si tratta di pace con gloria.»

Si arrestò per mezzo istante; eppure persino il silenzio del mare e della roccia pareva colmo d’un applauso moltitudinario, tanto perfettamente erano state pronunciate le parole.

«Penso che tra noi vi sia un solo pensiero, quali che siano state le nostre molte giuste obiezioni durante questi lunghi ed estenuanti mesi di trattative–penso che vi sia un solo pensiero ora. Che la pace possa essere piena quanto la guerra–che la pace possa essere intrepida quanto la guerra.»

Ancora una volta si arrestò un istante; e sentì un fantasma d’applauso, per così dire, non dalle mani ma dalle teste degli uomini. Proseguì.

«Se dobbiamo cessare di combattere, possiamo certo cessare di mercanteggiare. Una prescrizione o, se volete, un’amnistia è di certo cosa opportuna quando una pace tanto sublime suggella una lotta tanto sublime. E se vi è qualcosa in cui un vecchio diplomatico possa consigliarvi, direi con la massima fermezza questo: che non vi sia alcun nuovo turbamento di qualunque vincolo amichevole o domestico si sia formato durante questo tempo travagliato. Ammetto d’essere abbastanza all’antica da ritenere ogni ingerenza nella vita interiore della famiglia un precedente di non piccolo pericolo. Né sarò così illiberale da non estendere alle antiche usanze dell’Islam ciò che estenderei alle antiche usanze del Cristianesimo. Ci è stata sottoposta la proposta d’intraprendere una rinnovata guerra di recriminazioni sul fatto che certe donne abbiano lasciato le loro case con o senza il proprio consenso. Non concepisco controversia più pericolosa da avviare o più impossibile da concludere. Oserò dire che esprimo il pensiero di tutti voi, quando dico che, quali che siano i torti commessi dall’una o dall’altra parte, le case, i matrimoni, gli assetti familiari di questo grande Impero Ottomano rimarranno quali sono oggi.»

Nessuno si mosse tranne Patrick Dalroy, che per un momento posò la mano sull’elsa della sua spada e li guardò tutti con occhi sbarrati; poi la mano gli ricadde ed egli rise forte e all’improvviso.

Lord Ivywood non se ne diede per inteso, ma riprese il foglio dell’ordine del giorno, e di nuovo inforcò gli occhiali che lo facevano parere più vecchio. Lesse il secondo punto–inutile dirlo, non ad alta voce. Il ministro tedesco dal volto tutt’altro che tedesco aveva scritto per lui questa nota:

«Sia Coote sia i Bernstein insistono che ci vogliono dei Cinesi per il marmo. Dei Greci non ci si può fidare nelle cave, per ora.»

«Ma per quanto,» proseguì Lord Ivywood, «noi desideriamo che queste istituzioni fondamentali, come la famiglia musulmana, rimangano quali sono anche in questo momento, non acconsentiamo alla stagnazione sociale. Né diciamo neppure per un istante che la grande tradizione dell’Islam sia capace da sola di sostenere le necessità del Vicino Oriente. Ma domanderei seriamente alle vostre Eccellenze: perché dovremmo essere così presuntuosi da supporre che l’unico rimedio per il Vicino Oriente sia di necessità il Vicino Occidente? Se occorrono idee nuove, se occorre sangue nuovo, non sarebbe più naturale appellarsi a quelle civiltà più vive, più laboriose, che formano la vasta riserva dell’Oriente? L’Asia in Europa, se il mio amico Oman Pascià mi permette la critica, è stata finora Asia in armi. Non potremmo forse vedere l’Asia in Europa e nondimeno l’Asia in pace? Queste, almeno, sono le ragioni che mi inducono ad acconsentire a un piano di colonizzazione.»

Patrick Dalroy balzò in piedi, tirandosi su dal suo posto aggrappandosi a un ramo d’olivo sopra il capo. Si sostenne posando una mano sul tronco dell’albero, e semplicemente li fissò tutti. Cadde su di lui l’enorme impotenza della mera forza fisica. Poteva gettarli in mare; ma a che sarebbe servito? Altri uomini della parte sbagliata sarebbero stati accreditati alla campagna diplomatica; e l’unico uomo della parte giusta sarebbe stato screditato per qualsiasi cosa. Scosse l’olivo ramoso sopra di sé nella sua furia. Ma non turbò neppure per un istante Lord Ivywood, che aveva appena letto il terzo punto del suo ordine del giorno privato («Oman Pascià insiste sulla distruzione dei vigneti») ed era a questo tempo impegnato in una perorazione che in seguito divenne famosa e si può trovare in molti manuali e prontuari di retorica. Ne era ben addentro prima che la rabbia e lo stupore di Dalroy gli permettessero di seguire le parole.

“… do we indeed owe nothing,” the diplomatist was saying “to that gesture of high refusal in which so many centuries ago the great Arabian mystic put the wine-cup from his lips? Do we owe nothing to the long vigil of a valiant race, the long fast by which they have testified against the venomous beauty of the Vine? Ours is an age when men come more and more to see that the creeds hold treasures for each other, that each religion has a secret for its neighbour, that faith unto faith uttereth speech, and church unto church showeth knowledge. If it be true, and I claim again the indulgence of Oman Pasha when I say I think it is true, that we of the West have brought some light to Islam in the matter of the preciousness of peace and of civil order, may we not say that Islam in answer shall give us peace in a thousand homes, and encourage us to cut down that curse that has done so much to thwart and madden the virtues of Western Christendom. Already in my own country the orgies that made horrible the nights of the noblest families are no more. Already the legislature takes more and more sweeping action to deliver the populace from the bondage of the all-destroying drug. Surely the prophet of Mecca is reaping his harvest; the cession of the disputed vineyards to the greatest of his champions is of all acts the most appropriate to this day; to this happy day that may yet deliver the East from the curse of war and the West from the curse of wine. The gallant prince who meets us here at last, to offer an olive branch even more glorious than his sword, may well have our sympathy if he himself views the cession with some sentimental regret; but I have little doubt that he also will live to rejoice in it at last. And I would remind you that it is not the vine alone that has been the sign of the glory of the South. There is another sacred tree unstained by loose and violent memories, guiltless of the blood of Pentheus or of Orpheus and the broken lyre. We shall pass from this place in a little while as all things pass and perish:

“Far called, our navies melt away.

On dune and headland sinks the fire,

And all our pomp of yesterday

Is one with Nineveh and Tyre.

“But so long as sun can shine and soil can nourish, happier men and women after us shall look on this lovely islet and it shall tell its own story; for they shall see these three holy olive trees lifted in everlasting benediction, over the humble spot out of which came the peace of the world.”

The other two men were staring at Patrick Dalroy; his hand had tightened on the tree, and a giant billow of effort went over his broad breast. A small stone jerked itself out of the ground at the foot of the tree as if it were a grasshopper jumping; and then the coiled roots of the olive tree rose very slowly out of the earth like the limbs of a dragon lifting itself from sleep.

“I offer an olive branch,” said the King of Ithaca, totteringly leaning the loose tree so that its vast shadow, much larger than itself, fell across the whole council. “An olive branch,” he gasped, “more glorious than my sword. Also heavier.”

Then he made another effort and tossed it into the sea below.

The German, who was no German, had put up his arm in apprehension when the shadow fell across him. Now he got up and edged away from the table; seeing that the wild Irishman was tearing up the second tree. This one came out more easily; and before he flung it after the first, he stood with it a moment; looking like a man juggling with a tower.

Lord Ivywood showed more firmness; but he rose in tremendous remonstrance. Only the Turkish Pasha still sat with blank eyes, immovable. Dalroy rent out the last tree and hurled it, leaving the island bare.

“There!” said Dalroy, when the third and last olive had splashed in the tide. “Now I will go. I have seen something today that is worse than death: and the name of it is Peace.”

Oman Pasha rose and held out his hand.

“You are right,” he said in French, “and I hope we meet again in the only life that is a good life. Where are you going now?”

“I am going,” said Dalroy, dreamily, “to ‘The Old Ship.’”

“Do you mean?” asked the Turk, “that you are going back to the warships of the English King?”

“No,” answered the other, “I am going back to ‘The Old Ship’ that is behind the apple trees by Pebblewick; where the Ule flows among the trees. I fear I shall never see you there.”

After an instant’s hesitation he wrung the red hand of the great tyrant and walked to his boat without a glance at the diplomatists.

«… non dobbiamo forse nulla,» stava dicendo il diplomatico «a quel gesto di sublime rifiuto con cui, tanti secoli fa, il grande mistico arabo allontanò dalle proprie labbra la coppa del vino? Non dobbiamo forse nulla alla lunga veglia di una razza valorosa, al lungo digiuno con cui essa ha testimoniato contro la velenosa bellezza della Vite? La nostra è un’epoca in cui gli uomini giungono sempre più a comprendere che i credi custodiscono tesori gli uni per gli altri, che ogni religione ha un segreto per la sua vicina, che fede a fede tramanda parola, e chiesa a chiesa rivela conoscenza. Se è vero, e invoco ancora l’indulgenza di Oman Pascià quando dico che credo sia vero, che noi dell’Occidente abbiamo recato qualche luce all’Islam riguardo alla preziosità della pace e dell’ordine civile, non possiamo forse dire che l’Islam in cambio ci darà pace in mille case, e ci incoraggerà ad abbattere quella maledizione che tanto ha fatto per ostacolare e render folli le virtù della Cristianità occidentale? Già nel mio stesso paese le orge che rendevano orribili le notti delle più nobili famiglie non esistono più. Già il legislatore prende misure sempre più radicali per liberare il popolo dalla schiavitù della droga che tutto distrugge. Di certo il profeta della Mecca sta mietendo la sua messe; la cessione dei vigneti contesi al più grande dei suoi campioni è, fra tutti gli atti, il più appropriato a questo giorno; a questo felice giorno che potrà ancora liberare l’Oriente dalla maledizione della guerra e l’Occidente dalla maledizione del vino. Il valoroso principe che qui finalmente ci incontra, per offrire un ramo d’ulivo ancor più glorioso della sua spada, ben può avere la nostra simpatia se egli stesso guarda alla cessione con qualche rammarico sentimentale; ma ho pochi dubbi che anch’egli vivrà per rallegrarsene alla fine. E vorrei ricordarvi che non è la vite soltanto a essere stata il segno della gloria del Sud. Vi è un altro albero sacro, non macchiato da memorie licenziose e violente, innocente del sangue di Penteo o di Orfeo e della lira spezzata. Fra breve ce ne andremo da questo luogo, come tutte le cose passano e periscono:

Lontano chiamate, le nostre flotte si dissolvono.

Su duna e promontorio si spegne il fuoco,

E tutta la nostra pompa di ieri

È tutt’uno con Ninive e Tiro.

«Ma finché il sole potrà splendere e il suolo nutrire, uomini e donne più felici di noi guarderanno questo grazioso isolotto ed esso racconterà la propria storia; poiché vedranno questi tre sacri ulivi levati in eterna benedizione, sopra l’umile luogo da cui venne la pace del mondo.»

Gli altri due uomini fissavano Patrick Dalroy; la sua mano si era stretta sull’albero, e un gigantesco flutto di sforzo percorse il suo ampio petto. Una piccola pietra schizzò fuori dal terreno ai piedi dell’albero come una cavalletta che salta; e allora le radici avvolte dell’ulivo si sollevarono assai lentamente dalla terra come le membra di un drago che si leva dal sonno.

«Offro un ramo d’ulivo,» disse il Re di Itaca, reggendo con passo malfermo l’albero sradicato così che la sua vasta ombra, assai più grande di esso, cadde sull’intero consiglio. «Un ramo d’ulivo,» ansimò, «più glorioso della mia spada. E anche più pesante.»

Poi fece un altro sforzo e lo gettò nel mare sottostante.

Il tedesco, che tedesco non era, aveva alzato il braccio in apprensione quando l’ombra gli era caduta addosso. Ora si alzò e si scostò dal tavolo; vedendo che il selvaggio irlandese stava sradicando il secondo albero. Questo venne via più facilmente; e prima di scagliarlo dietro al primo, rimase un momento a reggerlo; simile a un uomo che giocoli con una torre.

Lord Ivywood mostrò maggiore fermezza; ma si levò in tremenda protesta. Solo il pascià turco sedeva ancora con occhi vacui, immobile. Dalroy strappò l’ultimo albero e lo scagliò, lasciando l’isola spoglia.

«Ecco!» disse Dalroy, quando il terzo e ultimo ulivo fu piombato con un tonfo nella marea. «Ora me ne andrò. Ho visto oggi qualcosa che è peggiore della morte: e il suo nome è Pace.»

Oman Pascià si alzò e tese la mano.

«Avete ragione,» disse in francese, «e spero che ci incontreremo di nuovo nell’unica vita che sia una vita buona. Dove andate ora?»

«Vado,» disse Dalroy, sognante, «alla “Vecchia Nave”.»

«Volete dire,» chiese il turco, «che ritornate alle navi da guerra del Re d’Inghilterra?»

«No,» rispose l’altro, «ritorno alla “Vecchia Nave” che sta dietro i meli presso Pebblewick; dove l’Ule scorre tra gli alberi. Temo che non vi vedrò mai laggiù.»

Dopo un istante d’esitazione strinse la rossa mano del grande tiranno e si avviò alla sua barca senza uno sguardo ai diplomatici.

CHAPTER III: THE SIGN OF “THE OLD SHIP”

UPON few of the children of men has the surname of Pump fallen, and of these few have been maddened into naming a child Humphrey in addition to it. To such extremity, however, had the parents of the innkeeper at “The Old Ship” proceeded, that their son might come at last to be called “Hump” by his dearest friends, and “Pumph” by an aged Turk with a green umbrella. All this, or all he knew of it, he endured with a sour smile; for he was of a stoical temper.

Mr. Humphrey Pump stood outside his inn, which stood almost on the seashore, screened only by one line of apple trees, dwarfed, twisted and salted by the sea air; but in front of it was a highly banked bowling green, and behind it the land sank abruptly; so that one very steep sweeping road vanished into the depth and mystery of taller trees. Mr. Pump was standing immediately under his trim sign, which stood erect in the turf; a wooden pole painted white and suspending a square white board, also painted white but further decorated with a highly grotesque blue ship, such as a child might draw, but into which Mr. Pump’s patriotism had insinuated a disproportionately large red St. George’s cross.

Mr. Humphrey Pump was a man of middle size, with very broad shoulders, wearing a sort of shooting suit with gaiters. Indeed, he was engaged at the moment in cleaning and reloading a double-barrelled gun, a short but powerful weapon which he had invented, or at least improved, himself; and which, though eccentric enough as compared with latest scientific arms, was neither clumsy nor necessarily out of date. For Pump was one of those handy men who seem to have a hundred hands like Briareus; he made nearly everything for himself and everything in his house was slightly different from the same thing in anyone else’s house. He was also as cunning as Pan or a poacher in everything affecting every bird or dish, every leaf or berry in the woods. His mind was a rich soil of subconscious memories and traditions; and he had a curious kind of gossip so allusive as to almost amount to reticence; for he always took it for granted that everyone knew his county and its tales as intimately as he did; so he would mention the most mysterious and amazing things without relaxing a muscle on his face, which seemed to be made of knotted wood. His dark brown hair ended in two rudimentary side whiskers, giving him a slightly horsy look, but in the old-fashioned sportsman’s style. His smile was rather wry and crabbed; but his brown eyes were kindly and soft. He was very English.

As a rule his movements, though quick, were cool; but on this occasion he put down the gun on the table outside the inn in a rather hurried manner and came forward dusting his hands in an unusual degree of animation and even defiance. Beyond the goblin green apple trees and against the sea had appeared the tall, slight figure of a girl, in a dress about the colour of copper and a large shady hat. Under the hat her face was grave and beautiful though rather swarthy. She shook hands with Mr. Pump; then he very ceremoniously put a chair for her and called her “Lady Joan.”

“I thought I would like a look at the old place,” she said. “We have had some happy times here when we were boys and girls. I suppose you hardly see any of your old friends now.”

“Very little,” answered Pump, rubbing his short whisker reflectively. “Lord Ivywood’s become quite a Methody parson, you know, since he took the place; he’s pulling down beer-shops right and left. And Mr. Charles was sent to Australia for lying down flat at the funeral. Pretty stiff I call it; but the old lady was a terror.”

“Do you ever hear,” asked Lady Joan Brett, carelessly, “of that Irishman, Captain Dalroy?”

“Yes, more often than from the rest,” answered the innkeeper. “He seems to have done wonders in this Greek business. Ah! He was a sad loss to the Navy!”

“They insulted his country,” said the girl, looking at the sea with a heightened colour. “After all, Ireland was his country; and he had a right to resent it being spoken of like that.”

“And when they found he’d painted him green,” went on Mr. Pump.

“Painted him what?” asked Lady Joan.

“Painted Captain Dawson green,” continued Mr. Pump in colourless tones. “Captain Dawson said green was the colour of Irish traitors, so Dalroy painted him green. It was a great temptation, no doubt, with this fence being painted at the time and the pail of stuff there; but, of course, it had a very prejudicial effect on his professional career.”

“What an extraordinary story!” said the staring Lady Joan, breaking into a rather joyless laugh. “It must go down among your county legends. I never heard that version before. Why, it might be the origin of the ‘Green Man’ over there by the town.”

“Oh, no,” said Pump, simply, “that’s been there since before Waterloo times. Poor old Noyle had it until they put him away. You remember old Noyle, Lady Joan. Still alive, I hear, and still writing love-letters to Queen Victoria. Only of course they aren’t posted now.”

“Have you heard from your Irish friend lately?” asked the girl, keeping a steady eye on the sky-line.

“Yes, I had a letter last week,” answered the innkeeper. “It seems not impossible that he may return to England. He’s been acting for one of these Greek places, and the negotiations seem to be concluded. It’s a queer thing that his lordship himself was the English minister in charge of them.”

“You mean Lord Ivywood,” said Lady Joan, rather coldly. “Yes, he has a great career before him, evidently.”

“I wish he hadn’t got his knife into us so much,” chuckled Pump. “I don’t believe there’ll be an inn left in England. But the Ivywoods were always cranky. It’s only fair to him to remember his grandfather.”

“I think it’s very ungallant on your part,” said Lady Joan, with a mournful smile, “to ask a lady to remember his grandfather.”

CAPITOLO III: L’INSEGNA DELLA «VECCHIA NAVE»

A pochi tra i figli degli uomini è toccato in sorte il cognome di Pump, e di questi pochi taluni sono stati spinti fino alla follia di aggiungervi, battezzando un bambino, anche il nome di Humphrey. A tale estremità, tuttavia, erano giunti i genitori dell’oste della «Vecchia Nave», sicché il loro figlio poté infine essere chiamato «Hump» dai suoi amici più cari, e «Pumph» da un vecchio turco con un ombrello verde. Tutto questo, o quanto ne sapeva, lo sopportava con un sorriso acido; poiché era di temperamento stoico.

Il signor Humphrey Pump se ne stava davanti alla sua taverna, che sorgeva quasi in riva al mare, riparata soltanto da un filare di meli, nani, contorti e salati dall’aria marina; ma dinanzi a essa si stendeva un campo da bocce dagli argini rialzati, e dietro il terreno precipitava di colpo; sicché una strada ripidissima e sinuosa spariva nella profondità e nel mistero di alberi più alti. Il signor Pump stava immediatamente sotto la sua linda insegna, che si ergeva diritta nel tappeto erboso; un palo di legno dipinto di bianco che reggeva una tavola quadrata anch’essa bianca, ma per giunta ornata di una nave azzurra assai grottesca, quale un bambino potrebbe disegnare, ma nella quale il patriottismo del signor Pump aveva insinuato una croce di San Giorgio rossa e sproporzionatamente grande.

Il signor Humphrey Pump era un uomo di statura media, dalle spalle assai larghe, che indossava una sorta di completo da caccia con le ghette. Anzi, in quel momento era intento a pulire e ricaricare un fucile a doppia canna, un’arma corta ma potente che aveva inventato, o almeno perfezionato, da sé; e che, per quanto abbastanza eccentrica rispetto alle più recenti armi scientifiche, non era né goffa né necessariamente fuori moda. Poiché Pump era uno di quegli uomini pratici che paiono avere cento mani come Briareo; si faceva da sé quasi ogni cosa, e ogni cosa nella sua casa era lievemente diversa dalla stessa cosa nella casa di chiunque altro. Era inoltre astuto come Pan o come un bracconiere in tutto ciò che riguardava ogni uccello o pietanza, ogni foglia o bacca dei boschi. La sua mente era un suolo fertile di ricordi e tradizioni subconsci; e aveva una curiosa forma di chiacchiera tanto allusiva da rasentare quasi la reticenza; poiché dava sempre per scontato che tutti conoscessero la sua contea e le sue storie intimamente come lui; sicché menzionava le cose più misteriose e sorprendenti senza muovere un muscolo del volto, che pareva fatto di legno nodoso. I suoi capelli castano scuro terminavano in due rudimentali basette, che gli davano un’aria un po’ cavallina, ma nello stile del vecchio sportivo all’antica. Il suo sorriso era piuttosto storto e arcigno; ma i suoi occhi bruni erano gentili e miti. Era molto inglese.

Di regola i suoi movimenti, per quanto rapidi, erano posati; ma in quell’occasione posò il fucile sul tavolo fuori della taverna in modo piuttosto affrettato e si fece avanti spolverandosi le mani con un grado insolito di animazione e persino di sfida. Oltre i meli verdi come folletti e contro il mare era apparsa l’alta, esile figura di una fanciulla, in un abito press’a poco del colore del rame e con un ampio cappello ombroso. Sotto il cappello il suo volto era grave e bello, sebbene piuttosto olivastro. Ella strinse la mano al signor Pump; poi egli, con gran cerimonia, le accostò una sedia e la chiamò «Lady Joan».

«Ho pensato che mi sarebbe piaciuto dare un’occhiata al vecchio luogo», disse. «Abbiamo passato dei bei momenti qui, quand’eravamo ragazzi e ragazze. Immagino che ormai tu veda ben poco dei tuoi vecchi amici».

«Ben poco», rispose Pump, sfregandosi pensosamente la corta basetta. «Lord Ivywood è diventato una specie di predicatore metodista, sa, da quando ha preso possesso della tenuta; abbatte le birrerie a destra e a manca. E il signor Charles è stato spedito in Australia per essersi sdraiato lungo disteso al funerale. Una cosa piuttosto dura, dico io; ma la vecchia signora era un terrore».

«Le capita mai di aver notizie», chiese con noncuranza Lady Joan Brett, «di quell’irlandese, il capitano Dalroy?»

«Sì, più spesso che dagli altri», rispose l’oste. «Pare abbia fatto meraviglie in questa faccenda greca. Ah! Fu una triste perdita per la Marina!»

«Insultarono il suo paese», disse la fanciulla, guardando il mare con un colorito acceso. «Dopotutto, l’Irlanda era il suo paese; e aveva il diritto di risentirsi nel sentirne parlare in quel modo».

«E quando scoprirono che l’aveva dipinto di verde», proseguì il signor Pump.

«Dipinto di che?» chiese Lady Joan.

«Dipinse di verde il capitano Dawson», continuò il signor Pump con tono incolore. «Il capitano Dawson disse che il verde era il colore dei traditori irlandesi, e così Dalroy lo dipinse di verde. Fu una gran tentazione, senza dubbio, con questa staccionata che veniva dipinta proprio in quel momento e il secchio della roba lì a portata di mano; ma, naturalmente, ebbe un effetto assai pregiudizievole sulla sua carriera professionale».

«Che storia straordinaria!» disse Lady Joan sgranando gli occhi, scoppiando in una risata piuttosto priva di allegria. «Merita di entrare tra le leggende della vostra contea. Non avevo mai udito prima questa versione. Ma sì, potrebbe essere l’origine dell‘“Uomo Verde” laggiù presso il paese».

«Oh, no», disse Pump con semplicità, «quello è lì da prima dei tempi di Waterloo. Il povero vecchio Noyle lo tenne finché non lo rinchiusero. Si ricorda del vecchio Noyle, Lady Joan. Ancora vivo, a quanto sento, e sempre a scrivere lettere d’amore alla Regina Vittoria. Solo che, naturalmente, ora non vengono più imbucate».

«Ha avuto notizie del suo amico irlandese di recente?» chiese la fanciulla, tenendo lo sguardo fisso sulla linea dell’orizzonte.

«Sì, ho ricevuto una lettera la settimana scorsa», rispose l’oste. «Pare non impossibile che ritorni in Inghilterra. Ha fatto da agente per uno di questi luoghi greci, e le trattative sembrano concluse. È cosa curiosa che proprio sua signoria fosse il ministro inglese incaricato di esse».

«Intende Lord Ivywood», disse Lady Joan piuttosto freddamente. «Sì, ha evidentemente una grande carriera davanti a sé».

«Vorrei che non ce l’avesse tanto con noi», ridacchiò Pump. «Non credo che rimarrà una sola taverna in Inghilterra. Ma gli Ivywood furono sempre gente stramba. È giusto, per rendergli merito, ricordare suo nonno».

«Trovo assai poco galante da parte tua», disse Lady Joan con un sorriso mesto, «chiedere a una signora di ricordare suo nonno».

“You know what I mean, Lady Joan,” said her host, good humouredly. “And I never was hard on the case myself; we all have our little ways. I shouldn’t like it done to my pig; but I don’t see why a man shouldn’t have his own pig in his own pew with him if he likes it. It wasn’t a free seat. It was the family pew.”

Lady Joan broke out laughing again. “What horrible things you do seem to have heard of,” she said. “Well, I must be going, Mr. Hump–I mean Mr. Pump–I used to call you Hump … oh, Hump, do you think any of us will ever be happy again?”

“I suppose it rests with Providence,” he said, looking at the sea.

“Oh, do say Providence again!” cried the girl. “It’s as good as ‘Masterman Ready.’”

With which inconsequent words she betook herself again to the path by the apple trees and walked back by the sea front to Pebblewick.

The inn of “The Old Ship” lay a little beyond the old fishing village of Pebblewick; and that again was separated by an empty half-mile or so from the new watering-place of Pebblewick-on-Sea. But the dark-haired lady walked steadily along the sea-front, on a sort of parade which had been stretched out to east and west in the insane optimism of watering-places, and, as she approached the more crowded part, looked more and more carefully at the groups on the beach. Most of them were much the same as she had seen them more than a month before. The seekers after truth (as the man in the fez would say) who assembled daily to find out what the man was doing with the paper-boxes, had not found out yet; neither had they wearied of their intellectual pilgrimage. Pennies were still thrown to the thundering atheist in acknowledgment of his incessant abuse; and this was all the more mysterious because the crowd was obviously indifferent, and the atheist was obviously sincere. The man with the long neck who led Low Church hymns with a little wooden spade had indeed disappeared; for children’s services of this kind are generally a moving feast; but the man whose only claim consisted of carrots round his hat was still there; and seemed to have even more money than before. But Lady Joan could see no sign of the little old man in the fez. She could only suppose that he had failed entirely; and, being in a bitter mood, she told herself bitterly that he had sunk out of sight precisely because there was in his rubbish a touch of unearthly and insane clearheadedness of which all these vulgar idiots were incapable. She did not confess to herself consciously that what had made both the man in the fez and the man at the inn interesting was the subject of which they had spoken.

As she walked on rather wearily along the parade she caught sight of a girl in black with faint fair hair and a tremulous, intelligent face which she was sure she had seen before. Pulling together all her aristocratic training for the remembering of middle class people, she managed to remember that this was a Miss Browning who had done typewriting work for her a year or two before; and immediately went forward to greet her, partly out of genuine good nature and partly as a relief from her own rather dreary thoughts. Her tone was so seriously frank and friendly that the lady in black summoned the social courage to say:

“I’ve so often wanted to introduce you to my sister who’s much cleverer than I am, though she does live at home; which I suppose is very old-fashioned. She knows all sorts of intellectual people. She is talking to one of them now; this Prophet of the Moon that everyone’s talking about. Do let me introduce you.”

Lady Joan Brett had met many prophets of the moon and of other things. But she had the spontaneous courtesy which redeems the vices of her class, and she followed Miss Browning to a seat on the parade. She greeted Miss Browning’s sister with glowing politeness; and this may really be counted to her credit; for she had great difficulty in looking at Miss Browning’s sister at all. For on the seat beside her, still in a red fez but in a brilliantly new black frock coat and every appearance of prosperity, sat the old gentleman who had lectured on the sands about the inns of England.

“He lectured at our Ethical Society,” whispered Miss Browning, “on the word Alcohol. Just on the word Alcohol. He was perfectly thrilling. All about Arabia and Algebra, you know, and how everything comes from the East. You really would be interested.”

“I am interested,” said Lady Joan.

“Poot it to yourselfs,” the man in the fez was saying to Miss Browning’s sister, “joost what sort of meaning the names of your ince can have if they do not commemorate the unlimitable influence of Islam. There is a vary populous Inn in London, one of the most distinguished, one of the most of the Centre, and it is called the Horseshoe? Now, my friendss, why should anyone commemorate a horse-shoe? It iss but an appendage to a creature more interesting than itself. I have already demonstrated to you that the very fact that you have in your town a place of drink called the Bool–”

“I should like to ask–” began Lady Joan, suddenly.

“A place of drink called the Bool,” went on the man in the fez, deaf to all distractions, “and I have urged that the Bool is a disturbing thought, while the Bul-Bul is a reassuring thought. But even you my friends, would not name a place after a ring in a Bool’s nose and not after the Bool? Why then name an equivalent place after the shoo, the mere shoo, upon a horse’s hoof, and not after the noble horse? Surely it is clear, surely it is evident that the term ‘horse-shoe’ is a cryptic term, an esoteric term, a term made during the days when the ancient Moslem faith of this English country was oppressed by the passing superstition of the Galileans. That bent shape, that duplex curving shape, which you call horse-shoe, is it not clearly the Crescent?” and he cast his arms wide as he had done on the sands, “the Crescent of the Prophet of the only God?”

“I should like to ask,” began Lady Joan, again, “how you would explain the name of the inn called ‘The Green Man,’ just behind that row of houses.”

“Exactly! exactly!” cried the Prophet of the Moon, in almost insane excitement. “The seeker after truth could not at all probably find a more perfect example of these principles. My friendss, how could there be a green man? You are acquainted with green grass, with green leaves, with green cheese, with green chartreuse. I ask if any one of you, however wide her social circle, has ever been acquainted with a green man. Surely, surely, it is evident, my friendss, that this is an imperfect version, an abbreviated version, of the original words. What can be clearer than that the original expression, was ‘the green-turban’d man,’ in allusion to the well-known uniform of the descendants of the Prophet? ‘Turban’d’ surely is just the sort of word, exactly the sort of foreign and unfamiliar word, that might easily be slurred over and ultimately suppressed.”

“There is a legend in these parts,” said Lady Joan, steadily, “that a great hero, hearing the colour that was sacred to his holy island insulted, really poured it over his enemy for a reply.”

“A legend! a fable!” cried the man in the fez, with another radiant and rational expansion of the hands. “Is it not evident that no such thing can have really happened?”

“Oh, yes–it really happened,” said the young lady, softly. “There is not much to comfort one in this world; but there are some things. Oh, it really happened.”

And taking a graceful farewell of the group, she resumed her rather listless walk along the parade.

«Sapete cosa intendo, Lady Joan», disse il suo ospite, di buon umore. «E io stesso non sono mai stato severo in proposito; ognuno ha le proprie piccole abitudini. Non vorrei che lo si facesse al mio maiale; ma non vedo perché un uomo non debba tenersi il proprio maiale nel proprio banco di chiesa, se così gli aggrada. Non era un posto libero. Era il banco di famiglia.»

Lady Joan tornò a scoppiare a ridere. «Che cose orribili sembra abbiate udito», disse. «Ebbene, devo andare, signor Hump… voglio dire signor Pump… vi chiamavo Hump… oh, Hump, credete che qualcuno di noi tornerà mai a essere felice?»

«Suppongo che ciò dipenda dalla Provvidenza», disse, guardando il mare.

«Oh, dite ancora Provvidenza!» esclamò la fanciulla. «È bello come “Masterman Ready”.»

Con queste parole sconclusionate si avviò di nuovo lungo il sentiero fra i meli e tornò a piedi lungo il lungomare fino a Pebblewick.

La locanda della “Vecchia Nave” sorgeva un poco oltre il vecchio villaggio di pescatori di Pebblewick; e questo, a sua volta, era separato da un vuoto mezzo miglio circa dalla nuova stazione balneare di Pebblewick-on-Sea. Ma la dama dai capelli scuri camminava con passo fermo lungo il lungomare, su una sorta di passeggiata che era stata protesa a oriente e a occidente nell’insano ottimismo delle stazioni balneari, e, man mano che si avvicinava alla parte più affollata, osservava con crescente attenzione i gruppi sulla spiaggia. La maggior parte di essi era pressoché identica a come li aveva veduti più di un mese prima. I cercatori della verità (come avrebbe detto l’uomo dal fez) che si radunavano ogni giorno per scoprire cosa facesse quell’uomo con le scatole di cartone, non l’avevano ancora scoperto; né si erano stancati del loro pellegrinaggio intellettuale. Ancora si gettavano monetine all’ateo tonante in riconoscimento delle sue incessanti ingiurie; e ciò era tanto più misterioso in quanto la folla era palesemente indifferente, e l’ateo era palesemente sincero. L’uomo dal lungo collo che dirigeva gli inni della Bassa Chiesa con una piccola vanga di legno era in verità scomparso; poiché le funzioni per bambini di questo genere sono generalmente una festa mobile; ma l’uomo il cui unico titolo consisteva in carote intorno al cappello era ancora là; e pareva avere perfino più denaro di prima. Ma Lady Joan non riusciva a scorgere traccia del piccolo vecchio dal fez. Poteva solo supporre che avesse fallito del tutto; e, trovandosi in un umore amaro, si disse con amarezza che egli era sprofondato fuori dalla vista proprio perché nelle sue fandonie v’era un tocco di ultraterrena e folle lucidità di cui tutti quei volgari idioti erano incapaci. Non si confessava consapevolmente che ciò che aveva reso interessanti sia l’uomo dal fez sia l’uomo alla locanda era l’argomento di cui avevano parlato.

Mentre proseguiva piuttosto stancamente lungo la passeggiata, scorse una fanciulla vestita di nero, dai tenui capelli biondi e da un volto tremulo e intelligente che era certa di aver già veduto. Raccogliendo tutto il suo addestramento aristocratico nel rammentare le persone del ceto medio, riuscì a ricordare che si trattava di una certa signorina Browning che aveva svolto per lei lavori di dattilografia un anno o due prima; e si fece subito avanti per salutarla, in parte per genuina bontà di natura e in parte come sollievo dai propri pensieri piuttosto tetri. Il suo tono era così seriamente franco e cordiale che la dama in nero radunò il coraggio sociale per dire:

«Ho tanto spesso desiderato presentarvi mia sorella, che è assai più intelligente di me, benché viva a casa; il che suppongo sia molto all’antica. Conosce ogni sorta di persone intellettuali. In questo momento sta parlando con una di esse; questo Profeta della Luna di cui tutti parlano. Permettetemi di presentarvela.»

Lady Joan Brett aveva incontrato molti profeti della luna e di altre cose. Ma possedeva quella spontanea cortesia che riscatta i vizi della sua classe, e seguì la signorina Browning fino a un sedile sulla passeggiata. Salutò la sorella della signorina Browning con smagliante affabilità; e ciò le può davvero essere ascritto a merito; poiché ebbe grande difficoltà anche solo a guardare la sorella della signorina Browning. Perché sul sedile accanto a lei, ancora con un fez rosso ma in una redingote nera sfolgorante di nuovo e con ogni apparenza di prosperità, sedeva il vecchio signore che aveva tenuto una conferenza sulla sabbia a proposito delle locande d’Inghilterra.

«Ha tenuto una conferenza alla nostra Società Etica», sussurrò la signorina Browning, «sulla parola Alcol. Soltanto sulla parola Alcol. Era perfettamente elettrizzante. Tutto sull’Arabia e sull’Algebra, sapete, e su come ogni cosa provenga dall’Oriente. Ne sareste davvero interessata.»

«Sono interessata», disse Lady Joan.

«Ponéteveelo voi stéssi», l’uomo dal fez stava dicendo alla sorella della signorina Browning, «qual è mai il significato che i nomi delle vostre locande possono avere se non commemorano l’illimitabile influsso dell’Islam. Vi è una Locanda assaai popolosa a Londra, una delle più distinte, una delle più del Centro, e si chiama il Ferro di Cavallo? Orbene, amici mieei, perché mai qualcuno dovrebbe commemorare un ferro di cavallo? Non è che un’appendice di una creatura più interessante di esso. Vi ho già dimostrato che il fatto stesso che voi abbiate nella vostra città un luogo di bevute chiamato il Tooro…»

«Vorrei chiedere…» cominciò Lady Joan, all’improvviso.

«Un luogo di bevute chiamato il Tooro», proseguì l’uomo dal fez, sordo a ogni distrazione, «e io ho sostenuto che il Tooro è un pensiero inquietante, mentre il Bul-Bul è un pensiero rassicurante. Ma persino voi, amici mieei, non intitolereste un luogo a un anello nel naso di un Tooro anziché al Tooro stesso? Perché dunque intitolare un luogo equivalente al ferro, al mero ferro, sotto lo zoccolo di un cavallo, e non al nobile cavallo? Certo è chiaro, certo è evidente che il termine “ferro di cavallo” è un termine criptico, un termine esoterico, un termine coniato nei giorni in cui l’antica fede musulmana di questo paese inglese era oppressa dalla superstizione passeggera dei Galilei. Quella forma piegata, quella duplice forma ricurva, che voi chiamate ferro di cavallo, non è forse chiaramente la Mezzaluna?» e spalancò le braccia come aveva fatto sulla sabbia, «la Mezzaluna del Profeta dell’unico Dio?»

«Vorrei chiedere», cominciò di nuovo Lady Joan, «come spieghereste il nome della locanda chiamata “L’Uomo Verde”, proprio dietro quella fila di case.»

«Esatto! esatto!» esclamò il Profeta della Luna, con eccitazione quasi folle. «Il cercatore della verità non potrebbe con ogni probabilità trovare un esempio più perfetto di questi princìpi. Amici mieei, come potrebbe esservi un uomo verde? Voi conoscete l’erba verde, le foglie verdi, il formaggio verde, la chartreuse verde. Vi domando se qualcuno di voi, per quanto ampia sia la sua cerchia sociale, abbia mai conosciuto un uomo verde. Certo, certo, è evidente, amici mieei, che questa è una versione imperfetta, una versione abbreviata, delle parole originali. Cosa può esservi di più chiaro del fatto che l’espressione originaria fosse “l’uomo dal turbante verde”, in allusione alla ben nota uniforme dei discendenti del Profeta? “Dal turbante” è certo proprio il genere di parola, esattamente il genere di parola straniera e inconsueta, che potrebbe facilmente essere biascicata e alla fine soppressa.»

«C’è una leggenda da queste parti», disse Lady Joan, con fermezza, «secondo cui un grande eroe, udendo insultare il colore che era sacro alla sua santa isola, lo versò davvero sul proprio nemico in risposta.»

«Una leggenda! una favola!» esclamò l’uomo dal fez, con un altro raggiante e razionale allargarsi delle mani. «Non è forse evidente che una cosa simile non può essere realmente accaduta?»

«Oh, sì… è davvero accaduto», disse la giovane dama, dolcemente. «Non v’è molto che consoli in questo mondo; ma vi sono alcune cose. Oh, è davvero accaduto.»

E, prendendo un grazioso congedo dal gruppo, riprese la sua passeggiata piuttosto svogliata lungo la passeggiata.

CHAPTER IV: THE INN FINDS WINGS

MR. HUMPHREY PUMP stood in front of his inn once more, the cleaned and loaded gun still lay on the table, and the white sign of The Ship still swung in the slight sea breeze over his head; but his leatherish features were knotted over a new problem. He held two letters in his hand, letters of a very different sort, but letters that pointed to the same difficult problem. The first ran:

CAPITOLO IV: LA LOCANDA METTE LE ALI

IL SIGNOR HUMPHREY PUMP se ne stava di nuovo davanti alla sua locanda, il fucile pulito e carico giaceva ancora sul tavolo, e la bianca insegna della Nave dondolava ancora nella lieve brezza marina sopra il suo capo; ma i suoi lineamenti coriacei erano aggrottati sopra un nuovo problema. Teneva due lettere in mano, lettere di natura assai diversa, ma lettere che additavano il medesimo, difficile problema. La prima diceva:

CHAPTER V: THE ASTONISHMENT OF THE AGENT

LORD IVYWOOD shared the mental weakness of most men who have fed on books; he ignored, not the value but the very existence of other forms of information. Thus Humphrey Pump was perfectly aware that Lord Ivywood considered him an ignorant man who carried a volume of Pickwick and could not be got to read any other book. But Lord Ivywood was quite unaware that Humphrey never looked at him without thinking that he could be most successfully hidden in a wood of small beeches, as his grey-brown hair and sallow, ashen face exactly reproduced the three predominant tints of such a sylvan twilight. Mr. Pump, I fear, had sometimes partaken of partridge or pheasant, in his early youth, under circumstances in which Lord Ivywood was not only unconscious of the hospitality he was dispensing, but would have sworn that it was physically impossible for anyone to elude the vigilance of his efficient system of game-keeping. But it is very unwise in one who counts himself superior to physical things to talk about physical impossibility.

Lord Ivywood was in error, therefore, when he said that the fugitives could not possibly escape in modern England. You can do a great many things in modern England if you have noticed; some things, in fact, which others know by pictures or current speech; if you know, for instance, that most roadside hedges are taller and denser than they look, and that even the largest man lying just behind them, takes up far less room than you would suppose; if you know that many natural sounds are much more like each other than the enlightened ear can believe, as in the case of wind in leaves and of the sea; if you know that it is easier to walk in socks than in boots, if you know how to take hold of the ground; if you know that the proportion of dogs who will bite a man under any circumstances is rather less than the proportion of men who will murder you in a railway carriage; if you know that you need not be drowned even in a river, unless the tide is very strong, and unless you practise putting yourself into the special attitudes of a suicide; if you know that country stations have objectless, extra waiting rooms that nobody ever goes into; and if you know that county folk will forget you if you speak to them, but talk about you all day if you don’t.

By the exercise of these and other arts and sciences Humphrey Pump was able to guide his friend across country, mostly in the character of trespasser and occasionally in that of something like housebreaker, and eventually, with sign, keg, cheese and all to step out of a black pinewood onto a white road in a part of the county where they would not be sought for the present.

Opposite them was a cornfield and on their right, in the shades of the pine trees, a cottage, a very tumbledown cottage that seemed to have collapsed under its own thatch. The red-haired Irishman’s face wore a curious smile. He stuck the inn-sign erect in the road and went and hammered on the door.

It was opened tremulously by an old man with a face so wrinkled that the wrinkles seemed more distinctly graven than the features themselves, which seemed lost in the labyrinth of them. He might have crawled out of the hole in a gnarled tree and he might have been a thousand years old.

He did not seem to notice the sign-board, which stood rather to the left of the door; and what life remained in his eyes seemed to awake in wonder at Dalroy’s stature and strange uniform and the sword at his side. “I beg your pardon,” said the Captain, courteously. “I fear my uniform startles you. It is Lord Ivywood’s livery. All his servants are to dress like this. In fact, I understand the tenants also and even yourself, perhaps … excuse my sword. Lord Ivywood is very particular that every man should have a sword. You know his beautiful, eloquent way of putting his views. ‘How can we profess,’ he was saying to me yesterday, while I was brushing his trousers. ‘How can we profess that all men are brothers while we refuse to them the symbol of manhood; or with what assurance can we claim it as a movement of modern emancipation to deny the citizen that which has in all ages marked the difference between the free man and the slave. Nor need we anticipate any such barbaric abuses as my honourable friend who is cleaning the knives has prophesied, for this gift is a sublime act of confidence in your universal passion for the severe splendours of Peace; and he that has the right to strike is he who has learnt to spare.’”

Talking all this nonsense with extreme rapidity and vast oratorical flourishes of the hand, Captain Dalroy proceeded to trundle both the big cheese and the cask of rum into the house of the astonished cottager: Mr. Pump following with a grim placidity and his gun under his arm.

“Lord Ivywood,” said Dalroy, setting the rum cask with a bump on the plain deal table, “wishes to take wine with you. Or, more strictly speaking, rum. Don’t you run away, my friend, with any of these stories about Lord Ivywood being opposed to drink. Three-bottle Ivywood, we call him in the kitchen. But it must be rum; nothing but rum for the Ivywoods. ‘Wine may be a mocker,’ he was saying the other day (and I particularly noted the phrasing, which seemed to be very happy even for his lordship; he was standing at the top of the steps, and I stopped cleaning them to make a note of it), ‘wine may be a mocker; strong drink may be raging, but nowhere in the sacred pages will you find one word of censure of the sweeter spirit sacred to them that go down to the sea in ships; no tongue of priest and prophet was ever lifted to break the sacred silence of Holy Writ about Rum.’ He then explained to me,” went on Dalroy, signing to Pump to tap the cask according to his own technical secret, “that the great tip for avoiding any bad results that a bottle or two of rum might have on young and inexperienced people was to eat cheese with it, particularly this kind of cheese that I have here. I’ve forgotten its name.”

CAPITOLO V: LO STUPORE DELL’AGENTE

LORD IVYWOOD condivideva la debolezza mentale della maggior parte degli uomini che si sono nutriti di libri; ignorava non il valore, ma la stessa esistenza di altre forme di informazione. Così Humphrey Pump era perfettamente consapevole che Lord Ivywood lo considerava un uomo ignorante che portava con sé un volume del Pickwick e non lo si poteva indurre a leggere alcun altro libro. Ma Lord Ivywood ignorava del tutto che Humphrey non lo guardava mai senza pensare che lo si sarebbe potuto nascondere con pieno successo in un bosco di piccoli faggi, giacché i suoi capelli grigio-bruni e il volto giallastro e cinereo riproducevano esattamente le tre tinte predominanti di un simile crepuscolo silvestre. Il signor Pump, temo, aveva talvolta gustato pernice o fagiano, nella prima giovinezza, in circostanze in cui Lord Ivywood non solo era inconsapevole dell’ospitalità che dispensava, ma avrebbe giurato che fosse fisicamente impossibile a chiunque eludere la vigilanza del suo efficiente sistema di guardiacaccia. Ma è assai imprudente, per chi si reputa superiore alle cose fisiche, parlare di impossibilità fisica.

Lord Ivywood era dunque in errore quando affermava che i fuggitivi non potevano in alcun modo dileguarsi nell’Inghilterra moderna. Si possono fare moltissime cose nell’Inghilterra moderna, se si è saputo osservare; alcune, in verità, che altri conoscono solo per figure o per sentito dire; se si sa, per esempio, che la maggior parte delle siepi lungo le strade è più alta e più fitta di quanto sembri, e che anche l’uomo più grosso, disteso proprio dietro di esse, occupa assai meno spazio di quanto si supporrebbe; se si sa che molti suoni naturali si assomigliano tra loro assai più di quanto l’orecchio illuminato possa credere, come nel caso del vento tra le foglie e del mare; se si sa che è più facile camminare in calze che in stivali, se si sa come far presa sul terreno; se si sa che la proporzione dei cani che morderanno un uomo in qualsiasi circostanza è piuttosto minore della proporzione degli uomini che vi assassinerebbero in uno scompartimento ferroviario; se si sa che non si è costretti ad annegare nemmeno in un fiume, a meno che la corrente non sia fortissima, e a meno che non ci si eserciti ad assumere le posizioni particolari del suicida; se si sa che le stazioni di campagna hanno sale d’aspetto supplementari e prive di scopo in cui nessuno entra mai; e se si sa che la gente di contea vi dimenticherà se le rivolgete la parola, ma parlerà di voi tutto il giorno se non lo fate.

Mediante l’esercizio di queste e di altre arti e scienze Humphrey Pump poté guidare l’amico attraverso la campagna, per lo più nella veste di sconfinatore e talvolta in quella di qualcosa di simile a uno scassinatore, e infine, con insegna, barile, formaggio e ogni cosa, uscire da una nera pineta su una bianca strada in una parte della contea dove per il momento non sarebbero stati cercati.

Di fronte a loro si stendeva un campo di grano e alla loro destra, nell’ombra dei pini, un casolare, un casolare assai cadente che pareva essere crollato sotto il proprio tetto di paglia. Il volto dell’irlandese dai capelli rossi recava uno strano sorriso. Piantò ritta l’insegna della locanda nella strada e andò a battere alla porta.

Fu aperta tremolante da un vecchio dal volto così rugoso che le rughe parevano incise più nettamente dei lineamenti stessi, i quali sembravano smarriti nel loro labirinto. Avrebbe potuto uscire strisciando dal cavo di un albero nodoso e avrebbe potuto avere mille anni.

Non parve accorgersi dell’insegna, che stava piuttosto alla sinistra della porta; e quel poco di vita che restava nei suoi occhi parve destarsi nello stupore dinanzi alla statura e alla strana uniforme di Dalroy e alla spada al suo fianco. «Vi chiedo scusa», disse il Capitano, cortesemente. «Temo che la mia uniforme vi spaventi. È la livrea di Lord Ivywood. Tutti i suoi servi devono vestire così. Anzi, mi risulta che anche i fittavoli e perfino voi stesso, forse… scusate la mia spada. Lord Ivywood tiene moltissimo a che ogni uomo abbia una spada. Conoscete il suo bel modo eloquente di esporre le sue vedute. “Come possiamo professare”, mi diceva ieri, mentre gli spazzolavo i calzoni, “come possiamo professare che tutti gli uomini sono fratelli mentre rifiutiamo loro il simbolo della virilità; o con quale sicurezza possiamo rivendicare come moto di moderna emancipazione il negare al cittadino ciò che in tutte le epoche ha segnato la differenza fra l’uomo libero e lo schiavo. Né dobbiamo temere abusi barbarici come quelli profetizzati dal mio onorevole amico che sta pulendo i coltelli, poiché questo dono è un sublime atto di fiducia nella vostra universale passione per i severi splendori della Pace; e colui che ha il diritto di colpire è colui che ha imparato a risparmiare.”»

Snocciolando tutte queste sciocchezze con estrema rapidità e vasti svolazzi oratorii della mano, il Capitano Dalroy si mise a far rotolare tanto il grosso formaggio quanto la botte di rum dentro la casa dello sbalordito casolano: il signor Pump lo seguiva con una torva placidità e il fucile sotto il braccio.

«Lord Ivywood», disse Dalroy, posando con un tonfo la botte di rum sul tavolo di legno grezzo, «desidera prendere del vino con voi. O, per essere più precisi, del rum. Non lasciatevi ingannare, amico mio, da tutte quelle storie secondo cui Lord Ivywood sarebbe contrario al bere. Ivywood-tre-bottiglie, lo chiamiamo in cucina. Ma dev’essere rum; nient’altro che rum per gli Ivywood. “Il vino può essere schernitore”, diceva l’altro giorno (e notai in particolare la formulazione, che mi parve assai felice perfino per sua signoria; se ne stava in cima ai gradini, e io smisi di pulirli per prenderne nota), “il vino può essere schernitore; la bevanda forte può infuriare, ma in nessun punto delle sacre pagine troverete una sola parola di biasimo verso lo spirito più dolce sacro a coloro che scendono al mare sulle navi; nessuna lingua di sacerdote o di profeta si è mai levata a rompere il sacro silenzio della Sacra Scrittura riguardo al Rum.” Egli mi spiegò poi», proseguì Dalroy, facendo cenno a Pump di spillare la botte secondo il suo segreto tecnico, «che il grande accorgimento per evitare qualsiasi cattivo effetto che una bottiglia o due di rum potessero avere su persone giovani e inesperte era mangiarvi insieme del formaggio, in particolare questo tipo di formaggio che ho qui. Ne ho dimenticato il nome.»

“Cheddar,” said Pump, quite gravely.

“But mind you!” continued the Captain almost ferociously, shaking his big finger in warning at the aged man. “Mind you ‘nobread with the cheese. All the devastating ruin wrought by cheese and the once happy homes of this country, has been due to the reckless and insane experiment of eating bread with it.’ You’ll get no bread from me, my friend. Indeed, Lord Ivywood has given directions that the allusion to this ignorant and depraved habit shall be eliminated from the Lord’s Prayer. Have a drink.”

He had already poured out a little of the spirit into two thick tumblers and a broken teacup, which he had induced the aged man to produce; and now solemnly pledged him.

“Thank ye kindly, sir,” said the old man, using his cracked voice for the first time. Then he drank; and his old face changed as if it were an old horn lantern in which the flame began to rise.

“Ar,” he said. “My son he be a sailor.”

“I wish him a happy voyage,” said the Captain. “And I’ll sing you a song about the first sailor there ever was in the world; and who (as Lord Ivywood acutely observes) lived before the time of rum.”

He sat down on a wooden chair and lifted his loud voice once more, beating on the table with the broken tea-cup.

“Old Noah, he had an ostrich farm, and fowls on the greatest scale;

He ate his egg with a ladle in an egg-cup big as a pail,

And the soup he took was Elephant Soup and the fish he took was Whale;

But they all were small to the cellar he took when he set out to sail;

And Noah, he often said to his wife when he sat down to dine,

‘I don’t care where the water goes if it doesn’t get into the wine.’

“The cataract of the cliff of heaven fell blinding off the brink,

As if it would wash the stars away as suds go down a sink,

The seven heavens came roaring down for the throats of hell to drink,

And Noah, he cocked his eye and said, ‘It looks like rain, I think,

The water has drowned the Matterhorn as deep as a Mendip mine,

But I don’t care where the water goes if it doesn’t get into the wine.’

“But Noah he sinned, and we have sinned; on tipsy feet we trod,

Till a great big black teetotaller was sent to us for a rod,

And you can’t get wine at a P. S. A. or chapel or Eisteddfod;

For the Curse of Water has come again because of the wrath of God,

And water is on the Bishop’s board and the Higher Thinker’s shrine,

But I don’t care where the water goes if it doesn’t get into the wine.”

“Lord Ivywood’s favourite song,” concluded Mr. Patrick Dalroy, drinking. “Sing us a song yourself.”

Rather to the surprise of the two humourists, the old gentleman actually began in a quavering voice to chant,

“King George that lives in London Town,

I hope they will defend his crown,

And Bonyparte be quite put down

On Christmas Day in the morning.

“Old Squire is gone to the Meet today

All in his–”

It is perhaps fortunate for the rapidity of this narrative that the old gentleman’s favourite song, which consists of forty-seven verses, was interrupted by a curious incident. The door of the cottage opened and a sheepish-looking man in corduroys stood silently in the room for a few seconds and then said, without preface or further explanation,

“Four ale.”

“I beg your pardon?” inquired the polite Captain.

“Four ale,” said the man with solidity; then catching sight of Humphrey seemed to find a few more words in his vocabulary.

“Morning, Mr. Pump. Didn’t know as how you’d moved ‘The Old Ship.’”

Mr. Pump, with a twist of a smile, pointed to the old man whose song had been interrupted.

“Mr. Marne’s seeing after it now, Mr. Gowl,” said Pump with the strict etiquette of the country side. “But he’s got nothing but this rum in stock as yet.”

“Better’nowt,” said the laconic Mr. Gowl; and put down some money in front of the aged Marne, who eyed it wonderingly. As he was turning with a farewell and wiping his mouth with the back of his hand, the door once more moved, letting in white sunlight and a man in a red neckerchief.

“Morning, Mr. Marne; Morning, Mr. Pump; Morning, Mr. Gowl,” said the man in the red neckerchief.

“Morning, Mr. Coote,” said the other three, one after another.

“Have some rum, Mr. Coote?” asked Humphrey Pump, genially. “That’s all Mr. Marne’s got just now.”

Mr. Coote also had a little rum; and also laid a little money under the rather vague gaze of the venerable cottager. Mr. Coote was just proceeding to explain that these were bad times, but if you saw a sign you were all right still; a lawyer up at Grunton Abbot had told him so; when the company was increased and greatly excited by the arrival of a boisterous and popular tinker, who ordered glasses all round and said he had his donkey and cart outside. A prolonged, rich and confused conversation about the donkey and cart then ensued, in which the most varied views were taken of their merits; and it gradually began to dawn on Dalroy that the tinker was trying to sell them.

An idea, suited to the romantic opportunism of his present absurd career, suddenly swept over his mind, and he rushed out to look at the cart and donkey. The next moment he was back again, asking the tinker what his price was, and almost in the same breath offering a much bigger price than the tinker would have dreamed of asking. This was considered, however, as a lunacy specially allowed to gentlemen; the tinker had some more rum on the strength of the payment, and then Dalroy, offering his excuses, sealed up the cask and took it and the cheese to be stowed in the bottom of the cart. The money, however, he still left lying in shining silver and copper before the silver beard of old Marne.

«Cheddar», disse Pump, con tutta serietà.

«Ma badate bene!» continuò il Capitano quasi ferocemente, agitando in ammonimento il grosso dito verso il vecchio. «Badate bene: “niente pane con il formaggio. Tutta la devastante rovina operata dal formaggio e dalle un tempo felici dimore di questo paese è stata dovuta all’avventato e insano esperimento di mangiarvi insieme il pane.” Da me non avrete pane, amico mio. Anzi, Lord Ivywood ha disposto che l’allusione a questa ignorante e depravata abitudine sia eliminata dalla Preghiera del Signore. Bevete un sorso.»

Aveva già versato un po’ del liquore in due grossi bicchieri e in una tazza da tè rotta, che aveva indotto il vecchio a tirar fuori; e ora brindò solennemente in suo onore.

«Vi ringrazio di cuore, signore», disse il vecchio, usando per la prima volta la sua voce incrinata. Poi bevve; e il suo vecchio volto mutò come se fosse una vecchia lanterna di corno in cui la fiamma cominci a levarsi.

«Ar», disse. «Mio figlio l’è un marinaio.»

«Gli auguro un felice viaggio», disse il Capitano. «E vi canterò una canzone sul primo marinaio che vi fu mai al mondo; e che (come Lord Ivywood acutamente osserva) visse prima del tempo del rum.»

Sedette su una sedia di legno e levò ancora una volta la voce sonora, battendo sul tavolo con la tazza da tè rotta.

«Il vecchio Noè aveva un allevamento di struzzi, e polli su vastissima scala;

Mangiava l’uovo con un mestolo in un portauovo grande come un secchio,

E la zuppa che prendeva era Zuppa d’Elefante e il pesce che prendeva era Balena;

Ma tutti erano piccoli in confronto alla cantina che prese quando salpò per navigare;

E Noè spesso diceva alla moglie quando si sedeva a desinare,

“Non m’importa dove vada l’acqua purché non finisca nel vino.”

“La cateratta della rupe del cielo cadde accecante dal ciglio,

Come se volesse spazzar via le stelle come la schiuma se ne va giù per un lavandino,

I sette cieli precipitarono ruggendo perché le gole dell’inferno bevessero,

E Noè aguzzò l’occhio e disse: “Pare che voglia piovere, mi sa,

L’acqua ha annegato il Cervino profondo come una miniera del Mendip,

Ma non m’importa dove vada l’acqua purché non finisca nel vino.”

“Ma Noè peccò, e noi abbiamo peccato; camminammo con piedi malfermi,

Finché un gran nero astemio ci fu inviato come verga,

E non puoi avere vino a un P. S. A. o a una cappella o a un Eisteddfod;

Poiché la Maledizione dell’Acqua è tornata a causa dell’ira di Dio,

E l’acqua è sulla mensa del Vescovo e sul sacrario del Pensatore Superiore,

Ma non m’importa dove vada l’acqua purché non finisca nel vino.”

«La canzone preferita di Lord Ivywood», concluse il signor Patrick Dalroy, bevendo. «Cantateci voi una canzone.»

Con non poca sorpresa dei due burloni, il vecchio signore cominciò davvero, con voce tremula, a intonare,

«Re Giorgio che vive nella Città di Londra,

Spero che difenderanno la sua corona,

E che Bonyparte sia ben abbattuto

Il giorno di Natale, al mattino.

«Il vecchio Squire è andato oggi alla Muta

Tutto nel suo…»

È forse una fortuna per la rapidità di questa narrazione che la canzone preferita del vecchio signore, la quale consta di quarantasette strofe, fosse interrotta da un curioso incidente. La porta del casolare si aprì e un uomo dall’aria imbarazzata, in fustagno, rimase in silenzio nella stanza per qualche secondo e poi disse, senza preambolo né ulteriore spiegazione,

«Birra da quattro soldi.»

«Come dite, prego?» s’informò il cortese Capitano.

«Birra da quattro soldi», disse l’uomo con solidità; poi, scorgendo Humphrey, parve trovare qualche altra parola nel suo vocabolario.

«Buongiorno, signor Pump. Non sapevo che aveste spostato “La Vecchia Nave”.»

Il signor Pump, con un accenno di sorriso, indicò il vecchio la cui canzone era stata interrotta.

«Adesso se ne occupa il signor Marne, signor Gowl», disse Pump con la rigida etichetta della campagna. «Ma per ora non ha in magazzino altro che questo rum.»

«Mèi che gnente», disse il laconico signor Gowl; e depose un po’ di denaro davanti al vecchio Marne, che lo fissò con meraviglia. Mentre si voltava per congedarsi asciugandosi la bocca col dorso della mano, la porta si mosse ancora una volta, lasciando entrare la bianca luce del sole e un uomo con un fazzoletto rosso al collo.

«Buongiorno, signor Marne; buongiorno, signor Pump; buongiorno, signor Gowl», disse l’uomo dal fazzoletto rosso.

«Buongiorno, signor Coote», dissero gli altri tre, l’uno dopo l’altro.

«Gradite del rum, signor Coote?» chiese Humphrey Pump, gioviale. «È tutto ciò che il signor Marne ha in questo momento.»

Anche il signor Coote prese un po’ di rum; e anch’egli depose un po’ di denaro sotto lo sguardo piuttosto vago del venerabile casolano. Il signor Coote stava giusto spiegando che erano tempi grami, ma che se vedevi un’insegna eri ancora a posto; glielo aveva detto un avvocato lassù a Grunton Abbot; quando la compagnia fu accresciuta e assai eccitata dall’arrivo di un chiassoso e popolare calderaio, che ordinò bicchieri per tutti e disse di avere fuori il suo asino e il carretto. Ne seguì allora una prolungata, ricca e confusa conversazione sull’asino e sul carretto, nella quale si espressero i pareri più svariati sui loro pregi; e a poco a poco cominciò a balenare in mente a Dalroy che il calderaio stava cercando di venderli.

Un’idea, adatta al romantico opportunismo della sua presente e assurda carriera, gli attraversò d’un tratto la mente, ed egli si precipitò fuori a guardare il carretto e l’asino. Un istante dopo era di nuovo dentro, chiedendo al calderaio quale fosse il suo prezzo, e quasi nello stesso fiato offrendo un prezzo assai più alto di quanto il calderaio avrebbe sognato di chiedere. Ciò fu però considerato una follia particolarmente concessa ai gentiluomini; il calderaio prese dell’altro rum in virtù del pagamento, e poi Dalroy, porgendo le sue scuse, sigillò la botte e la prese, insieme al formaggio, per riporla in fondo al carretto. Il denaro, tuttavia, lo lasciò ancora là, in argento e rame lucente, dinanzi alla barba d’argento del vecchio Marne.

No one acquainted with the quaint and often wordless camaraderie of the English poor will require to be told that they all went out and stared at him as he loaded the cart and saw to the harness of the donkey –all except the old cottager, who sat as if hypnotised by the sight of the money. While they were standing there they saw coming down the white, hot road, where it curled over the hill, a figure that gave them no pleasure, even when it was a mere marching black spot in the distance. It was a Mr. Bullrose, the agent of Lord Ivywood’s estates.

Mr. Bullrose was a short, square man with a broad, square head with ridges of close, black curls on it, with a heavy, froglike face and starting, suspicious eyes; a man with a good silk hat but a square business jacket. Mr. Bullrose was not a nice man. The agent on that sort of estate hardly ever is a nice man. The landlord often is; and even Lord Ivywood had an arctic magnanimity of his own, which made most people want, if possible, to see him personally. But Mr. Bullrose was petty. Every really practical tyrant must be petty.

He evidently failed to understand the commotion in front of Mr. Marne’s partly collapsed cottage, but he felt there must be something wrong about it. He wanted to get rid of the cottage altogether, and had not, of course, the faintest intention of giving the cottager any compensation for it. He hoped the old man would die; but in any case he could easily clear him out if it became suddenly necessary, for he could not possibly pay the rent for this week. The rent was not very much; but it was immeasurably too much for the old man who had no conceivable way of borrowing or earning it. That is where the chivalry of our aristocratic land system comes in.

“Good-bye, my friends,” the enormous man in the fantastic uniform was saying, “all roads lead to rum, as Lord Ivywood said in one of his gayer moments, and we hope to be back soon, establishing a first class hotel here, of which prospectuses will soon be sent out.”

The heavy froglike face of Mr. Bullrose, the agent, grew uglier with astonishment; and the eyes stood out more like a snail’s than a frog’s. The indefensible allusion to Lord Ivywood would in any case have caused a choleric intervention, if it had not been swallowed up in the earthquake suggestion of an unlicensed hotel on the estate. This again would have effected the explosion, if that and everything else had not been struck still and rigid by the sight of a solid, wooden sign-post already erected outside old Marne’s miserable cottage.

“I’ve got him now,” muttered Mr. Bullrose. “He can’t possibly pay; and out he shall go.” And he walked swiftly towards the door of the cottage, almost at the same moment that Dalroy went to the donkey’s head, as if to lead it off along the road.

“Look here, my man,” burst out Bullrose, the instant he was inside the cottage. “You’ve cooked yourself this time. His lordship has been a great deal too indulgent with you; but this is going to be the end of it. The insolence of what you’ve done outside, especially when you know his lordship’s wishes in such things, has just put the lid on.” He stopped a moment and sneered. “So unless you happen to have the exact rent down to a farthing or two about you, out you go. We’re sick of your sort.”

In a very awkward and fumbling manner, the old man pushed a heap of coins across the table. Mr. Bullrose sat down suddenly on the wooden chair with his silk hat on, and began counting them furiously. He counted them once; he counted them twice; and he counted them again. Then he stared at them more steadily than the cottager had done.

“Where did you get this money?” he asked in a thick, gross voice. “Did you steal it?”

“I ain’t very spry for stealin’,” said the old man in quavering comedy.

Bullrose looked at him and then at the money; and remembered with fury that Ivywood was a just though cold magistrate on the bench.

“Well, anyhow,” he cried, in a hot, heady way, “we’ve got enough against you to turn you out of this. Haven’t you broken the law, my man, to say nothing of the regulations for tenants, in sticking up that fancy sign of yours outside the cottage? Eh?”

The tenant was silent.

“Eh?” reiterated the agent.

“Ar,” replied the tenant.

“Have you or have you not a sign-board outside this house?” shouted Bullrose, hammering the table.

The tenant looked at him for a long time with a patient and venerable face, and then said: “Mubbe, yes. Mubbe, no.”

“I’ll mubbe you,” cried Mr. Bullrose, springing up and sticking his silk hat on the back of his head. “I don’t know whether you people are too drunk to see anything, but I saw the thing with my own eyes out in the road. Come out, and deny it if you dare!”

“Ar,” said Mr. Marne, dubiously.

He tottered after the agent, who flung open the door with a businesslike fury and stood outside on the threshold. He stood there quite a long time, and he did not speak. Deep in the hardened mud of his materialistic mind there had stirred two things that were its ancient enemies; the old fairy tale in which every thing can be believed; the new scepticism in which nothing can be believed–not even one’s own eyes. There was no sign, nor sign of a sign, in the landscape.

On the withered face of the old man Marne there was a faint renewal of that laughter that has slept since the Middle Ages.

Nessuno che conosca la bizzarra e spesso muta cameratismo dei poveri inglesi avrà bisogno che gli si dica che uscirono tutti a fissarlo mentre caricava il carretto e badava ai finimenti dell’asino – tutti tranne il vecchio casolano, che sedeva come ipnotizzato dalla vista del denaro. Mentre se ne stavano là, videro venire giù per la bianca, rovente strada, là dove si arricciava sopra la collina, una figura che non procurava loro alcun piacere, anche quando non era che una nera macchia in marcia in lontananza. Era un certo signor Bullrose, l’agente delle tenute di Lord Ivywood.

Il signor Bullrose era un uomo basso e tarchiato, dalla larga testa quadrata su cui si stendevano creste di riccioli neri e fitti, dal volto pesante e ranocchiesco e dagli occhi sporgenti e sospettosi; un uomo con un bel cilindro di seta ma con una quadrata giacca da lavoro. Il signor Bullrose non era un uomo simpatico. L’agente di quel genere di tenute non lo è quasi mai. Il padrone spesso lo è; e perfino Lord Ivywood possedeva una sua artica magnanimità, che induceva la maggior parte della gente a desiderare, se possibile, di vederlo di persona. Ma il signor Bullrose era meschino. Ogni tiranno davvero pratico dev’essere meschino.

Egli evidentemente non riusciva a comprendere il trambusto dinanzi al casolare in parte crollato del signor Marne, ma sentiva che doveva esservi qualcosa di storto. Voleva sbarazzarsi del tutto del casolare, e non aveva, s’intende, la benché minima intenzione di dare al casolano alcun compenso per esso. Sperava che il vecchio morisse; ma in ogni caso poteva facilmente cacciarlo via qualora fosse divenuto improvvisamente necessario, poiché costui non poteva in alcun modo pagare l’affitto di quella settimana. L’affitto non era molto; ma era incommensurabilmente troppo per il vecchio, che non aveva alcun modo concepibile di prenderlo a prestito o di guadagnarlo. È qui che entra in scena la cavalleria del nostro aristocratico sistema fondiario.

«Addio, amici miei», stava dicendo l’enorme uomo dalla fantastica uniforme, «tutte le strade portano al rum, come disse Lord Ivywood in uno dei suoi momenti più allegri, e speriamo di tornare presto, per fondare qui un albergo di prima categoria, del quale saranno tra breve diramati i prospetti.»

Il pesante volto ranocchiesco del signor Bullrose, l’agente, si fece più brutto per lo stupore; e gli occhi gli sporsero più come quelli di una lumaca che di una rana. L’indifendibile allusione a Lord Ivywood avrebbe in ogni caso provocato un collerico intervento, se non fosse stata inghiottita dalla tellurica insinuazione di un albergo senza licenza sulla tenuta. Anche questo avrebbe prodotto l’esplosione, se quello e ogni altra cosa non fossero stati impietriti e resi rigidi dalla vista di un solido palo di legno con l’insegna, già eretto fuori dal misero casolare del vecchio Marne.

«Ora lo tengo in pugno», mormorò il signor Bullrose. «Non può in alcun modo pagare; e fuori se ne andrà.» E si diresse rapidamente verso la porta del casolare, quasi nello stesso istante in cui Dalroy si portava alla testa dell’asino, come per condurlo via lungo la strada.

«Sentite un po’, brav’uomo», sbottò Bullrose, non appena fu dentro il casolare. «Ve la siete cotta da solo questa volta. Sua signoria è stata fin troppo indulgente con voi; ma questa sarà la fine. L’insolenza di ciò che avete fatto là fuori, specie sapendo i desideri di sua signoria in simili faccende, ha proprio colmato la misura.» Si fermò un momento e sogghignò. «Perciò, a meno che per caso non abbiate addosso l’affitto esatto fino all’ultimo quattrino, fuori ve ne andate. Siamo stufi di gente della vostra risma.»

In modo assai goffo e maldestro, il vecchio spinse un mucchio di monete attraverso il tavolo. Il signor Bullrose si lasciò cadere di colpo sulla sedia di legno, col cilindro di seta in testa, e cominciò a contarle furiosamente. Le contò una volta; le contò due volte; e le contò ancora. Poi le fissò più fissamente di quanto avesse fatto il casolano.

«Dove avete preso questo denaro?» chiese con voce spessa e grossolana. «L’avete rubato?»

«Non sono tanto lesto per rubare», disse il vecchio in tremula comicità.

Bullrose guardò lui e poi il denaro; e ricordò con furia che Ivywood era un magistrato giusto, benché freddo, quando sedeva in tribunale.

«Comunque sia», gridò, in modo caldo e avventato, «abbiamo abbastanza contro di voi per cacciarvi da qui. Non avete forse infranto la legge, brav’uomo, per non parlare dei regolamenti per i fittavoli, piantando fuori dal casolare quella vostra bella insegna? Eh?»

Il fittavolo taceva.

«Eh?» ribadì l’agente.

«Ar», rispose il fittavolo.

«Avete o non avete un’insegna fuori da questa casa?» gridò Bullrose, martellando il tavolo.

Il fittavolo lo guardò a lungo tempo con volto paziente e venerabile, e poi disse: «Fórse sì. Fórse no.»

«Adesso vi faccio vedere io il “forse”», gridò il signor Bullrose, balzando in piedi e cacciandosi il cilindro di seta sulla nuca. «Non so se voialtri siate troppo ubriachi per vedere alcunché, ma io la cosa l’ho vista coi miei stessi occhi là fuori sulla strada. Uscite, e negatelo se ne avete il coraggio!»

«Ar», disse il signor Marne, dubbioso.

Barcollò dietro l’agente, che spalancò la porta con sbrigativa furia e si fermò fuori sulla soglia. Rimase là un lungo tempo, e non parlò. Nel profondo del fango indurito della sua mente materialistica si erano agitate due cose che ne erano le antiche nemiche; la vecchia fiaba in cui tutto può essere creduto; il nuovo scetticismo in cui nulla può essere creduto – nemmeno i propri occhi. Non c’era insegna, né segno di insegna, nel paesaggio.

Sul volto avvizzito del vecchio Marne v’era un tenue rinnovarsi di quella risata che dorme sin dal Medioevo.

CHAPTER VI: THE HOLE IN HEAVEN

THAT delicate ruby light which is one of the rarest but one of the most exquisite of evening effects warmed the land, sky and seas as if the whole world were washed in wine; and dyed almost scarlet the strong red head of Patrick Dalroy as he stood on the waste of furze and bracken, where he and his friends had halted. One of his friends was re-examining a short gun, rather like a double-barrelled carbine, the other was eating thistles.

Dalroy himself was idle and ruminant, with his hands in his pockets and his eye on the horizon. Land-wards the hills, plains and woods lay bathed in the rose-red light; but it changed somewhat to purple, to cloud and something like storm over the distant violet strip of sea. It was towards the sea that he was staring.

Suddenly he woke up; and seemed almost to rub his eyes, or at any rate, to rub his red eyebrow.

“Why, we’re on the road back of Pebblewick,” he said. “That’s the damned little tin chapel by the beach.”

“I know,” answered his friend and guide. “We’ve done the old hare trick; doubled, you know. Nine times out of ten it’s the best. Parson Whitelady used to do it when they were after him for dog-stealing. I’ve pretty much followed his trail; you can’t do better than stick to the best examples. They tell you in London that Dick Turpin rode to York. Well, I know he didn’t; for my old grandfather up at Cobble’s End knew the Turpins intimately–threw one of them into the river on a Christmas day; but I think I can guess what he did do and how the tale got about. If Dick was wise, he went flying up the old North Road, shouting ‘York! York!’ or what not, before people recognised him; then if he did the thing properly, he might half an hour afterwards walk down the Strand with a pipe in his mouth. They say old Boney said, ‘Go where you aren’t expected,’ and I suppose as a soldier he was right. But for a gentleman dodging the police like yourself, it isn’t exactly the right way of putting it. I should say, ‘Go where you ought to be expected’ –and you’ll generally find your fellow creatures don’t do what they ought about expecting any more than about anything else.”

“Well, this bit between here and the sea,” said the Captain, in a brown study, “I know it so well–so well that–that I rather wish I’d never seen it again. Do you know,” he asked, suddenly pointing to a patch and pit of sand that showed white in the dusky heath a hundred yards away, “do you know what makes that spot so famous in history?”

“Yes,” answered Mr. Pump, “that’s where old Mother Grouch shot the Methodist.”

“You are in error,” said the Captain. “Such an incident as you describe would in no case call for special comment or regret. No, that spot is famous because a very badly brought up girl once lost a ribbon off a plait of black hair and somebody helped her to find it.”

“Has the other person been well brought up?” asked Pump, with a faint smile.

“No,” said Dalroy, staring at the sea. “He has been brought down.” Then, rousing himself again, he made a gesture toward a further part of the heath. “Do you know the remarkable history of that old wall, the one beyond the last gorge over there?”

“No,” replied the other, “unless you mean Dead Man’s Circus, and that happened further along.”

“I do not mean Dead Man’s Circus,” said the Captain. “The remarkable history of that wall is that somebody’s shadow once fell on it; and that shadow was more desirable than the substance of all other living things. It isthis,” he cried, almost violently, resuming his flippant tone, “it is this circumstance, Hump, and not the trivial and everyday incident of a dead man going to a circus to which you have presumed to compare it, it isthis historical event which Lord Ivywood is about to commemorate by rebuilding the wall with solid gold and Greek marbles stolen by the Turks from the grave of Socrates, enclosing a column of solid gold four hundred feet high and surmounted by a colossal equestrian statue of a bankrupt Irishman riding backwards on a donkey.”

He lifted one of his long legs over the animal, as if about to pose for the group; then swung back on both feet again, and again looked at the purple limit of the sea.

“Do you know, Hump,” he said, “I think modern people have somehow got their minds all wrong about human life. They seem to expect what Nature has never promised; and then try to ruin all that Nature has really given. At all those atheist chapels of Ivywood’s they’re always talking of Peace, Perfect Peace, and Utter Peace, and Universal Joy and souls that beat as one. But they don’t look any more cheerful than anyone else; and the next thing they do is to start smashing a thousand good jokes and good stories and good songs and good friendships by pulling down ‘The Old Ship.’” He gave a glance at the loose sign-post lying on the heath beside him, almost as if to reassure himself that it was not stolen. “Now it seems to me,” he went on, “that this is asking for too much and getting too little. I don’t know whether God means a man to have happiness in that All in All and Utterly Utter sense of happiness. But God does mean a man to have a little Fun; and I mean to go on having it. If I mustn’t satisfy my heart, I can gratify my humour. The cynical fellows who think themselves so damned clever have a sort of saying, ‘Be good and you will be happy; but you will not have a jolly time.’ The cynical fellows are quite wrong, as they generally are. They have got hold of the exact opposite of the truth. God knows I don’t set up to be good; but even a rascal sometimes has to fight the world in the same way as a saint. I think I have fought the world;et militavi non sine–what’s the Latin for having a lark? I can’t pretend to Peace and Joy, and all the rest of it, particularly in this original briar-patch. I haven’t been happy, Hump, but I have had a jolly time.”

CAPITOLO VI: IL BUCO NEL CIELO

QUELLA delicata luce di rubino, che è uno dei più rari ma insieme uno dei più squisiti effetti serali, riscaldava la terra, il cielo e i mari come se il mondo intero fosse lavato nel vino; e tingeva quasi di scarlatto la forte testa rossa di Patrick Dalroy mentre stava ritto sulla landa di ginestra spinosa e felci, dove egli e i suoi amici si erano fermati. Uno dei suoi amici stava riesaminando un fucile corto, piuttosto simile a una carabina a doppia canna, l’altro mangiava cardi.

Dalroy stesso se ne stava ozioso e meditabondo, con le mani in tasca e l’occhio all’orizzonte. Verso terra le colline, le pianure e i boschi giacevano immersi nella luce rossa di rosa; ma essa mutava alquanto in porpora, in nuvola e in qualcosa di simile a tempesta sopra la lontana striscia violetta del mare. Era verso il mare che egli fissava lo sguardo.

D’un tratto si riscosse; e parve quasi stropicciarsi gli occhi, o comunque stropicciarsi il rosso sopracciglio.

«Ma guarda, siamo sulla strada dietro Pebblewick», disse. «Quella è la maledetta cappelletta di latta presso la spiaggia.»

«Lo so», rispose il suo amico e guida. «Abbiamo fatto il vecchio trucco della lepre; siamo tornati sui nostri passi, sapete. Nove volte su dieci è la mossa migliore. Il parroco Whitelady lo faceva quando gli davano la caccia per furto di cani. Ho seguito quasi in tutto la sua traccia; non si può fare di meglio che attenersi ai migliori esempi. A Londra vi raccontano che Dick Turpin cavalcò fino a York. Ebbene, io so che non lo fece; poiché il mio vecchio nonno lassù a Cobble’s End conosceva intimamente i Turpin – ne gettò uno nel fiume il giorno di Natale; ma credo di poter indovinare cosa fece davvero e come nacque la storia. Se Dick era accorto, se ne andò a spron battuto su per la vecchia Strada del Nord, gridando “York! York!” o che so io, prima che la gente lo riconoscesse; poi, se fece la cosa a dovere, poteva mezz’ora dopo passeggiare giù per lo Strand con la pipa in bocca. Dicono che il vecchio Boney dicesse: “Va’ dove non ti aspettano”, e suppongo che come soldato avesse ragione. Ma per un gentiluomo che schiva la polizia come voi, non è esattamente il modo giusto di metterla. Io direi: “Va’ dove dovresti essere aspettato” – e generalmente troverai che i tuoi simili non fanno ciò che dovrebbero quanto ad aspettarti, non più che in qualsiasi altra cosa.»

«Ebbene, questo tratto fra qui e il mare», disse il Capitano, immerso in cupa meditazione, «lo conosco così bene – così bene che… che quasi vorrei non averlo mai più riveduto. Sapete», chiese, indicando d’un tratto una chiazza e una fossa di sabbia che biancheggiava nella brughiera crepuscolare a un centinaio di iarde di distanza, «sapete cosa rende quel luogo così famoso nella storia?»

«Sì», rispose il signor Pump, «è là che la vecchia Madre Grouch sparò al metodista.»

«Siete in errore», disse il Capitano. «Un incidente quale voi descrivete non richiederebbe in nessun caso particolare commento o rimpianto. No, quel luogo è famoso perché una fanciulla assai mal educata vi perse una volta un nastro da una treccia di capelli neri e qualcuno l’aiutò a ritrovarlo.»

«E l’altra persona è stata bene educata?» chiese Pump, con un tenue sorriso.

«No», disse Dalroy, fissando il mare. «È stato tirato giù.» Poi, riscuotendosi di nuovo, fece un gesto verso una parte più lontana della brughiera. «Conoscete la notevole storia di quel vecchio muro, quello là oltre l’ultima gola?»

«No», replicò l’altro, «a meno che non intendiate il Circo del Morto, e quello accadde più in là.»

«Non intendo il Circo del Morto», disse il Capitano. «La notevole storia di quel muro è che l’ombra di qualcuno vi cadde sopra una volta; e quell’ombra era più desiderabile della sostanza di tutte le altre cose viventi. È questa», gridò, quasi con violenza, riprendendo il suo tono frivolo, «è questa circostanza, Hump, e non il banale e quotidiano episodio di un morto che va al circo, cui hai osato paragonarla, è questo evento storico che Lord Ivywood sta per commemorare ricostruendo il muro con oro massiccio e marmi greci rubati dai Turchi dalla tomba di Socrate, racchiudendo una colonna d’oro massiccio alta quattrocento piedi e sormontata da una colossale statua equestre di un irlandese in bancarotta che cavalca all’indietro su un asino.»

Sollevò una delle sue lunghe gambe sopra l’animale, come per mettersi in posa per il gruppo scultoreo; poi si rimise in equilibrio su entrambi i piedi, e di nuovo guardò il purpureo limite del mare.

«Sai, Hump», disse, «credo che i moderni si siano in qualche modo confusi del tutto le idee sulla vita umana. Sembrano attendersi ciò che la Natura non ha mai promesso; e poi cercano di rovinare tutto ciò che la Natura ha realmente dato. In tutte quelle cappelle atee di Ivywood non fanno che parlare di Pace, Pace Perfetta, e Pace Assoluta, e Gioia Universale e anime che battono all’unisono. Ma non hanno l’aria più lieta di chiunque altro; e la cosa seguente che fanno è mettersi a fracassare un migliaio di buone facezie e buone storie e buone canzoni e buone amicizie tirando giù “La Vecchia Nave”.» Diede un’occhiata al palo dell’insegna che giaceva sciolto sulla brughiera accanto a lui, quasi a rassicurarsi che non fosse stato rubato. «Ora mi pare», proseguì, «che questo sia chiedere troppo e ottenere troppo poco. Non so se Dio intenda che un uomo abbia la felicità in quel senso di Tutto in Tutto e di Assolutamente Assoluto della felicità. Ma Dio intende bene che un uomo abbia un po’ di Spasso; e io intendo continuare ad averlo. Se non posso appagare il cuore, posso soddisfare il mio Umorismo. Quei tipi cinici che si credono così maledettamente arguti hanno una specie di detto: “Sii buono e sarai felice; ma non passerai un tempo gaio”. I tipi cinici hanno del tutto torto, come accade loro di solito. Hanno afferrato l’esatto contrario della verità. Dio sa che io non pretendo di essere buono; ma anche un mascalzone talvolta deve combattere il mondo allo stesso modo di un santo. Credo di aver combattuto il mondo; et militavi non sine… come si dice in latino “essersi spassati”? Non posso pretendere alla Pace e alla Gioia, e a tutto il resto, specialmente in questo originario roveto. Non sono stato felice, Hump, ma ho passato un tempo gaio.»

The sunset stillness settled down again, save for the cropping of the donkey in the undergrowth; and Pump said nothing sympathetically; and it was Dalroy once more who took up his parable.

“So I think there’s too much of this playing on our emotions, Hump; as this place is certainly playing the cat and banjo with mine. Damn it all, there are other things to do with the rest of one’s life! I don’t like all this fuss about feeling things–it only makes people miserable. In my present frame of mind I’m in favour of doing things. All of which, Hump,” he said with a sudden lift of the voice that always went in him with a rushing, irrational return of merely animal spirits–“All of which I have put into a Song Against Songs, that I will now sing you.”

“I shouldn’t sing it here,” said Humphrey Pump, picking up his gun and putting it under his arm. “You look large in this open place; and you sound large. But I’ll take you to the Hole in Heaven you’ve been talking about so much, and hide you as I used to hide you from that tutor–I couldn’t catch his name–man who could only get drunk on Greek wine at Squire Wimpole’s.”

“Hump!” cried the Captain, “I abdicate the throne of Ithaca. You are far wiser than Ulysses. Here I have had my heart torn with temptations to ten thousand things between suicide and abduction, and all by the mere sight of that hole in the heath, where we used to have picnics. And all that time I’d forgotten we used to call it the Hole in Heaven. And, by God, what a good name–in both senses.”

“I thought you’d have remembered it, Captain,” said the innkeeper, “from the joke young Mr. Matthews made.”

“In the heat of some savage hand to hand struggle in Albania,” said Mr. Dalroy, sadly, passing his palm across his brow, “I must have forgotten for one fatal instant the joke young Mr. Matthews made.”

“It wasn’t very good,” said Mr. Pump, simply. “Ah, his aunt was the one for things like that. She went too far with old Gudgeon, though.”

With these words he jumped and seemed to be swallowed up by the earth. But they had merely strolled the few yards needed to bring them to the edge of the sand-pit on the heath of which they had been speaking. And it is one of the truths concealed by Heaven from Lord Ivywood, and revealed by Heaven to Mr. Pump, that a hiding-place can be covered when you are close to it; and yet be open and visible from some spot of vantage far off. From the side by which they approached it, the sudden hollow of sand, a kind of collapsed chamber in the heath, seemed covered with a natural curve of fern and furze, and flashed out of sight like a fairy.

“It’s all right,” he called out from under a floor or roof of leaves. “You’ll remember it all when you get here. This is the place to sing your song, Captain. Lord bless me, Captain, don’t I remember your singing that Irish song you made up at college–bellowing it like a bull of Bashan–all about hearts and sleeves or some such things–and her ladyship and the tutor never heard a breath, because that bank of sand breaks everything. It’s worth knowing all this, you know. It’s a pity it’s not part of a young gentleman’s education. Now you shall sing me the song in favour of having no feelings, or whatever you call it.”

Dalroy was staring about him at the cavern of his old picnics, so forgotten and so startlingly familiar. He seemed to have lost all thought of singing anything, and simply to be groping in the dark house of his own boyhood. There was a slight trickle from a natural spring in sandstone just under the ferns, and he remembered they used to try to boil the water in a kettle. He remembered a quarrel about who had upset the kettle which, in the morbidity of first love, had given him for days the tortures of the damned. When the energetic Pump broke once more through the rather thorny roof, on an impulse to accumulate their other eccentric possessions, Patrick remembered about a thorn in a finger, that made his heart stop with something that was pain and perfect music. When Pump returned with the rum-keg and the cheese and rolled them with a kick down the shelving sandy side of the hole, he remembered, with almost wrathful laughter, that in the old days he had rolled down that slope himself, and thought it a rather fine thing to do. He felt then as if he were rolling down a smooth side of the Matterhorn. He observed now that the height was rather less than that of the second storey of one of the stunted cottages he had noted on his return. He suddenly understood he had grown bigger; bigger in a bodily sense. He had doubts about any other.

“The Hole in Heaven!” he said. “What a good name! What a good poet I was in those days! The Hole in Heaven. But does it let one in, or let one out?”

In the last level shafts of the fallen sun the fantastic shadow of the long-eared quadruped, whom Pump had now tethered to a new and nearer pasture, fell across the last sunlit scrap of sand. Dalroy looked at the long exaggerated shadow of the ass; and laughed that short explosive laugh he had uttered when the doors of the harems had been closed after the Turkish war. He was normally a man much too loquacious; but he never explained those laughs.

Humphrey Pump plunged down again into the sunken nest, and began to broach the cask of rum in his own secret style, saying– “We can get something else somehow tomorrow. For tonight we can eat cheese and drink rum, especially as there’s water on tap, so to speak. And now, Captain, sing us the Song Against Songs.”

Patrick Dalroy drank a little rum out of a small medicine glass which the generally unaccountable Mr. Pump unaccountably produced from his waistcoat pocket; but Patrick’s colour had risen, his brow was almost as red as his hair; and he was evidently reluctant.

La quiete del tramonto tornò a posarsi, salvo per il brucare dell’asino nel sottobosco; e Pump non disse nulla per solidarietà; e fu ancora una volta Dalroy a riprendere la sua parabola.

«Perciò penso che si giochi troppo sulle nostre emozioni, Hump; come questo luogo sta di certo scombussolando le mie. Diavolo, ci sono altre cose da fare col resto della propria vita! Non mi piace tutto questo baccano attorno al sentire le cose – non fa che rendere infelice la gente. Nel mio presente stato d’animo sono per il fare le cose. Tutto ciò, Hump», disse con un’improvvisa alzata di voce che in lui si accompagnava sempre a un impetuoso, irrazionale ritorno di spiriti meramente animali – «tutto ciò l’ho messo in una Canzone Contro le Canzoni, che ora ti canterò.»

«Non la canterei qui», disse Humphrey Pump, raccogliendo il fucile e mettendoselo sotto il braccio. «In questo luogo aperto sembrate grande; e suonate grande. Ma vi porterò al Buco nel Cielo di cui avete tanto parlato, e vi nasconderò come solevo nascondervi da quel precettore – non riuscii mai ad afferrarne il nome – quell’uomo che riusciva a ubriacarsi solo col vino greco dallo Squire Wimpole.»

«Hump!» gridò il Capitano, «abdico al trono di Itaca. Sei assai più saggio di Ulisse. Qui ho avuto il cuore straziato da tentazioni verso diecimila cose, tra il suicidio e il rapimento, e tutto per la semplice vista di quel buco nella brughiera, dove solevamo fare i picnic. E per tutto quel tempo avevo dimenticato che lo chiamavamo il Buco nel Cielo. E, per Dio, che bel nome – in entrambi i sensi.»

«Pensavo l’avreste ricordato, Capitano», disse il locandiere, «per via della facezia che fece il giovane signor Matthews.»

«Nel calore di qualche selvaggia lotta corpo a corpo in Albania», disse il signor Dalroy, mestamente, passandosi il palmo sulla fronte, «devo aver dimenticato per un fatale istante la facezia che fece il giovane signor Matthews.»

«Non era granché», disse il signor Pump, semplicemente. «Ah, sua zia sì che era brava per cose del genere. Andò troppo oltre col vecchio Gudgeon, però.»

A queste parole balzò e parve inghiottito dalla terra. Ma avevano soltanto percorso le poche iarde necessarie a portarli sull’orlo della cava di sabbia nella brughiera di cui avevano parlato. Ed è una delle verità celate dal Cielo a Lord Ivywood, e rivelate dal Cielo al signor Pump, che un nascondiglio può essere coperto quando gli si è vicini; e tuttavia essere aperto e visibile da qualche punto d’osservazione lontano. Dal lato per cui vi si accostarono, l’improvviso incavo di sabbia, una specie di camera crollata nella brughiera, pareva coperto da una naturale curva di felce e di ginestra spinosa, e guizzava fuori dalla vista come una fata.

«Va tutto bene», gridò da sotto un pavimento o un tetto di foglie. «Ricorderai tutto quando sarai qui. Questo è il posto per cantare la tua canzone, Capitano. Dio mi benedica, Capitano, se non ricordo che cantavi quella canzone irlandese che componesti al collegio – muggendola come un toro di Basan – tutta su cuori e maniche o robe del genere – e sua signoria e il precettore non ne udirono un fiato, perché quel banco di sabbia spezza ogni cosa. Vale la pena saperle, queste cose, sai. È un peccato che non facciano parte dell’educazione di un giovane gentiluomo. Ora mi canterai la canzone in favore del non aver sentimenti, o come diavolo la chiami.»

Dalroy stava guardandosi attorno nella caverna dei suoi vecchi picnic, così dimenticata e così sorprendentemente familiare. Sembrava aver perduto ogni pensiero di cantare alcunché, e semplicemente brancolare nella buia casa della propria fanciullezza. C’era un lieve stillicidio da una naturale sorgente nell’arenaria proprio sotto le felci, ed egli ricordò che solevano provare a far bollire l’acqua in un bollitore. Ricordò un litigio su chi avesse rovesciato il bollitore che, nella morbosità del primo amore, gli aveva dato per giorni le torture dei dannati. Quando l’energico Pump irruppe ancora una volta attraverso il tetto piuttosto spinoso, per l’impulso di radunare gli altri loro eccentrici averi, Patrick ricordò una spina in un dito, che gli fece fermare il cuore con qualcosa che era dolore e perfetta musica. Quando Pump tornò con la botticella di rum e il formaggio e li fece rotolare con un calcio giù per il declivio sabbioso del buco, egli ricordò, con risa quasi iraconde, che ai vecchi tempi era rotolato giù per quel pendio lui stesso, e l’aveva creduta un’impresa piuttosto notevole. Si sentì allora come se stesse rotolando giù per un liscio fianco del Cervino. Osservò adesso che l’altezza era piuttosto minore di quella del secondo piano di uno di quei casolari striminziti che aveva notato al ritorno. Comprese d’un tratto di essere cresciuto; cresciuto in senso corporeo. Nutriva dubbi su ogni altro senso.

«Il Buco nel Cielo!» disse. «Che bel nome! Che buon poeta ero a quei tempi! Il Buco nel Cielo. Ma fa entrare, o fa uscire?»

Negli ultimi raggi orizzontali del sole calato la fantastica ombra del quadrupede dalle lunghe orecchie, che Pump aveva ora legato a un nuovo e più vicino pascolo, cadeva sull’ultimo lembo di sabbia illuminato dal sole. Dalroy guardò la lunga, esagerata ombra dell’asino; e rise di quella breve risata esplosiva che aveva emesso quando le porte degli harem erano state chiuse dopo la guerra turca. Era di norma un uomo fin troppo loquace; ma non spiegava mai quelle risate.

Humphrey Pump si tuffò di nuovo nel nido incassato, e cominciò a spillare la botte di rum secondo il suo segreto stile, dicendo: «Domani in qualche modo ci procureremo qualcos’altro. Per stanotte possiamo mangiare formaggio e bere rum, tanto più che c’è acqua alla spina, per così dire. E ora, Capitano, cantaci la Canzone Contro le Canzoni.»

Patrick Dalroy bevve un po’ di rum da un bicchierino da medicina che il generalmente imprevedibile signor Pump imprevedibilmente estrasse dal taschino del panciotto; ma il colorito di Patrick era salito, la fronte gli era quasi rossa come i capelli; ed era palesemente riluttante.

“I don’t see why I should sing all the songs,” he said. “Why the divil don’t you sing a song yourself? And now I come to think of it,” he cried, with an accumulating brogue, not, perhaps, wholly unaffected by the rum, which he had not, in fact, drunk for years, “and now I come to think of it, what about that song of yours? All me youth’s coming back in this blest and cursed place; and I remember that song of yours, that never existed nor ever will. Don’t ye remember now, Humphrey Pump, that night when I sang ye no less than seventeen songs of me own composition?”

“I remember it very well,” answered the Englishman, with restraint.

“And don’t ye remember,” went on the exhilarated Irishman, with solemnity, “that unless ye could produce a poetic lyric of your own, written and sung by yourself, I threatened to …”

“To sing again,” said the impenetrable Pump. “Yes, I know.”

He calmly proceeded to take out of his pockets, which were, alas, more like those of a poacher than an innkeeper, a folded and faded piece of paper.

“I wrote it when you asked me,” he said simply. “I have never tried to sing it. But I’ll sing it myself, when you’ve sung your song, against anybody singing at all.”

“All right,” cried the somewhat excited Captain, “to hear a song from you–why, I’ll sing anything. This is the Song Against Songs, Hump.”

And again he let his voice out like a bellow against the evening silence.

“The song of the sorrow of Melisande is a weary song and a dreary song,

The glory of Mariana’s grange had got into great decay,

The song of the Raven Never More has never been called a cheery song,

And the brightest things in Baudelaire are anything else but gay.

But who will write us a riding song,

Or a hunting song or a drinking song,

Fit for them that arose and rode,

When day and the wine were red?

But bring me a quart of claret out,

And I will write you a clinking song,

A song of war and a song of wine,

And a song to wake the dead.

“The song of the fury of Fragolette is a florid song and a torrid song,

The song of the sorrow of Tara is sung to a harp unstrung,

The song of the cheerful Shropshire Kid I consider a perfectly horrid song,

And the song of the happy Futurist is a song that can’t be sung.

But who will write us a riding song,

Or a fighting song or a drinking song,

Fit for the fathers of you and me,

That knew how to think and thrive?

But the song of Beauty and Art and Love

Is simply an utterly stinking song,

To double you up and drag you down,

And damn your soul alive.

“Take some more rum,” concluded the Irish officer, affably, “and let’s hear your song at last.”

With the gravity inseparable from the deep conventionality of country people, Mr. Pump unfolded the paper on which he had recorded the only antagonistic emotion that was strong enough in him to screw his infinite English tolerance to the pitch of song. He read out the title very carefully and in full.

“Song Against Grocers, by Humphrey Pump, sole proprietor of ‘The Old Ship,’ Pebblewick. Good Accommodation for Man and Beast. Celebrated as the House at which both Queen Charlotte and Jonathan Wilde put up on different occasions; and where the Ice-cream man was mistaken for Bonaparte. This song is written against Grocers.”

“God made the wicked Grocer,

For a mystery and a sign,

That men might shun the awful shops,

And go to inns to dine;

Where the bacon’s on the rafter

And the wine is in the wood,

And God that made good laughter

Has seen that they are good.

“The evil-hearted Grocer

Would call his mother ‘Ma’am,’

And bow at her and bob at her,

Her aged soul to damn;

And rub his horrid hands and ask,

What article was next;

Thoughmortis in articulo,

Should be her proper text.

“His props are not his children

But pert lads underpaid,

Who call out ‘Cash!’ and bang about,

To work his wicked trade;

He keeps a lady in a cage,

Most cruelly all day,

And makes her count and calls her ‘Miss,’

Until she fades away.

“The righteous minds of inn-keepers

Induce them now and then

To crack a bottle with a friend,

Or treat unmoneyed men;

But who hath seen the Grocer

Treat housemaids to his teas,

Or crack a bottle of fish-sauce,

Or stand a man a cheese?

“He sells us sands of Araby

As sugar for cash down,

He sweeps his shop and sells the dust,

The purest salt in town;

He crams with cans of poisoned meat

Poor subjects of the King,

And when they die by thousands

Why, he laughs like anything.

“The Wicked Grocer groces

In spirits and in wine,

Not frankly and in fellowship,

As men in inns do dine;

But packed with soap and sardines

And carried off by grooms,

For to be snatched by Duchesses,

And drunk in dressing-rooms.

“The hell-instructed Grocer

Has a temple made of tin,

And the ruin of good inn-keepers

Is loudly urged therein;

But now the sands are running out

From sugar of a sort,

The Grocer trembles; for his time

Just like his weight is short.”

Captain Dalroy was getting considerably heated with his nautical liquor, and his appreciation of Pump’s song was not merely noisy but active. He leapt to his feet and waved his glass. “Ye ought to be Poet Laureate, Hump–ye’re right, ye’re right; we’ll stand all this no longer!”

He dashed wildly up the sand slope and pointed with the sign-post towards the darkening shore, where the low shed of corrugated iron stood almost isolated.

“There’s your tin temple!” he said. “Let’s burn it!”

They were some way along the coast from the large watering-place of Pebblewick and between the gathering twilight and the rolling country it could not be clearly seen. Nothing was now in sight but the corrugated iron hall by the beach and three half-built red brick villas.

Dalroy appeared to regard the hall and the empty houses with great malevolence.

“Look at it!” he said. “Babylon!”

He brandished the inn-sign in the air like a banner, and began to stride towards the place, showering curses.

“In forty days,” he cried, “shall Pebblewick be destroyed. Dogs shall lap the blood of J. Leveson, Secretary, and Unicorns–”

“Come back Pat,” cried Humphrey, “you’ve had too much rum.”

“Lions shall howl in its high places,” vociferated the Captain.

“Donkeys will howl, anyhow,” said Pump. “But I suppose the other donkey must follow.”

And loading and untethering the quadruped, he began to lead him along.

«Non vedo perché dovrei cantare io tutte le canzoni», disse. «Perché diavolo non canti una canzone tu stesso? E ora che ci penso», gridò, con un accento irlandese sempre più marcato, forse non del tutto immune dall’effetto del rum, che in verità non beveva da anni, «e ora che ci penso, che ne è di quella canzone tua? Tutta la mia giovinezza mi torna in questo luogo benedetto e maledetto; e ricordo quella tua canzone, che non è mai esistita né mai esisterà. Non ricordi ora, Humphrey Pump, quella notte in cui ti cantai non meno di diciassette canzoni di mia propria composizione?»

«Lo ricordo assai bene», rispose l’inglese, con ritegno.

«E non ricordi», proseguì l’esilarato irlandese, con solennità, «che se non fossi stato capace di produrre una lirica poetica tutta tua, scritta e cantata da te stesso, minacciai di…»

«Di cantare ancora», disse l’impenetrabile Pump. «Sì, lo so.»

Con calma si mise a estrarre dalle tasche, che erano, ahimè, più simili a quelle di un bracconiere che di un locandiere, un foglio di carta piegato e sbiadito.

«La scrissi quando me lo chiedeste», disse semplicemente. «Non ho mai provato a cantarla. Ma la canterò io stesso, quando avrete cantato la vostra canzone, contro il fatto che chiunque canti.»

«Va bene», gridò il Capitano alquanto eccitato, «per udire una canzone da te – ebbene, canterò qualsiasi cosa. Questa è la Canzone Contro le Canzoni, Hump.»

E di nuovo lasciò uscire la voce come un muggito contro il silenzio serale.

«La canzone del dolore di Melisande è una canzone stanca e una canzone tetra,

La gloria della fattoria di Mariana era caduta in gran rovina,

La canzone del Corvo Mai Più non è mai stata detta una canzone gaia,

E le cose più luminose in Baudelaire sono tutto fuorché allegre.

Ma chi ci scriverà una canzone da cavallo,

O una canzone da caccia o una canzone da bevuta,

Degna di coloro che si levarono e cavalcarono,

Quando il giorno e il vino erano rossi?

Ma portatemi fuori un boccale di chiaretto,

E io vi scriverò una canzone tintinnante,

Una canzone di guerra e una canzone di vino,

E una canzone da destare i morti.

«La canzone della furia di Fragolette è una canzone florida e una canzone torrida,

La canzone del dolore di Tara si canta su un’arpa senza corde,

La canzone dell’allegro Ragazzo dello Shropshire la considero una canzone perfettamente orrida,

E la canzone del felice Futurista è una canzone che non si può cantare.

Ma chi ci scriverà una canzone da cavallo,

O una canzone da battaglia o una canzone da bevuta,

Degna dei padri tuoi e miei,

Che sapevano pensare e prosperare?

Ma la canzone della Bellezza e dell’Arte e dell’Amore

È semplicemente una canzone del tutto puzzolente,

Da piegarti in due e trascinarti giù,

E dannare la tua anima da viva.

«Prendi dell’altro rum», concluse l’ufficiale irlandese, affabilmente, «e udiamo finalmente la tua canzone.»

Con la gravità inseparabile dalla profonda convenzionalità della gente di campagna, il signor Pump spiegò il foglio su cui aveva registrato l’unica emozione avversa che fosse in lui abbastanza forte da spingere la sua infinita tolleranza inglese fino al diapason della canzone. Lesse il titolo con gran cura e per intero.

«Canzone Contro i Droghieri, di Humphrey Pump, unico proprietario della “Vecchia Nave”, Pebblewick. Buon Alloggio per l’Uomo e per la Bestia. Celebre come la Casa presso cui alloggiarono in diverse occasioni tanto la Regina Carlotta quanto Jonathan Wilde; e dove il gelataio fu scambiato per Bonaparte. Questa canzone è scritta contro i Droghieri.»

«Dio fece il malvagio Droghiere,

Per mistero e per segno,

Affinché gli uomini fuggissero le orribili botteghe,

E andassero a desinare nelle locande;

Dove il lardo pende dalla trave

E il vino sta nella botte,

E Dio che fece il buon riso

Ha veduto che son cose buone.

«Il Droghiere dal cuore malvagio

Chiamerebbe sua madre “Signora”,

E le si inchinerebbe e le farebbe riverenze,

Per dannarne la vecchia anima;

E si strofinerebbe le orribili mani e chiederebbe,

Quale articolo desiderasse poi;

Benché mortis in articulo,

Dovrebbe essere il suo giusto motto.

«I suoi sostegni non sono i suoi figli

Ma sfacciati garzoni malpagati,

Che gridano “Cassa!” e sbattono di qua e di là,

Per esercitare il suo malvagio traffico;

Tiene una signora in gabbia,

Con gran crudeltà tutto il giorno,

E la fa contare e la chiama “Signorina”,

Finché ella non si spegne.

«Gli animi giusti dei locandieri

Li inducono di quando in quando

A stappare una bottiglia con un amico,

O a offrire da bere a uomini senza denaro;

Ma chi ha mai veduto il Droghiere

Offrire i suoi tè alle domestiche,

O stappare una bottiglia di salsa di pesce,

O pagare a un uomo un formaggio?

«Ci vende sabbie d’Arabia

Come zucchero, a pronti contanti,

Spazza la bottega e ci vende la polvere,

Il sale più puro della città;

Rimpinza di scatole di carne avvelenata

I poveri sudditi del Re,

E quando muoiono a migliaia

Ebbene, ride a più non posso.

«Il Malvagio Droghiere droghiereggia

In liquori e in vino,

Non francamente e in buona compagnia,

Come gli uomini desinano nelle locande;

Ma stipato tra sapone e sardine

E portato via da staffieri,

Per essere ghermito da Duchesse,

E bevuto nei camerini.

«Il Droghiere istruito dall’inferno

Ha un tempio fatto di latta,

E la rovina dei buoni locandieri

Vi è ad alta voce perorata;

Ma ora la sabbia sta scorrendo via

Da uno zucchero d’un certo tipo,

Il Droghiere trema; poiché il suo tempo

Proprio come il suo peso, è scarso.»

Il Capitano Dalroy si stava considerevolmente riscaldando col suo liquore marinaresco, e il suo apprezzamento per la canzone di Pump non era soltanto rumoroso ma attivo. Balzò in piedi e agitò il bicchiere. «Dovresti essere Poeta Laureato, Hump… hai ragione, hai ragione; non sopporteremo più tutto questo!»

Si slanciò follemente su per il pendio di sabbia e indicò col palo dell’insegna verso la riva che si oscurava, dove la bassa tettoia di lamiera ondulata sorgeva quasi isolata.

«Ecco il tuo tempio di latta!» disse. «Bruciamolo!»

Si trovavano a una certa distanza lungo la costa dalla grande stazione balneare di Pebblewick e, tra il crepuscolo che si addensava e la campagna ondulata, non la si poteva scorgere con chiarezza. Nulla era ormai in vista tranne la sala di lamiera ondulata presso la spiaggia e tre villette di mattoni rossi a metà costruite.

Dalroy pareva guardare la sala e le case vuote con gran malevolenza.

«Guardala!» disse. «Babilonia!»

Brandì l’insegna della locanda in aria come uno stendardo, e cominciò a marciare a gran passi verso il luogo, scagliando maledizioni.

«Fra quaranta giorni», gridò, «Pebblewick sarà distrutta. I Cani lambiranno il sangue di J. Leveson, Segretario, e gli Unicorni…»

«Torna indietro, Pat», gridò Humphrey, «hai bevuto troppo rum.»

«I Leoni ululeranno nei suoi alti luoghi», vociferò il Capitano.

«Gli asini ululeranno, in ogni caso», disse Pump. «Ma suppongo che l’altro asino debba seguirci.»

E, caricando e slegando il quadrupede, cominciò a condurlo con sé.

CHAPTER VII: THE SOCIETY OF SIMPLE SOULS

UNDER sunset, at once softer and more sombre, under which the leaden sea took on a Lenten purple, a tint appropriate to tragedy, Lady Joan Brett was once more drifting moodily along the sea-front. The evening had been rainy and lowering; the watering-place season was nearly over; and she was almost alone on the shore; but she had fallen into the habit of restlessly pacing the place, and it seemed to satisfy some subconscious hunger in her rather mixed psychology. Through all her brooding her animal senses always remained abnormally active: she couldsmell the sea when it had ebbed almost to the horizon, and in the same way she heard, through every whisper of waves or wind, the swish or flutter of another woman’s skirt behind her. There is, she felt, something unmistakable about the movements of a lady who is generally very dignified and rather slow, and who happens to be in a hurry.

She turned to look at the lady who was thus hastening to overtake her; lifted her eyebrows a little and held out her hand. The interruption was known to her as Lady Enid Wimpole, cousin of Lord Ivywood; a tall and graceful lady who unbalanced her own elegance by a fashionable costume that was at once funereal and fantastic; her fair hair was pale but plentiful; her face was not only handsome and fastidious in the aquiline style, but when considered seriously was sensitive, modest, and even pathetic, but her wan blue eyes seemed slightly prominent, with that expression of cold eagerness that is seen in the eyes of ladies who ask questions at public meetings.

Joan Brett was herself, as she had said, a connection of the Ivywood family; but Lady Enid was Ivywood’s first cousin, and for all practical purposes his sister. For she kept house for him and his mother, who was now so incredibly old that she only survived to satisfy conventional opinion in the character of a speechless and uselesschaperon. And Ivywood was not the sort who would be likely to call out any activity in an old lady exercising that office. Nor, for that matter, was Lady Enid Wimpole; there seemed to shine on her face the same kind of inhuman, absent-minded common sense that shone on her cousin’s.

“Oh, I’m so glad I’ve caught you up,” she said to Joan. “Lady Ivywood wants youso much to come to us for the week-end or so, while Philip is still there. He always admired your sonnet on Cyprus so much, and he wants to talk to you about this policy of his in Turkey. Of course he’s awfully busy, but I shall be seeing him tonight after the meeting.”

“No living creature,” said Lady Joan, with a smile, “ever saw him except before or after a meeting.”

“Are you a Simple Soul?” asked Lady Enid, carelessly.

“Am I a simple soul?” asked Joan, drawing her black brows together. “Merciful Heavens, no! What can you mean?”

“Their meeting’s on tonight at the small Universal Hall, and Philip’s taking the chair,” explained the other lady. “He’s very annoyed that he has to leave early to get up to the House, but Mr. Leveson can take the chair for the last bit. They’ve got Misysra Ammon.”

“Got Mrs. Who?” asked Joan, in honest doubt.

“You make game of everything,” said Lady Enid, in cheerless amiability. “It’s the man everyone’s talking about–you know as well as I do. It’s really his influence that hasmade the Simple Souls.”

“Oh!” said Lady Joan Brett.

Then after a long silence, she added: “Who are the Simple Souls? I should be interested in them, if I could meet any.” And she turned her dark, brooding face on the darkening purple sea.

“Do you mean to say, my dear,” asked Lady Enid Wimpole, “that you haven’t met any of them yet?”

“No,” said Joan, looking at the last dark line of sea. “I never met but one simple soul in my life.”

“But you must come to the meeting!” cried Lady Enid, with frosty and sparkling gaiety. “You must come at once! Philip is certain to be eloquent on a subject like this, and of course Misysra Ammon isalways so wonderful.”

Without any very distinct idea of where she was going or why she was going there, Joan allowed herself to be piloted to a low lead or tin shed, beyond the last straggling hotels, out of the echoing shell of which she could prematurely hear a voice that she thought she recognised. When she came in Lord Ivywood was on his feet, in exquisite evening dress, but with a light overcoat thrown over the seat behind him. Beside him, in less tasteful but more obvious evening dress, was the little old man she had heard on the beach.

No one else was on the platform, but just under it, rather to Joan’s surprise, sat Miss Browning, her old typewriting friend in her old black dress, industriously taking down Lord Ivywood’s words in shorthand. A yard or two off, even more to her surprise, sat Miss Browning’s more domestic sister, also taking down the same words in shorthand.

“That is Misysra Ammon,” whispered Lady Enid, earnestly, pointing a delicate finger at the little old man beside the chairman.

“I know him,” said Joan. “Where’s the umbrella?”

“… at least evident,” Lord Ivywood was saying, “that one of those ancestral impossibilities is no longer impossible. The East and the West are one. The East is no longer East nor the West West; for a small isthmus has been broken, and the Atlantic and Pacific are a single sea. No man assuredly has done more of this mighty work of unity than the brilliant and distinguished philosopher to whom you will have the pleasure of listening tonight; and I profoundly wish that affairs more practical, for I will not call them more important, did not prevent my remaining to enjoy his eloquence, as I have so often enjoyed it before. Mr. Leveson has kindly consented to take my place, and I can do no more than express my deep sympathy with the aims and ideals which will be developed before you tonight. I have long been increasingly convinced that underneath a certain mask of stiffness which the Mahommedan religion has worn through certain centuries, as a somewhat similar mask has been worn by the religion of the Jews, Islam has in it the potentialities of being the most progressive of all religions; so that a century or two to come we may see the cause of peace, of science and of reform everywhere supported by Islam as it is everywhere supported by Israel. Not in vain, I think, is the symbol of that faith the Crescent, the growing thing. While other creeds carry emblems implying more or less of finality, for this great creed of hope its very imperfection is its pride, and men shall walk fearlessly in new and wonderful paths, following the increasing curve which contains and holds up before them the eternal promises of the orb.”

CAPITOLO VII: LA SOCIETÀ DELLE ANIME SEMPLICI

Sotto un tramonto insieme più tenue e più cupo, sotto il quale il mare plumbeo assumeva un purpureo quaresimale, tinta consona alla tragedia, Lady Joan Brett vagava di nuovo tetra lungo il lungomare. La serata era stata piovosa e minacciosa; la stagione balneare era quasi finita; ed ella era quasi sola sulla riva; ma aveva preso l’abitudine di percorrere il luogo con passo inquieto, e ciò pareva saziare una qualche fame subconscia nella sua psicologia piuttosto composita. Attraverso tutto il suo rimuginare i suoi sensi animali restavano sempre anormalmente vigili: fiutava il mare anche quando si era ritirato quasi all’orizzonte, e allo stesso modo udiva, attraverso ogni sussurro di onde o di vento, il fruscìo o lo svolazzo della gonna di un’altra donna dietro di lei. C’è, sentiva, qualcosa di inconfondibile nei movimenti di una signora generalmente molto dignitosa e piuttosto lenta, che si trovi ad avere fretta.

Si voltò a guardare la signora che così s’affrettava a raggiungerla; inarcò un poco le sopracciglia e le porse la mano. L’importuna le era nota come Lady Enid Wimpole, cugina di Lord Ivywood; una signora alta e aggraziata che squilibrava la propria eleganza con un abbigliamento alla moda insieme funereo e stravagante; i suoi capelli biondi erano pallidi ma folti; il volto non solo era bello e delicato nello stile aquilino, ma, considerato seriamente, era sensibile, modesto e persino patetico; tuttavia i suoi smorti occhi azzurri parevano lievemente sporgenti, con quell’espressione di fredda avidità che si vede negli occhi delle signore che pongono domande alle assemblee pubbliche.

Joan Brett era ella stessa, come aveva detto, imparentata con la famiglia Ivywood; ma Lady Enid era cugina di primo grado di Ivywood, e a tutti gli effetti pratici sua sorella. Poiché teneva la casa per lui e per sua madre, ormai così incredibilmente vecchia che sopravviveva solo per soddisfare l’opinione convenzionale nel ruolo di muta e inutile dama di compagnia. E Ivywood non era il tipo capace di suscitare qualche attività in una vecchia signora che esercitasse quell’ufficio. Né, se è per questo, lo era Lady Enid Wimpole; pareva risplendere sul suo volto la stessa specie di buon senso inumano e distratto che risplendeva su quello del cugino.

«Oh, sono così contenta d’averti raggiunta,» disse a Joan. «Lady Ivywood desidera tanto che tu venga da noi per il fine settimana o giù di lì, finché Philip è ancora qui. Ha sempre ammirato moltissimo il tuo sonetto su Cipro, e vuole parlarti di questa sua politica in Turchia. Naturalmente è terribilmente occupato, ma lo vedrò stasera dopo l’adunanza.»

«Nessuna creatura vivente,» disse Lady Joan, con un sorriso, «lo ha mai visto se non prima o dopo un’adunanza.»

«Sei un’Anima Semplice?» chiese Lady Enid, con noncuranza.

«Se sono un’anima semplice?» chiese Joan, aggrottando le nere sopracciglia. «Cielo misericordioso, no! Che cosa vuoi dire?»

«La loro adunanza è stasera al piccolo Universal Hall, e Philip la presiede,» spiegò l’altra signora. «È molto seccato di doversene andare presto per correre alla Camera, ma il signor Leveson può presiedere l’ultima parte. Hanno con loro Misysra Ammon.»

«Hanno la signora chi?» chiese Joan, in onesto dubbio.

«Fai la beffa di tutto,» disse Lady Enid, con squallida amabilità. «È l’uomo di cui tutti parlano—lo sai bene quanto me. È davvero la sua influenza ad aver creato le Anime Semplici.»

«Oh!» disse Lady Joan Brett.

Poi, dopo un lungo silenzio, aggiunse: «Chi sono le Anime Semplici? M’interesserebbero, se solo potessi incontrarne qualcuna.» E volse il volto scuro e pensoso verso il mare purpureo che si oscurava.

«Vuoi forse dire, mia cara,» chiese Lady Enid Wimpole, «che non ne hai ancora incontrata nessuna?»

«No,» disse Joan, guardando l’ultima scura linea del mare. «In vita mia non ho mai incontrato che una sola anima semplice.»

«Ma devi venire all’adunanza!» esclamò Lady Enid, con gelida e scintillante allegria. «Devi venire subito! Philip sarà certo eloquente su un argomento simile, e naturalmente Misysra Ammon è sempre così meraviglioso.»

Senza un’idea molto chiara di dove andasse o perché vi andasse, Joan si lasciò condurre a un basso capannone di piombo o di latta, oltre gli ultimi alberghi sparpagliati, dal cui guscio riecheggiante poté udire in anticipo una voce che le parve di riconoscere. Quando entrò, Lord Ivywood era in piedi, in squisito abito da sera, ma con un leggero soprabito gettato sul sedile dietro di lui. Accanto a lui, in un abito da sera meno raffinato ma più vistoso, c’era il piccolo vecchio che aveva udito sulla spiaggia.

Nessun altro era sul palco, ma proprio sotto di esso, con una certa sorpresa di Joan, sedeva Miss Browning, la sua vecchia amica dattilografa nel suo vecchio abito nero, che trascriveva industriosamente in stenografia le parole di Lord Ivywood. A un metro o due di distanza, con sua ancor maggiore sorpresa, sedeva la sorella più casalinga di Miss Browning, che pure trascriveva in stenografia le medesime parole.

«Quello è Misysra Ammon,» sussurrò Lady Enid, con fervore, puntando un dito delicato verso il piccolo vecchio accanto al presidente.

«Lo conosco,» disse Joan. «Dov’è l’ombrello?»

«…almeno evidente,» stava dicendo Lord Ivywood, «che una di quelle impossibilità ancestrali non è più impossibile. L’Oriente e l’Occidente sono una cosa sola. L’Oriente non è più Oriente né l’Occidente Occidente; poiché un piccolo istmo è stato spezzato, e l’Atlantico e il Pacifico sono un unico mare. Nessuno di certo ha fatto più di questa possente opera di unità del brillante e illustre filosofo che avrete il piacere di ascoltare stasera; e desidero profondamente che affari più pratici, per non dirli più importanti, non m’impedissero di restare a godere della sua eloquenza, come tante volte ne ho goduto in passato. Il signor Leveson ha cortesemente acconsentito a prendere il mio posto, e io non posso far altro che esprimere la mia profonda simpatia per gli scopi e gli ideali che stasera saranno svolti dinanzi a voi. Da lungo tempo sono sempre più convinto che, sotto una certa maschera di rigidità che la religione maomettana ha indossato attraverso certi secoli, come una maschera in qualche modo simile è stata indossata dalla religione degli ebrei, l’Islam racchiuda in sé le potenzialità di essere la più progressista di tutte le religioni; sicché tra un secolo o due potremo vedere la causa della pace, della scienza e della riforma ovunque sostenuta dall’Islam come è ovunque sostenuta da Israele. Non invano, credo, il simbolo di quella fede è la Mezzaluna, la cosa che cresce. Mentre altri credi recano emblemi che implicano più o meno una finalità, per questo grande credo della speranza la sua stessa imperfezione è il suo orgoglio, e gli uomini cammineranno senza timore per sentieri nuovi e meravigliosi, seguendo la curva crescente che contiene e regge dinanzi a loro le eterne promesse dell’astro.»

It was characteristic of Lord Ivywood that, though he was really in a hurry, he sat down slowly and gravely amid the outburst of applause. The quiet resumption of the speaker’s seat, like the applause itself, was an artistic part of the peroration. When the last clap or stamp had subsided, he sprang up alertly, his light great-coat over his arm, shook hands with the lecturer, bowed to the audience and slid quickly out of the hall. Mr. Leveson, the swarthy young man with the drooping double-eyeglass rather bashfully to the front, took the empty seat on the platform, and in a few words presented the eminent Turkish mystic Misysra Ammon, sometimes called the Prophet of the Moon.

Lady Joan found the Prophet’s English accent somewhat improved by good society, but he still elongated the letter “u” in the same bleating manner, and his remarks had exactly the same rabidly wrong-headed ingenuity as his lecture upon English inns. It appeared that he was speaking on the higher Polygamy; but he began with a sort of general defence of the Moslem civilisation, especially against the charge of sterility and worldly ineffectiveness.

“It iss joost in the practical tings,” he was saying, “it iss joost in the practical tings, if you could come to consider them in a manner quite equal, that our methods are better than your methods. My ancestors invented the curved swords, because one cuts better with a curved sword. Your ancestors possessed the straight swords out of some romantic fancy of being what you call straight; or, I will take a more plain example, of which I have myself experience. When I first had the honour of meeting Lord Ivywood, I was unused to your various ceremonies and had a little difficulty, joost a little difficulty, in entering Mr. Claridge’s hotel, where his lordship had invited me. A servant of the hotel was standing joost beside me on the doorstep. I stoo-ooped down to take off my boo-oots, and he asked me what I was dooing. I said to him: ‘My friend, I am taking off my boo-oots.’”

A smothered sound came from Lady Joan Brett, but the lecturer did not notice it and went on with a beautiful simplicity.

“I told him that in my country, when showing respect for any spot, we do not take off our hats; we take off our boo-oots. And because I would keep on my hat and take off my boo-oots, he suggested to me that I had been afflicted by Allah, in the head. Now was not that foony?”

“Very,” said Lady Joan, inside her handkerchief, for she was choking with laughter. Something like a faint smile passed over the earnest faces of the two or three most intelligent of the Simple Souls, but for the most part the Souls seemed very simple indeed, helpless looking people with limp hair and gowns like green curtains, and their dry faces were as dry as ever.

“But I explained to him. I explained to him for a long time, for a carefully occupied time, that it was more practical, more business-like, more altogether for utility, to take off the boo-oots than to remove the hat. ‘Let us,’ I said to him, ‘consider what many complaints are made against the footwear, what few complaints against the headwear. You complain if in your drawing-rooms is the marching about of muddy boo-oots. Are any of your drawing-rooms marked thus with the marching about of muddy hats? How very many of your husbands kick you with the boo-oot! Yet how few of your husbands on any occasion butt you with the hat?’”

He looked round with a radiant seriousness, which made Lady Joan almost as speechless for sympathy as she was for amusement. With all that was most sound in his too complicated soul she realised the presence of a man really convinced.

“The man on the doorstep, he would not listen to me,” went on Misysra Ammon, pathetically. “He said there would be a crowd if I stood on the doorstep, holding in my hand my boo-oots. Well, I do not know why, in your country you always send the young males to be the first of your crowds. They certainly were making a number of noises, the young males.”

Lady Joan Brett stood up suddenly and displayed enormous interest in the rest of the audience in the back parts of the hall. She felt that if she looked for one moment more at the serious face with the Jewish nose and the Persian beard, she would publicly disgrace herself; or, what was quite as bad (for she was the generous sort of aristocrat) publicly insult the lecturer. She had a feeling that the sight of all the Simple Souls in bulk might have a soothing effect. It had. It had what might have been mistaken for a depressing effect. Lady Joan resumed her seat with a controlled countenance.

“Now, why,” asked the Eastern philosopher, “do I tell so simple a little story of your London streets–a thing happening any day? The little mistake had no preju-udicial effect. Lord Ivywood came out, at the end. He made no attempt to explain the true view of so important matters to Mr. Claridge’s servant, though Mr. Claridge’s servant remained on the doorstep. But he commanded Mr. Claridge’s servant to restore to me one of my boo-oots, which had fallen down the front steps, while I was explaining this harmlessness of the hat in the home. So all was, for me, very well. But why do I tell such little tales?”

He spread out his hands again, in his fanlike eastern style. Then he clapped them together, so suddenly that Joan jumped, and looked instinctively for the entrance of five hundred negro slaves, laden with jewels. But it was only his emphatic gesture of eloquence. He went on with an excited thickening of the accent.

“Because, my friends, this is the best example I could give of the wrong and slanderous character of the charge that we fail in our domesticities. That we fail especially in our treatment of the womankind. I appeal to any lady, to any Christian lady. Is not the boo-oot more devastating, more dreaded in the home than the hat? The boot jumps, he bound, he run about, he break things, he leave on the carpet the earths of the garden. The hat, he remain quiet on his hat-peg. Look at him on his hat-peg; how quiet and good he remain! Why not let him remain quiet also on his head?”

Era caratteristico di Lord Ivywood che, sebbene fosse davvero di fretta, si sedette lentamente e con gravità in mezzo all’esplosione di applausi. La tranquilla ripresa del posto dell’oratore, come l’applauso stesso, era una parte artistica della perorazione. Quando l’ultimo battito di mani o colpo di tosse si fu placato, saltò su con prontezza, il suo leggero pastrano sul braccio, strinse la mano al conferenziere, fece un inchino al pubblico e scivolò rapidamente fuori dalla sala. Il signor Leveson, il giovane uomo scuro con gli occhiali a doppia montatura che pendeva piuttosto timidamente in avanti, prese il posto vuoto sul palco e in poche parole presentò l’eminente mistico turco Misysra Ammon, talvolta chiamato il Profeta della Luna.

La signora Joan trovò l’accento inglese del Profeta un po’ migliorato dalla buona società, ma egli continuava a prolungare la lettera “u” nello stesso modo belante e le sue osservazioni avevano esattamente la stessa ingegnosità ostinatamente sbagliata della sua conferenza sugli alberghi inglesi. Sembrava che stesse parlando di poligamia superiore; ma iniziò con una sorta di difesa generale della civiltà musulmana, specialmente contro l’accusa di sterilità e inefficacia mondana.

“È proprio nelle cose pratiche”, diceva lui, “è proprio nelle cose pratiche che se le si potesse considerare in modo del tutto uguale, i nostri metodi sono migliori dei vostri. I miei antenati inventarono le spade curve perché con una spada curva si taglia meglio. Voi avete ereditato le spade dritte per qualche romantica fantasia di essere quello che voi chiamate diritti; oppure, prendiamo un esempio più semplice, su cui ho esperienza personale. Quando ebbi l’onore di incontrare Lord Ivywood, non ero abituato alle vostre varie cerimonie e trovai una certa difficoltà, solo una piccola difficoltà, a entrare nell’albergo Claridge dove sua signoria mi aveva invitato. Un servitore dell’albergo stava proprio accanto a me sulla soglia. Mi chinai per togliermi gli stivali e lui mi chiese cosa stessi facendo. Gli risposi: ‘Amico mio, sto togliendomi gli stivali.’”

Un suono soffocato provenne da lady Joan Brett, ma il conferenziere non lo notò e continuò con una bella semplicità.

«Gli ho detto che nel mio paese, quando si vuole dimostrare rispetto per un luogo, non ci togliamo il cappello; ci togliamo gli sti-vali. E poiché io avrei continuato a tenere il cappello e a togliermi gli sti-vali, lui mi ha suggerito che Allah mi aveva colpito alla testa. Non era divertente?»

«Molto», disse Lady Joan dietro il fazzoletto, perché stava soffocando dalle risate. Qualcosa come un pallido sorriso attraversò i volti seri dei due o tre più intelligenti tra le Anime Semplici, ma per lo più le Anime sembravano davvero molto semplici, persone dall’aria indifesa con capelli lisci e vestiti simili a tende verdi, e i loro volti secchi erano ancora più secchi di prima.

“Ma glielo ho spiegato. Gliel’ho spiegato per un lungo periodo, per un periodo attentamente occupato, che era più pratico, più commerciale, più utile in assoluto togliersi gli stivali piuttosto che il cappello. ‘Pensiamo’, gli ho detto, ‘a quante lamentele ci sono contro le calzature e a quante poche ce ne sono contro i copricapo. Ti lamenti se nei tuoi salotti si cammina con gli stivali pieni di fango. Ma c’è forse qualcuno dei tuoi salotti che è segnato dal fatto che ci si cammina con i cappelli pieni di fango? Quanti mariti ti calpestano con gli stivali! Eppure, quanti pochi mariti in qualche occasione ti danno una botta in testa col cappello?’”

Si guardò intorno con un’aria di serietà radiosa che rese Lady Joan quasi muta per la simpatia, come lo era per il divertimento. Con tutto ciò che c’era di più sano nella sua troppo complicata anima, si rese conto della presenza di un uomo veramente convinto.

“L’uomo sulla porta non mi ha voluto ascoltare”, continuò Misysra Ammon con voce patetica, “ha detto che ci sarebbe stata una folla se fossi rimasto sulla porta tenendo in mano i miei stivali. Beh, non so perché nel vostro paese mandate sempre i giovani maschi a fare da apripista alle vostre folle. Di certo facevano un sacco di rumore, quei giovani maschi.”

Lady Joan Brett si alzò improvvisamente e mostrò un enorme interesse per il resto del pubblico nelle parti posteriori della sala. Sentiva che se avesse guardato ancora per un momento quel volto serio con il naso ebraico e la barba persiana, si sarebbe umiliata pubblicamente; o, cosa altrettanto grave (perché era il tipo di aristocratica generosa), avrebbe insultato pubblicamente il conferenziere. Pensò che la vista di tutte quelle Anime Semplici in massa potesse avere un effetto calmante. Lo ebbe. Ebbe quello che si sarebbe potuto scambiare per un effetto deprimente. Lady Joan riprese posto con un’espressione controllata.

“Ora, perché”, chiese il filosofo orientale, “racconto una storia così semplice delle vostre strade di Londra - qualcosa che succede tutti i giorni? L’errore non ebbe alcun effetto pregiudizievole. Lord Ivywood alla fine uscì. Non fece nessun tentativo di spiegare la vera opinione su questioni così importanti al servo del signor Claridge, anche se il servo del signor Claridge rimase sulla soglia della porta. Ma ordinò al servo del signor Claridge di restituirmi uno dei miei stivali, che era caduto giù per i gradini d’ingresso mentre spiegavo questa innocuità del cappello nella casa. Così tutto andò, per me, molto bene. Ma perché racconto queste piccole storie?”

Di nuovo spalancò le mani in quel suo gesto orientale a ventaglio. Poi si batté le palme insieme così all’improvviso che Giovanna sobbalzò e istintivamente cercò con gli occhi l’ingresso di cinquecento schiavi neri carichi di gioielli. Ma era solo il suo enfatico gesto oratorio. Continuò con un ispessirsi dell’accento, eccitato.

«Perché, miei amici, questo è il miglior esempio che potrei dare del carattere errato e calunnioso dell’accusa di fallire nelle nostre faccende domestiche. Che falliamo specialmente nel nostro trattamento delle donne. Mi appello a qualsiasi signora, a qualsiasi signora cristiana. Non è forse lo sti-ivale più devastante, più temuto in casa rispetto al cappello? Lo stivale salta, si agita, corre in giro, rompe le cose, lascia sul tappeto la terra del giardino. Il cappello rimane tranquillo sul suo appendiabiti. Guardatelo sul suo appendiabiti; quanto è tranquillo e buono! Perché non lasciarlo tranquillo anche sulla sua testa?»

Lady Joan applauded warmly, as did several other ladies, and the sage went on, encouraged.

“Can you not therefore trust, dear ladies, this great religion to understand you concerning other things, as it understands you regarding boo-oots? What is the common objection our worthy enemies make against our polygamy? That it is disdainful of the womanhood. But how can this be so, my friends, when it allows the womanhood to be present in so large numbers? When in your House of Commons you put a hundred English members and joost one little Welsh member, you do not say ‘The Welshman is on top; he is our Sultan; may he live for ever!’ If your jury contained eleven great large ladies and one leetle man you would not say ‘this is unfair to the great large ladies.’ Why should you shrink, then, ladies, from this great polygamical experiment which Lord Ivywood himself–”

Joan’s dark eyes were still fixed on the wrinkled, patient face of the lecturer, but every word of the rest of the lecture was lost to her. Under her glowing Spanish tint she had turned pale with extraordinary emotions, but she did not stir a hair.

The door of the hall stood open, and occasional sounds came even from that deserted end of the town. Two men seemed to be passing along the distant parade; one of them was singing. It was common enough for workmen to sing going home at night, and the voice, though a loud one, would have been too far off for Joan to hear the words. Only Joan happened to know the words. She could almost see them before her, written in a round swaggering hand on the pink page of an old school-girl album at home. She knew the words and the voice.

“I come from Castlepatrick and my heart is on my sleeve,

And any sword or pistol boy can hit ut with me leave,

It shines there for an epaulette, as golden as a flame,

As naked as me ancestors, as noble as me name.

For I come from Castlepatrick and my heart is on my sleeve,

But a lady stole it from me on St. Gallowglass’s Eve.”

Startlingly and with strong pain there sprang up before Joan’s eyes a patch of broken heath with a very deep hollow of white sand, blinding in the sun. No words, no name, only the place.

“The folks that live in Liverpool, their heart is in their boots;

They go to Hell like lambs, they do, because the hooter hoots.

Where men may not be dancin’, though the wheels may dance all day;

And men may not be smokin’, but only chimneys may.

But I come from Castlepatrick and my heart is on my sleeve,

But a lady stole it from me on St. Poleyander’s Eve.

“The folks that live in black Belfast, their heart is in their mouth;

They see us making murders in the meadows of the South;

They think a plough’s a rack they do, and cattle-calls are creeds,

And they think we’re burnin’ witches when we’re only burnin’ weeds.

But I come from Castlepatrick, and me heart is on me sleeve;

But a lady stole it from me on St. Barnabas’s Eve.”

The voice had stopped suddenly, but the last lines were so much more distinct that it was certain the singer had come nearer, and was not marching away.

It was only after all this, and through a sort of cloud, that Lady Joan heard the indomitable Oriental bringing his whole eloquent address to a conclusion.

“… And if you do not refu-use the sun that returns and rises in the East with every morning, you will not refu-use either this great social experiment, this great polygamical method which also arose out of the East, and always returns. For this is that Higher Polygamy which always comes, like the sun itself, out of the orient, but is only at its noontide splendour when the sun is high in heaven.”

She was but vaguely conscious of Mr. Leveson, the man with the dark face and the eyeglasses, acknowledging the entrancing lecture in suitable terms, and calling on any of the Simple Souls who might have questions to ask, to ask them. It was only when the Simple Souls had displayed their simplicity with the usual parade of well-bred reluctance and fussy self-effacement, that anyone addressed the chair. And it was only after somebody had been addressing the chair for some time that Joan gradually awoke to the fact that the address was somewhat unusual.

Lady Joan applaudì calorosamente, come fecero diverse altre dame, e il saggio proseguì, incoraggiato.

«Non potete dunque fidarvi, care dame, che questa grande religione vi comprenda riguardo ad altre cose, così come vi comprende riguardo agli sti-ivali? Qual è la comune obiezione che i nostri degni nemici muovono contro la nostra poligamia? Che essa disprezza la femminilità. Ma come può essere così, amici miei, quando essa permette alla femminilità di essere presente in così gran numero? Quando nella vostra Camera dei Comuni mettete cento membri inglesi e sohltanto un piccolo membro gallese, non dite “Il gallese sta in cima; è il nostro Sultano; possa vivere in eterno!” Se la vostra giuria contenesse undici grandi e grosse dame e un ometto piccino, non direste “questo è ingiusto verso le grandi e grosse dame.” Perché dovreste allora ritrarvi, dame, da questo grande esperimento poligamico che Lord Ivywood stesso—»

Gli occhi scuri di Joan erano ancora fissi sul volto rugoso e paziente del conferenziere, ma ogni parola del resto della conferenza andò perduta per lei. Sotto il suo acceso incarnato spagnolo era impallidita per emozioni straordinarie, ma non mosse un capello.

La porta della sala era aperta, e suoni occasionali giungevano perfino da quell’estremità deserta della città. Due uomini sembravano passare lungo il lontano lungomare; uno di loro cantava. Era cosa abbastanza comune che gli operai cantassero tornando a casa di notte, e la voce, per quanto forte, sarebbe stata troppo lontana perché Joan potesse udire le parole. Solo che Joan per caso conosceva quelle parole. Poteva quasi vederle davanti a sé, scritte in una tonda grafia spavalda sulla pagina rosa di un vecchio album di collegiale a casa. Conosceva le parole e la voce.

«Vengo da Castlepatrick e il mio cuore è sulla manica,

E qualunque ragazzo con spada o pistola può colpirlo col mio consenso,

Vi brilla come una spallina, dorato come una fiamma,

Nudo come i miei antenati, nobile come il mio nome.

Ché vengo da Castlepatrick e il mio cuore è sulla manica,

Ma una dama me lo rubò la vigilia di San Gallowglass.»

Di soprassalto e con acuto dolore sorse davanti agli occhi di Joan un lembo di brughiera scoscesa con un incavo profondissimo di sabbia bianca, accecante al sole. Nessuna parola, nessun nome, solo il luogo.

«La gente che vive a Liverpool ha il cuore negli stivali;

Vanno all’Inferno come agnelli, sì, perché la sirena fischia.

Dove agli uomini non è concesso ballare, benché le ruote possano danzare tutto il giorno;

E agli uomini non è concesso fumare, ma solo ai camini.

Ma io vengo da Castlepatrick e il mio cuore è sulla manica,

Ma una dama me lo rubò la vigilia di San Poleyander.

«La gente che vive nella nera Belfast ha il cuore in gola;

Ci vedono commettere omicidi nei prati del Sud;

Credono che un aratro sia una ruota di tortura, e i richiami del bestiame dei credi,

E credono che bruciamo streghe quando bruciamo solo erbacce.

Ma io vengo da Castlepatrick, e il mio cuore è sulla manica;

Ma una dama me lo rubò la vigilia di San Barnaba.»

La voce si era interrotta di colpo, ma gli ultimi versi erano tanto più distinti che era certo che il cantore si fosse avvicinato, e non stesse andando via.

Fu solo dopo tutto questo, e come attraverso una sorta di nube, che Lady Joan udì l’indomito Orientale condurre a conclusione tutto il suo eloquente discorso.

«… E se non rifiu-utate il sole che ritorna e sorge a Oriente ogni mattina, non rifiu-uterete nemmeno questo grande esperimento sociale, questo grande metodo poligamico che pure sorse dall’Oriente, e sempre ritorna. Poiché questa è quella Poligamia Superiore che sempre viene, come il sole stesso, dall’oriente, ma è nel suo splendore meridiano soltanto quando il sole è alto nel cielo.»

Ella era solo vagamente consapevole del signor Leveson, l’uomo dal volto scuro e dagli occhiali, che ringraziava dell’incantevole conferenza in termini appropriati, e invitava chiunque tra le Anime Semplici avesse domande da porre a porle. Fu solo quando le Anime Semplici ebbero esibito la loro semplicità con la consueta sfilata di ben educata riluttanza e di premurosa auto-cancellazione, che qualcuno si rivolse al presidente. E fu solo dopo che qualcuno si era rivolto al presidente per qualche tempo che Joan si accorse a poco a poco che l’intervento era alquanto insolito.

CHAPTER VIII: VOX POPULI VOX DEI

“I AM sure,” Mr. Leveson, the Secretary, had said, with a somewhat constrained smile, “that after the eloquent and epoch-making speech to which we have listened there will be some questions asked, and we hope to have a debate afterwards. I am sure somebody will ask a question.” Then he looked interrogatively at one weary looking gentleman in the fourth row and said, “Mr. Hinch?”

Mr. Hinch shook his head with a pallid passion of refusal, wonderful to watch, and said, “I couldn’t! I really couldn’t!”

“We should be very pleased,” said Mr. Leveson, “if any lady would ask a question.”

In the silence that followed it was somehow psychologically borne in on the whole audience that one particular great large lady (as the lecturer would say) sitting at the end of the second row was expected to ask a question. Her own wax-work immobility was witness both to the expectation and its disappointment. “Are there any other questions?” asked Mr. Leveson –as if there had been any yet. He seemed to speak with a slight air of relief.

There was a sort of stir at the back of the hall and half way down one side of it. Choked whispers could be heard of “Now then, Garge!”–“Go it Garge! Is there any questions! Gor!”

Mr. Leveson looked up with an alertness somewhat akin to alarm. He realised for the first time that a few quite common men in coarse, unclean clothes, had somehow strolled in through the open door. They were not true rustics, but the semi-rustic labourers that linger about the limits of the large watering-places. There was no “Mr.” among them. There was a general tendency to call everybody George.

Mr. Leveson saw the situation and yielded to it. He modelled himself on Lord Ivywood and did much what he would have done in all cases, but with a timidity Lord Ivywood would not have shown. And the same social training that made him ashamed to be with such men, made him ashamed to own his shame. The same modern spirit that taught him to loathe such rags, also taught him to lie about his loathing.

“I am sure we should be very glad,” he said, nervously, “if any friends from outside care to join in our inquiry. Of course, we’re all Democrats,” and he looked round at the grand ladies with a ghastly smile, “and believe in the Voice of the People and so on. If our friend at the back of the hall will put his question briefly, we need not insist, I think, on his putting it in writing?”

There were renewed hoarse encouragements to George (that rightly christened champion) and he wavered forward on legs tied in the middle with string. He did not appear to have had any seat since his arrival, and made his remarks standing half way down what we may call the central aisle.

“Well, I want to ask the proprietor,” he began.

“Questions,” said Mr. Leveson, swiftly seizing a chance for that construction of debate which is the main business of a modern chairman, “must be asked of the chair, if they are points of order. If they concern the address, they should be asked of the lecturer.”

“Well, I ask the lecturer,” said the patient Garge, “whether it ain’t right that when you ’ave the thing outside you should ’ave the thing inside.” (Hoarse applause at the back.)

Mr. Leveson was evidently puzzled and already suspicious that something was quite wrong. But the enthusiasm of the Prophet of the Moon sprang up instantly at any sort of question and swept the Chairman along with it.

“But it iss the essence of our who-ole message,” he cried, spreading out his arms to embrace the world, “that the outer manifestation should be one with the inner manifestation. My friendss, it iss this very tru-uth our friend has stated, that iss responsible for our apparent lack of symbolism in Islam! We appear to neglect the symbol because we insist on the satisfactory symbol. My friend in the middle will walk round all our mosques and say loudly, ‘Where is the statue of Allah?’ But can my friend in the middle really execute a complete and generally approved statue of Allah?”

Misysra Ammon sat down greatly satisfied with his answer, but it was doubted by many whether, he had conveyed the satisfaction to his friend in the middle. That seeker after truth wiped his mouth with the back of his hand with an unsatisfied air and said:

“No offence, sir. But ain’t it the Law, sir, that if you ’ave that outside we’re all right? I came in ’ere as natural as could be. But Gorlumme, I never see a place like this afore.” (Hoarse laughter behind.)

“No apology is needed, my friend,” cried the Eastern sage, eagerly, “I can conceive you are not perhaps du-uly conversant with such schools of truth. But the Law is All. The Law is Allah. The inmost u-unity of–”

“Well, ain’t it the Law?” repeated the dogged George, and every time he mentioned the Law the poor men who are its chief victims applauded loudly. “I’m not one to make a fuss. I never was one to make a fuss. I’m a law-abidin’ man, I am. (More applause.) Ain’t it the Law that if so be such is your sign and such is your profession, you ought to serve us?”

“I fear I not quite follow,” cried the eager Turk. “I ought?”

“To serve us,” shouted a throng of thick voices from the back of the hall, which was already much more crowded than before.

“Serve you!” cried Misysra, leaping up like a spring released, “The Holy Prophet came from Heaven to serve you! The virtue and valour of a thousand years, my friends, has had no hunger but to serve you! We are of all faiths, the most the faith of service. Our highest prophet is no more than the servant of God, as I am, as you all are. Even for our symbol we choose a satellite, and honour the Moon because it only serves the Earth, and does not pretend to be the Sun.”

“I’m sure,” cried Mr. Leveson, jumping up with a tactful grin, “that the lecturer has answered this last point in a most eloquent and effective way, and the motor cars are waiting for some of the ladies who have come from some distance, and I really think the proceedings–”

CAPITOLO VIII: VOX POPULI VOX DEI

«Sono certo,» aveva detto il signor Leveson, il Segretario, con un sorriso alquanto forzato, «che dopo l’eloquente discorso epocale che abbiamo ascoltato verranno poste alcune domande, e speriamo di avere poi un dibattito. Sono certo che qualcuno porrà una domanda.» Poi guardò interrogativamente un signore dall’aria stanca nella quarta fila e disse: «Signor Hinch?»

Il signor Hinch scosse il capo con una pallida passione di rifiuto, mirabile a vedersi, e disse: «Non potrei! Davvero non potrei!»

«Saremmo assai lieti,» disse il signor Leveson, «se qualche dama volesse porre una domanda.»

Nel silenzio che seguì si impresse in qualche modo, psicologicamente, in tutto l’uditorio la sensazione che una certa grande e grossa dama (come avrebbe detto il conferenziere) seduta in fondo alla seconda fila fosse attesa a porre una domanda. La sua stessa immobilità da figura di cera testimoniava sia l’attesa sia la sua delusione. «Ci sono altre domande?» chiese il signor Leveson—come se ve ne fosse stata alcuna finora. Sembrava parlare con una lieve aria di sollievo.

Vi fu una sorta di agitazione in fondo alla sala e a metà di uno dei suoi lati. Si udivano bisbigli soffocati: «Su, Garge!»—«Dài, Garge! C’è qualche domanda! Gor!»

Il signor Leveson alzò lo sguardo con una prontezza affine all’allarme. Si rese conto per la prima volta che alcuni uomini assai comuni, in abiti rozzi e sudici, erano in qualche modo entrati passeggiando dalla porta aperta. Non erano veri campagnoli, ma quei braccianti semi-campagnoli che gironzolano ai margini delle grandi stazioni balneari. Fra loro non c’era alcun «signore». Vi era una generale tendenza a chiamare chiunque George.

Il signor Leveson colse la situazione e vi cedette. Si modellò su Lord Ivywood e fece press’a poco ciò che questi avrebbe fatto in ogni caso, ma con una timidezza che Lord Ivywood non avrebbe mostrato. E la medesima educazione sociale che lo faceva vergognare di trovarsi con simili uomini, lo faceva vergognare di ammettere la propria vergogna. Il medesimo spirito moderno che gli insegnava a detestare simili stracci, gli insegnava anche a mentire sulla propria repulsione.

«Sono certo che saremmo assai lieti,» disse, nervosamente, «se qualche amico venuto da fuori desiderasse unirsi alla nostra indagine. Naturalmente siamo tutti Democratici,» e si guardò attorno verso le nobili dame con un sorriso spettrale, «e crediamo nella Voce del Popolo e così via. Se il nostro amico in fondo alla sala vorrà porre la sua domanda brevemente, non occorre, credo, insistere perché la metta per iscritto?»

Vi furono rinnovati rauchi incoraggiamenti a George (quel campione ben battezzato) ed egli avanzò barcollando su gambe legate nel mezzo con lo spago. Non pareva aver avuto alcun posto a sedere dal suo arrivo, e fece le sue osservazioni in piedi, a metà di quello che possiamo chiamare il corridoio centrale.

«Beh, voglio chiedere al proprietario,» esordì.

«Le domande,» disse il signor Leveson, cogliendo prontamente l’occasione per quella costruzione del dibattito che è la principale mansione di un presidente moderno, «devono essere rivolte alla presidenza, se sono questioni di procedura. Se riguardano il discorso, vanno rivolte al conferenziere.»

«Beh, allora chiedo al conferenziere,» disse il paziente Garge, «se non è giusto che quando c’hai la cosa fuori tu debba avere la cosa dentro.» (Rauchi applausi in fondo.)

Il signor Leveson era palesemente perplesso e già sospettava che qualcosa fosse del tutto sbagliato. Ma l’entusiasmo del Profeta della Luna balzava su all’istante a qualsiasi sorta di domanda e trascinava con sé il Presidente.

«Ma è l’ee-ssenza di tutto il nostro inte-ero messaggio,» gridò, aprendo le braccia per abbracciare il mondo, «che la manifestazione esteriore sia una cosa sola con la manifestazione interiore. Amici mie-ei, è proprio questa veri-ità enunciata dal nostro amico che è responsabile della nostra apparente mancanza di simbolismo nell’Islam! Sembriamo trascurare il simbolo perché insistiamo sul simbolo soddisfacente. Il mio amico nel mezzo girerà intorno a tutte le nostre moschee e dirà ad alta voce: “Dov’è la statua di Allah?” Ma può davvero il mio amico nel mezzo eseguire una completa e generalmente approvata statua di Allah?»

Misysra Ammon si sedette assai soddisfatto della propria risposta, ma molti dubitarono che ne avesse trasmesso la soddisfazione al suo amico nel mezzo. Quel cercatore di verità si asciugò la bocca col dorso della mano con aria insoddisfatta e disse:

«Senza offesa, signore. Ma non è la Legge, signore, che se c’hai quella roba fuori noi siamo a posto? So’ entrato qua dentro come niente fosse. Ma perdinci, mai visto un posto come questo prima d’ora.» (Rauche risate dietro.)

«Nessuna scusa è necessaria, amico mio,» gridò il saggio orientale, con ardore, «posso immaginare che voi non siate forse deb-bitamente pratico di simili scuole di verità. Ma la Legge è Tutto. La Legge è Allah. L’intima u-unità di—»

«Beh, non è la Legge?» ripeté l’ostinato George, e ogni volta che nominava la Legge i poveri uomini che ne sono le principali vittime applaudivano forte. «Non sono tipo da far storie. Non sono mai stato tipo da far storie. Sono un uomo rispettoso della legge, io. (Altri applausi.) Non è la Legge che, se questa è la vostra insegna e questo è il vostro mestiere, dovete servirci?»

«Temo di non seguire bene,» gridò l’ardente Turco. «Io dovrei?»

«Servirci,» gridò una folla di voci rauche dal fondo della sala, che era già assai più affollata di prima.

«Servirvi!» gridò Misysra, balzando su come una molla scattata, «Il Santo Profeta venne dal Cielo per servirvi! La virtù e il valore di mille anni, amici miei, non hanno avuto altra fame che servirvi! Noi siamo, fra tutte le fedi, la più fede del servizio. Il nostro più alto profeta non è altro che il servo di Dio, come lo sono io, come lo siete tutti voi. Perfino come simbolo scegliamo un satellite, e onoriamo la Luna perché essa serve soltanto la Terra, e non pretende di essere il Sole.»

«Sono certo,» gridò il signor Leveson, balzando su con un sorriso diplomatico, «che il conferenziere ha risposto a quest’ultimo punto in modo eloquentissimo ed efficacissimo, e le automobili attendono alcune delle dame venute da lontano, e credo davvero che i lavori—»

All the artistic ladies were already getting on their wraps, with faces varying from bewilderment to blank terror. Only Lady Joan lingered, trembling with unexplained excitement. The hitherto speechless Hinch had slid up to the Chairman’s seat and whispered to him:

“You must get all the ladies away. I can’t imagine what’s up, but something’s up.”

“Well?” repeated the patient George. “So be it’s the Law, where is it?”

“Ladies and Gentlemen,” said Mr. Leveson, in his most ingratiating manner, “I think we have had a most delightful evening, and–”

“No, we ain’t,” cried a new and nastier voice from a corner of the room. “Where is it?”

“That’s what we got a right to know,” said the law-abiding George. “Where is it?”

“Where is what?” cried the nearly demented secretary in the chair. “What do you want?”

The law-abiding Mr. George made a half turn and a gesture towards the man in the corner and said:

“What’s yours, Jim?”

“I’ll ’ave a drop of Scotch,” said the man in the corner.

Lady Enid Wimpole, who had lingered a little in loyalty to Joan, the only other lady still left, caught both her wrists and cried in a thrilling whisper,

“Oh, we must go to the car, dear! They’re using the most awful language!”

Away on the wettest edge of the sands by the sea the prints of two wheels and four hoofs were being slowly washed away by a slowly rising tide; which was, indeed, the only motive of the man Humphrey Pump, leading the donkey cart, in leading it almost ankle deep in water.

“I hope you’re sober again now,” he said with some seriousness to his companion, a huge man walking heavily and even humbly with a straight sword swinging to and fro at his hip–“for honestly it was a mug’s game to go and stick up the old sign before that tin place. I haven’t often spoken to you like this, Captain, but I don’t believe any other man in the county could get you out of the hole as I can. But to go down there and frighten the ladies–why there’s been nothing so silly here since Bishop’s Folly. You could hear the ladies screaming before we left.”

“I heard worse than that long before we left,” said the large man, without lifting his head. “I heard one of them laugh… Christ, do you think I shouldn’t hear her laugh?”

There was a silence. “I didn’t mean to speak sharp,” said Humphrey Pump with that incorruptible kindliness which was the root of his Englishry, and may yet save the soul of the English. “But it’s the truth I was pretty well bothered about how to get out of this business. You’re braver than I am, you see, and I own I was frightened about both of us. If I hadn’t known my way to the lost tunnel, I should be fairly frightened still.”

“Known your way to what?” asked the Captain, lifting his red head for the first time.

“Oh, you know all about No More Ivywood’s lost tunnel,” said Pump, carelessly. “Why, we all used to look for it when we were boys. Only I happened to find it.”

“Have mercy on an exile,” said Dalroy, humbly. “I don’t know which hurt him most, the things he forgets or the things he remembers.”

Mr. Pump was silent for a little while and then said, more seriously than usual, “Well, the people from London say you must put up placards and statues and subscriptions and epitaphs and the Lord knows what, to the people who’ve found some new trick and made it come off. But only a man that knows his own land for forty miles round, knows what a lot of people, and clever people too, there were who found new tricks, and had to hide them because they didn’t come off. There was Dr. Boone, up by Gill-in-Hugby, who held out against Dr. Collison and the vaccination. His treatment saved sixty patients who had got small-pox; and Dr. Collison’s killed ninety-two patients who hadn’t got anything. But Boone had to keep it dark; naturally, because all his lady patients grew mustaches. It was a result of the treatment. But it wasn’t a result he wishes to dwell on. Then there was old Dean Arthur, who discovered balloons if ever a man did. He discovered them long before they were discovered. But people were suspicious about such things just then–there was a revival of the witch business in spite of all the parsons –and he had to sign a paper saying where he’d got the notion. Well, it stands to reason, you wouldn’t like to sign a paper saying you’d got it from the village idiot when you were both blowing soap-bubbles; and that’s all he could have signed, for he was an honest gentleman, the poor old Dean. Then there was Jack Arlingham and the diving bell–but you remember all about that. Well, it was just the same with the man that made this tunnel–one of the mad Ivywoods. There’s many a man, Captain, that has a statue in the great London squares for helping to make the railway trains. There’s many a man has his name in Westminster Abbey for doing something in discovering steamboats. Poor old Ivywood discovered both at once; and had to be put under control. He had a notion that a railway train might be made to rush right into the sea and turn into a steamboat; and it seemed all right, according as he worked it out. But his family were so ashamed of the thing, that they didn’t like the tunnel even mentioned. I don’t think anybody knows where it is but me and Bunchy Robinson. We shall be there in a minute or two. They’ve thrown the rocks about at this end; and let the thick plantation grow at the other, but I’ve got a race horse through before now, to save it from Colonel Chepstow’s little games, and I think I can manage this donkey. Honestly, I think it’s the only place we’ll be safe in after what we’ve left behind us at Pebblewick. But it’s the best place in the world, there’s no doubt, for lying low and starting afresh. Here we are. You think you can’t get behind that rock, but you can. In fact, you have.”

Tutte le dame artistiche si stavano già infilando gli scialli, con volti che andavano dallo sconcerto al terrore assoluto. Solo Lady Joan indugiava, tremante per un’inspiegabile eccitazione. Hinch, fino ad allora ammutolito, era scivolato fino al seggio del Presidente e gli sussurrò:

«Dovete portar via tutte le dame. Non riesco a immaginare cosa succeda, ma qualcosa succede.»

«Allora?» ripeté il paziente George. «Se è la Legge, dov’è?»

«Signore e Signori,» disse il signor Leveson, col suo fare più accattivante, «credo che abbiamo trascorso una serata deliziosissima, e—»

«No, per niente,» gridò una voce nuova e più sgradevole da un angolo della stanza. «Dov’è?»

«Questo è ciò che abbiamo il diritto di sapere,» disse George rispettoso della legge. «Dov’è?»

«Dov’è cosa?» gridò il segretario quasi impazzito alla presidenza. «Cosa volete?»

Il signor George, rispettoso della legge, fece un mezzo giro e un gesto verso l’uomo nell’angolo e disse:

«Cosa prendi, Jim?»

«Me piglio un goccio di whisky scozzese,» disse l’uomo nell’angolo.

Lady Enid Wimpole, che aveva indugiato un poco per lealtà verso Joan, l’unica altra dama ancora rimasta, le afferrò entrambi i polsi e gridò in un sussurro concitato:

«Oh, dobbiamo andare all’automobile, cara! Stanno usando un linguaggio spaventoso!»

Laggiù, sul lembo più bagnato della sabbia in riva al mare, le impronte di due ruote e quattro zoccoli venivano lentamente cancellate da una marea che saliva lenta; il che era, invero, l’unico motivo per cui l’uomo Humphrey Pump, conducendo il carretto dell’asino, lo conduceva quasi a caviglia nell’acqua.

«Spero che ora tu sia di nuovo sobrio,» disse con una certa serietà al suo compagno, un uomo enorme che camminava pesantemente e persino umilmente con una spada diritta che gli dondolava avanti e indietro al fianco—«perché, sinceramente, è stata una mossa da sciocchi andare a piantare la vecchia insegna davanti a quel baraccone di latta. Non ti ho parlato spesso così, Capitano, ma non credo che alcun altro uomo della contea potrebbe tirarti fuori dai guai come posso io. Ma scendere laggiù e spaventare le dame—diamine, non s’era vista una cosa tanto sciocca da queste parti dai tempi della Follia del Vescovo. Si sentivano le dame strillare prima che ce ne andassimo.»

«Ho udito di peggio molto prima che ce ne andassimo,» disse l’uomo grande, senza alzare il capo. «Ho udito una di loro ridere… Cristo, credi che non riconoscerei la sua risata?»

Vi fu un silenzio. «Non intendevo parlare bruscamente,» disse Humphrey Pump con quell’incorruttibile bonarietà che era la radice della sua indole inglese, e che potrà ancora salvare l’anima degli inglesi. «Ma è la verità che ero parecchio bene tormentato su come uscire da questa faccenda. Tu sei più coraggioso di me, vedi, e ammetto che avevo paura per entrambi. Se non avessi conosciuto la via per il tunnel perduto, sarei ancora piuttosto spaventato.»

«Conoscevi la via per cosa?» chiese il Capitano, alzando la sua rossa testa per la prima volta.

«Oh, sai tutto del tunnel perduto di No More Ivywood,» disse Pump, con noncuranza. «Diamine, da ragazzi lo cercavamo tutti. Solo che a me capitò di trovarlo.»

«Abbi pietà di un esule,» disse Dalroy, umilmente. «Non so cosa lo ferisca di più, le cose che dimentica o quelle che ricorda.»

Il signor Pump tacque per un poco e poi disse, più seriamente del solito: «Beh, la gente di Londra dice che si devono erigere manifesti e statue e sottoscrizioni ed epitaffi e il Signore sa cos’altro alle persone che hanno trovato qualche trucco nuovo e sono riuscite a farlo funzionare. Ma solo un uomo che conosce la propria terra per quaranta miglia all’intorno sa quanta gente, e gente in gamba per giunta, ci fu che trovò trucchi nuovi, e dovette nasconderli perché non funzionarono. C’era il dottor Boone, su verso Gill-in-Hugby, che tenne testa al dottor Collison e alla vaccinazione. Il suo trattamento salvò sessanta pazienti che avevano preso il vaiolo; e quello del dottor Collison ne uccise novantadue che non avevano nulla. Ma Boone dovette tenerlo nascosto; naturalmente, perché a tutte le sue pazienti donne crebbero i baffi. Era un effetto del trattamento. Ma non era un effetto su cui gli piacesse soffermarsi. Poi c’era il vecchio Decano Arthur, che scoprì i palloni aerostatici se mai un uomo lo fece. Li scoprì molto prima che venissero scoperti. Ma la gente era sospettosa verso simili cose a quei tempi—c’era un ritorno della faccenda delle streghe a dispetto di tutti i pastori—ed egli dovette firmare una carta in cui diceva dove avesse preso l’idea. Beh, è logico, non ti piacerebbe firmare una carta in cui dici di averla avuta dallo scemo del villaggio mentre facevate entrambi le bolle di sapone; e questo è tutto ciò che avrebbe potuto firmare, perché era un onesto gentiluomo, il povero vecchio Decano. Poi c’era Jack Arlingham e la campana da palombaro—ma ti ricordi tutto di quello. Beh, fu proprio lo stesso con l’uomo che costruì questo tunnel—uno dei folli Ivywood. C’è più d’un uomo, Capitano, che ha una statua nelle grandi piazze di Londra per aver contribuito a fare i treni ferroviari. C’è più d’un uomo che ha il proprio nome nell’Abbazia di Westminster per aver fatto qualcosa nella scoperta dei battelli a vapore. Il povero vecchio Ivywood scoprì entrambe le cose in una volta sola; e dovette essere messo sotto tutela. Aveva l’idea che un treno ferroviario potesse essere fatto precipitare dritto in mare e trasformarsi in un battello a vapore; e sembrava tutto giusto, per come lo elaborava. Ma la sua famiglia si vergognava tanto della cosa che non gradiva nemmeno che il tunnel venisse menzionato. Non credo che nessuno sappia dove sia tranne me e Bunchy Robinson. Ci saremo tra un minuto o due. Hanno sparso le rocce a quest’estremità; e lasciato crescere la fitta piantagione all’altra, ma ci ho fatto passare un cavallo da corsa in passato, per salvarlo dai giochetti del Colonnello Chepstow, e credo di poter far passare questo asino. Sinceramente, credo sia l’unico posto in cui saremo al sicuro dopo ciò che ci siamo lasciati alle spalle a Pebblewick. Ma è il posto migliore del mondo, non c’è dubbio, per starsene nascosti e ricominciare da capo. Eccoci qua. Credi di non poter passare dietro quella roccia, ma puoi. Anzi, l’hai già fatto.»

Dalroy found himself, with some bewilderment, round the corner of a rock and in a long bore or barrel of blackness that ended in a very dim spot of green. Hearing the hoofs of the ass and the feet of his friend behind him, he turned his head, but could see nothing but the pitch darkness of a closed coal cellar. He turned again to the dim green speck, and marching forward was glad to see it grow larger and brighter, like a big emerald, till he came out on a throng of trees, mostly thin, but growing so thickly and so close to the cavernous entrance of the tunnel that it was quite clear the place was meant to be choked up by forests and forgotten. The light that came glimmering through the trees was so broken and tremulous that it was hard to tell whether it was daybreak or moonrise.

“I know there’s water here,” said Pump. “They couldn’t keep it out of the stone-work when they made the tunnel, and old Ivywood hit the hydraulic engineer with a spirit level. With the bit of covert here and the sea behind us we ought to be able to get food of one kind or another, when the cheese has given out, and donkeys can eat anything. By the way,” he added with some embarrassment, “you don’t mind my saying it, Captain, but I think we’d better keep that rum for rare occasions. It’s the best rum in England, and may be the last, if these mad games are going on. It’ll do us good to feel it’s there, so we can have it when we want it. The cask’s still nearly full.”

Dalroy put out his hand and shook the other’s. “Hump,” he said, seriously, “you’re right. It’s a sacred trust for Humanity; and we’ll only drink it ourselves to celebrate great victories. In token of which I will take a glass now, to celebrate our glorious victory over Leveson and his tin tabernacle.”

He drained one glass and then sat down on the cask, as if to put temptation behind him. His blue ruminant bull’s eye seemed to plunge deeper and deeper into the emerald twilight of the trees in front of him, and it was long before he spoke again.

At last he observed, “I think you said, Hump, that a friend of yours–a gentleman named Bunchy Robinson, I think–was also ahabitué here.”

“Yes, he knew the way,” answered Pump, leading the donkey to the most suitable patch of pasturage.

“May we, do you think, have the pleasure of a visit from Mr. Robinson?” inquired the Captain.

“Not unless they’re jolly careless up in Blackstone Gaol,” replied Pump. And he moved the cheese well into the arch of the tunnel. Dalroy still sat with his square chin on his hand, staring at the mystery of the little wood.

“You seem absent-minded, Captain,” remarked Humphrey.

“The deepest thoughts are all commonplaces,” said Dalroy. “That is why I believe in Democracy, which is more than you do, you foul blood-stained old British Tory. And the deepest commonplace of all is that Vanitas Vanitatem, which is not pessimism but is really the opposite of pessimism. It is man’s futility that makes us feel he must be a god. And I think of this tunnel, and how the poor old lunatic walked about on this grass, watching it being built, the soul in him on fire with the future. And he saw the whole world changed and the seas thronged with his new shipping; and now,” and Dalroy’s voice changed and broke, “now there is good pasture for the donkey and it is very quiet here.”

“Yes,” said Pump, in some way that conveyed his knowledge that the Captain was thinking of other things also. The Captain went on dreamily:

“And I think about another Lord Ivywood recorded in history who also had a great vision. For it is a great vision after all, and though the man is a prig, he is brave. He also wants to drive a tunnel–between East and West–to make the Indian Empire more British; to effect what he calls the orientation of England, and I call the ruin of Christendom. And I am wondering just now whether the clear intellect and courageous will of a madman will be strong enough to burst and drive that tunnel, as everything seems to show at this moment that it will. Or whether there be indeed enough life and growth in your England to leave it at last as this is left, buried in English forests and wasted by an English sea.”

The silence fell between them again, and again there was only the slight sound the animal made in eating. As Dalroy had said, it was very quiet there.

But it was not quiet in Pebblewick that night; when the Riot Act was read, and all the people who had seen the sign-board outside fought all the people who hadn’t seen the sign-board outside; or when babies and scientists next morning, seeking for shells and other common objects of the sea-shore, found that their study included fragments of the outer clothing of Leveson and scraps of corrugated iron.

Dalroy si ritrovò, con un certo sconcerto, dietro l’angolo di una roccia e dentro un lungo condotto o canna di tenebra che terminava in un fioco punto di verde. Udendo dietro di sé gli zoccoli dell’asino e i piedi del suo amico, voltò il capo, ma non riuscì a vedere altro che il buio pesto di una carbonaia chiusa. Si volse di nuovo al fioco punto verde, e avanzando fu lieto di vederlo farsi più ampio e luminoso, come un grande smeraldo, finché non sbucò tra una folla di alberi, per lo più esili, ma cresciuti così fitti e così vicini all’ingresso cavernoso del tunnel che era del tutto evidente che quel luogo era destinato a essere soffocato dalle foreste e dimenticato. La luce che filtrava tremolante tra gli alberi era così frammentata e tremula che era difficile dire se fosse l’alba o il sorgere della luna.

«So che qui c’è acqua,» disse Pump. «Non riuscirono a tenerla fuori dalla muratura quando costruirono il tunnel, e il vecchio Ivywood colpì l’ingegnere idraulico con una livella a bolla. Con questo po’ di boscaglia qui e il mare alle spalle dovremmo riuscire a procurarci cibo dell’uno o dell’altro genere, quando il formaggio sarà finito, e gli asini possono mangiare qualsiasi cosa. A proposito,» aggiunse con un certo imbarazzo, «non ti dispiaccia che lo dica, Capitano, ma credo che faremmo meglio a tenere quel rum per le occasioni rare. È il miglior rum d’Inghilterra, e potrebbe essere l’ultimo, se questi folli giochi continuano. Ci farà bene sentire che è lì, così potremo berlo quando ne avremo voglia. La botte è ancora quasi piena.»

Dalroy tese la mano e strinse quella dell’altro. «Hump,» disse, seriamente, «hai ragione. È un sacro deposito per l’Umanità; e lo berremo noi stessi soltanto per festeggiare grandi vittorie. In pegno di ciò prenderò un bicchiere ora, per festeggiare la nostra gloriosa vittoria su Leveson e il suo tabernacolo di latta.»

Vuotò un bicchiere e poi si sedette sulla botte, come per mettersi la tentazione alle spalle. Il suo azzurro occhio bovino e ruminante pareva sprofondare sempre più nel crepuscolo di smeraldo degli alberi davanti a lui, e passò molto tempo prima che riparlasse.

Alla fine osservò: «Credo tu abbia detto, Hump, che un tuo amico—un gentiluomo di nome Bunchy Robinson, mi pare—era anch’egli un habitué di questo luogo.»

«Sì, conosceva la via,» rispose Pump, conducendo l’asino al lembo di pascolo più adatto.

«Potremo, credi, avere il piacere di una visita del signor Robinson?» s’informò il Capitano.

«Non a meno che non siano parecchio distratti su a Blackstone Gaol,» replicò Pump. E spinse il formaggio bene dentro l’arco del tunnel. Dalroy sedeva ancora col mento squadrato sulla mano, fissando il mistero del boschetto.

«Sembri distratto, Capitano,» osservò Humphrey.

«I pensieri più profondi sono tutti luoghi comuni,» disse Dalroy. «È per questo che credo nella Democrazia, più di quanto vi creda tu, sudicio vecchio Tory britannico dalle mani macchiate di sangue. E il più profondo luogo comune di tutti è quel Vanitas Vanitatem, che non è pessimismo ma è in verità l’opposto del pessimismo. È la futilità dell’uomo che ci fa sentire ch’egli deve essere un dio. E penso a questo tunnel, e a come il povero vecchio pazzo passeggiasse su quest’erba, guardandolo costruire, con l’anima in fiamme per il futuro. E vide il mondo intero mutato e i mari gremiti dalle sue nuove navi; e ora,» e la voce di Dalroy mutò e si spezzò, «ora c’è buon pascolo per l’asino ed è molto quieto qui.»

«Sì,» disse Pump, in un modo che lasciava intendere la sua consapevolezza che il Capitano stesse pensando anche ad altre cose. Il Capitano proseguì sognante:

«E penso a un altro Lord Ivywood registrato nella storia che ebbe anch’egli una grande visione. Perché in fondo è una grande visione, e per quanto l’uomo sia un pedante, è coraggioso. Anche lui vuole scavare un tunnel—tra Oriente e Occidente—per rendere l’Impero Indiano più britannico; per compiere ciò che egli chiama l’orientamento dell’Inghilterra, e io chiamo la rovina della Cristianità. E in questo momento mi domando se il lucido intelletto e la volontà coraggiosa di un pazzo saranno abbastanza forti da far esplodere e scavare quel tunnel, come tutto sembra mostrare in questo istante che sarà. Oppure se vi sia davvero abbastanza vita e crescita nella tua Inghilterra da lasciarlo alla fine come questo è lasciato, sepolto in foreste inglesi e disperso da un mare inglese.»

Il silenzio calò di nuovo tra loro, e di nuovo non vi fu che il lieve suono che l’animale faceva mangiando. Come aveva detto Dalroy, era molto quieto lì.

Ma non era quieto a Pebblewick quella notte; quando fu letto il Riot Act, e tutta la gente che aveva visto l’insegna fuori si azzuffò con tutta la gente che non aveva visto l’insegna fuori; o quando lattanti e scienziati, il mattino seguente, cercando conchiglie e altri comuni oggetti della battigia, scoprirono che il loro studio comprendeva frammenti degli indumenti esteriori di Leveson e brandelli di lamiera ondulata.

CHAPTER IX: THE HIGHER CRITICISM AND MR. HIBBS

PEBBLEWICK boasted an enterprising evening paper of its own, called “The Pebblewick Globe,” and it was the great vaunt of the editor’s life that he had got out an edition announcing the mystery of the vanishing sign-board, almost simultaneously with its vanishing. In the rows that followed sandwich men found no little protection from the blows indiscriminately given them behind and before, in the large wooden boards they carried inscribed:

CAPITOLO IX: L’ALTA CRITICA E IL SIGNOR HIBBS

PEBBLEWICK vantava un suo intraprendente giornale della sera, chiamato «The Pebblewick Globe», ed era il grande vanto della vita del direttore l’aver mandato in stampa un’edizione che annunciava il mistero dell’insegna scomparsa quasi simultaneamente alla sua scomparsa. Nei tafferugli che ne seguirono gli uomini-sandwich trovarono non poca protezione dai colpi loro inferti indiscriminatamente di dietro e davanti, nei grandi cartelloni di legno che portavano, su cui stava scritto:

CHAPTER X: THE CHARACTER OF QUOODLE

THERE lay about in Lord Ivywood’s numerous gardens, terraces, outhouses, stable yards and similar places, a dog that came to be called by the name of Quoodle. Lord Ivywood did not call him Quoodle. Lord Ivywood was almost physically incapable of articulating such sounds. Lord Ivywood did not care for dogs. He cared for the Cause of dogs, of course; and he cared still more for his own intellectual self-respect and consistency. He would never have permitted a dog in his house to be physically ill-treated; nor, for that matter, a rat; nor, for that matter, even a man. But if Quoodle was not physically ill-treated, he was at least socially neglected, and Quoodle did not like it. For dogs care for companionship more than for kindness itself.

Lord Ivywood would probably have sold the dog, but he consulted experts (as he did on everything he didn’t understand and many things that he did), and the impression he gathered from them was that the dog, technically considered, would fetch very little; mostly, it seemed, because of the mixture of qualities that it possessed. It was a sort of mongrel bull-terrier, but with rather too much of the bull-dog; and this fact seemed to weaken its price as much as it strengthened its jaw. His Lordship also gained a hazy impression that the dog might have been valuable as a watch-dog if it had not been able to follow game like a pointer; and that even in the latter walk of life it would always be discredited by an unfortunate talent for swimming as well as a retriever. But Lord Ivywood’s impressions may very well have been slightly confused, as he was probably thinking about the Black stone of Mecca, or some such subject at the moment. The victim of this entanglement of virtues, therefore, still lay about in the sunlight of Ivywood, exhibiting no general result of that entanglement except the most appalling ugliness.

Now Lady Joan Brett did appreciate dogs. It was the whole of her type and a great deal of her tragedy that all that was natural in her was still alive under all that was artificial; and she could smell hawthorn or the sea as far off as a dog can smell his dinner. Like most aristocrats she would carry cynicism almost to the suburbs of the city of Satan; she was quite as irreligious as Lord Ivywood, or rather more. She could be quite equally frigid or supercilious when she felt inclined. And in the great social talent of being tired, she could beat him any day of the week. But the difference remained in spite of her sophistries and ambitions; that her elemental communications were not cut, and his were. For her the sunrise was still the rising of a sun, and not the turning on of a light by a convenient cosmic servant. For her the Spring was really the Season in the country, and not merely the Season in town. For her cocks and hens were natural appendages to an English house; and not (as Lord Ivywood had proved to her from an encyclopaedia) animals of Indian origin, recently imported by Alexander the Great. And so for her a dog was a dog, and not one of the higher animals, nor one of the lower animals, nor something that had the sacredness of life, nor something that ought to be muzzled, nor something that ought not to be vivisected. She knew that in every practical sense proper provision would be made for the dog; as, indeed, provision was made for the yellow dogs in Constantinople by Abdul Hamid, whose life Lord Ivywood was writing for theProgressive Potentates series. Nor was she in the least sentimental about the dog or anxious to turn him into a pet. It simply came natural to her in passing to rub all his hair the wrong way and call him something which she instantly forgot.

The man who was mowing the garden lawn looked up for a moment, for he had never seen the dog behave in exactly that way before. Quoodle arose, shook himself, and trotted on in front of the lady, leading her up an iron side staircase, of which, as it happened, she had never made use before. It was then, most probably, that she first took any special notice of him; and her pleasure, like that which she took in the sublime prophet from Turkey, was of a humorous character. For the complex quadruped had retained the bow legs of the bull-dog; and, seen from behind, reminded her ridiculously of a swaggering little Major waddling down to his Club.

The dog and the iron stairway between them led her into a series of long rooms, one opening into the other. They formed part of what she had known in earlier days as the disused Wing of Ivywood House, which had been neglected or shut up, probably because it bore some defacements from the fancies of the mad ancestor, the memory of whom the present Lord Ivywood did not think helpful to his own political career. But it seemed to Joan that there were indications of a recent attempt to rehabilitate the place. There was a pail of whitewash in one of the empty rooms, a step-ladder in another, here and there a curtain rod, and at last, in the fourth room a curtain. It hung all alone on the old woodwork, but it was a very gorgeous curtain, being a kind of orange-gold relieved with wavy bars of crimson, which somehow seemed to suggest the very spirit and presence of serpents, though they had neither eyes nor mouths among them.

In the next of the endless series of rooms she came upon a kind of ottoman, striped with green and silver standing alone on the bare floor. She sat down on it from a mixed motive of fatigue and of impudence, for she dimly remembered a story which she had always thought one of the funniest in the world, about a lady only partly initiated in Theosophy who had been in the habit of resting on a similar object, only to discover afterward that it was a Mahatma, covered with his eastern garment and prostrate and rigid in ecstasy. She had no hopes of sitting on a Mahatma herself, but the very thought of it made her laugh, because it would make Lord Ivywood look such a fool. She was not sure whether she liked or disliked Lord Ivywood, but she felt quite certain that it would gratify her to make him look a fool. The moment she had sat down on the ottoman, the dog, who had been trotting beside her, sat down also, and on the edge of her skirt.

CAPITOLO X: IL CARATTERE DI QUOODLE

Se ne stava sdraiato tra i numerosi giardini, le terrazze, le rimesse, i cortili delle scuderie e simili luoghi di Lord Ivywood, un cane che finì per essere chiamato col nome di Quoodle. Lord Ivywood non lo chiamava Quoodle. Lord Ivywood era quasi fisicamente incapace di articolare simili suoni. Lord Ivywood non amava i cani. Amava la Causa dei cani, si capisce; e amava ancora di più il proprio intellettuale amor proprio e la propria coerenza. Non avrebbe mai permesso che un cane in casa sua fosse maltrattato fisicamente; né, del resto, un topo; né, del resto, nemmeno un uomo. Ma se Quoodle non era maltrattato fisicamente, era però socialmente trascurato, e a Quoodle questo non piaceva. Poiché i cani tengono alla compagnia più che alla bontà stessa.

Lord Ivywood avrebbe probabilmente venduto il cane, ma consultò degli esperti (come faceva su tutto ciò che non capiva e su molte cose che capiva), e l’impressione che ne ricavò fu che il cane, tecnicamente considerato, avrebbe reso pochissimo; soprattutto, pareva, a causa della mescolanza di qualità che possedeva. Era una specie di bull-terrier bastardo, ma con un po’ troppo del bull-dog; e questo fatto sembrava indebolirne il prezzo tanto quanto ne rafforzava la mascella. Sua Signoria ricavò inoltre la vaga impressione che il cane sarebbe potuto essere prezioso come cane da guardia se non fosse stato capace di seguire la selvaggina come un pointer; e che perfino in quest’ultimo mestiere sarebbe stato sempre screditato da uno sfortunato talento nel nuotare bene quanto un retriever. Ma le impressioni di Lord Ivywood potevano benissimo essere leggermente confuse, giacché egli stava probabilmente pensando alla Pietra Nera della Mecca, o a qualche simile argomento in quel momento. La vittima di questo groviglio di virtù, dunque, se ne stava ancora sdraiata al sole di Ivywood, senza esibire alcun risultato generale di quel groviglio se non la più spaventosa bruttezza.

Ora, Lady Joan Brett i cani li apprezzava davvero. Era tutta la sua indole e gran parte della sua tragedia che tutto ciò che in lei era naturale fosse ancora vivo sotto tutto ciò che era artificiale; e sapeva fiutare il biancospino o il mare da lontano quanto un cane sa fiutare il proprio pasto. Come la maggior parte degli aristocratici, ella spingeva il cinismo quasi fino ai sobborghi della Città di Satana; era irreligiosa tanto quanto Lord Ivywood, anzi di più. Sapeva essere altrettanto glaciale o altezzosa quando ne aveva voglia. E nel grande talento sociale dell’essere annoiata, poteva batterlo qualunque giorno della settimana. Ma la differenza rimaneva a dispetto dei suoi sofismi e delle sue ambizioni; e cioè che le sue comunicazioni elementari non erano recise, mentre le sue lo erano. Per lei l’alba era ancora il sorgere di un sole, e non l’accensione di una luce da parte di un comodo servitore cosmico. Per lei la Primavera era davvero la Stagione in campagna, e non semplicemente la Stagione in città. Per lei galli e galline erano appendici naturali di una casa inglese; e non (come Lord Ivywood le aveva dimostrato da un’enciclopedia) animali di origine indiana, importati di recente da Alessandro Magno. E così per lei un cane era un cane, e non uno degli animali superiori, né uno degli animali inferiori, né qualcosa che avesse la sacralità della vita, né qualcosa che dovesse essere museruolato, né qualcosa che non dovesse essere vivisezionato. Sapeva che, in ogni senso pratico, si sarebbe provveduto opportunamente al cane; come, invero, si provvide ai cani gialli di Costantinopoli da parte di Abdul Hamid, la cui vita Lord Ivywood stava scrivendo per la collana Progressive Potentates. Né era minimamente sentimentale riguardo al cane, o ansiosa di trasformarlo in un animale da compagnia. Le veniva semplicemente naturale, passando, arruffargli tutto il pelo al contrario e chiamarlo con un nome che dimenticava all’istante.

L’uomo che stava falciando il prato del giardino alzò lo sguardo per un istante, poiché non aveva mai visto il cane comportarsi esattamente a quel modo. Quoodle si alzò, si scrollò, e trotterellò davanti alla dama, conducendola su per una scala laterale di ferro, della quale, guarda caso, ella non si era mai servita prima. Fu allora, con ogni probabilità, che per la prima volta gli prestò particolare attenzione; e il suo diletto, come quello che traeva dal sublime profeta venuto dalla Turchia, era di natura umoristica. Poiché il complesso quadrupede aveva conservato le gambe arcuate del bull-dog; e, visto da dietro, le ricordava ridicolmente un tronfio piccolo Maggiore che se ne va ciondolando verso il suo Club.

Il cane e la scala di ferro insieme la condussero in una serie di lunghe stanze, l’una che si apriva nell’altra. Facevano parte di ciò che ella aveva conosciuto un tempo come l’Ala in disuso di Casa Ivywood, che era stata trascurata o chiusa, probabilmente perché recava alcuni sfregi dovuti ai capricci dell’antenato pazzo, la cui memoria l’attuale Lord Ivywood non riteneva giovevole alla propria carriera politica. Ma parve a Joan che vi fossero indizi di un recente tentativo di riabilitare il luogo. C’era un secchio di calce in una delle stanze vuote, una scala a pioli in un’altra, qua e là un’asta per tende, e infine, nella quarta stanza, una tenda. Pendeva tutta sola sull’antico legname, ma era una tenda sfarzosissima, di una sorta di oro-arancio ravvivato da ondulate strisce cremisi, che in qualche modo pareva suggerire lo spirito stesso e la presenza di serpenti, benché tra esse non vi fossero né occhi né bocche.

Nella successiva dell’infinita serie di stanze s’imbatté in una sorta di ottomana, a righe verdi e argento, che se ne stava sola sul pavimento nudo. Vi si sedette per un motivo misto di stanchezza e di impertinenza, poiché ricordava vagamente una storia che aveva sempre giudicato una delle più buffe del mondo, su una dama solo in parte iniziata alla Teosofia che aveva l’abitudine di riposare su un oggetto simile, salvo scoprire in seguito che si trattava di un Mahatma, coperto della sua veste orientale e prostrato e rigido in estasi. Non aveva alcuna speranza di sedersi lei stessa su un Mahatma, ma il solo pensarci la faceva ridere, perché avrebbe fatto apparire Lord Ivywood un tale sciocco. Non era certa se Lord Ivywood le piacesse o le dispiacesse, ma si sentiva del tutto sicura che le avrebbe fatto piacere farlo apparire uno sciocco. Nell’istante in cui si fu seduta sull’ottomana, il cane, che le aveva trotterellato accanto, si sedette anch’esso, e sull’orlo della sua gonna.

After a minute or two she rose (and the dog rose), and she looked yet farther down that long perspective of large rooms, in which men like Philip Ivywood forget that they are only men. The next was more ornate and the next yet more so; it was plain that the scheme of decoration that was in progress had been started at the other end. She could now see that the long lane ended in rooms that from afar off looked like the end of a kaleidoscope, rooms like nests made only from humming birds or palaces built of fixed fireworks. Out of this furnace of fragmentary colours she saw Ivywood advancing toward her, with his black suit and his white face accented by the contrast. His lips were moving, for he was talking to himself, as many orators do. He did not seem to see her, and she had to strangle a subconscious and utterly senseless cry, “He is blind!”

The next moment he was welcoming her intrusion with the well-bred surprise and rather worldly simplicity suitable to such a case, and Joan fancied she understood why his face had seemed a little bleaker and blinder than usual. It was by contrast. He was carrying clutched to his forefinger, as his ancestors might have carried a falcon clutched to the wrist, a small bright coloured semi-tropical bird, the expression of whose head, neck and eye was the very opposite of his own. Joan thought she had never seen a living creature with a head so lively and insulting. Its provocative eye and pointed crest seemed to be offering to fight fifty game-cocks. It was no wonder (she told herself) that by the side of this gaudy gutter-snipe with feathers Ivywood’s faint-coloured hair and frigid face looked like the hair and face of a corpse walking.

“You’ll never know what this is,” said Ivywood, in his most charming manner. “You’ve heard of him a hundred times and never had a notion of what he was. This is the Bulbul.”

“I never knew,” replied Joan. “I am afraid I never cared. I always thought it was something like a nightingale.”

“Ah, yes,” answered Ivywood, “but this is the real Bulbul peculiar to the East,Pycnonotus Haemorrhous. You are thinking ofDaulias Golzii.”

“I suppose I am,” replied Lady Joan with a faint smile. “It is an obsession. When shall I not be thinking of Daulias Galsworthy? Was it Galsworthy?” Then feeling quite touched by the soft austerity of her companion’s face, she caressed the gaudy and pugnacious bird with one finger and said, “It’s a dear little thing.”

The quadruped intimately called Quoodle did not approve of all this at all. Like most dogs, he liked to be with human beings when they were silent, and he extended a magnificent toleration to them as long as they were talking to each other. But conversational attention paid to any other animal at all remote from a mongrel bull-terrier wounded Mr. Quoodle in his most sensitive and gentlemanly feelings. He emitted a faint growl. Joan, with all the instincts that were in her, bent down and pulled his hair about once more, and felt the instant necessity of diverting the general admiration fromPycnonotus Haemorrhous. She turned it to the decoration at the end of the refurnished wing; for they had already come to the last of the long suite of rooms, which ended in some unfinished but exquisite panelling in white and coloured woods, inlaid in the oriental manner. At one corner the whole corridor ended by curving into a round turret chamber overlooking the landscape; and which Joan, who had known the house in childhood, was sure was an innovation. On the other hand a black gap, still left in the lower left-hand corner of the oriental woodwork, suddenly reminded her of something she had forgotten.

“Surely,” she said (after much mere aesthetic ecstasy), “there used to be a staircase there, leading to the old kitchen garden, or the old chapel or something.”

Ivywood nodded gravely. “Yes,” he said, “it did lead to the ruins of a Mediaeval Chapel, as you say. The truth is it led to several things that I cannot altogether consider a credit to the family in these days. All that scandal and joking about the unsuccessful tunnel (your mother may have told you of it), well, it did us no good in the County, I’m afraid; so as it’s a mere scrap of land bordering on the sea, I’ve fenced it off and let it grow wild. But I’m boarding up the end of the room here for quite another reason. I want you to come and see it.”

He led her into the round corner turret in which the new architecture ended, and Joan, with her thirst for the beautiful, could not stifle a certain thrill of beatitude at the prospect. Five open windows of a light and exquisite Saracenic outline looked out over the bronze and copper and purple of the Autumn parks and forests to the peacock colours of the sea. There was neither house nor living thing in sight, and, familiar as she had been with that coast, she knew she was looking out from a new angle of vision on a new landscape of Ivywood.

“You can write sonnets?” said Ivywood with something more like emotion in his voice than she had ever heard in it. “What comes first into your mind with these open windows?”

“I know what you mean,” said Joan after a silence. “The same hath oft …”

“Yes,” he said. “That is how I felt … of perilous seas in fairy lands forlorn.”

There was another silence and the dog sniffed round and round the circular turret chamber.

“I want it to be like that,” said Ivywood in a low and singularly moved intonation. “I want this to be the end of the house. I want this to be the end of the world. Don’t you feel that is the real beauty of all this eastern art; that it is coloured like the edges of things, like the little clouds of morning and the islands of the blest? Do you know,” and he lowered his voice yet more, “it has the power over me of making me feel as if I were myself absent and distant; some oriental traveller who was lost and for whom men were looking. When I see that greenish lemon yellow enamel there let into the white, I feel that I am standing thousands of leagues from where I stand.”

Dopo un minuto o due ella si alzò (e il cane si alzò), e guardò ancora più in fondo a quella lunga prospettiva di ampie stanze, nelle quali uomini come Philip Ivywood dimenticano di essere soltanto uomini. La successiva era più ornata e quella dopo ancora di più; era evidente che lo schema decorativo in corso era stato iniziato dall’altra estremità. Poteva ora vedere che il lungo corridoio terminava in stanze che da lontano parevano l’estremità di un caleidoscopio, stanze come nidi fatti soltanto di uccelli canterini o palazzi costruiti di fuochi d’artificio immobili. Da questa fornace di colori frammentari vide Ivywood avanzare verso di lei, col suo abito nero e il suo volto bianco accentuato dal contrasto. Le sue labbra si muovevano, poiché parlava a se stesso, come fanno molti oratori. Non pareva vederla, ed ella dovette soffocare un grido subconscio e del tutto insensato: «È cieco!»

L’istante seguente accoglieva la sua intrusione con la beneducata sorpresa e la piuttosto mondana semplicità adatte a un caso simile, e Joan si figurò di capire perché il suo volto fosse parso un po’ più tetro e più cieco del solito. Era per contrasto. Portava stretto all’indice, come i suoi antenati avrebbero potuto portare un falcone stretto al polso, un piccolo uccello semitropicale dai colori vivaci, l’espressione della cui testa, collo e occhio era l’esatto contrario della propria. Joan pensò di non aver mai visto una creatura vivente con una testa tanto vivace e insolente. Il suo occhio provocatorio e la sua cresta appuntita parevano offrirsi di combattere cinquanta galli da combattimento. Non c’era da stupirsi (si disse) che, accanto a questo vistoso monello impiumato, i capelli dai colori smorti e il volto glaciale di Ivywood paressero i capelli e il volto di un cadavere che cammina.

«Non indovinerai mai cos’è,» disse Ivywood, col suo fare più affascinante. «Ne hai sentito parlare cento volte senza avere la minima idea di cosa fosse. Questo è il Bulbul.»

«Non l’ho mai saputo,» rispose Joan. «Temo di non essermene mai curata. Ho sempre creduto che fosse qualcosa come un usignolo.»

«Ah, sì,» rispose Ivywood, «ma questo è il vero Bulbul proprio dell’Oriente, Pycnonotus Haemorrhous. Tu stai pensando al Daulias Golzii.»

«Suppongo di sì,» replicò Lady Joan con un debole sorriso. «È un’ossessione. Quando smetterò di pensare al Daulias Galsworthy? Era Galsworthy?» Poi, sentendosi assai commossa dalla dolce austerità del volto del suo compagno, accarezzò il vistoso e battagliero uccello con un dito e disse: «È una cara piccola cosa.»

Il quadrupede intimamente chiamato Quoodle non approvava affatto tutto ciò. Come la maggior parte dei cani, amava stare con gli esseri umani quando erano silenziosi, ed estendeva loro una magnifica tolleranza finché parlavano tra loro. Ma l’attenzione conversativa rivolta a qualunque altro animale anche solo remotamente diverso da un bull-terrier bastardo feriva il signor Quoodle nei suoi sentimenti più sensibili e signorili. Emise un debole ringhio. Joan, con tutti gli istinti che erano in lei, si chinò e gli arruffò ancora una volta il pelo, e sentì l’immediata necessità di distogliere l’ammirazione generale da Pycnonotus Haemorrhous. La rivolse alla decorazione in fondo all’ala riarredata; poiché erano già giunte all’ultima della lunga infilata di stanze, che terminava in un pannello incompiuto ma squisito di legni bianchi e colorati, intarsiati alla maniera orientale. A un angolo l’intero corridoio terminava curvandosi in una tonda camera a torretta che dominava il paesaggio; e che Joan, la quale aveva conosciuto la casa nell’infanzia, era certa fosse un’innovazione. D’altra parte un varco nero, ancora lasciato nell’angolo inferiore sinistro del legname orientale, le ricordò d’un tratto qualcosa che aveva dimenticato.

«Di sicuro,» disse (dopo molta pura estasi estetica), «là c’era una scala, che conduceva al vecchio orto, o alla vecchia cappella o qualcosa del genere.»

Ivywood annuì gravemente. «Sì,» disse, «conduceva alle rovine di una Cappella Medievale, come dici. La verità è che conduceva a diverse cose che di questi tempi non posso del tutto considerare un vanto per la famiglia. Tutto quello scandalo e quelle facezie sul tunnel fallito (tua madre potrebbe avertene parlato), beh, non ci giovarono nella Contea, temo; sicché, trattandosi di un mero lembo di terra confinante col mare, l’ho recintato e lasciato inselvatichire. Ma sto tamponando con assi l’estremità della stanza qui per tutt’altra ragione. Voglio che tu venga a vederla.»

La condusse nella tonda torretta d’angolo in cui la nuova architettura terminava, e Joan, con la sua sete del bello, non poté soffocare un certo fremito di beatitudine dinanzi al panorama. Cinque finestre aperte, di leggiadro e squisito profilo saraceno, guardavano oltre il bronzo, il rame e il porpora dei parchi e delle foreste d’autunno verso i colori di pavone del mare. Non v’era in vista né casa né essere vivente, e, per quanto ella conoscesse bene quella costa, sapeva di affacciarsi da un nuovo angolo di visuale su un nuovo paesaggio di Ivywood.

«Tu sai comporre sonetti?» disse Ivywood con qualcosa di più simile all’emozione nella voce di quanto ella vi avesse mai udito. «Cosa ti viene per prima in mente dinanzi a queste finestre aperte?»

«So cosa intendi,» disse Joan dopo un silenzio. «Quella stessa che spesso …»

«Sì,» disse. «È così che mi sono sentito … di mari perigliosi in fatate terre desolate.»

Vi fu un altro silenzio e il cane annusava girando e rigirando per la circolare camera a torretta.

«Voglio che sia così,» disse Ivywood con un’intonazione bassa e singolarmente commossa. «Voglio che questa sia la fine della casa. Voglio che questa sia la fine del mondo. Non senti che è questa la vera bellezza di tutta quest’arte orientale; che è colorata come gli orli delle cose, come le piccole nubi del mattino e le isole dei beati? Sai,» e abbassò ancora di più la voce, «essa ha su di me il potere di farmi sentire come se io stesso fossi assente e lontano; un qualche viaggiatore orientale che si era perduto e che gli uomini cercavano. Quando vedo quello smalto giallo-limone verdastro incastonato là nel bianco, sento di trovarmi a migliaia di leghe da dove mi trovo.»

“You are right,” said Joan, looking at him with some wonder, “I have felt like that myself.”

“This art,” went on Ivywood as in a dream, “does indeed take the wings of the morning and abide in the uttermost parts of the sea. They say it contains no form of life, but surely we can read its alphabet as easily as the red hieroglyphics of sunrise and sunset which are on the fringes of the robe of God.”

“I never heard you talk like that before,” said the lady, and again stroked the vivid violet feathers of the small eastern bird.

Mr. Quoodle could stand it no longer. He had evidently formed a very low opinion of the turret chamber and of oriental art generally, but seeing Joan’s attention once more transferred to his rival, he trotted out into the longer room, and finding the gap in the woodwork which was soon to be boarded up, but which still opened on an old dark staircase, he went “galumphing” down the stairs.

Lord Ivywood gently placed the bird on the girl’s own finger, and went to one of the open windows, leaning out a little.

“Look here,” he said, “doesn’t this express what we both feel? Isn’t this the sort of fairy-tale house that ought to hang on the last wall of the world?”

And he motioned her to the window-sill, just outside which hung the bird’s empty cage, beautifully wrought in brass or some of the yellow metals.

“Why that is the best of all!” cried Lady Joan. “It makes one feel as if it really were the Arabian Nights. As if this were a tower of the gigantic Genii with turrets up to the moon; and this were an enchanted Prince caged in a golden palace suspended by the evening star.”

Something stirred in her dim but teeming subconsciousness, something like a chill or change like that by which we half know that weather has altered, or distant and unnoticed music suddenly ceased.

“Where is the dog?” she asked suddenly.

Ivywood turned with a mild, grey eye.

“Was there a dog here?” he asked.

“Yes,” said Lady Joan Brett, and gave him back the bird, which he restored carefully to its cage.

The dog after whom she inquired had in truth trundled down a dark, winding staircase and turned into the daylight, into a part of the garden he had never seen before; nor, indeed, had anybody else for some time past. It was altogether tangled and overgrown with weeds, and the only trace of human handiwork, the wreck of an old Gothic Chapel, stood waist high in numberless nettles and soiled with crawling fungoids. Most of these merely discoloured the grey crumbling stone with shades of bronze or brown; but some of them, particularly on the side farthest from the house, were of orange or purple tints almost bright enough for Lord Ivywood’s oriental decoration. Some fanciful eyes that fell on the place afterward found something like an allegory in those graven and broken saints or archangels feeding such fiery and ephemeral parasites as those toadstools like blood or gold. But Mr. Quoodle had never set himself up as an allegorist, and he merely trotted deeper and deeper into the grey-green English jungle. He grumbled very much at the thistles and nettles, much as a city man will grumble at the jostling of a crowd. But he continued to press forward, with his nose near the ground, as if he had already smelt something that interested him. And, indeed, he had smelt something in which a dog, except on special occasions, is much more interested than he is in dogs. Breaking through a last barrier of high and hoary purple thistles he came out on a semicircle of somewhat clearer ground, dotted with slender trees, and having, by way of back scene, the brown brick arch of an old tunnel. The tunnel was boarded up with a very irregular fence or mask made of motley wooden lathes, and looked, somehow, rather like a pantomime cottage. In front of this a sturdy man in very shabby shooting clothes was standing attending to a battered old frying-pan which he held over a rather irregular flame which, small as it was, smelt strongly of burnt rum. In the frying-pan, and also on the top of a cask or barrel that served for a table hard by, were a number of the grey, brown, and even orange fungi which were plastered over the stone angels and dragons of the fallen chapel.

“Hullo, old man,” said the person in the shooting jacket with tranquillity and without looking up from his cooking. “Come to pay us a visit? Come along then.” He flashed one glance at the dog and returned to the frying pan. “If your tail were two inches shorter, you’d be worth a hundred pounds. Had any breakfast?”

The dog trotted across to him and began nosing and sniffing round his dilapidated leather gaiters. The man did not interrupt his cookery, on which his eyes were fixed and both his hands were busy; but he crooked his knee and foot so as to caress the quadruped in a nerve under the angle of the jaw, the stimulation of which (as some men of science have held) is for a dog what a good cigar is for a man. At the same moment a huge voice like on ogre’s came from within the masked tunnel, calling out, “And who are ye talking to?”

A very crooked kind of window in the upper part of the pantomime cottage burst open and an enormous head, with erect, startling, and almost scarlet hair and blue eyes as big as a bullfrog’s, was thrust out above the scene.

“Hump,” cried the ogre. “Me moral counsels have been thrown away. In the last week I’ve sung you fourteen and a half songs of me own composition; instead of which you go about stealing dogs. You’re following in the path of Parson Whats-his-name in every way, I’m afraid.”

“No,” said the man with the frying pan, impartially, “Parson Whitelady struck a very good path for doubling on Pebblewick, that I was glad to follow. But I think he was quite silly to steal dogs. He was young and brought up pious. I know too much about dogs to steal one.”

“Well,” asked the large red-haired man, “and how do you get a dog like that?”

“I let him steal me,” said the person stirring the pan. And indeed the dog was sitting erect and even arrogant at his feet, as if he was a watch-dog at a high salary, and had been there before the building of the tunnel.

«Hai ragione,» disse Joan, guardandolo con un certo stupore, «l’ho provato anch’io.»

«Quest’arte,» proseguì Ivywood come in un sogno, «prende davvero le ali dell’aurora e dimora negli estremi confini del mare. Dicono che non contenga alcuna forma di vita, ma di certo possiamo leggerne l’alfabeto con la stessa facilità dei rossi geroglifici dell’alba e del tramonto che stanno sui lembi della veste di Dio.»

«Non ti avevo mai sentito parlare così prima,» disse la dama, e accarezzò di nuovo le vivide piume violette del piccolo uccello orientale.

Il signor Quoodle non ne poté più. Si era evidentemente formato un’opinione assai meschina della camera a torretta e dell’arte orientale in generale, ma vedendo l’attenzione di Joan trasferirsi ancora una volta al suo rivale, trotterellò fuori nella stanza più lunga, e trovando il varco nel legname che presto sarebbe stato tamponato con assi, ma che ancora si apriva su una vecchia scala buia, discese le scale «a balzelloni».

Lord Ivywood posò delicatamente l’uccello sul dito della ragazza, e andò a una delle finestre aperte, sporgendosi un poco.

«Guarda qui,» disse, «non esprime forse ciò che entrambi sentiamo? Non è questa la sorta di casa fiabesca che dovrebbe pendere sull’ultima parete del mondo?»

E le accennò al davanzale della finestra, appena fuori dal quale pendeva la gabbia vuota dell’uccello, splendidamente lavorata in ottone o in qualche metallo giallo.

«Ma questo è il meglio di tutto!» esclamò Lady Joan. «Fa sentire come se fossero davvero le Mille e una Notte. Come se questa fosse una torre dei giganteschi Genii con torrette fino alla luna; e questo fosse un Principe incantato imprigionato in un palazzo dorato sospeso alla stella della sera.»

Qualcosa si mosse nel suo fosco ma brulicante subconscio, qualcosa come un brivido o un mutamento simile a quello per cui a metà ci accorgiamo che il tempo è cambiato, o che una musica lontana e inavvertita è cessata d’improvviso.

«Dov’è il cane?» chiese d’un tratto.

Ivywood si voltò con un mite occhio grigio.

«C’era un cane qui?» chiese.

«Sì,» disse Lady Joan Brett, e gli restituì l’uccello, che egli ripose con cura nella gabbia.

Il cane per cui ella si era informata era in verità disceso rotolando giù per una buia scala a chiocciola ed era spuntato alla luce del giorno, in una parte del giardino che non aveva mai visto prima; né, invero, l’aveva vista nessun altro da qualche tempo a quella parte. Era tutto intricato e invaso dalle erbacce, e l’unica traccia di opera umana, il rudere di una vecchia Cappella Gotica, si ergeva all’altezza della cintola tra innumerevoli ortiche e sozzo di funghi striscianti. La maggior parte di essi si limitava a scolorire la grigia pietra sgretolata con sfumature di bronzo o di bruno; ma alcuni, in particolare sul lato più lontano dalla casa, erano di tinte arancioni o purpuree quasi abbastanza vivide per la decorazione orientale di Lord Ivywood. Certi occhi fantasiosi che caddero su quel luogo in seguito vi trovarono qualcosa come un’allegoria in quei santi o arcangeli scolpiti e infranti che nutrivano parassiti tanto ardenti ed effimeri quanto quei funghi velenosi simili a sangue o a oro. Ma il signor Quoodle non si era mai eretto ad allegorista, e si limitò a trotterellare sempre più addentro nella grigioverde giungla inglese. Brontolava assai contro i cardi e le ortiche, press’a poco come un uomo di città brontolerà per gli spintoni di una folla. Ma continuò a spingersi avanti, col naso rasente al suolo, come se avesse già fiutato qualcosa che lo interessava. E, invero, aveva fiutato qualcosa per cui un cane, salvo in occasioni speciali, è assai più interessato di quanto lo sia per i cani. Sfondando un’ultima barriera di alti e canuti cardi purpurei, sbucò su un semicerchio di terreno alquanto più sgombro, punteggiato di alberi esili, e avente, a guisa di fondale, l’arco di mattoni bruni di un vecchio tunnel. Il tunnel era tamponato con assi da una staccionata o maschera assai irregolare fatta di variopinte stecche di legno, e somigliava, in qualche modo, piuttosto a una casetta da pantomima. Davanti a essa un uomo robusto, in abiti da caccia assai malandati, se ne stava intento a una vecchia padella ammaccata che teneva sopra una fiamma piuttosto irregolare la quale, per quanto piccola, sapeva forte di rum bruciato. Nella padella, e anche sopra una botte o un barile che fungeva da tavolo lì accanto, c’erano parecchi dei funghi grigi, bruni e persino arancioni che erano spalmati sugli angeli e i draghi di pietra della cappella caduta.

«Salve, vecchio mio,» disse la persona nella giacca da caccia con tranquillità e senza alzare lo sguardo dalla sua cucina. «Venuto a farci visita? Vieni avanti, allora.» Lanciò un’occhiata al cane e tornò alla padella. «Se la tua coda fosse due pollici più corta, varresti cento sterline. Fatta colazione?»

Il cane gli trotterellò incontro e cominciò a fiutare e annusare intorno alle sue malandate ghette di cuoio. L’uomo non interruppe la sua cucina, su cui teneva fissi gli occhi ed entrambe le mani affaccendate; ma piegò il ginocchio e il piede in modo da accarezzare il quadrupede in un nervo sotto l’angolo della mascella, la cui stimolazione (come alcuni uomini di scienza hanno sostenuto) è per un cane ciò che un buon sigaro è per un uomo. Nello stesso istante una voce enorme come quella di un orco giunse dall’interno del tunnel mascherato, gridando: «E con chi stai parlando?»

Una sorta di finestra assai storta nella parte superiore della casetta da pantomima si spalancò di colpo e un’enorme testa, dai capelli ritti, sorprendenti e quasi scarlatti e con occhi azzurri grandi come quelli di una rana toro, fu sporta al di sopra della scena.

«Hump,» gridò l’orco. «I miei consigli morali sono andati sprecati. Nell’ultima settimana ti ho cantato quattordici canzoni e mezza di mia composizione; e in cambio te ne vai in giro a rubare cani. Stai seguendo in ogni modo la via del Parroco Comesichiama, temo.»

«No,» disse l’uomo con la padella, imparzialmente, «il Parroco Whitelady imboccò un’ottima via per far perdere le tracce verso Pebblewick, che fui lieto di seguire. Ma credo che fosse proprio sciocco a rubare cani. Era giovane e cresciuto pio. Ne so troppo sui cani per rubarne uno.»

«Beh,» chiese il grosso uomo dai capelli rossi, «e come fai a procurarti un cane così?»

«L’ho lasciato rubare me,» disse la persona che rimestava nella padella. E in effetti il cane sedeva eretto e persino arrogante ai suoi piedi, come se fosse un cane da guardia dall’alto stipendio, e fosse stato lì prima della costruzione del tunnel.

CHAPTER XI: VEGETARIANISM IN THE DRAWING-ROOM

THE Company that assembled to listen to the Prophet of the Moon, on the next occasion of his delivering any formal address, was much more select than the comparatively mixed and middle-class society of the Simple Souls. Miss Browning and her sister, Mrs. Mackintosh, were indeed present; for Lord Ivywood had practically engaged them both as private secretaries, and kept them pretty busy, too. There was also Mr. Leveson, because Lord Ivywood believed in his organizing power; and also Mr. Hibbs, because Mr. Leveson believed in his political judgment, whenever he could discover what it was. Mr. Leveson had straight, dark hair, and looked nervous. Mr. Hibbs had straight, fair hair, and also looked nervous. But the rest of the company were more of Ivywood’s own world, or the world of high finance with which it mixes both here and on the continent. Lord Ivywood welcomed, with something approaching to warmth, a distinguished foreign diplomatist, who was, indeed, none other than that silent German representative who had sat beside him in that last conference on the Island of the Olives. Dr. Gluck was no longer in his quiet, black suit, but wore an ornate, diplomatic uniform with a sword and Prussian, Austrian or Turkish Orders; for he was going on from Ivywood to a function at Court. But his curl of red lips, his screw of black mustache, and his unanswering almond eyes had no more changed than the face of a wax figure in a barber’s shop window.

The Prophet had also effected an improvement in his dress. When he had orated on the sands his costume, except for the fez, was the shabby but respectable costume of any rather unsuccessful English clerk. But now that he had come among aristocrats who petted their souls as they did their senses, there must be no such incongruity. He must be a proper, fresh-picked oriental tulip or lotus. So–he wore long, flowing robes of white, relieved here and there by flame-coloured threads of tracery, and round his head was a turban of a kind of pale golden green. He had to look as if he had come flying across Europe on the magic carpet, or fallen a moment before from his paradise in the moon.

The ladies of Lord Ivywood’s world were much as we have already found them. Lady Enid Wimpole still overwhelmed her earnest and timid face with a tremendous costume, that was more like a procession than a dress. It looked rather like the funeral procession of Aubrey Beardsley. Lady Joan Brett still looked like a very beautiful Spaniard with no illusions left about her castle in Spain. The large and resolute lady who had refused to ask any questions at Misysra’s earlier lecture, and who was known as Lady Crump, the distinguished Feminist, still had the air of being so full and bursting with questions fatal to Man as to have passed the speaking and reached the speechless stage of hostility. Throughout the proceedings she contributed nothing but bursting silence and a malevolent eye. And old Lady Ivywood, under the oldest and finest lace and the oldest and finest manners, had a look like death on her, which can often be seen in the parents of pure intellectuals. She had that face of a lost mother that is more pathetic than the face of a lost child.

“And what are you going to delight us with today?” Lady Enid was asking of the Prophet.

“My lecture,” answered Misysra, gravely, “is on the Pig.”

It was part of a simplicity really respectable in him that he never saw any incongruity in the arbitrary and isolated texts or symbols out of which he spun his thousand insane theories. Lady Enid endured the impact of this singular subject for debate without losing that expression of wistful sweetness which she wore on principle when talking to such people.

“The Pig, he is a large subject,” continued the Prophet, making curves in the air, as if embracing some particularly prize specimen. “He includes many subjects. It is to me very strange that the Christians should so laugh and be surprised because we hold ourselves to be defiled by pork; we and also another of the Peoples of the Book. But, surely, you Christians yourselves consider the pig as a manner of pollution; since it is your most usual expression of your despising, of your very great dislike. You say ‘swine,’ my dear lady; you do not say animals far more unpopular, such as the alligator.”

“I see,” said the lady, “how wonderful!”

“If you are annoyed,” went on the encouraged and excited gentleman, “if you are annoyed with anyone, with a–what you say?–a lady’s maid, you do not say to her ‘Horse.’ You do not say to her ‘Camel.’”

“Ah, no,” said Lady Enid, earnestly.

“‘Pig of a lady’s maid,’ you say in your colloquial English,” continued the Prophet, triumphantly. “And yet this great and awful Pig, this monster whose very name, when whispered, you think will wither all your enemies, you allow, my dear lady, to approach yet closer to you. You incorporate this great Pig in the substance of your own person.”

Lady Enid Wimpole was looking a little dazed at last, at this description of her habits, and Joan gave Lord Ivywood a hint that the lecturer had better be transferred to his legitimate sphere of lecturing. Ivywood led the way into a larger room that was full of ranked chairs, with a sort of lectern at the other end, and flanked on all four sides with tables laden with all kinds of refreshments. It was typical of the strange, half-fictitious enthusiasm and curiosity of that world, that one long table was set out entirely with vegetarian foods, especially of an eastern sort (like a table spread in the desert for a rather fastidious Indian hermit); but that tables covered with game patties, lobster and champagne were equally provided, and very much more frequented. Even Mr. Hibbs, who would honestly have thought entering a public-house more disgraceful than entering a brothel, could not connect any conception of disgrace with Lord Ivywood’s champagne.

CAPITOLO XI: IL VEGETARIANISMO IN SALOTTO

LA compagnia che si radunò per ascoltare il Profeta della Luna, nella successiva occasione in cui egli tenne un discorso formale, era assai più scelta della società relativamente eterogenea e borghese delle Anime Semplici. La signorina Browning e sua sorella, la signora Mackintosh, erano in effetti presenti; poiché Lord Ivywood aveva praticamente ingaggiato entrambe come segretarie private, e le teneva anche assai occupate. Vi era pure il signor Leveson, perché Lord Ivywood credeva nella sua capacità organizzativa; e anche il signor Hibbs, perché il signor Leveson credeva nel suo giudizio politico, ogni volta che riusciva a scoprire in che cosa consistesse. Il signor Leveson aveva capelli lisci e scuri, e pareva nervoso. Il signor Hibbs aveva capelli lisci e biondi, e pareva anch’egli nervoso. Ma il resto della compagnia apparteneva piuttosto al mondo di Ivywood, o a quel mondo dell’alta finanza con cui esso si mescola tanto qui quanto sul continente. Lord Ivywood accolse, con qualcosa che rasentava il calore, un illustre diplomatico straniero, il quale non era in verità altri se non quel silenzioso rappresentante tedesco che gli era stato seduto accanto in quell’ultima conferenza sull’Isola degli Ulivi. Il dottor Gluck non indossava più il suo tranquillo abito nero, ma portava una sontuosa uniforme diplomatica con una spada e Ordini prussiani, austriaci o turchi; poiché da Ivywood proseguiva verso una funzione a Corte. Ma la piega delle sue labbra rosse, l’attorcigliarsi dei suoi baffi neri, e i suoi occhi a mandorla che nulla rispondevano non erano mutati più del volto d’una figura di cera nella vetrina d’un barbiere.

Anche il Profeta aveva apportato un miglioramento nel proprio abbigliamento. Quando aveva perorato sulla sabbia, il suo costume, eccetto il fez, era il costume trasandato ma rispettabile di un qualsiasi impiegato inglese piuttosto poco fortunato. Ma ora che era giunto tra aristocratici che vezzeggiavano la propria anima come i propri sensi, non doveva esservi tale incongruenza. Egli doveva essere un vero tulipano o loto orientale, appena colto. Così – indossava lunghe vesti fluenti di bianco, ravvivate qua e là da fili color fiamma disposti a trama, e attorno al capo aveva un turbante d’una sorta di verde dorato pallido. Doveva apparire come se fosse giunto volando attraverso l’Europa sul tappeto magico, o caduto un istante prima dal suo paradiso nella luna.

Le dame del mondo di Lord Ivywood erano più o meno quali già le abbiamo trovate. Lady Enid Wimpole soverchiava ancora il suo volto serio e timido con un costume tremendo, che somigliava più a una processione che a un abito. Pareva piuttosto il corteo funebre di Aubrey Beardsley. Lady Joan Brett somigliava ancora a una bellissima spagnola senza più illusioni sul proprio castello in Spagna. La grande e risoluta dama che aveva rifiutato di porre domande alla precedente conferenza di Misysra, e che era nota come Lady Crump, l’insigne femminista, aveva ancora l’aria d’essere tanto colma e gonfia di domande fatali all’Uomo da aver oltrepassato lo stadio della parola e raggiunto quello muto dell’ostilità. Per tutto lo svolgimento non contribuì con nulla se non con un silenzio esplosivo e uno sguardo malevolo. E la vecchia Lady Ivywood, sotto il più antico e fine merletto e le più antiche e fini maniere, aveva su di sé un che di simile alla morte, quale spesso si può scorgere nei genitori dei puri intellettuali. Aveva quel volto di madre perduta che è più patetico del volto di un figlio perduto.

«E con che cosa ci delizierete oggi?» stava chiedendo Lady Enid al Profeta.

«La mia conferenza,» rispose Misysra, gravemente, «verte sul Maiale.»

Faceva parte di una semplicità in lui davvero rispettabile il fatto che egli non vedesse mai alcuna incongruità nei testi o simboli arbitrari e isolati da cui filava le sue mille folli teorie. Lady Enid sopportò l’urto di questo singolare argomento di dibattito senza perdere quell’espressione di malinconica dolcezza che portava per principio quando parlava con simili persone.

«Il Maiale, esso è un vasto argomento,» proseguì il Profeta, tracciando curve nell’aria, come abbracciando qualche esemplare particolarmente pregiato. «Esso include molti argomenti. Mi è assai strano che i cristiani ridano tanto e si stupiscano perché noi ci riteniamo contaminati dal maiale; noi e anche un altro dei Popoli del Libro. Ma, di certo, voi cristiani stessi considerate il maiale come una sorta di contaminazione; poiché è la vostra più consueta espressione del vostro disprezzo, della vostra grandissima avversione. Voi dite “porco”, mia cara signora; non dite animali assai più impopolari, come l’alligatore.»

«Capisco,» disse la dama, «che meraviglia!»

«Se vi irritate,» continuò il gentiluomo incoraggiato ed eccitato, «se vi irritate con qualcuno, con una – come dite? – una cameriera, non le dite “Cavallo”. Non le dite “Cammello”.»

«Ah, no,» disse Lady Enid, con serietà.

«“Porca d’una cameriera”, dite nel vostro inglese colloquiale,» continuò il Profeta, trionfante. «Eppure questo grande e terribile Maiale, questo mostro il cui solo nome, quando lo si sussurra, credete appassirà tutti i vostri nemici, voi permettete, mia cara signora, che si avvicini ancor più a voi. Voi incorporate questo grande Maiale nella sostanza della vostra stessa persona.»

Lady Enid Wimpole appariva finalmente un poco stordita, a questa descrizione delle sue abitudini, e Joan diede a Lord Ivywood un cenno che sarebbe stato meglio trasferire il conferenziere nella sua legittima sfera di conferenziere. Ivywood aprì la via in una sala più ampia, gremita di file di sedie, con una sorta di leggìo all’estremità opposta, e fiancheggiata su tutti e quattro i lati da tavoli carichi di ogni sorta di rinfreschi. Era tipico del bizzarro, semi-fittizio entusiasmo e curiosità di quel mondo che un lungo tavolo fosse imbandito interamente di cibi vegetariani, specialmente di tipo orientale (come una mensa apparecchiata nel deserto per un eremita indiano piuttosto schizzinoso); ma che tavoli coperti di pasticci di selvaggina, aragosta e champagne fossero altrettanto forniti, e assai più frequentati. Persino il signor Hibbs, che avrebbe onestamente reputato più disonorevole entrare in una taverna che in un bordello, non poteva collegare alcun concetto di disonore allo champagne di Lord Ivywood.

For the purpose of the lecture was not wholly devoted to the great and awful Pig, and the purpose of the meeting even less. Lord Ivywood, the white furnace of whose mind was always full of new fancies hardening into ambitions, wanted to have a debate on the diet of East and West, and felt that Misysra might very appropriately open with an account of the Moslem veto on pork or other coarse forms of flesh food. He reserved it to himself to speak second.

The Prophet began, indeed, with some of his dizziest flights. He informed the Company that they, the English, had always gone in hidden terror and loathing of the Pig, as a sacred symbol of evil. He proved it by the common English custom of drawing a pig with one’s eyes shut. Lady Joan smiled, and yet she asked herself (in a doubt that had been darkening round her about many modern things lately) whether it was really much more fanciful than many things the scientists told her: as, the traces of Marriage by Capture which they found in that ornamental and even frivolous being, the Best Man.

He said that the dawn of greater enlightenment is shown in the use of the word “gammon,” which still expresses disgust at “the porcine image,” but no longer fear of it, but rather a rational disdain and disbelief. “Rowley,” said the Prophet, solemnly, and then after a long pause, “Powley,Gammon and Spinach.”

Lady Joan smiled again, but again asked herself if it was much more farfetched than a history book she had read, which proved the unpopularity of Catholicism in Tudor times from the word “hocus pocus.”

He got into a most amazing labyrinth of philology between the red primeval sins of the first pages of Genesis and the Common English word “ham.” But, again, Joan wondered whether it was much wilder than the other things she had heard said about Primitive Man by people who had never seen him.

He suggested that the Irish were set to keep pigs because they were a low and defiled caste, and the serfs of the pig-scorning Saxon; and Joan thought it was about as sensible as what the dear old Archdeacon had said about Ireland years ago; which had caused an Irishman of her acquaintance to play “the Shan Van Voght” and then smash the piano.

Joan Brett had been thoughtful for the last few days. It was partly due to the scene in the turret, where she had struck a sensitive and artistic side of Philip Ivywood she had never seen before, and partly to disturbing news of her mother’s health, which, though not menacing, made her feel hypothetically how isolated she was in the world. On all previous occasions she had merely enjoyed the mad lecturer now at the reading-desk. Today she felt a strange desire to analyse him, and imagine how a man could be so connected and so convinced and yet so wildly wide of the mark. As she listened carefully, looking at the hands in her lap, she began to think she understood.

The lecturer did really try to prove that the “porcine image” had never been used in English history or literature, except in contempt. And the lecturer really did know a very great deal about English history and literature: much more than she did; much more than the aristocrats round her did. But she noted that in every case what he knew was a fragmentary fact. In every case what he did not know was the truth behind the fact. What he did not know was the atmosphere. What he did not know was the tradition. She found herself ticking off the cases like counts in an indictment.

Misysra Ammon knew, what next to none of the English present knew, that Richard III was called a “boar” by an eighteenth century poet and a “hog” by a fifteenth century poet. What he did not know was the habit of sport and of heraldry. He did not know (what Joan knew instantly, though she had never thought of it before in her life) that beasts courageous and hard to kill are noble beasts, by the law of chivalry. Therefore, the boar was a noble beast, and a common crest for great captains. Misysra tried to show that Richard had only been called a pig after he was cold pork at Bosworth.

Misysra Ammon knew, what next to none of the English present knew, that there never was such a person as Lord Bacon. The phrase is a falsification of what should be Lord Verulam or Lord St. Albans. What he did not know was exactly what Joan did know (though it had never crossed her mind till that moment) that when all is said and done, a title is a sort of joke, while a surname is a serious thing. Bacon was a gentleman, and his name was Bacon; whatever titles he took. But Misysra seriously tried to prove that “Bacon” was a term of abuse applied to him during his unpopularity or after his fall.

Misysra Ammon knew, what next to none of the English present knew, that the poet Shelley had a friend called Hogg, who treated him on one occasion with grave treachery. He instantly tried to prove that the man was only called “Hogg” because he had treated Shelley with grave treachery. And he actually adduced the fact that another poet, practically contemporary, was called “Hogg” as completing the connection with Shelley. What he did not know was just what Joan had always known without knowing it: the kind of people concerned, the traditions of aristocrats like the Shelleys or of Borderers like the Ettrick Shepherd.

The lecturer concluded with a passage of impenetrable darkness about pig-iron and pigs of lead, which Joan did not even venture to understand. She could only say that if it did not mean that some day our diet might become so refined that we ate lead and iron, she could form no fancy of what it did mean.

“Can Philip Ivywood believe this kind of thing?” she asked herself; and even as she did so, Philip Ivywood rose.

He had, as Pitt and Gladstone had, an impromptu classicism of diction, his words wheeling and deploying into their proper places like a well-disciplined army in its swiftest advance. And it was not long before Joan perceived that the last phase of the picture, obscure and monstrous as it seemed, gave Ivywood exactly the opening he wanted. Indeed, she felt, no doubt, that he had arranged for it beforehand.

Poiché lo scopo della conferenza non era interamente dedicato al grande e terribile Maiale, e quello della riunione ancor meno. Lord Ivywood, la cui bianca fornace mentale era sempre colma di nuove fantasie che si indurivano in ambizioni, voleva tenere un dibattito sulla dieta d’Oriente e d’Occidente, e sentiva che Misysra avrebbe potuto assai opportunamente aprire con un resoconto del veto musulmano sul maiale o su altre forme grossolane di cibo carneo. Si riservava di parlare per secondo.

Il Profeta cominciò, in verità, con alcuni dei suoi voli più vertiginosi. Informò la compagnia che essi, gli inglesi, avevano sempre nutrito un nascosto terrore e ribrezzo del Maiale, quale sacro simbolo del male. Lo provò con la comune usanza inglese di disegnare un maiale a occhi chiusi. Lady Joan sorrise, eppure si chiese (in un dubbio che negli ultimi tempi le andava oscurando la mente intorno a molte cose moderne) se ciò fosse davvero molto più fantasioso di molte cose che gli scienziati le raccontavano: come le tracce del Matrimonio per Ratto che essi rinvenivano in quell’essere ornamentale e persino frivolo, il Testimone dello sposo.

Disse che l’alba di un più grande illuminismo si manifesta nell’uso della parola «gammon», che esprime ancora disgusto per «l’immagine porcina», ma non più paura di essa, bensì piuttosto un razionale disdegno e incredulità. «Rowley,» disse il Profeta, solennemente, e poi dopo una lunga pausa, «Powley, Gammon and Spinach.»

Lady Joan sorrise di nuovo, ma di nuovo si chiese se ciò fosse molto più tirato per i capelli di un libro di storia che aveva letto, il quale dimostrava l’impopolarità del cattolicesimo in epoca Tudor a partire dalla parola «hocus pocus».

Egli si smarrì in un sorprendentissimo labirinto di filologia tra i rossi peccati primordiali delle prime pagine della Genesi e la comune parola inglese «ham». Ma, ancora una volta, Joan si domandò se ciò fosse molto più stravagante delle altre cose che aveva udito dire sull’Uomo Primitivo da persone che non l’avevano mai visto.

Egli suggerì che agli irlandesi fosse toccato l’allevamento dei maiali perché costituivano una casta bassa e contaminata, e i servi della gleba del sassone sprezzatore del maiale; e Joan pensò che ciò fosse press’a poco sensato quanto ciò che il caro vecchio Arcidiacono aveva detto sull’Irlanda anni addietro; il che aveva indotto un irlandese di sua conoscenza a suonare «the Shan Van Voght» e poi a fracassare il pianoforte.

Joan Brett era stata pensierosa negli ultimi giorni. Ciò era dovuto in parte alla scena nella torretta, dove aveva toccato un lato sensibile e artistico di Philip Ivywood che non aveva mai visto prima, e in parte a notizie inquietanti sulla salute di sua madre, le quali, benché non minacciose, le facevano sentire in via ipotetica quanto fosse isolata al mondo. In tutte le precedenti occasioni si era limitata a divertirsi con il folle conferenziere ora al leggìo. Oggi provava uno strano desiderio di analizzarlo, e di immaginare come un uomo potesse essere tanto coerente e tanto convinto e tuttavia tanto follemente lontano dal segno. Mentre ascoltava attentamente, guardando le mani in grembo, cominciò a pensare di aver capito.

Il conferenziere cercava davvero di provare che «l’immagine porcina» non era mai stata usata nella storia o nella letteratura inglese, se non con disprezzo. E il conferenziere sapeva davvero moltissimo sulla storia e sulla letteratura inglese: molto più di lei; molto più degli aristocratici intorno a lei. Ma ella notò che in ogni caso ciò che egli sapeva era un fatto frammentario. In ogni caso ciò che non sapeva era la verità dietro il fatto. Ciò che non sapeva era l’atmosfera. Ciò che non sapeva era la tradizione. Si ritrovò a spuntare i casi come capi d’accusa in un atto d’imputazione.

Misysra Ammon sapeva ciò che quasi nessuno degli inglesi presenti sapeva, ossia che Riccardo III fu chiamato «cinghiale» da un poeta del Settecento e «porco» da un poeta del Quattrocento. Ciò che non sapeva era l’usanza della caccia e dell’araldica. Non sapeva (ciò che Joan sapeva all’istante, benché non ci avesse mai pensato prima in vita sua) che le bestie coraggiose e difficili da uccidere sono bestie nobili, per la legge della cavalleria. Perciò il cinghiale era una bestia nobile, e un comune cimiero per i grandi capitani. Misysra cercò di dimostrare che Riccardo era stato chiamato maiale solo dopo essere divenuto carne di porco fredda a Bosworth.

Misysra Ammon sapeva ciò che quasi nessuno degli inglesi presenti sapeva, ossia che non esistette mai una persona chiamata Lord Bacon. La locuzione è una falsificazione di ciò che dovrebbe essere Lord Verulam o Lord St. Albans. Ciò che non sapeva era esattamente ciò che Joan sapeva (benché non le fosse mai passato per la mente fino a quel momento): che, in fin dei conti, un titolo è una sorta di scherzo, mentre un cognome è cosa seria. Bacon era un gentiluomo, e il suo nome era Bacon; quali che fossero i titoli che assumeva. Ma Misysra cercò seriamente di provare che «Bacon» fosse un termine d’ingiuria rivoltogli durante la sua impopolarità o dopo la sua caduta.

Misysra Ammon sapeva ciò che quasi nessuno degli inglesi presenti sapeva, ossia che il poeta Shelley aveva un amico di nome Hogg, il quale in una certa occasione lo trattò con grave slealtà. Cercò immediatamente di provare che l’uomo era chiamato «Hogg» solo perché aveva trattato Shelley con grave slealtà. E addusse effettivamente il fatto che un altro poeta, praticamente contemporaneo, si chiamava «Hogg», quasi a completare il legame con Shelley. Ciò che non sapeva era proprio ciò che Joan aveva sempre saputo senza saperlo: il genere di persone in questione, le tradizioni di aristocratici come gli Shelley o di uomini di frontiera come il Pastore di Ettrick.

Il conferenziere concluse con un passaggio di impenetrabile oscurità sulla ghisa e sui pani di piombo, che Joan non osò neppure tentare di comprendere. Poté solo dire che, se ciò non significava che un giorno la nostra dieta sarebbe potuta divenire tanto raffinata da farci mangiare piombo e ferro, non riusciva a farsi alcuna idea di che cosa significasse.

«Può Philip Ivywood credere a cose di questo genere?» si chiese; e proprio mentre lo faceva, Philip Ivywood si alzò.

Egli aveva, come Pitt e Gladstone, un classicismo estemporaneo di dizione, con le parole che roteavano e si schieravano ai loro posti come un esercito ben disciplinato nella sua più rapida avanzata. E non passò molto prima che Joan si accorgesse che l’ultima fase del quadro, per quanto oscura e mostruosa apparisse, dava a Ivywood esattamente l’appiglio che desiderava. In verità, ella sentiva, senza dubbio, che egli l’aveva predisposta in anticipo.

“It is within my memory,” said Lord Ivywood, “though it need in no case have encumbered yours, that when it was my duty to precede the admired lecturer whom I now feel it a privilege even to follow, I submitted a suggestion which, however simple, would appear to many paradoxical. I affirmed or implied the view that the religion of Mahomet was, in a peculiar sense, a religion of progress. This is so contrary, not only to historical convention but to common platitude, that I shall find no ground either of surprise or censure if it takes a perceptible time before it sinks into the mind of the English public. But I think, ladies and gentlemen, that this period is notably abbreviated by the remarkable exposition which we have heard today. For this question of the attitude of Islam toward food affords as excellent an example of its special mode of progressive purification as the more popular example of its attitude toward drink. For it illustrates that principle which I have ventured to call the principle of the Crescent: the principle of perpetual growth toward an implied and infinite perfection.

“The great religion of Islam does not of itself forbid the eating of flesh foods. But, in accordance with that principle of growth which is its life, it has pointed the way to a perfection not yet perhaps fully attainable by our nature; it has taken a plain and strong example of the dangers of meat-eating; and hung up the repellent carcass as a warning and a sign. In the gradual emergence of mankind from a gross and sanguinary mode of sustenance, the Semite has led the way. He has laid, as it were, a symbolic embargo upon the beast typical, the beast of beasts. With the instinct of the true mystic, he selected for exemption from such cannibal feasts the creature which appeals to both sides of the higher vegetarian ethic. The pig is at once the creature whose helplessness most moves our pity and whose ugliness most repels our taste.

“It would be foolish to affirm that no difficulty arises out of the different stages of moral evolution in which the different races find themselves. Thus it is constantly said, and such things are not said without some excuse in document or incident, that followers of the Prophet have specialised in the arts of war and have come into a contact, not invariably friendly, with those Hindoos of India who have specialised in the arts of Peace. In the same way the Hindoos, it must be confessed, have been almost as much in advance of Islam in the question of meat as Islam is in advance of Christianity in the matter of drink. It must be remembered again and again, ladies and gentlemen, that every allegation we have of any difference between Hindoo and Moslem comes through a Christian channel, and is therefore tainted evidence. But in this matter, even, can we not see the perils of disregarding such plain danger signals as the veto on pork? Did not an Empire nearly slip out of our hands because our hands were greased with cow-fat? And did not the well of Cawnpore brim with blood instead of water because we would not listen to the instinct of the Oriental about the shedding of sacred blood?

“But if it be proposed, with whatever graduation, to approach that repudiation of flesh food which Buddhism mainly and Islam partly recommends, it will always be asked by those who hate the very vision of Progress–‘Where do you draw the line? May I eat oysters? May I eat eggs? May I drink milk?’ You may. You may eat or drink anything essential to your stage of evolution, so long as you are evolving toward a clearer and cleaner ideal of bodily life. If,” he said gravely, “I may employ a phrase of flippancy, I would say that you may eat six dozen oysters today, but I should strongly advise five dozen oysters tomorrow. For how else has all progress in public or private manners been achieved? Would not the primitive cannibals be surprised at the strange distinction we draw between men and beasts? All historians pay high honour to the Huguenots, and the great Huguenot Prince, Henri Quatre. None need deny that his aspiration that every Frenchman should have a chicken in his pot was, for his period, a high aspiration. It is no disrespect to him that we, mounting to higher levels, and looking down longer perspectives, consider the chicken. And this august march of discovery passes figures higher than that of Henry of Navarre. I shall always give a high place, as Islam has always given a high place, to that figure, mythical or no, which we find presiding over the foundations of Christianity. I cannot doubt that the fable, incredible and revolting otherwise, which records the rush of swine into the sea, was an allegory of his early realisation that a spirit, evil indeed, does reside in all animals in so far as they tempt us to devour them. I cannot doubt that the Prodigal leaving his sins among the swine is another illustration of the great thesis of the Prophet of the Moon. But here, also, progress and relativity are relentless in their advance; and not a few of us may have risen today to the point of regretting that the joyful sounds around the return of the Prodigal should be marred by the moaning of a calf.

“For the rest, he who asks us whither we go knows not the meaning of Progress. If we come at last to live on light, as men said of the chameleon, if some cosmic magic closed to us now, as radium was but recently closed, allows us to transmute the very metals into flesh without breaking into the bloody house of life, we shall know these things when we have achieved them. It is enough for us now if we have reached a spiritual station, in which at least the living head we lop has not eyes to reproach us; and the herbs we gather cannot cry against our cruelty like the mandrake.”

«È nella mia memoria,» disse Lord Ivywood, «benché non abbia dovuto in alcun caso ingombrare la vostra, che, quando fu mio dovere precedere l’ammirato conferenziere che ora sento come un privilegio persino seguire, io sottoposi un’ipotesi la quale, per quanto semplice, potrebbe apparire a molti paradossale. Affermai o lasciai intendere l’idea che la religione di Maometto fosse, in un senso peculiare, una religione di progresso. Ciò è tanto contrario, non solo alla convenzione storica ma al comune luogo comune, che non troverò motivo né di sorpresa né di biasimo se occorrerà un tempo apprezzabile prima che penetri nella mente del pubblico inglese. Ma io penso, signore e signori, che tale periodo sia notevolmente abbreviato dalla notevole esposizione che oggi abbiamo udito. Poiché questa questione dell’atteggiamento dell’Islam verso il cibo offre un esempio tanto eccellente del suo speciale modo di purificazione progressiva quanto il più popolare esempio del suo atteggiamento verso il bere. Poiché esso illustra quel principio che mi sono azzardato a chiamare il principio della Mezzaluna: il principio della perpetua crescita verso una perfezione implicita e infinita.

«La grande religione dell’Islam non proibisce di per sé il consumo di cibi carnei. Ma, in conformità a quel principio di crescita che è la sua vita, essa ha indicato la via verso una perfezione forse non ancora pienamente conseguibile dalla nostra natura; ha preso un esempio semplice e forte dei pericoli del mangiar carne; e ha appeso in alto la carcassa repellente come monito e come segno. Nel graduale emergere dell’umanità da un modo di sostentamento grossolano e sanguinario, il Semita ha aperto la via. Egli ha posto, per così dire, un embargo simbolico sulla bestia per eccellenza, la bestia delle bestie. Con l’istinto del vero mistico, egli ha scelto, per esentarla da tali banchetti cannibaleschi, la creatura che fa appello a entrambi i lati della più elevata etica vegetariana. Il maiale è al tempo stesso la creatura la cui impotenza più commuove la nostra pietà e la cui bruttezza più respinge il nostro gusto.

«Sarebbe sciocco affermare che nessuna difficoltà sorga dai diversi stadi di evoluzione morale in cui le diverse razze si trovano. Così si dice di continuo, e simili cose non si dicono senza qualche giustificazione in documento o episodio, che i seguaci del Profeta si sono specializzati nelle arti della guerra e sono venuti a contatto, non sempre amichevole, con quegli indù dell’India che si sono specializzati nelle arti della Pace. Allo stesso modo gli indù, bisogna confessarlo, sono stati quasi tanto più avanti dell’Islam nella questione della carne quanto l’Islam è più avanti del Cristianesimo nella questione del bere. Bisogna ricordare più e più volte, signore e signori, che ogni accusa che abbiamo di una qualsiasi differenza tra indù e musulmano ci giunge attraverso un canale cristiano, ed è perciò testimonianza inquinata. Ma anche in questa faccenda, non riusciamo forse a scorgere i pericoli del trascurare segnali di pericolo tanto evidenti quanto il veto sul maiale? Non fu forse un Impero sul punto di sfuggirci di mano perché le nostre mani erano unte di grasso di vacca? E il pozzo di Cawnpore non traboccò forse di sangue invece che d’acqua, perché non volemmo ascoltare l’istinto dell’Orientale circa lo spargimento di sangue sacro?

«Ma se ci si propone, con qualsivoglia gradazione, di accostarsi a quel ripudio del cibo carneo che il Buddhismo principalmente e l’Islam in parte raccomandano, sarà sempre chiesto da coloro che odiano la sola visione del Progresso: “Dove tracciate il limite? Posso mangiare ostriche? Posso mangiare uova? Posso bere latte?”. Potete. Potete mangiare o bere qualunque cosa essenziale al vostro stadio di evoluzione, purché stiate evolvendo verso un ideale più chiaro e più puro della vita corporea. Se,» disse gravemente, «mi è concesso impiegare una frase di leggerezza, direi che oggi potete mangiare sei dozzine di ostriche, ma domani vi consiglierei vivamente cinque dozzine di ostriche. Poiché in quale altro modo si è mai conseguito ogni progresso nelle maniere pubbliche o private? Non sarebbero forse i cannibali primitivi sorpresi della strana distinzione che noi tracciamo tra uomini e bestie? Tutti gli storici rendono alto onore agli Ugonotti, e al grande principe ugonotto, Enrico Quarto. Nessuno può negare che la sua aspirazione che ogni francese avesse un pollo nella pentola fosse, per la sua epoca, un’alta aspirazione. Non gli è alcuna mancanza di rispetto se noi, salendo a livelli più alti, e guardando prospettive più lunghe, prendiamo in considerazione il pollo. E questa augusta marcia della scoperta oltrepassa figure più alte di quella di Enrico di Navarra. Darò sempre un alto posto, come l’Islam ha sempre dato un alto posto, a quella figura, mitica o no, che troviamo a presiedere alle fondamenta del Cristianesimo. Non posso dubitare che la favola, per altro incredibile e ripugnante, che registra la corsa dei porci nel mare, fosse un’allegoria della sua precoce comprensione che uno spirito, invero maligno, risiede in tutti gli animali nella misura in cui essi ci tentano a divorarli. Non posso dubitare che il Figliol Prodigo, lasciando i suoi peccati tra i porci, sia un’altra illustrazione della grande tesi del Profeta della Luna. Ma anche qui il progresso e la relatività sono implacabili nella loro avanzata; e non pochi di noi possono essere saliti oggi al punto di rammaricarsi che i suoni gioiosi intorno al ritorno del Prodigo debbano essere guastati dal muggito di un vitello.

«Del resto, chi ci chiede dove andiamo non conosce il significato del Progresso. Se giungeremo infine a vivere di luce, come si diceva del camaleonte, se qualche cosmica magia a noi ora preclusa, come il radio fu precluso fino a poco fa, ci permetterà di trasmutare i metalli stessi in carne senza irrompere nella sanguinosa casa della vita, conosceremo queste cose quando le avremo conseguite. Ci basta ora l’aver raggiunto una stazione spirituale in cui almeno il capo vivente che recidiamo non abbia occhi per rimproverarci; e le erbe che cogliamo non possano gridare contro la nostra crudeltà come la mandragora.»

Lord Ivywood resumed his seat, his colourless lips still moving. By some previous arrangement, probably, Mr. Leveson rose to move a motion about Vegetarianism. Mr. Leveson was of opinion that the Jewish and Moslem veto on pork had been the origin of Vegetarianism. He thought it was a great step, and showed how progressive the creed could be. He thought the persecution of the Hindoos by Moslems had probably been much exaggerated; he thought our experience in the Indian Mutiny showed we considered the feeling of Easterners too little in such matters. He thought Vegetarianism in some ways an advance on orthodox Christianity. He thought we must be ready for yet further advances; and he sat down. And as he had said precisely, clause by clause, everything that Lord Ivywood had said, it is needless to say that that nobleman afterward congratulated him on the boldness and originality of his brilliant speech.

At a similar sort of preconcerted signal, Hibbs However rose rather vaguely to his feet to second the motion. He rather prided himself on being a man of few words, in the vocal sense; he was no orator, as Brutus was. It was only with pen in hand, in an office lined with works of reference, that he could feel that sense of confused responsibility that was the one pleasure of his life. But on this occasion he was brighter than usual; partly because he liked being in a lord’s house; partly because he had never tasted champagne before, and he felt as if it agreed with him; partly because he saw in the subject of Progress an infinite opportunity of splitting hairs.

“Whatever,” said Hibbs, with a solemn cough, “whatever we may think of the old belief that Moslems have differed from Buddhism in a regrettable way, there can be no doubt the responsibility lay with the Christian Churches. Had the Free Churches put their foot down and met Messrs. Opalstein’s demand, we should have heard nothing of these old differences between one belief and another.” As it was, it reminded him of Napoleon. He gave his own opinion for what it was worth, but he was not afraid to say at any cost, even there and in that company, that this business of Asiatic vegetation had occupied less of the time of the Wesleyan Conference than it should have done. He would be the last to say, of course, that anyone was in any sense to blame. They all knew Dr. Coon’s qualifications. They all knew as well as he did, that a more strenuous social worker than Charles Chadder had never rallied the forces of progress. But that which was not really an indiscretion might be represented as an indiscretion, and perhaps we had had enough of that just lately. It was all very well to talk about Coffe but it should be remembered, with no disrespect to those in Canada to whom we owe so much, that all that happened before 1891. No one had less desire to offend our Ritualistic friends than he did, but he had no hesitation in saying that the question was a question that could be asked, and though no doubt, from one point of view the goat’s–.

Lady Joan moved sharply in her chair, as if gripped by sudden pain. And, indeed, she had suddenly felt the chronic and recurrent pain of her life. She was brave about bodily pain, as are most women, even luxurious women: but the torment that from time to time returned and tore her was one to which many philosophical names have been given, but no name so philosophical as Boredom.

She felt she could not stand a minute more of Mr. Hibbs. She felt she would die if she heard about the goats–from one or any point of view. She slipped from her chair and somehow slid round the corner, in pretence of seeking one of the tables of refreshment in the new wing. She was soon among the new oriental apartments, now almost completed; but she took no refreshments, though attenuated tables could still be found here and there. She threw herself on an ottoman and stared toward the empty and elfin turret chambers in which Ivywood had made her understand that he, also, could thirst for beauty and desire to be at peace. He certainly had a poetry of his own, after all; a poetry that never touched earth; the poetry of Shelley rather than Shakespeare. His phrase about the fairy turret was true: it did look like the end of the world. It did seem to teach her that there is always some serene limit at last.

She started and half rose on her elbow with a small laugh. A dog of ludicrous but familiar appearance came shuffling toward her and she lifted herself in the act of lifting him. She also lifted her head, and saw something that seemed to her, in a sense more Christian and catastrophic, very like the end of the world.

Lord Ivywood riprese posto, le sue labbra incolori ancora in movimento. Per un accordo precedente, probabilmente, il signor Leveson si alzò per proporre una mozione sul vegetarianesimo. Il signor Leveson era dell’opinione che il divieto ebraico e mussulmano sulla carne di maiale fosse stato l’origine del vegetarianesimo. Pensava che fosse un grande passo avanti, e dimostrasse quanto la dottrina potesse essere progressista. Riteneva che la persecuzione degli indù da parte dei mussulmani fosse stata probabilmente molto esagerata; pensava che la nostra esperienza nella rivolta indiana mostrasse che consideravamo troppo poco il sentimento degli orientali in tali questioni. Pensava che il vegetarianesimo, in qualche modo, rappresentasse un progresso rispetto al cristianesimo ortodosso. Riteneva che dovessimo essere pronti per ulteriori passi avanti; e si sedette. E dato che aveva detto esattamente, punto per punto, tutto ciò che Lord Ivywood aveva affermato, non c’è bisogno di dire che quel nobile in seguito lo congratulò per l’audacia e l’originalità del suo brillante discorso.

A un segnale simile, preordinato, Hibbs si alzò piuttosto vagamente in piedi per sostenere la mozione. Si vantava di essere un uomo di poche parole, nel senso vocale; non era un oratore, come Bruto. Solo con una penna in mano, in uno studio pieno di opere di consultazione, poteva provare quel senso di responsabilità confusa che era l’unica gioia della sua vita. Ma in questa occasione era più brillante del solito; in parte perché gli piaceva trovarsi nella casa di un lord; in parte perché non aveva mai assaggiato lo champagne prima, e sentiva che gli faceva bene; in parte perché vedeva nell’argomento del Progresso un’infinita opportunità di spaccare il capello in quattro.

«Qualunque cosa» disse Hibbs con una tosse solenne «qualunque cosa possiamo pensare del vecchio credo che i musulmani si siano discostati dal buddismo in modo deplorevole, non ci può essere alcun dubbio che la responsabilità ricada sulle Chiese cristiane. Se le Chiese libere avessero fatto valere il loro diritto e risposto alla richiesta dei signori Opalstein, non avremmo mai sentito parlare di queste vecchie divergenze tra una credenza e l’altra». Com’era, gli ricordava Napoleone. Diede la sua opinione per quel che valeva, ma non aveva paura di dire a ogni costo, anche lì e in quella compagnia, che questa faccenda della vegetazione asiatica aveva occupato meno del tempo della Conferenza metodista di quanto avrebbe dovuto. Sarebbe stato l’ultimo a dire, ovviamente, che qualcuno fosse in qualche modo responsabile. Tutti conoscevano le qualifiche del dottor Coon. Tutti sapevano bene come lui che un lavoratore sociale più strenuo di Charles Chadder non aveva mai radunato le forze del progresso. Ma ciò che in realtà non era una indiscrezione poteva essere rappresentata come tale, e forse ne avevamo avuto abbastanza ultimamente. Era tutto molto bene parlare di Coffe ma si doveva ricordare, senza mancare di rispetto a coloro in Canada ai quali dobbiamo tanto, che tutto ciò è accaduto prima del 1891. Nessuno aveva meno desiderio di offendere i nostri amici ritualisti di lui, ma non ebbe esitazioni nel dire che la questione era una questione che poteva essere posta, e sebbene senza alcun dubbio, da un punto di vista il capro…

Lady Joan si mosse bruscamente sulla sedia, come se fosse stata presa da un improvviso dolore. E infatti aveva sentito all’improvviso il dolore cronico e ricorrente della sua vita. Era coraggiosa riguardo al dolore fisico, come la maggior parte delle donne, anche quelle più lussuose: ma il tormento che di tanto in tanto tornava a straziarla era uno a cui erano stati dati molti nomi filosofici, ma nessuno così filosofico come la Noia.

Sentiva di non poter sopportare un minuto di più il signor Hibbs. Sentiva che sarebbe morta se avesse sentito parlare delle capre, da uno o qualsiasi altro punto di vista. Scivolò via dalla sua sedia e in qualche modo girò l’angolo, fingendo di cercare uno dei tavoli con le rinfresche nell’ala nuova. Ben presto si trovò tra gli appartamenti orientali nuovi, ormai quasi completati; ma non prese alcun rinfresco, anche se qua e là si potevano ancora trovare tavoli spogli. Si gettò su un divanetto e fissò le vuote e fatate camere della torretta in cui Ivywood l’aveva fatta capire che lui pure poteva anelare alla bellezza e desiderare di essere in pace. Dopotutto, aveva certamente una sua poesia; una poesia che non toccava mai terra; la poesia di Shelley piuttosto che di Shakespeare. La sua frase sulla torretta fatata era vera: sembrava davvero il confine del mondo. Le sembrò di capire che alla fine c’è sempre un limite sereno.

Sussultò e si sollevò a metà sul gomito con una risatina. Un cane dall’aspetto ridicolo ma familiare venne barcollando verso di lei e lei si alzò nel gesto di prenderlo in braccio. Alzò anche la testa, e vide qualcosa che le sembrò, in un senso più cristiano e catastrofico, molto simile alla fine del mondo.

CHAPTER XII: VEGETARIANISM IN THE FOREST

HUMPHREY PUMP’S cooking of a fungus in an old frying-pan (which he had found on the beach) was extremely typical of him. He was, indeed, without any pretence of book-learning, a certain kind of scientific man that science has really been unfortunate in losing. He was the old-fashioned English Naturalist like Gilbert White or even Isaac Walton, who learned things not academically like an American Professor, but actually, like an American Indian. And every truth a man has found out as a man of science is always subtly different from any truth he has found out as a man, because a man’s family, friends, habits and social type have always got well under way before he has thoroughly learned the theory of anything. For instance, any eminent botanist at aSoirée of the Royal Society could tell you, of course, that other edible fungi exist, as well as mushrooms and truffles. But long before he was a botanist, still less an eminent botanist, he had begun, so to speak, on a basis of mushrooms and truffles. He felt, in a vague way, that these were really edible, that mushrooms were a moderate luxury, proper to the middle classes, while truffles were a much more expensive luxury, more suitable to the Smart Set. But the old English Naturalists, of whom Isaac Walton was perhaps the first, and Humphrey Pump perhaps the last, had in many cases really begun at the other end, and found by experience (often most disastrous experience) that some fungi are wholesome and some are not; but the wholesome ones are, on a whole, the majority. So a man like Pump was no more afraid of a fungus as such than he was of an animal as such. He no more started with the supposition that a grey or purple growth on a stone must be a poisonous growth than he started with the supposition that the dog who came to him out of the wood must be a mad dog. Most of them he knew; those he did not know he treated with rational caution, but to him, as a whole race, these weird-hued and one-legged goblins of the forests were creatures friendly to man.

“You see,” he said to his friend the Captain, “eating vegetables isn’t half bad, so long as you know what vegetables there are and eat all of them that you can. But there are two ways where it goes wrong among the gentry. First, they’ve never had to eat a carrot or a potato because it was all there was in the house; so they’ve never learnt how to be really hungry for carrots, as that donkey might be. They only know the vegetables that are meant to help the meat. They know you take duck and peas; and when they turn vegetarian they can only think of the peas without the duck. They know you take lobster in a salad; and when they turn vegetarian they can only think of the salad without the lobster. But the other reason is worse. There’s plenty of good people even round here, and still more in the north, who get meat very seldom. But then, when they do get it, they gobble it up like good ’uns. But the trouble with the gentry is different. The trouble is, the same sort of gentry that don’t want to eat meat don’t really want to eat anything. The man called a Vegetarian who goes to Ivywood House is generally like a cow trying to live on a blade of grass a day. You and I, Captain, have pretty well been vegetarians for some time, so as not to break into the cheese, and we haven’t found it so difficult, because we eat as much as we can.”

“It’s not so difficult as being teetotallers,” answered Dalroy, “so as not to break into the cask. But I’ll never deny that I feel the better for that, too, on the whole. But only because I could leave off being one whenever I chose. And, now I come to think of it,” he cried, with one of his odd returns of animal energy, “if I’m to be a vegetarian why shouldn’t I drink? Why shouldn’t I have a purely vegetarian drink? Why shouldn’t I take vegetables in their highest form, so to speak? The modest vegetarians ought obviously to stick to wine or beer, plain vegetarian drinks, instead of filling their goblets with the blood of bulls and elephants, as all conventional meat-eaters do, I suppose. What is the matter?”

“Nothing,” answered Pump. “I was looking out for somebody who generally turns up about this time. But I think I’m fast.”

“I should never have thought so from the look of you,” answered the Captain, “but what I’m saying is that the drinking of decent fermented liquor is just simply the triumph of vegetarianism. Why, it’s an inspiring idea! I could write a sort of song about it. As, for instance–

“You will find me drinking rum

Like a sailor in a slum,

You will find me drinking beer like a Bavarian;

You will find me drinking gin

In the lowest kind of inn,

Because I am a rigid Vegetarian.”

Why, it’s a vista of verbal felicity and spiritual edification! It has I don’t know how many hundred aspects! Let’s see; how could the second verse go? Something like–

“So I cleared the inn of wine,

And I tried to climb the Sign;

And I tried to hail the constable as ‘Marion’;

But he said I couldn’t speak,

And he bowled me to the Beak,

Because I was a Happy Vegetarian.”

“I really think something instructive to the human race may come out of all this … Hullo! Is that what you were looking for?”

The quadruped Quoodle came in out of the woods a whole minute later than the usual time and took his seat beside Humphrey’s left foot with a preoccupied air.

“Good old boy,” said the Captain. “You seem to have taken quite a fancy to us. I doubt, Hump, if he’s properly looked after up at the house. I particularly don’t want to talk against Ivywood, Hump. I don’t want his soul to be able in all eternity to accuse my soul of a mean detraction. I want to be fair to him, because I hate him like hell, and he has taken from me all for which I lived. But I don’t think, with all this in my mind, I don’t think I say anything beyond what he would own himself (for his brain is clear) when I say that he could never understand an animal. And so he could never understand the animal side of a man. He doesn’t know to this day, Hump, that your sight and hearing are sixty times quicker than his. He doesn’t know that I have a better circulation. That explains the extraordinary people he picks up and acts with; he never looks at them as you and I look at that dog. There was a fellow calling himself Gluck who was (mainly by Ivywood’s influence, I believe) his colleague on the Turkish Conferences, being supposed to represent Germany. My dear Hump, he was a man that a great gentleman like Ivywood ought not to have touched with a barge-pole. It’s not the race he was–if it was one race–it’s the Sort he was. A coarse, common, Levantine nark and eaves-dropper–but you mustn’t lose your temper, Hump. I implore you, Hump, to control this tendency to lose your temper when talking at any length about such people. Have recourse, Hump, to that consoling system of versification which I have already explained to you.

CAPITOLO XII: IL VEGETARIANISMO NELLA FORESTA

IL modo in cui HUMPHREY PUMP cucinava un fungo in una vecchia padella (che aveva trovato sulla spiaggia) era estremamente tipico di lui. Egli era, in verità, senza alcuna pretesa di erudizione libresca, una certa specie di uomo di scienza che la scienza è stata davvero sfortunata a perdere. Era il naturalista inglese all’antica, come Gilbert White o addirittura Isaac Walton, che imparava le cose non accademicamente come un professore americano, ma effettivamente, come un pellerossa americano. E ogni verità che un uomo ha scoperto come uomo di scienza è sempre sottilmente diversa da qualsiasi verità egli abbia scoperto come uomo, perché la famiglia, gli amici, le abitudini e il tipo sociale di un uomo hanno sempre preso ben l’avvio prima che egli abbia appreso a fondo la teoria di alcunché. Per esempio, qualsiasi eminente botanico a un ricevimento della Royal Society potrebbe dirvi, naturalmente, che esistono altri funghi commestibili, oltre ai prataioli e ai tartufi. Ma molto prima di essere botanico, e ancor meno eminente botanico, egli aveva cominciato, per così dire, su una base di prataioli e tartufi. Sentiva, in modo vago, che questi erano davvero commestibili, che i prataioli erano un lusso moderato, adatto alle classi medie, mentre i tartufi erano un lusso assai più costoso, più conveniente allo Smart Set. Ma i vecchi naturalisti inglesi, dei quali Isaac Walton fu forse il primo, e Humphrey Pump forse l’ultimo, in molti casi avevano davvero cominciato dall’altro capo, e avevano scoperto per esperienza (spesso esperienza disastrosissima) che alcuni funghi sono salubri e alcuni no; ma quelli salubri sono, nel complesso, la maggioranza. Sicché un uomo come Pump non aveva più paura di un fungo in quanto tale di quanta ne avesse di un animale in quanto tale. Non partiva più dal presupposto che una crescita grigia o purpurea su una pietra dovesse essere una crescita velenosa di quanto partisse dal presupposto che il cane che gli veniva incontro dal bosco dovesse essere un cane rabbioso. La maggior parte di essi li conosceva; quelli che non conosceva li trattava con razionale cautela, ma per lui, come intera stirpe, questi folletti dai colori strani e monopodi delle foreste erano creature amiche dell’uomo.

«Vedete,» disse al suo amico il Capitano, «mangiare verdura non è affatto male, purché sappiate quali verdure ci sono e ne mangiate tutte quante potete. Ma ci sono due punti in cui la cosa va storta tra i signori. Primo, non hanno mai dovuto mangiare una carota o una patata perché era tutto ciò che c’era in casa; sicché non hanno mai imparato ad aver davvero fame di carote, come potrebbe averne quell’asino. Conoscono solo le verdure che servono ad accompagnare la carne. Sanno che si prende l’anatra con i piselli; e quando si fanno vegetariani riescono a pensare solo ai piselli senza l’anatra. Sanno che si prende l’aragosta in insalata; e quando si fanno vegetariani riescono a pensare solo all’insalata senza l’aragosta. Ma l’altra ragione è peggiore. C’è un mucchio di brava gente anche qui intorno, e ancor più al nord, che ottiene carne assai di rado. Ma poi, quando ne ottengono, se la ingozzano da bravi. Il guaio dei signori, però, è diverso. Il guaio è che quella stessa specie di signori che non vuole mangiare carne non vuole in realtà mangiare nulla. L’uomo chiamato Vegetariano che va a Villa Ivywood è generalmente come una vacca che cerca di vivere con un filo d’erba al giorno. Voi e io, Capitano, siamo stati vegetariani abbastanza a lungo, da un certo tempo a questa parte, per non intaccare il formaggio, e non l’abbiamo trovato così difficile, perché mangiamo quanto più possiamo.»

«Non è così difficile come essere astemi,» rispose Dalroy, «per non intaccare la botte. Ma non negherò mai che anche di questo mi sento meglio, nel complesso. Ma solo perché potrei smettere di esserlo ogni volta che scegliessi. E, ora che ci penso,» esclamò, con uno dei suoi bizzarri ritorni di energia animale, «se devo essere vegetariano, perché non dovrei bere? Perché non dovrei avere una bevanda puramente vegetariana? Perché non dovrei prendere le verdure nella loro forma più alta, per così dire? I modesti vegetariani dovrebbero ovviamente attenersi al vino o alla birra, semplici bevande vegetariane, invece di riempire i loro calici con il sangue di tori ed elefanti, come fanno tutti i convenzionali mangiatori di carne, suppongo. Che cosa c’è?»

«Niente,» rispose Pump. «Stavo cercando qualcuno che di solito si fa vivo verso quest’ora. Ma credo di essere in anticipo.»

«Non l’avrei mai detto, a vedervi,» rispose il Capitano, «ma quel che dico è che il bere un decoroso liquore fermentato è semplicemente il trionfo del vegetarianismo. Diamine, è un’idea entusiasmante! Potrei scriverci sopra una specie di canzone. Come, per esempio –

«Mi troverai a bere rum

Come un marinaio in un tugurio,

Mi troverai a bere birra come un bavarese;

Mi troverai a bere gin

Nella più infima delle locande,

Perché sono un rigido Vegetariano.»

Diamine, è una prospettiva di felicità verbale e di edificazione spirituale! Ha non so quante centinaia di aspetti! Vediamo; come potrebbe andare la seconda strofa? Qualcosa come –

«Così ripulii la locanda dal vino,

E cercai di arrampicarmi sull’Insegna;

E cercai di salutare il poliziotto chiamandolo “Marion”;

Ma egli disse che non sapevo parlare,

E mi spedì rotolando dal Giudice,

Perché ero un Felice Vegetariano.»

«Penso davvero che qualcosa di istruttivo per il genere umano possa venir fuori da tutto ciò… Ehilà! È questo che stavi cercando?»

Il quadrupede Quoodle uscì dai boschi un minuto intero più tardi dell’ora consueta e prese posto accanto al piede sinistro di Humphrey con aria preoccupata.

«Bravo, vecchio mio,» disse il Capitano. «Pare che tu abbia preso una bella simpatia per noi. Dubito, Hump, che sia accudito come si deve lassù alla villa. Non voglio in particolare parlar male di Ivywood, Hump. Non voglio che la sua anima possa in tutta l’eternità accusare la mia anima di una meschina calunnia. Voglio essere giusto con lui, perché lo odio come l’inferno, e mi ha tolto tutto ciò per cui vivevo. Ma non credo, con tutto questo in mente, non credo di dire nulla che vada oltre ciò che egli stesso ammetterebbe (poiché il suo cervello è lucido) quando dico che non potrebbe mai capire un animale. E dunque non potrebbe mai capire il lato animale di un uomo. Non sa, a tutt’oggi, Hump, che la tua vista e il tuo udito sono sessanta volte più rapidi dei suoi. Non sa che io ho una circolazione migliore. Ciò spiega la gente straordinaria che si sceglie e con cui agisce; non li guarda mai come tu e io guardiamo quel cane. C’era un tale che si faceva chiamare Gluck, il quale era (principalmente per influenza di Ivywood, credo) suo collega nelle Conferenze Turche, essendo supposto rappresentare la Germania. Mio caro Hump, era un uomo che un gran gentiluomo come Ivywood non avrebbe dovuto toccare nemmeno con un palo da barcaiolo. Non è la razza che era – se era una razza – è la Specie che era. Una spia e un origliatore levantino, grossolano e volgare – ma non devi perdere la calma, Hump. Ti scongiuro, Hump, di controllare questa tendenza a perdere la calma quando parli a lungo di simili persone. Ricorri, Hump, a quel consolante sistema di versificazione che ti ho già spiegato.

“Oh I knew a Doctor Gluck,

And his nose it had a hook,

And his attitudes were anything but Aryan;

So I gave him all the pork

That I had, upon a fork;

Because I am myself a Vegetarian.”

“If you are,” said Humphrey Pump, “You’d better come and eat some vegetables. The White Hat can be eaten cold–or raw, for that matter. But Bloodspots wants some cooking.”

“You are right, Hump,” said Dalroy, seating himself with every appearance of speechless greed. “I will be silent. As the poet says–

“I am silent in the Club,

I am silent in the pub,

I am silent on a bally peak in Darien;

For I stuff away for life,

Shoving peas in with a knife,

Because I am at heart a Vegetarian.”

He fell to his food with great gusto, dispatched a good deal of it in a very short time, threw a glance of gloomy envy at the cask, and then sprang to his feet again. He caught up the inn-sign from where it leant against the Pantomime Cottage, and planted it like a pike in the ground beside him. Then he began to sing again, in an even louder voice than before.

“O, Lord Ivywood may lop,

And his privilege is sylvan and riparian;

And is also free to top,

But–.”

“Do you know,” said Hump, also finishing his lunch, “that I’m rather tired of that particular tune?”

“Tired, is it?” said the indignant Irishman, “then I’ll sing you a longer song, to an even worse tune, about more and more vegetarians, and you shall see me dance as well; and I will dance till you burst into tears and offer me the half of your kingdom; and I shall ask for Mr. Leveson’s head on the frying-pan. For this, let me tell you, is a song of oriental origin, celebrating the caprices of an ancient Babylonian Sultan and should be performed in palaces of ivory with palm trees and a bulbul accompaniment.”

And he began to bellow another and older lyric of his own on vegetarianism.

“Nebuchadnezzar, the King of the Jews,

Suffered from new and original views,

He crawled on his hands and knees it’s said,

With grass in his mouth and a crown on his head,

With a wowtyiddly, etc.

“Those in traditional paths that trod,

Thought the thing was a curse from God;

But a Pioneer men always abuse,

Like Nebuchadnezzar the King of the Jews.”

Dalroy, as he sang this, actually began to dance about like a ballet girl, an enormous and ridiculous figure in the sunlight, waving the wooden sign around his head. Quoodle opened his eyes and pricked up his ears and seemed much interested in these extraordinary evolutions. Suddenly, with one of those startling changes that will transfigure the most sedentary dogs, Quoodle decided that the dance was a game, and began to bark and bound round the performer, sometimes leaping so far into the air as almost to threaten the man’s throat. But, though the sailor naturally knew less about dogs than the countryman, he knew enough about them (as about many other things) not to be afraid, and the voice he sang with might have drowned the baying of a pack.

“Black Lord Foulon the Frenchmen slew,

Thought it a Futurist thing to do;

He offered them grass instead of bread,

So they stuffed him with grass when they cut off his head.

With a wowtyiddly, etc.

“For the pride of his soul he perished then,

But of course it is always of Pride that men

A Man in Advance of his Age accuse

Like Nebuchadnezzar the King of the Jews.

“Simeon Scudder of Styx, in Maine,

Thought of the thing and was at it again;

He gave good grass and water in pails

To a thousand Irishmen hammering rails,

With a wowtyiddly, etc.

“Appetites differ, and tied to a stake,

He was tarred and feathered for Conscience Sake;

But stoning the prophets is ancient news,

Like Nebuchadnezzar the King of the Jews.”

In an abandon, unusual even for him, he had danced his way down through the thistles into the jungle of weeds risen round the sunken Chapel. And the dog, now fully convinced that it was not only a game but an expedition, perhaps a hunting expedition, ran barking in front of him, along the path that his own dog’s paws had already burst through the tangle. Before Patrick Dalroy well knew what he was doing, or even remembered that he still carried the ridiculous sign-board in his hand, he found himself outside the open porch of a sort of narrow tower at the angle of a building which, to the best of his recollection, he had never seen before. Quoodle instantly ran up four or five steps in the dark staircase inside, and then, lifting his ears again, looked back for his companion.

There is, perhaps, such a thing as asking too much of a man. If there is, it was asking too much of Patrick Dalroy to ask him not to accept so eccentric an invitation. Hurriedly plunging his unwieldy wooden ensign upright in the thick of thistles and grass, he bent his gigantic neck and shoulders to enter the porch, and proceeded to climb the stairs. It was quite dark, and it was only after at least two twists of the stone spiral that he saw light ahead of him, and then it was a sort of rent in the wall that seemed to him as ragged as the mouth of a Cornish cave. It was also so low that he had some difficulty in squeezing his bulk through it, but the dog had jumped through with an air of familiarity, and once more looked back to see him follow.

If he had found himself inside any ordinary domestic interior, he would instantly have repented his escapade and gone back. But he found himself in surroundings which he had never seen before, or even, in one sense, believed possible.

His first feeling was that he was walking in the most sealed and secret suite of apartments in the castle of a dream. All the chambers had that air of perpetually opening inwards which is the soul of the Arabian Nights. And the ornament was of the same tradition; gorgeous and flamboyant, yet featureless and stiff. A purple mansion seemed to be built inside a green mansion and a golden mansion inside that. And the quaintly cut doorways or fretted lattices all had wavy lines like a dancing sea, and for some reason (sea-sickness for all he knew) this gave him a feeling as if the place were beautiful but faintly evil: as if it were bored and twisted for the fallen palace of the Worm.

“Ah! Conoscevo un dottor Gluck,

E il suo naso aveva un uncino,

E i suoi atteggiamenti erano tutt’altro che ariani;

Così gli ho dato tutto il prosciutto

Che avevo, su una forchetta;

Perché anch’io sono un vegetariano.»

«Se lo sei», disse Humphrey Pump, «è meglio che venga a mangiare un po’ di verdure. Il Cappello Bianco può essere mangiato freddo - o crudo, del resto. Ma il Macchiabianca vuole una cottura.»

«Avete ragione, Hump», disse Dalroy, sedendosi con ogni apparenza di silenziosa avidità. «Resterò in silenzio. Come dice il poeta:

“Sono silenzioso al Circolo,”

Sono silenzioso al pub,

Sono silenzioso su una dannata vetta nel Darien;

Perché mi riempio la vita di cose,

Infilare i piselli con un coltello,

Perché, in fondo al cuore, sono un vegetariano.»

Si avventò sul cibo con grande gusto, ne consumò una buona quantità in un tempo brevissimo, lanciò uno sguardo di cupa invidia alla botte e poi si rialzò di scatto. Afferrò il cartello dell’osteria da dove era appoggiato contro la Pantomime Cottage e lo piantò come una picca nel terreno accanto a lui. Poi ricominciò a cantare, con una voce ancora più forte di prima.

“O, Lord Ivywood può tagliare,”

E il suo privilegio è boschivo e fluviale;

E inoltre è libero di completare,

Però…»

«Sapete», disse Hump, finendo anche lui il suo pranzo, «che mi sto un po’ stancando di quella particolare melodia?»

“Stanco, eh?” disse l’indignato irlandese “allora ti canterò una canzone più lunga, su un motivo ancora peggiore, di vegetariani sempre più numerosi e tu mi vedrai danzare altrettanto bene; danzerò finché non scoppi in lacrime e non mi offrirai metà del tuo regno; io chiederò la testa di Mr. Leveson su una padella. Perché, sappi che questa è una canzone di origine orientale, che celebra i capricci di un antico Sultano babilonese e dovrebbe essere eseguita in palazzi d’avorio con palme e accompagnamento di bulbul.”

E cominciò a ruggire un’altra e più antica canzone di sua composizione sull’argomento del vegetarianesimo.

«Nabucodonosor, il Re degli Ebrei,

Ha sofferto per idee nuove e originali,

Si dice che strisciò sulle mani e sulle ginocchia

Con l’erba in bocca e una corona sulla testa,

Con un wowtyiddly eccetera,

“Coloro che percorrono i sentieri tradizionali,”

Pensava che fosse una maledizione di Dio;

Ma i pionieri vengono sempre maltrattati,

Come Nabucodonosor, il Re degli Ebrei».

Dalroy, mentre cantava questo, iniziò effettivamente ad ballare come una ballerina di balletto, un’enorme e ridicola figura alla luce del sole, agitando il cartello di legno sopra la sua testa. Quoodle aprì gli occhi e drizzò le orecchie e sembrò molto interessato a queste straordinarie evoluzioni. Improvvisamente, con uno di quei cambiamenti sorprendenti che possono trasfigurare i cani più sedentari, Quoodle decise che la danza era un gioco e iniziò ad abbaiare e a saltellare intorno all’artista, talvolta balzando così in alto da minacciare quasi la gola dell’uomo. Ma, sebbene il marinaio naturalmente sapesse meno dei contadini riguardo ai cani, ne sapeva abbastanza (come su molte altre cose) per non aver paura, e la voce con cui cantava avrebbe potuto sovrastare l’abbaiare di una muta.

“I Francesi uccisero il nero Lord Foulon,

Pensò che fosse una cosa da futurista fare;

Egli offrì loro erba invece di pane,

Così lo imbottirono d’erba quando gli tagliarono la testa.

Con un wowtyiddly eccetera,

“Per l’orgoglio della sua anima egli morì allora,

Ma naturalmente si tratta sempre di orgoglio che gli uomini

Un uomo avanti rispetto al suo tempo

Come Nabucodonosor, il Re degli Ebrei.

“Simeon Scudder di Styx nel Maine,”

Pensò alla cosa e ci riprovò;

Dava buon fieno e acqua nei secchi

A mille irlandesi che martellano i binari,

Con un wowtyiddly eccetera,

“Gusti diversi e legati a un palo,”

Fu cosparso di pece e piume per amore della coscienza;

Ma lapidare i profeti è storia antica,

Come Nabucodonosor, il Re degli Ebrei».

In un abbandono insolito anche per lui, aveva danzato tra i cardi fino alla giungla di erbacce cresciuta intorno alla cappella affondata. E il cane, ormai pienamente convinto che non si trattasse solo di un gioco ma di una spedizione, forse addirittura di caccia, correva abbaiando davanti a lui lungo il sentiero che le zampe del suo stesso cane avevano già aperto nel groviglio. Prima che Patrick Dalroy bene sapesse cosa stava facendo o anche solo ricordasse di avere ancora in mano quella ridicola targa, si ritrovò fuori dal portico aperto di una sorta di torre stretta all’angolo di un edificio che, per quanto ne sapeva, non aveva mai visto prima. Quoodle salì immediatamente quattro o cinque gradini della scala buia all’interno e poi, rialzando le orecchie, si guardò indietro in attesa del suo compagno.

C’è forse qualcosa che si chiede troppo a un uomo. Se c’è, era chiedere troppo a Patrick Dalroy di non accettare un invito così eccentrico. Immergendo frettolosamente il suo ingombrante vessillo di legno in mezzo ai cardi e all’erba, si piegò con il collo e le spalle gigantesche per entrare nel portico e proseguì a salire le scale. Era completamente buio, e fu solo dopo almeno due giri della scala a chiocciola che vide una luce davanti a sé, e poi sembrava un tipo di squarcio nella parete che gli apparve strappato come la bocca di una grotta del Cornovaglia. Era anche così basso che ebbe qualche difficoltà a passarci attraverso con il suo enorme corpo, ma il cane era saltato dentro con un’aria di familiarità e ancora una volta si guardò indietro per vederlo seguire.

Se si fosse trovato all’interno di un qualsiasi ambiente domestico ordinario, si sarebbe subito pentito della sua evasione e sarebbe tornato indietro. Ma si ritrovò in un contesto che non aveva mai visto prima, o addirittura, in un certo senso, creduto possibile.

La sua prima sensazione fu di camminare nella suite più sigillata e segreta degli appartamenti nel castello del sogno. Tutte le stanze avevano quell’aria di aprirsi continuamente verso l’interno che è la anima delle Mille e una notte. E gli ornamenti erano della stessa tradizione; sontuosi e vistosi, ma privi di caratteristiche e rigidi. Una dimora viola sembrava essere costruita all’interno di una dimora verde e una dimora dorata dentro quella. E le porte stranamente intagliate o i reticoli lavorati a giorno avevano tutti linee ondulate come un mare danzante, e per qualche motivo (forse il mal di mare) questo gli dava la sensazione che il luogo fosse bello ma vagamente maligno: come se fosse annoiato e contorto per essere il palazzo caduto del Verme.

But he had also another sensation which he could not analyze; for it reminded him of being a fly on the ceiling or the wall. Was it the Hanging Gardens of Babylon coming back to his imagination; or the Castle East of the Sun and West of the Moon? Then he remembered that in some boyish illness he had stared at a rather Moorish sort of wall paper, which was like rows and rows of brightly coloured corridors, empty and going on forever. And he remembered that a fly was walking along one of the parallel lines; and it seemed to his childish fancy that the corridors were all dead in front of the fly, but all came to life as he passed.

“By George!” he cried, “I wonder whether that’s the real truth about East and West! That the gorgeous East offers everything needed for adventures except the man to enjoy them. It would explain the tradition of the Crusades uncommonly well. Perhaps that’s what God meant by Europe and Asia. We dress the characters and they paint the scenery. Well, anyhow, three of the least Asiatic things in the world are lost in this endless Asiatic palace–a good dog, a straight sword, and an Irishman.”

But as he went down this telescope of tropical colours he really felt something of that hard fatalistic freedom of the heroes (or should we say villains?) in the Arabian Nights. He was prepared for any impossibility. He would hardly have been surprised if from under the lid of one of the porcelain pots standing in a corner had come a serpentine string of blue or yellow smoke, as if some wizard’s oil were within. He would hardly have been surprised if from under the curtains or closed doors had crawled out a snaky track of blood, or if a dumb negro dressed in white had come out with a bow string, having done his work. He would not have been surprised if he had walked suddenly into the still chamber of some Sultan asleep, whom to wake was a death in torments. And yet he was very much more surprised by what he did see, and when he saw it, he was certain at last that he was only wandering in the labyrinth of his own brain. For what he saw was what was really in the core of all his dreams.

What he saw, indeed, was more appropriate to that inmost eastern chamber than anything he had imagined. On a divan of blood-red and orange cushions lay a startlingly beautiful woman, with a skin almost swarthy enough for an Arab’s, and who might well have been the Princess proper to such an Arabian tale. But in truth it was not her appropriateness to the scene, but rather her inappropriateness, that made his heart bound. It was not her strangeness but her familiarity that made his big feet suddenly stop.

The dog ran on yet more rapidly, and the princess on the sofa welcomed him warmly, lifting him on his short hind legs. Then she looked up, and seemed turned to stone.

“Bismillah,” said the oriental traveller, affably, “may your shadow never grow less–or more, as the ladies would say. The Commander of the Faithful has deputed his least competent slave to bring you back a dog. Owing to temporary delay in collecting the fifteen largest diamonds in the moon, he has been compelled to send the animal without any collar. Those responsible for the delay will instantly be beaten to death, with the tails of dragons–”

The frightful shock, which had not yet left the lady’s face, brought him back to responsible speech.

“In short,” he said, “in the name of the Prophet, dog. I say, Joan, I wish this wasn’t a dream.”

“It isn’t,” said the girl, speaking for the first time, “and I don’t know yet whether I wish it was.”

“Well,” argued the dreamer, rationally, “what are you, anytime, if you’re not a dream–or a vision? And what are all these rooms, if they aren’t a dream –or rather a nightmare?”

“This is the new wing of Ivywood House,” said the lady addressed as Joan, speaking with great difficulty. “Lord Ivywood has fitted them up in the eastern style; he is inside conducting a most interesting debate in defence of Eastern Vegetarianism. I only came out because the room was rather hot.”

“Vegetarian!” cried Dalroy, with abrupt and rather unreasonable exasperation. “That table seems to fall a bit short of Vegetarianism.” And he pointed to one of the long, narrow tables, laid somewhere in almost all the central rooms, and loaded with elaborate cold meats and expensive wines.

“He must be liberal-minded,” cried Joan, who seemed to be on the verge of something, possibly temper. “He can’t expect people suddenly to begin being Vegetarians when they’ve never been before.”

“It has been done,” said Dalroy, tranquilly, walking across to look at the table. “I say, your ascetical friends seem to have made a pretty good hole in the champagne. You may not believe it, Joan, but I haven’t touched what you call alcohol for a month.”

With which words he filled with champagne a large tumbler intended for claret cup and swallowed it at a draught.

Lady Joan Brett stood up straight but trembling.

“Now that’s really wrong, Pat,” she cried. “Oh, don’t be silly–you know I don’t care about the alcohol or all that. But you’re in the man’s house, uninvited, and he doesn’t know. That wasn’t like you.”

“He shall know, all right,” said the large man, quietly. “I know the exact price of a tumbler of that champagne.”

And he scribbled some words in pencil on the back of a bill of fare on the table, and then carefully laid three shillings on top of it.

“And there you do Philip the worst wrong of all,” cried Lady Joan, flaming white. “You know as well as I do, anyhow, that he would not take your money.” Patrick Dalroy stood looking at her for some seconds with an expression on his broad and unusually open face which she found utterly puzzling.

Ma provava anche un’altra sensazione che non riusciva ad analizzare; perché gli ricordava di essere una mosca sul soffitto o sulla parete. Erano i Giardini Sospesi di Babilonia a tornare alla sua immaginazione; oppure il Castello a est del Sole e a ovest della Luna? Poi si ricordò che durante una malattia infantile aveva fissato un tipo di carta da parati piuttosto moresco, che sembrava avere file su file di corridoi vivacemente colorati, vuoti e interminabili. E si ricordò che una mosca camminava lungo una delle linee parallele; e gli sembrava nella sua fantasia infantile che i corridoi fossero tutti morti davanti alla mosca, ma prendessero vita al suo passaggio.

«Per Giorgio!» esclamò «mi domando se questa sia la vera verità su Oriente e Occidente! Che l’opulento Oriente offra tutto ciò che serve per le avventure, tranne l’uomo capace di godersele. Spiegherebbe alla perfezione la tradizione delle crociate. Forse è questo che Dio intendeva con Europa e Asia. Noi vestiamo i personaggi ed essi dipingono il paesaggio. Bene, comunque, tre delle cose meno asiatiche al mondo sono perse in questo infinito palazzo asiatico: un buon cane, una spada diritta e un irlandese.»

Ma mentre scendeva lungo questo telescopio di colori tropicali provava davvero qualcosa di quella dura libertà fatalistica degli eroi (o dovremmo dire dei malvagi?) nelle Mille e una notte. Era preparato a qualsiasi impossibilità. Non si sarebbe quasi sorpreso se da sotto il coperchio di uno dei vasi di porcellana in un angolo fosse uscito un serpente filo di fumo blu o giallo, come se all’interno ci fosse l’olio di qualche mago. Non si sarebbe quasi sorpreso se da sotto le tende o dalle porte chiuse fosse strisciata fuori una scia sinuosa di sangue, o se un negro muto vestito di bianco fosse uscito con una corda per l’arco, avendo compiuto il suo lavoro. Non si sarebbe sorpreso se fosse entrato all’improvviso nella camera silenziosa di qualche sultano addormentato, che svegliare era una morte in tormenti. Eppure fu molto più sorpreso da ciò che vide davvero, e quando lo vide fu certo infine che stava solo vagando nel labirinto del suo cervello. Perché quello che vide era proprio il cuore di tutti i suoi sogni.

Ciò che vide era davvero più adatto a quella camera orientale più interna di quanto avesse mai immaginato. Su un divano con cuscini color rosso sangue e arancione giaceva una donna straordinariamente bella, con una pelle quasi abbastanza scura da essere quella di un’araba, che ben si sarebbe potuta rivelare la Principessa adatta a una fiaba del genere. Ma in verità non fu l’adeguatezza della donna alla scena a far battere più forte il suo cuore, bensì piuttosto la sua inadeguatezza. Non fu la sua stranezza ma la sua familiarità che fece fermare di colpo i suoi grandi piedi.

Il cane continuò a correre ancora più velocemente e la principessa sul divano lo accolse calorosamente, sollevandolo sulle sue corte zampe posteriori. Poi alzò gli occhi e sembrò trasformarsi in pietra.

«Bismillah», disse il viaggiatore orientale, con affabilità, «che la tua ombra non si accorci mai – o non si allunghi, come direbbero le signore. Il Comandante dei Fedeli ha incaricato il suo schiavo meno competente di riportarti un cane. A causa del ritardo temporaneo nel raccogliere i quindici diamanti più grandi della luna, è stato costretto a inviare l’animale senza alcun collare. Chi è responsabile del ritardo sarà immediatamente battuto fino alla morte, con le code dei draghi –»

Lo spaventoso choc che ancora non aveva abbandonato il volto della signora lo riportò a un linguaggio responsabile.

“Insomma”, disse, “in nome del Profeta, cane. Dico, Giovanna, vorrei che questo non fosse un sogno.”

“Non lo è”, disse la ragazza, parlando per la prima volta, “e non so ancora se desidero che lo sia”.

«Bene,» argomentò il sognatore, in modo razionale, «cosa sei tu, in qualsiasi momento, se non un sogno - o una visione? E cosa sono tutte queste stanze, se non un sogno - o piuttosto un incubo?»

«Questo è il nuovo ala di Ivywood House», disse la signora chiamata Joan, parlando con grande difficoltà. «Lord Ivywood li ha arredati in stile orientale; è dentro che sta conducendo un dibattito molto interessante in difesa del vegetarianismo orientale. Sono uscita solo perché la stanza era piuttosto calda».

“Vegetariano!” esclamò Dalroy con un’irritazione improvvisa e piuttosto irragionevole. “Quel tavolo sembra essere un po’ al di sotto del Vegetarismo.” E indicò uno dei lunghi, stretti tavoli apparecchiati in quasi tutte le stanze centrali, carichi di elaborati salumi freddi e vini costosi.

«Deve essere di mentalità aperta», esclamò Giovanna, che sembrava sul punto di qualcosa, forse di perdere la pazienza. «Non può pretendere che le persone comincino improvvisamente a diventare vegetariane quando non lo sono mai state prima».

«È fatto», disse Dalroy con tranquillità, avvicinandosi per guardare il tavolo. «Dico, i tuoi amici ascetici sembrano aver fatto un buon buco nello champagne. Potresti non crederci, Joan, ma non ho toccato quello che chiami alcol da un mese».

Con queste parole riempì di champagne un grande bicchiere destinato al claret cup e lo inghiottì in un sorso solo.

La signora Joan Brett si alzò dritta ma tremante.

«Adesso questo è davvero sbagliato, Pat», esclamò lei. «Oh, non fare la sciocca: sai che non mi interessa l’alcol o tutte quelle cose. Ma sei nella casa dell’uomo senza essere stata invitata e lui non lo sa. Non è da te».

«Lo saprà, certo», disse l’uomo robusto, tranquillamente. «Conosco il prezzo esatto di un bicchiere di quel champagne».

E scarabocchiò alcune parole con una matita sul retro di un menu sul tavolo e poi vi depose sopra con cura tre scellini.

“E lì fai a Philip il peggior torto di tutti”, gridò Lady Joan, pallidissima. “Comunque tu lo sai bene quanto me che non accetterebbe i tuoi soldi.” Patrick Dalroy la guardò per alcuni secondi con un’espressione sul suo largo e insolitamente aperto volto che lei trovò del tutto sconcertante.

“Curiously enough,” he observed, at last, and with absolutely even temper, “curiously enough, it is you who are doing Philip Ivywood a wrong. I think him quite capable of breaking England or Creation. But I do honestly think he would never break his word. And what is more, I think the more arbitrary and literal his word had been, the more he would keep it. You will never understand a man like that, till you understand that he can have devotion to a definition; even a new definition. He can really feel about an amendment to an Act of Parliament, inserted at the last moment, as you feel about England or your mother.”

“Oh, don’t philosophise,” cried Joan suddenly. “Can’t you see this has been a shock?”

“I only want you to see the point,” he replied. “Lord Ivywood clearly told me, with his own careful lips, that I might go in and pay for fermented liquor in any place displaying a public sign outside. And he won’t go back on that definition or on any definition. If he finds me here, he may quite possibly put me in prison on some other charge, as a thief or a vagabond, or what not. But he will not grudge the champagne. And he will accept the three shillings. And I shall honour him for his glorious consistency.”

“I don’t understand,” said Joan, “one word of what you are talking about. Which way did you come? How can I get you away? You don’t seem to grasp that you’re in Ivywood House.”

“You see there’s a new name outside the gate,” observed Patrick, conversationally, and led the lady to the end of the corridor by which he had entered and into its ultimate turret chamber.

Following his indications, Lady Joan peered a little over the edge of the window where hung the brilliant purple bird in its brilliant golden cage. Almost immediately below, outside the entrance to the half-closed stairway, stood a wooden tavern sign, as solid and still as if it had been there for centuries.

“All back at the sign of ‘The Old Ship,’ you see,” said the Captain. “Can I offer you anything in a lady-like way?”

There was a vast impudence in the slight, hospitable movement of his hand, that disturbed Lady Joan’s features with an emotion other than any that she desired to show.

“Well!” cried Patrick, with a wild geniality, “I’ve made you laugh again, my dear.”

He caught her to him as in a whirlwind, and then vanished from the fairy turret like a blast, leaving her standing with her hand up to her wild black hair.

«Curiosamente,» osservò infine, e con umore del tutto pacato, «curiosamente, sei tu che stai facendo un torto a Philip Ivywood. Lo credo ben capace di mandare in rovina l’Inghilterra o il Creato. Ma credo onestamente che non verrebbe mai meno alla parola data. E per di più, penso che quanto più arbitraria e letterale fosse stata la sua parola, tanto più la manterrebbe. Non capirai mai un uomo simile, finché non capirai che egli può nutrire devozione per una definizione; anche per una definizione nuova. Può davvero provare, per un emendamento a una legge del Parlamento inserito all’ultimo momento, ciò che tu provi per l’Inghilterra o per tua madre.»

«Oh, non filosofeggiare,» gridò Joan all’improvviso. «Non vedi che è stato un colpo?»

«Voglio solo che tu colga il punto,» rispose. «Lord Ivywood mi ha detto chiaramente, con le sue labbra scrupolose, che potevo entrare e pagare per liquore fermentato in qualsiasi luogo esponesse un’insegna pubblica all’esterno. E non rinnegherà quella definizione né alcun’altra definizione. Se mi trova qui, può benissimo mettermi in prigione con qualche altra accusa, come ladro o vagabondo, o che so io. Ma non mi lesinerà lo champagne. E accetterà i tre scellini. E lo onorerò per la sua gloriosa coerenza.»

«Non capisco,» disse Joan, «una sola parola di ciò che stai dicendo. Da che parte sei venuto? Come posso portarti via? Non sembri renderti conto che sei in Casa Ivywood.»

«Vedi, c’è un nome nuovo fuori del cancello,» osservò Patrick, con tono da conversazione, e condusse la dama in fondo al corridoio da cui era entrato e nella sua ultima stanza a torretta.

Seguendo le sue indicazioni, Lady Joan sbirciò un poco oltre l’orlo della finestra dove pendeva il brillante uccello purpureo nella sua brillante gabbia dorata. Quasi immediatamente sotto, fuori dall’ingresso della scala semichiusa, stava un’insegna di taverna in legno, solida e immobile come se fosse stata lì da secoli.

«Tutti di ritorno all’insegna della “Vecchia Nave”, vedi,» disse il Capitano. «Posso offrirti qualcosa, alla maniera d’una dama?»

C’era una vasta impudenza nel gesto lieve e ospitale della sua mano, che turbò i lineamenti di Lady Joan con un’emozione diversa da qualunque ella desiderasse mostrare.

«Ebbene!» gridò Patrick, con selvaggia cordialità, «ti ho fatto ridere di nuovo, mia cara.»

La strinse a sé come in un turbine, e poi svanì dalla fatata torretta come una raffica, lasciandola in piedi con la mano levata verso i suoi selvaggi capelli neri.

CHAPTER XIII: THE BATTLE OF THE TUNNEL

WHAT Joan Brett really felt, as she went back from the second tête-à-tête she had experienced in the turret, it is doubtful if anyone will ever know. But she was full of the pungent feminine instinct to “drive at practice,” and what she did clearly realise was the pencil writing Dalroy had left on the back of Lord Ivywood’smenu. Heaven alone knew what it was, and (as it pleased her profane temper to tell herself) she was not satisfied with Heaven alone knowing. She went swiftly back, with swishing skirts, to the table where it had been left. But her skirts fell more softly and her feet trailed slower and more in her usual manner as she came near the table. For standing at it was Lord Ivywood, reading the card with tranquil lowered eyelids, that set off perfectly the long and perfect oval of his face. He put down the card with a quite natural action; and, seeing Joan, smiled at her in his most sympathetic way.

“So you’ve come out too,” he said. “So have I; it’s really too hot for anything. Dr. Gluck is making an uncommonly good speech, but I couldn’t stop even for that. Don’t you think my eastern decorations are rather a success after all? A sort of Vegetarianism in design, isn’t it?”

He led her up and down the corridors, pointing out lemon-coloured crescents or crimson pomegranates in the scheme of ornament, with such utter detachment that they twice passed the open mouth of the hall of debate, and Joan could distinctly hear the voice of the diplomatic Gluck saying:

“Indeed, we owe our knowledge of the pollution of the pork primarily to the Jewth and not the Mothlemth. I do not thare that prejudithe against the Jewth, which ith too common in my family and all the arithtocratic and military Prutthian familieth. I think we Prutthian arithtocrats owe everything to the Jewth. The Jewth have given to our old Teutonic rugged virtueth, jutht that touch of refinement, jutht that intellectual thuperiority which–.”

And then the voice would die away behind, as Lord Ivywood lectured luxuriantly, and very well, on the peacock tail in decoration, or some more extravagant eastern version of the Greek Key. But the third time they turned, they heard the noise of subdued applause and the breaking up the meeting; and people came pouring forth.

With stillness and swiftness, Ivywood pitched on the people he wanted and held them. He button-holed Leveson and was evidently asking him to do something which neither of the two liked doing.

“If your lordship insists,” she heard Leveson whispering, “of course I will go myself; but there is a great deal to be done here with your lordship’s immediate matters. And if there were anyone else–.”

If Philip, Lord Ivywood, had ever looked at a human being in his life, he would have seen that J. Leveson, Secretary, was suffering from a very ancient human malady, excusable in all men and rather more excusable in one who has had his top-hat smashed over his eyes and has run for his life. As it was, he saw nothing, but merely said, “Oh, well, get someone else. What about your friend Hibbs?”

Leveson ran across to Hibbs, who was drinking another glass of champagne at one of the innumerable buffets.

“Hibbs,” said Leveson, rather nervously, “will you do Lord Ivywood a favour? He says you have so much tact. It seems possible that a man may be hanging about the grounds just below that turret there. He is a man it would certainly be Lord Ivywood’s public duty to put into the hands of the police, if he is there. But then, again, he is quite capable of not being there at all–I mean of having sent his message from somewhere else and in some other way. Naturally, Lord Ivywood doesn’t want to alarm the ladies and perhaps turn the laugh against himself, by getting up a sort of police raid about nothing. He wants some sensible, tactful friend of his to go down and look round the place–it’s a sort of disused garden–and report if there’s anyone about. I’d go myself, but I’m wanted here.”

Hibbs nodded, and filled another glass.

“But there’s a further difficulty,” went on Leveson. “He’s a clever brute, it seems, a ‘remarkable and a dangerous man,’ were his lordship’s words; and it looks as if he’d spotted a very good hiding-place, a disused tunnel leading to the sands, just beyond the disused garden and chapel. It’s a smart choice, you see, for he can bolt into the woods if anyone comes from the shore, or on to the shore if anyone comes from the woods. But it would take a good time even to get the police here, and it would take ten times longer to get ’em round to the sea end of the tunnel, especially as the sea comes up to the cliffs once or twice between here and Pebblewick. So we mustn’t frighten him away, or he’ll get a start. If you meet anyone down there talk to him quite naturally, and come back with the news. We won’t send for the police till you come. Talk as if you were just wandering like himself. His lordship wishes your presence to appear quite accidental.”

“Wishes my presence to appear quite accidental,” repeated Hibbs, gravely.

When the feverish Leveson had flashed off satisfied, Hibbs took a glass or two more of wine; feeling that he was going on a great diplomatic mission to please a lord. Then he went through the opening, picked his way down the stair, and somehow found his way out into the neglected garden and shrubbery.

It was already evening, and an early moon was brightening over the sunken chapel with its dragon-coloured scales of fungus. The night breeze was very fresh and had a marked effect on Mr. Hibbs. He found himself taking a meaningless pleasure in the scene; especially in one fungus that was white with brown spots. He laughed shortly, to think that it should be white with brown spots. Then he said, with carefully accurate articulation, “His lordship wishes my presence to appear quite accidental.” Then he tried to remember something else that Leveson had said.

CAPITOLO XIII: LA BATTAGLIA DEL TUNNEL

CHE cosa Joan Brett provasse davvero, mentre tornava dal secondo tête-à-tête che aveva vissuto nella torretta, è dubbio che qualcuno lo saprà mai. Ma era colma del pungente istinto femminile di «puntare alla pratica», e ciò che comprese chiaramente fu la scritta a matita che Dalroy aveva lasciato sul retro del menù di Lord Ivywood. Il Cielo solo sapeva che cosa fosse, e (come piaceva al suo temperamento profano dirsi) ella non si accontentava che il Cielo solo lo sapesse. Tornò rapidamente indietro, con le gonne fruscianti, al tavolo dove era stata lasciata. Ma le sue gonne ricaddero più morbide e i suoi piedi si trascinarono più lenti e più nel suo modo consueto man mano che si avvicinava al tavolo. Poiché in piedi accanto ad esso stava Lord Ivywood, che leggeva il cartoncino con le palpebre tranquillamente abbassate, le quali mettevano perfettamente in risalto il lungo e perfetto ovale del suo viso. Posò il cartoncino con un gesto del tutto naturale; e, vedendo Joan, le sorrise nel suo modo più affabile.

«Così anche voi siete uscita,» disse. «Anch’io; fa davvero troppo caldo per qualsiasi cosa. Il dottor Gluck sta facendo un discorso straordinariamente buono, ma non ho potuto trattenermi neppure per quello. Non trovate che le mie decorazioni orientali siano dopo tutto un discreto successo? Una sorta di Vegetarianismo nel disegno, non vi pare?»

La condusse su e giù per i corridoi, additando mezzelune color limone o melagrane cremisi nello schema dell’ornamento, con tale totale distacco che passarono due volte davanti alla bocca aperta della sala del dibattito, e Joan poté distintamente udire la voce del diplomatico Gluck che diceva:

«In verità, dobbiamo la nothtra conothenza della contaminathione del maiale primariamente agli Ebrei e non ai Muthulmani. Io non condivido quel pregiudithio contro gli Ebrei, che è troppo comune nella mia famiglia e in tutte le famiglie arithtocratiche e militari prutthiane. Pentho che noi arithtocratici prutthiani dobbiamo tutto agli Ebrei. Gli Ebrei hanno dato alle nothtre vecchie rudi virtù teutoniche proprio quel tocco di raffinatetha, proprio quella thuperiorità intellettuale che –.»

E poi la voce moriva dietro di loro, mentre Lord Ivywood teneva lezione lussureggiante, e assai bene, sulla coda di pavone nella decorazione, o su qualche più stravagante versione orientale del meandro greco. Ma la terza volta che si voltarono, udirono il rumore di un applauso sommesso e lo sciogliersi della riunione; e la gente venne riversandosi fuori.

Con immobilità e prontezza, Ivywood piombò sulle persone che voleva e le trattenne. Prese da parte Leveson e gli stava evidentemente chiedendo di fare qualcosa che nessuno dei due gradiva fare.

«Se vostra signoria insiste,» ella udì Leveson sussurrare, «andrò io stesso, naturalmente; ma c’è moltissimo da fare qui con le questioni immediate di vostra signoria. E se ci fosse qualcun altro –.»

Se Philip, Lord Ivywood, avesse mai in vita sua guardato un essere umano, avrebbe visto che J. Leveson, segretario, soffriva di un antichissimo malanno umano, scusabile in tutti gli uomini e piuttosto più scusabile in uno a cui hanno schiacciato il cilindro sugli occhi e che ha corso per salvarsi la vita. Così com’era, egli non vide nulla, ma disse semplicemente: «Oh, be’, trovate qualcun altro. Che ne dite del vostro amico Hibbs?»

Leveson corse da Hibbs, il quale stava bevendo un altro bicchiere di champagne a uno degli innumerevoli buffet.

«Hibbs,» disse Leveson, piuttosto nervosamente, «vuoi fare un favore a Lord Ivywood? Dice che hai tanto tatto. Pare possibile che un uomo si aggiri per il parco proprio sotto quella torretta laggiù. È un uomo che sarebbe certamente dovere pubblico di Lord Ivywood consegnare nelle mani della polizia, se è là. Ma poi, ancora, è pienamente capace di non esservi affatto – voglio dire di aver mandato il suo messaggio da qualche altro luogo e in qualche altro modo. Naturalmente, Lord Ivywood non vuole allarmare le signore e magari attirarsi le risa addosso, mettendo in piedi una sorta di retata di polizia per niente. Vuole che qualche suo amico assennato e pieno di tatto scenda a dare un’occhiata al posto – è una specie di giardino abbandonato – e riferisca se c’è qualcuno in giro. Andrei io stesso, ma mi vogliono qui.»

Hibbs annuì, e riempì un altro bicchiere.

«Ma c’è un’ulteriore difficoltà,» proseguì Leveson. «È un bruto astuto, a quanto pare, un “uomo notevole e pericoloso”, furono le parole di sua signoria; e sembra che abbia individuato un ottimo nascondiglio, un tunnel in disuso che conduce alla sabbia, appena oltre il giardino e la cappella abbandonati. È una scelta scaltra, vedi, perché può sgusciare nei boschi se qualcuno arriva dalla riva, o sulla riva se qualcuno arriva dai boschi. Ma ci vorrebbe un bel po’ di tempo anche solo per far arrivare qui la polizia, e ci vorrebbe dieci volte tanto per farla girare fino all’estremità marina del tunnel, tanto più che il mare arriva fino alle scogliere una o due volte tra qui e Pebblewick. Perciò non dobbiamo spaventarlo e farlo fuggire, o prenderà il largo. Se incontri qualcuno laggiù, parlagli in modo del tutto naturale, e torna con la notizia. Non manderemo a chiamare la polizia finché non torni. Parla come se stessi solo vagabondando come lui. Sua signoria desidera che la tua presenza appaia del tutto casuale.»

«Desidera che la mia presenza appaia del tutto casuale,» ripeté Hibbs, gravemente.

Quando il febbrile Leveson fu sfrecciato via soddisfatto, Hibbs prese uno o due altri bicchieri di vino; sentendo che stava partendo per una grande missione diplomatica per compiacere un lord. Poi passò attraverso l’apertura, si fece strada giù per la scala, e in qualche modo trovò l’uscita nel giardino e nell’arbusteto trascurati.

Era già sera, e una precoce luna rischiarava la cappella sprofondata con le sue squame di fungo color drago. La brezza della notte era assai fresca ed ebbe un marcato effetto sul signor Hibbs. Si ritrovò a provare un piacere insensato per la scena; specialmente per un fungo che era bianco a macchie brune. Rise brevemente, al pensiero che dovesse essere bianco a macchie brune. Poi disse, con articolazione accuratamente precisa: «Sua signoria desidera che la mia presenza appaia del tutto casuale.» Poi cercò di ricordare qualcos’altro che Leveson aveva detto.

He began to wade through the waves of weed and thorn past the Chapel, but he found the soil much more uneven and obstructive than he had supposed.

He slipped, and sought to save himself by throwing one arm round a broken stone angel at a corner of the heap of Gothic fragments; but it was loose and rocked in its socket.

Mr. Hibbs presented for a moment the appearance of waltzing with the Angel in the moonlight, in a very amorous and irreverent manner. Then the statue rolled over one way and he rolled over the other, and lay on his face in the grass, making inaudible remarks. He might have lain there for some time, or at least found some difficulty in rising, but for another circumstance. The dog Quoodle, with characteristic officiousness, had followed him down the dark stairs and out of the doorway, and, finding him in this unusual posture, began to bark as if the house were on fire.

This brought a heavy human footstep from the more hidden parts of the copse; and in a minute or two the large man with the red hair was looking down at him in undisguised wonder. Hibbs said, in a muffled voice which came obscurely from under his hidden face, “Wish my presence to appear quite accidental.”

“It does,” said the Captain, “can I help you up? Are you hurt?”

He gently set the prostrate gentleman on his feet, and looked genuinely concerned. The fall had somewhat sobered Lord Ivywood’s representative; and he really had a red graze on the left cheek that looked more ugly than it was.

“I am so sorry,” said Patrick Dalroy, cordially, “come and sit down in our camp. My friend Pump will be back presently, and he’s a capital doctor.”

His friend Pump may or may not have been a capital doctor, but the Captain himself was certainly a most inefficient one. So small was his talent for diagnosing the nature of a disease at sight, that having given Mr. Hibbs a seat on a fallen tree by the tunnel, he proceeded to give him (in mere automatic hospitality) a glass of rum.

Mr. Hibbs’s eyes awoke again, when he had sipped it, but they awoke to a new world.

“Wharever may be our invidual pinions,” he said, and looked into space with an expression of humorous sagacity.

He then put his hand hazily in his pocket, as if to find some letter he had to deliver. He found nothing but his old journalistic note book, which he often carried when there was a chance of interviewing anybody. The feel of it under his fingers changed the whole attitude of his mind. He took it out and said:

“And wha’ would you say of Vegetarianism, Colonel Pump?”

“I think it palls,” replied the recipient of this complex title, staring.

“Sha’ we say,” asked Hibbs brightly, turning a leaf in his note book, “sha’ we say long been strong vegetarian by conviction?”

“No; I have only once been convicted,” answered Dalroy, with restraint, “and I hope to lead a better life when I come out.”

“Hopes lead better life,” murmured Hibbs, writing eagerly, with the wrong end of his pencil. “And wha’ would you shay was best vegable food for really strong vegetarian by conviction?”

“Thistles,” said the Captain, wearily. “But I don’t know much about it, you know.”

“Lord Ivywoo’ strong veg’tarian by conviction,” said Mr. Hibbs, shaking his head with unction. “Lord Ivywoo’ says tact. Talk to him naturally. And so I do. That’s what I do. Talk to him naturally.”

Humphrey Pump came through the clearer part of the wood, leading the donkey, who had just partaken of the diet recommended to a vegetarian by conviction; the dog sprang up and ran to them. Pump was, perhaps, the most naturally polite man in the world, and said nothing. But his eyes had accepted, with one snap of surprise, the other fact, also not unconnected with diet, which had escaped Dalroy’s notice when he administered rum as a restorative.

“Lord Ivywoo’ says,” murmured the journalistic diplomatist. “Lord Ivywoo’ says, ‘talk as if you were just wandering.’ That’s it. That’s tact. That’s what I’ve got to do–talk as if I was just wandering. Long way round to other end tunnel; sea and cliffs. Don’ sphose they can swim.” He seized his note book again and looked in vain for his pencil. “Good subjec’ correspondence. Can policem’n swim?”

“Policemen?” said Dalroy, in a dead silence. The dog looked up, and the innkeeper did not.

“Get to Ivywoo’ one thing,” reasoned the diplomatist. “Get policemen beach other end other thing. No good do one thing no’ do other thing, ’no goo’ do other thing no’ do other thing. Wish my presence appear quite accidental. Haw!”

“I’ll harness the donkey,” said Pump.

“Will he go through that door?” asked Dalroy, with a gesture toward the entrance of the rough boarding with which they had faced the tunnel, “or shall I smash it all at once?”

“He’ll go through all right,” answered Pump. “I saw to that when I made it. And I think I’ll get him to the safe end of the tunnel before I load him up. The best thing you can do is to pull up one of those saplings to bar the door with. That’ll delay them a minute or two; though I think we’ve got warning in pretty easy time.”

He led his donkey to the cart, and carefully harnessed the donkey; like all men cunning in the old healthy sense he knew that the last chance of leisure ought to be leisurely, in order that it may be lucid. Then he led the whole equipment through the temporary wooden door of the tunnel, the inquisitive Quoodle, of course, following at his heels.

“Excuse me if I take a tree,” said Dalroy, politely, to his guest, like a man reaching across another man for a match. And with that he rent up a young tree by its roots, as he had done in the Island of the Olives, and carried it on his shoulder, like the club of Hercules.

Cominciò a farsi strada attraverso le onde di erbacce e spine oltre la Cappella, ma trovò il terreno assai più accidentato e ostruttivo di quanto avesse supposto.

Scivolò, e cercò di salvarsi gettando un braccio attorno a un angelo di pietra spezzato a un angolo del cumulo di frammenti gotici; ma esso era malfermo e oscillò nel suo alloggiamento.

Il signor Hibbs presentò per un momento l’aspetto di uno che valzeggiava con l’Angelo al chiaro di luna, in modo assai amoroso e irriverente. Poi la statua rotolò da una parte ed egli rotolò dall’altra, e giacque bocconi nell’erba, facendo osservazioni inudibili. Sarebbe potuto restare lì disteso per un certo tempo, o almeno avrebbe trovato qualche difficoltà a rialzarsi, se non fosse stato per un’altra circostanza. Il cane Quoodle, con caratteristica invadenza, lo aveva seguito giù per le scale buie e fuori dalla soglia, e, trovandolo in quella posa insolita, cominciò ad abbaiare come se la casa fosse in fiamme.

Ciò fece giungere un pesante passo umano dalle parti più nascoste del boschetto; e in un minuto o due il grosso uomo dai capelli rossi lo guardava dall’alto con non dissimulata meraviglia. Hibbs disse, con voce soffocata che veniva oscuramente da sotto il suo volto nascosto: «Voglio che la mia presenza appaia del tutto casuale.»

«E lo è,» disse il Capitano, «posso aiutarvi a rialzarvi? Vi siete fatto male?»

Rimise gentilmente in piedi il gentiluomo prostrato, e appariva sinceramente preoccupato. La caduta aveva alquanto rinsavito il rappresentante di Lord Ivywood; ed egli aveva davvero un’escoriazione rossa sulla guancia sinistra che pareva più brutta di quanto fosse.

«Sono davvero spiacente,» disse Patrick Dalroy, cordialmente, «venite a sedervi nel nostro accampamento. Il mio amico Pump sarà di ritorno tra poco, ed è un dottore coi fiocchi.»

Il suo amico Pump poteva essere o non essere un dottore coi fiocchi, ma il Capitano stesso era certamente il più inefficiente dei dottori. Tanto scarso era il suo talento nel diagnosticare a vista la natura di un male, che, avendo dato al signor Hibbs un posto a sedere su un albero abbattuto presso il tunnel, procedette a dargli (per mera automatica ospitalità) un bicchiere di rum.

Gli occhi del signor Hibbs si ridestarono, quando lo ebbe sorseggiato, ma si ridestarono a un mondo nuovo.

«Qualunqe possan esse’ le nostre opignoni indivduali,» disse, e guardò nello spazio con un’espressione di umoristica saggezza.

Poi mise vagamente la mano in tasca, come per trovare qualche lettera che doveva consegnare. Non trovò nulla se non il suo vecchio taccuino giornalistico, che spesso portava con sé quando c’era la possibilità di intervistare qualcuno. Il sentirlo sotto le dita mutò l’intero atteggiamento della sua mente. Lo tirò fuori e disse:

«E che direbbe del Vegetarianismo, colonnello Pump?»

«Penso che venga a noia,» rispose il destinatario di questo complesso titolo, sbarrando gli occhi.

«Diciam’,» chiese Hibbs allegramente, voltando una pagina del suo taccuino, «diciam’ da lungo tempo strenuo vegetariano per convinzione?»

«No; sono stato incriminato una volta sola,» rispose Dalroy, con moderazione, «e spero di condurre una vita migliore quando ne uscirò.»

«Spera condurre vita migliore,» mormorò Hibbs, scrivendo con foga, con la punta sbagliata della matita. «E qual sarebb’ il miglior cibo veg’tale per un davvero strenuo vegetariano per convinzione?»

«Cardi,» disse il Capitano, stancamente. «Ma non ne so molto, sapete.»

«Lord Ivywoo’ strenuo veg’tariano per convinzione,» disse il signor Hibbs, scuotendo il capo con unzione. «Lord Ivywoo’ dice tatto. Parlagli con naturalezza. E così faccio. È quel che faccio. Parlargli con naturalezza.»

Humphrey Pump giunse attraverso la parte più sgombra del bosco, conducendo l’asino, che aveva appena consumato la dieta raccomandata a un vegetariano per convinzione; il cane balzò su e corse verso di loro. Pump era, forse, l’uomo più naturalmente educato del mondo, e non disse nulla. Ma i suoi occhi avevano accolto, con un solo scatto di sorpresa, l’altro fatto, anch’esso non slegato dalla dieta, che era sfuggito all’attenzione di Dalroy quando aveva somministrato il rum come ricostituente.

«Lord Ivywoo’ dice,» mormorò il diplomatico giornalistico. «Lord Ivywoo’ dice: ‘parla come se stessi solo vagabondando’. Ecco. Questo è tatto. Questo è quel che devo fare – parlare come se stessi solo vagabondando. Lunga strada per l’altro capo del tunnel; mare e scogliere. ‘N credo sappiano nuotare.» Afferrò di nuovo il taccuino e cercò invano la matita. «Buon soggetto corrispondenza. Sanno nuotare i poliziò?»

«I poliziotti?» disse Dalroy, in un silenzio di morte. Il cane alzò lo sguardo, e il locandiere no.

«Arrivare da Ivywoo’ una cosa,» ragionava il diplomatico. «Mettere poliziotti spiaggia altro capo altra cosa. Non serve fare una cosa non fa’ l’altra cosa, ‘n serve fa’ altra cosa non fa’ altra cosa. Voglio mia presenza appaia del tutto casuale. Ah!»

«Attaccherò l’asino,» disse Pump.

«Passerà attraverso quella porta?» chiese Dalroy, con un gesto verso l’ingresso del rozzo assito con cui avevano chiuso il tunnel, «o la sfascio tutta in un colpo?»

«Passerà senza problemi,» rispose Pump. «Ci ho badato quando l’ho fatta. E penso che lo porterò all’estremità sicura del tunnel prima di caricarlo. La cosa migliore che puoi fare è divellere uno di quegli alberelli per sbarrare la porta. Questo li ritarderà di un minuto o due; anche se penso che abbiamo ricevuto l’avviso con un discreto anticipo.»

Condusse il suo asino al carro, e bardò con cura l’asino; come tutti gli uomini accorti nel vecchio senso sano, sapeva che l’ultima occasione di agio dovrebbe essere presa con agio, affinché sia lucida. Poi condusse l’intero equipaggiamento attraverso la porta di legno provvisoria del tunnel, l’inquisitivo Quoodle, naturalmente, seguendolo alle calcagna.

«Scusatemi se prendo un albero,» disse Dalroy, cortesemente, al suo ospite, come un uomo che si allunga oltre un altro per prendere un fiammifero. E con ciò divelse dalle radici un giovane albero, come aveva fatto nell’Isola degli Ulivi, e se lo portò sulla spalla, come la clava di Ercole.

CHAPTER XIV: THE CREATURE THAT MAN FORGETS

DESPITE the natural hubbub round the wound of Lord Ivywood and the difficulties of the police in finding their way to the shore, the fugitives of the Flying Inn must almost certainly have been captured but for a curious accident, which also flowed, as it happened, from the great Ivywood debate on Vegetarianism.

The comparatively late hour at which Lord Ivywood had made his discovery had been largely due to a very long speech which Joan had not heard, and which was delivered immediately before the few concluding observations she had heard from Dr. Gluck. The speech was made by an eccentric, of course. Most of those who attended, and nearly all of those who talked, were eccentric in one way or another. But he was an eccentric of great wealth and good family, an M.P., a J.P., a relation of Lady Enid, a man well known in art and letters; in short, a personality who could not be prevented from being anything he chose, from a revolutionist to a bore. Dorian Wimpole had first become famous outside his own class under the fanciful title of the Poet of the Birds. A volume of verse, expanding the several notes or cries of separate song-birds into fantastic soliloquies of these feathered philosophers, had really contained a great deal of ingenuity and elegance. Unfortunately, he was one of those who always tend to take their own fancies seriously, and in whose otherwise legitimate extravagance there is too little of the juice of jest. Hence, in his later works, when he explained “The Fable of the Angel,” by trying to prove that the fowls of the air were creatures higher than man or the anthropoids, his manner was felt to be too austere; and when he moved an amendment to Lord Ivywood’s scheme for the model village called Peaceways, urging that its houses should all follow the more hygienic architecture of nests hung in trees, many regretted that he had lost his light touch. But, when he went beyond birds and filled his poems with conjectural psychology about all the Zoological Gardens, his meaning became obscure; and Lady Susan had even described it as his bad period. It was all the more uncomfortable reading because he poured forth the imaginary hymns, love-songs and war-songs of the lower animals, without a word of previous explanation. Thus, if someone seeking for an ordinary drawing-room song came on lines that were headed “A Desert Love Song,” and which began–

“Her head is high against the stars,

Her hump is heaved in pride,”

the compliment to the lady would at first seem startling, until the reader realised that all the characters in the idyll were camels. Or, if he began a poem simply entitled, “The March of Democracy,” and found in the first lines–

“Comrades, marching evermore,

Fix your teeth in floor and door,”

he might be doubtful about such a policy for the masses; until he discovered that it was supposed to be addressed by an eloquent and aspiring rat to the social solidarity of his race. Lord Ivywood had nearly quarrelled with his poetic relative over the uproarious realism of the verses called “A Drinking Song,” until it was carefully explained to him that the drink was water, and that the festive company consisted of bisons. His vision of the perfect husband, as it exists in the feelings of the young female walrus, is thoughtful and suggestive; but would doubtless receive many emendations from anyone who had experienced those feelings. And in his sonnet called “Motherhood” he has made the young scorpion consistent and convincing, yet somehow not wholly lovable. In justice to him, however, it should be remembered that he attacked the most difficult cases on principle, declaring that there was no earthly creature that a poet should forget.

He was of the blond type of his cousin, with flowing fair hair and mustache, and a bright blue, absent-minded eye; he was very well dressed in the carefully careless manner, with a brown velvet jacket and the image on his ring of one of those beasts men worshipped in Egypt.

His speech was graceful and well worded and enormously long, and it was all about an oyster. He passionately protested against the suggestion of some humanitarians who were vegetarians in other respects, but maintained that organisms so simple might fairly be counted as exceptions. Man, he said, even at his miserable best, was always trying to excommunicate some one citizen of the cosmos, to forget some one creature that he should remember. Now, it seemed that creature was the oyster. He gave a long account of the tragedy of the oyster, a really imaginative and picturesque account; full of fantastic fishes, and coral crags crawling and climbing, and bearded creatures streaking the seashore and the green darkness in the cellars of the sea.

“What a horrid irony it is,” he cried, “that this is the only one of the lower creatures whom we call a Native! We speak of him, and of him alone as if he were a native of the country. Whereas, indeed, he is an exile in the universe. What can be conceived more pitiful than the eternal frenzy of the impotent amphibian? What is more terrible than the tear of an oyster? Nature herself has sealed it with the hard seal of eternity. The creature man forgets bears against him a testimony that cannot be forgotten. For the tears of widows and of captives are wiped away at last like the tears of children. They vanish like the mists of morning or the small pools after a flood. But the tear of the oyster is a pearl.”

The Poet of the Birds was so excited with his own speech that, after the meeting, he walked out with a wild eye to the motor car, which had been long awaiting him, the chauffeur giving some faint signs of relief.

CAPITOLO XIV: LA CREATURA CHE L’UOMO DIMENTICA

NONOSTANTE il naturale trambusto attorno alla ferita di Lord Ivywood e le difficoltà della polizia nel trovare la via verso la riva, i fuggitivi della Locanda Volante sarebbero stati quasi certamente catturati se non fosse stato per un curioso incidente, il quale scaturì anch’esso, per come andarono le cose, dal grande dibattito di Ivywood sul Vegetarianismo.

L’ora relativamente tarda alla quale Lord Ivywood aveva fatto la sua scoperta era stata in gran parte dovuta a un lunghissimo discorso che Joan non aveva udito, e che fu pronunciato immediatamente prima delle poche osservazioni conclusive che ella aveva udito dal dottor Gluck. Il discorso fu tenuto da un eccentrico, naturalmente. La maggior parte di coloro che vi assistevano, e quasi tutti coloro che parlavano, erano eccentrici in un modo o nell’altro. Ma egli era un eccentrico di grande ricchezza e di buona famiglia, un membro del Parlamento, un giudice di pace, un parente di Lady Enid, un uomo ben noto nell’arte e nelle lettere; in breve, una personalità a cui non si poteva impedire di essere qualunque cosa scegliesse, da rivoluzionario a seccatore. Dorian Wimpole era divenuto per la prima volta famoso fuori dalla propria classe sotto il fantasioso titolo di Poeta degli Uccelli. Un volume di versi, che ampliava le varie note o grida di singoli canori uccelli in fantastici soliloqui di questi filosofi pennuti, aveva davvero contenuto una grande dose di ingegno ed eleganza. Sfortunatamente, egli era uno di quelli che tendono sempre a prendere sul serio le proprie fantasie, e nella cui altrimenti legittima stravaganza c’è troppo poco del succo dello scherzo. Sicché, nelle sue opere successive, quando spiegò «La Favola dell’Angelo», cercando di provare che i volatili dell’aria fossero creature superiori all’uomo o agli antropoidi, la sua maniera fu giudicata troppo austera; e quando presentò un emendamento allo schema di Lord Ivywood per il villaggio modello chiamato Peaceways, sostenendo che le sue case dovessero tutte seguire la più igienica architettura dei nidi appesi agli alberi, molti rimpiansero che egli avesse perduto il suo tocco leggero. Ma, quando andò oltre gli uccelli e riempì i suoi poemi di congetturale psicologia su tutti i Giardini Zoologici, il suo significato divenne oscuro; e Lady Susan lo aveva persino descritto come il suo cattivo periodo. Era una lettura tanto più imbarazzante perché egli riversava gli immaginari inni, amorosi canti e canti di guerra dei più bassi animali, senza una parola di previa spiegazione. Così, se qualcuno in cerca di un’ordinaria canzone da salotto si imbatteva in versi intitolati «Del Deserto un Canto d’Amore», e che cominciavano –

«La sua testa è alta contro le stelle,

La sua gobba si erge d’orgoglio,»

il complimento alla dama parrebbe dapprima sorprendente, finché il lettore non si rendesse conto che tutti i personaggi dell’idillio erano cammelli. Oppure, se cominciava un poema intitolato semplicemente «La Marcia della Democrazia», e trovava nei primi versi –

«Compagni, in marcia per sempre,

Conficcate i denti nel pavimento e nella porta,»

egli avrebbe potuto nutrire dubbi su una simile politica per le masse; finché non scoprisse che essa era supposta essere rivolta da un eloquente e aspirante topo alla solidarietà sociale della sua razza. Lord Ivywood aveva quasi litigato col suo poetico parente per il tumultuoso realismo dei versi chiamati «Un Canto Conviviale», finché non gli fu accuratamente spiegato che la bevanda era acqua, e che la festosa compagnia era composta di bisonti. La sua visione del marito perfetto, quale esiste nei sentimenti della giovane femmina di tricheco, è meditata e suggestiva; ma riceverebbe senza dubbio molte emendazioni da chiunque avesse sperimentato quei sentimenti. E nel suo sonetto intitolato «Maternità» egli ha reso il giovane scorpione coerente e convincente, eppure in qualche modo non del tutto amabile. A sua difesa, tuttavia, va ricordato che egli affrontava per principio i casi più difficili, dichiarando che non c’era creatura terrena che un poeta dovesse dimenticare.

Era del tipo biondo di sua cugina, con fluenti capelli e baffi chiari, e un occhio azzurro brillante e distratto; era assai ben vestito nella maniera studiatamente trascurata, con una giacca di velluto marrone e, sull’anello, l’effigie di una di quelle bestie che gli uomini adoravano in Egitto.

Il suo discorso fu grazioso e ben formulato ed enormemente lungo, e verteva tutto su un’ostrica. Egli protestò appassionatamente contro il suggerimento di alcuni umanitari che erano vegetariani sotto altri aspetti, ma sostenevano che organismi tanto semplici potessero equamente essere considerati eccezioni. L’uomo, disse, persino nel suo miserabile meglio, cercava sempre di scomunicare qualche cittadino del cosmo, di dimenticare qualche creatura che dovrebbe ricordare. Ora, pareva che quella creatura fosse l’ostrica. Diede un lungo resoconto della tragedia dell’ostrica, un resoconto davvero immaginoso e pittoresco; pieno di fantastici pesci, e di rupi coralline che strisciavano e si arrampicavano, e di creature barbute che striavano la riva del mare e la verde oscurità nelle cantine del mare.

«Che orribile ironia,» esclamò, «che questa sia l’unica fra le creature inferiori che noi chiamiamo Nativa! Parliamo di essa, e di essa sola come se fosse una nativa del paese. Mentre, in verità, essa è un’esule nell’universo. Che cosa si può concepire di più pietoso dell’eterna frenesia dell’impotente anfibio? Che cosa è più terribile della lacrima di un’ostrica? La Natura stessa l’ha sigillata con il duro sigillo dell’eternità. La creatura che l’uomo dimentica reca contro di lui una testimonianza che non può essere dimenticata. Poiché le lacrime delle vedove e dei prigionieri vengono infine asciugate come le lacrime dei bambini. Svaniscono come le brume del mattino o le piccole pozze dopo un’inondazione. Ma la lacrima dell’ostrica è una perla.»

Il Poeta degli Uccelli era così eccitato dal proprio discorso che, dopo la riunione, uscì con occhio selvaggio verso l’automobile, che lo attendeva da lungo tempo, mentre l’autista dava qualche debole segno di sollievo.

“Toward home, for the present,” said the poet, and stared at the moon with an inspired face.

He was very fond of motoring, finding it fed him with inspirations; and he had been doing it from an early hour that morning, having enjoyed a slightly lessened sleep. He had scarcely spoken to anybody until he spoke to the cultured crowd at Ivywood. He did not wish to speak to anyone for many hours yet. His ideas were racing. He had thrown on a fur coat over his velvet jacket, but he let it fly open, having long forgotten the coldness in the splendour of the moonstruck night. He realised only two things: the swiftness of his car and the swiftness of his thoughts. He felt, as it were, a fury of omniscience; he seemed flying with every bird that sped or spun above the woods, with every squirrel that had leapt and tumbled within them, with every tree that had swung under and sustained the blast.

Yet in a few moments he leaned forward and tapped the glass frontage of the car, and the chauffeur suddenly squaring his shoulders, jarringly stopped the wheels. Dorian Wimpole had just seen something in the clear moonlight by the roadside, which appealed both to this and to the other side of his tradition; something that appealed to Wimpole as well as to Dorian.

Two shabby looking men, one in tattered gaiters and the other in what looked like the remains of fancy dress with the addition of hair, of so wild a red that it looked like a wig, were halted under the hedge, apparently loading a donkey cart. At least two rounded, rudely cylindrical objects, looking more or less like tubs, stood out in the road beside the wheels, along with a sort of loose wooden post that lay along the road beside them. As a matter of fact, the man in the old gaiters had just been feeding and watering the donkey, and was now adjusting its harness more easily. But Dorian Wimpole naturally did not expect that sort of thing from that sort of man. There swelled up in him the sense that his omnipotence went beyond the poetical; that he was a gentleman, a magistrate, an M.P. and J.P., and so on. This callousness or ignorance about animals should not go on while he was a J.P.; especially since Ivywood’s last Act. He simply strode across to the stationary cart and said:

“You are overloading that animal, and it is forfeited. And you must come with me to the police station.”

Humphrey Pump, who was very considerate to animals, and had always tried to be considerate to gentlemen, in spite of having put a bullet into one of their legs, was simply too astounded and distressed to make any answer at all. He moved a step or two backward and stared with brown, blinking eyes at the poet, the donkey, the cask, the cheese, and the sign-board lying in the road.

But Captain Dalroy, with the quicker recovery of his national temperament, swept the poet and magistrate a vast fantastic bow and said with agreeable impudence, “interested in donkeys, no doubt?”

“I am interested in all things men forget,” answered the poet, with a fine touch of pride, “but mostly in those like this, that are most easily forgotten.”

Somehow from those two first sentences Pump realised that these two eccentric aristocrats had unconsciously recognised each other. The fact that it was unconscious seemed, somehow, to exclude him all the more. He stirred a little the moonlit dust of the road with his rather dilapidated boots and eventually strolled across to speak to the chauffeur.

“Is the next police station far from here?” he asked.

The chauffeur answered with one syllable of which the nearest literal rendering is “dno.” Other spellings have been attempted, but the sentiment expressed is that of agnosticism.

But something of special brutality of abbreviation made the shrewd, and therefore sensitive, Mr. Pump look at the man’s face. And he saw it was not only the moonlight that made it white.

With that dumb delicacy that was so English in him, Pump looked at the man again, and saw he was leaning heavily on the car with one arm, and saw that the arm was shaking. He understood his countrymen enough to know that whatever he said he must say in a careless manner.

“I hope it’s nearer to your place. You must be a bit done up.”

“Oh hell!” said the driver and spat on the road.

Pump was sympathetically silent, and Mr. Wimpole’s chauffeur broke out incoherently, as if in another place.

“Blarsted beauties o’ dibrike and no breakfast. Blarsted lunch Hivywood and no lunch. Blarsted black everlastin’ hours artside while ’e ’as ’is cike an’ champine. And then it’s a dornkey.”

“You don’t mean to say,” said Pump in a very serious voice, “that you’ve had no food today?”

“Ow no!” replied the cockney, with the irony of the deathbed. “Ow, of course not.”

Pump strolled back into the road again, picked up the cheese in his left hand, and landed it on the seat beside the driver. Then his right hand went to one of his large loose equivocal pockets, and the blade of a big jack-knife caught and recaught the steady splendours of the moon.

The driver stared for several instants at the cheese, with the knife shaking in his hand. Then he began to hack it, and in that white witchlike light the happiness of his face was almost horrible.

Pump was wise in all such things, and knew that just as a little food will sometimes prevent sheer intoxication, so a little stimulant will sometimes prevent sudden and dangerous indigestion. It was practically impossible to make the man stop eating cheese. It was far better to give him a very little of the rum, especially as it was very good rum, and better than anything he could find in any of the public-houses that were still permitted. He walked across the road again and picked up the small cask, which he put on the other side of the cheese and from which he filled, in his own manner, the little cup he carried in his pocket.

«Verso casa, per ora», disse il poeta, e fissò la luna con volto ispirato.

Amava molto andare in automobile, trovando che ciò lo nutriva di ispirazioni; e lo faceva fin dalle prime ore di quel mattino, avendo goduto di un sonno leggermente ridotto. Non aveva quasi rivolto parola ad alcuno finché non aveva parlato con la colta folla di Ivywood. Non desiderava parlare con nessuno ancora per molte ore. Le sue idee correvano. Aveva gettato una pelliccia sopra la giacca di velluto, ma la lasciava svolazzare aperta, avendo da tempo dimenticato il freddo nello splendore della notte lunatica. Percepiva soltanto due cose: la rapidità della sua vettura e la rapidità dei suoi pensieri. Sentiva, per così dire, una furia di onniscienza; gli pareva di volare con ogni uccello che sfrecciava o roteava sopra i boschi, con ogni scoiattolo che vi aveva saltato e capitombolato dentro, con ogni albero che si era piegato sotto la raffica e l’aveva sostenuta.

Eppure in pochi istanti si sporse in avanti e batté sul vetro anteriore della vettura, e l’autista, raddrizzando di colpo le spalle, arrestò con un sobbalzo le ruote. Dorian Wimpole aveva appena scorto qualcosa nel chiaro di luna sul ciglio della strada, che faceva appello tanto a questa quanto all’altra parte della sua tradizione; qualcosa che faceva appello a Wimpole non meno che a Dorian.

Due uomini dall’aspetto malandato, uno con ghette lacere e l’altro in quel che pareva il resto di un costume da carnevale con l’aggiunta di capelli, di un rosso tanto selvaggio da sembrare una parrucca, se ne stavano fermi sotto la siepe, apparentemente intenti a caricare un carretto tirato da un asino. Almeno due oggetti tondeggianti, rozzamente cilindrici, simili più o meno a tinozze, spiccavano sulla strada accanto alle ruote, insieme a una specie di palo di legno sciolto che giaceva lungo la strada accanto ad essi. A dire il vero, l’uomo dalle vecchie ghette aveva appena finito di dar da mangiare e da bere all’asino, e ora ne aggiustava più comodamente i finimenti. Ma Dorian Wimpole naturalmente non si aspettava quel genere di cosa da quel genere di uomo. Gli si gonfiò dentro il senso che la sua onnipotenza andasse oltre il poetico; che egli fosse un gentiluomo, un magistrato, un membro del Parlamento e giudice di pace, e così via. Questa insensibilità o ignoranza verso gli animali non doveva continuare finché egli era giudice di pace; specialmente dopo l’ultima Legge di Ivywood. Attraversò senz’altro fino al carretto fermo e disse:

«State sovraccaricando quell’animale, ed esso è confiscato. E dovrete venire con me alla stazione di polizia.»

Humphrey Pump, che era molto premuroso verso gli animali, e aveva sempre cercato di essere premuroso verso i gentiluomini, malgrado avesse piantato una pallottola nella gamba di uno di loro, era semplicemente troppo sbalordito e afflitto per dare una qualsiasi risposta. Fece un passo o due indietro e fissò con occhi bruni e ammiccanti il poeta, l’asino, il barile, il formaggio e l’insegna che giaceva sulla strada.

Ma il capitano Dalroy, con la più rapida ripresa del suo temperamento nazionale, fece al poeta e magistrato un vasto e fantastico inchino e disse con gradevole impudenza: «Interessato agli asini, senza dubbio?»

«Mi interesso a tutte le cose che gli uomini dimenticano», rispose il poeta, con un bel tocco di orgoglio, «ma soprattutto a quelle come questa, che sono le più facilmente dimenticate.»

In qualche modo, da quelle due prime frasi Pump comprese che questi due eccentrici aristocratici si erano inconsciamente riconosciuti l’un l’altro. Il fatto che fosse inconscio pareva, in qualche modo, escluderlo ancor di più. Smosse un poco la polvere illuminata dalla luna della strada con i suoi stivali piuttosto malandati e infine si allontanò per andare a parlare con l’autista.

«È lontana da qui la prossima stazione di polizia?» chiese.

L’autista rispose con una sillaba di cui la resa letterale più vicina è «nzò». Sono state tentate altre grafie, ma il sentimento espresso è quello dell’agnosticismo.

Ma qualcosa di particolarmente brutale in quell’abbreviazione fece guardare in faccia l’uomo all’accorto, e perciò sensibile, signor Pump. E vide che non era soltanto il chiaro di luna a renderlo bianco.

Con quella muta delicatezza che era in lui tanto inglese, Pump guardò di nuovo l’uomo, e vide che si appoggiava pesantemente alla vettura con un braccio, e vide che il braccio tremava. Conosceva abbastanza i suoi compatrioti da sapere che qualunque cosa dicesse doveva dirla con noncuranza.

«Spero che sia più vicina a casa vostra. Dovete essere un po’ distrutto.»

«Oh, all’inferno!» disse l’autista e sputò sulla strada.

Pump tacque comprensivo, e l’autista del signor Wimpole proruppe in modo sconnesso, come se fosse altrove.

«Maledette bellezze dell’alba e niente colazione. Maledetto pranzo a Ivywood e niente pranzo. Maledette ore nere ed eterne là fuori mentre lui si prende la sua torta e lo champagne. E poi è un asino.»

«Non vorrete dirmi», disse Pump con voce molto grave, «che oggi non avete mangiato niente?»

«Oh no!» rispose il cockney, con l’ironia del letto di morte. «Oh, certo che no.»

Pump tornò a passeggiare sulla strada, raccolse il formaggio con la mano sinistra, e lo posò sul sedile accanto all’autista. Poi la sua mano destra andò a una delle sue grandi tasche larghe ed equivoche, e la lama di un grosso coltello a serramanico colse e ricolse i costanti splendori della luna.

L’autista fissò per parecchi istanti il formaggio, con il coltello che gli tremava in mano. Poi cominciò a tagliuzzarlo, e in quella luce bianca e stregata la felicità del suo volto era quasi orribile.

Pump era saggio in tutte queste faccende, e sapeva che, così come un poco di cibo talvolta previene la pura ebbrezza, così un poco di stimolante talvolta previene un’improvvisa e pericolosa indigestione. Era praticamente impossibile far smettere all’uomo di mangiare formaggio. Era assai meglio dargli pochissimo del rum, tanto più che era ottimo rum, e migliore di qualunque cosa egli potesse trovare in una qualsiasi delle osterie ancora permesse. Attraversò di nuovo la strada e raccolse il piccolo barile, che pose dall’altro lato del formaggio e da cui riempì, a modo suo, la coppetta che portava in tasca.

But at the sight of this the cockney’s eyes lit at once with terror and desire.

“But yer cawnt do it,” he whispered hoarsely, “its the pleece. It’s gile for that, with no doctor’s letter nor sign-board nor nothink.”

Mr. Humphrey Pump made yet another march back into the road. When he got there he hesitated for the first time, but it was quite clear from the attitude of the two insane aristocrats who were arguing and posturing in the road that they would notice nothing except each other. He picked the loose post off the road and brought it to the car, humorously propping it erect in the aperture between keg and cheese.

The little glass of rum was wavering in the poor chauffeur’s hand exactly as the big knife had done, but when he looked up and actually saw the wooden sign above him, he seemed not so much to pluck up his courage, but rather to drag up some forgotten courage from the foundations of some unfathomable sea. It was indeed the forgotten courage of the people.

He looked once at the bleak, black pinewoods around him and took the mouthful of golden liquid at a gulp, as if it were a fairy potion. He sat silent; and then, very slowly, a sort of stony glitter began to come into his eyes. The brown and vigilant eyes of Humphrey Pump were studying him with some anxiety or even fear. He did look rather like a man enchanted or turned to stone. But he spoke very suddenly.

“The blighter!” he said. “I’ll give ’im ’ell. I’ll give ’im bleeding ’ell. I’ll give ’im somethink wot ’e don’t expect.”

“What do you mean?” asked the inn-keeper.

“Why,” answered the chauffeur, with abrupt composure, “I’ll give ’im a little dornkey.”

Mr. Pump looked troubled. “Do you think,” he observed, affecting to speak lightly, “that he’s fit to be trusted even with a little donkey?”

“Ow, yes,” said the man. “He’s very amiable with donkeys, and donkeys we is to be amiable with ’im.”

Pump still looked at him doubtfully, appearing or affecting not to follow his meaning. Then he looked equally anxiously across at the other two men; but they were still talking. Different as they were in every other way, they were of the sort who forget everything, class, quarrel, time, place and physical facts in front of them, in the lust of lucid explanation and equal argument.

Thus, when the Captain began by lightly alluding to the fact that after all it was his donkey, since he had bought it from a tinker for a just price, the police station practically vanished from Wimpole’s mind–and I fear the donkey-cart also. Nothing remained but the necessity of dissipating the superstition of personal property.

“I own nothing,” said the poet, waving his hands outward, “I own nothing save in the sense that I own everything. All depends whether wealth or power be used for or against the higher purposes of the cosmos.”

“Indeed,” replied Dalroy, “and how does your motor car serve the higher purposes of the cosmos?”

“It helps me,” said Mr. Wimpole, with honourable simplicity, “to produce my poems.”

“And if it could be used for some higher purpose (if such a thing could be), if some new purpose had come into the cosmos’s head by accident,” inquired the other, “I suppose it would cease to be your property.”

“Certainly,” replied the dignified Dorian. “I should not complain. Nor have you any title to complain when the donkey ceases to be yours when you depress it in the cosmic scale.”

“What makes you think,” asked Dalroy, “that I wanted to depress it?”

“It is my firm belief,” replied Dorian Wimpole, sternly, “that you wanted to ride on it” (for indeed the Captain had once repeated his playful gesture of putting his large leg across). “Is not that so?”

“No,” answered the Captain, innocently, “I never ride on a donkey. I’m afraid of it.”

“Afraid of a donkey!” cried Wimpole, incredulously.

“Afraid of an historical comparison,” said Dalroy.

There was a short pause, and Wimpole said coolly enough, “Oh, well, we’ve outlived those comparisons.”

“Easily,” answered the Irish Captain. “It is wonderful how easily one outlives someone else’s crucifixion.”

“In this case,” said the other grimly, “I think it is the donkey’s crucifixion.”

“Why, you must have drawn that old Roman caricature of the crucified donkey,” said Patrick Dalroy, with an air of some wonder. “How well you have worn; why, you look quite young! Well, of course, if this donkey is crucified, he must be uncrucified. But are you quite sure,” he added, very gravely, “that you know how to uncrucify a donkey? I assure you it’s one of the rarest of human arts. All a matter of knack. It’s like the doctors with the rare diseases, you know; the necessity so seldom arises. Granted that, by the higher purposes of the cosmos, I am unfit to look after this donkey, I must still feel a faint shiver of responsibility in passing him on to you. Will you understand this donkey? He is a delicate-minded donkey. He is a complex donkey. How can I be certain that, on so short an acquaintance, you will understand every shade of his little likes and dislikes?”

The dog Quoodle, who had been sitting as still as the sphinx under the shadow of the pine trees, waddled out for an instant into the middle of the road and then returned. He ran out when a slight noise as of rotatory grinding was heard; and ran back when it had ceased. But Dorian Wimpole was much too keen on his philosophical discovery to notice either dog or wheel.

“I shall not sit on its back, anyhow,” he said proudly, “but if that were all it would be a small matter. It is enough for you that you have left it in the hands of the only person who could really understand it; one who searches the skies and seas so as not to neglect the smallest creature.”

Ma alla vista di ciò gli occhi del cockney si accesero d’un tratto di terrore e desiderio.

«Ma non potete farlo», sussurrò rauco, «è la polizia. C’è la galera per questo, senza lettera del dottore né insegna né niente.»

Il signor Humphrey Pump compì un’altra marcia di ritorno sulla strada. Giuntovi, esitò per la prima volta, ma dall’atteggiamento dei due aristocratici insensati che discutevano e si atteggiavano sulla strada era del tutto chiaro che non avrebbero notato nulla se non l’un l’altro. Raccolse il palo sciolto dalla strada e lo portò alla vettura, piantandolo con umorismo dritto nell’apertura tra il barilotto e il formaggio.

Il bicchierino di rum vacillava nella mano del povero autista esattamente come aveva fatto il grosso coltello, ma quando alzò lo sguardo e vide davvero l’insegna di legno sopra di sé, parve non tanto farsi coraggio, quanto piuttosto trascinar su un qualche coraggio dimenticato dalle fondamenta di un mare insondabile. Era in verità il coraggio dimenticato del popolo.

Guardò una volta i cupi e neri pineti attorno a sé e trangugiò d’un fiato la sorsata di liquido dorato, come fosse una pozione fatata. Rimase seduto in silenzio; e poi, molto lentamente, una specie di petreo bagliore cominciò ad affiorargli negli occhi. Gli occhi bruni e vigili di Humphrey Pump lo studiavano con una certa ansia o persino paura. Aveva davvero l’aria di un uomo incantato o mutato in pietra. Ma parlò all’improvviso.

«Quel farabutto!» disse. «Gli farò passare le pene dell’inferno. Gli farò vedere l’inferno maledetto. Gli darò qualcosa che non si aspetta.»

«Che cosa intendete?» chiese il locandiere.

«Ma sì», rispose l’autista, con brusca compostezza, «gli darò un piccolo asino.»

Il signor Pump parve turbato. «Credete», osservò, fingendo di parlare con leggerezza, «che gli si possa affidare anche solo un piccolo asino?»

«Oh, sì», disse l’uomo. «È molto amabile con gli asini, e con gli asini noi dobbiamo essere amabili con lui.»

Pump continuava a guardarlo dubbioso, mostrando o fingendo di non seguirne il senso. Poi guardò con eguale ansia gli altri due uomini; ma stavano ancora parlando. Per quanto diversi in ogni altra cosa, erano di quella specie che dimentica tutto, classe, contesa, tempo, luogo e i fatti fisici davanti a sé, nella brama di lucida spiegazione e di dibattito paritario.

Così, quando il capitano cominciò accennando con leggerezza al fatto che dopotutto l’asino era suo, poiché lo aveva comprato da uno stagnino a giusto prezzo, la stazione di polizia praticamente svanì dalla mente di Wimpole — e temo anche il carretto dell’asino. Nulla rimase se non la necessità di dissipare la superstizione della proprietà personale.

«Io non possiedo nulla», disse il poeta, agitando le mani all’infuori, «non possiedo nulla, se non nel senso che possiedo tutto. Tutto dipende dal fatto che la ricchezza o il potere siano usati a favore o contro i fini superiori del cosmo.»

«Davvero», replicò Dalroy, «e in che modo la vostra automobile serve i fini superiori del cosmo?»

«Mi aiuta», disse il signor Wimpole, con onorevole semplicità, «a produrre le mie poesie.»

«E se potesse essere usata per qualche fine più alto (se una tal cosa esistesse), se un nuovo scopo fosse per caso venuto in mente al cosmo», domandò l’altro, «immagino che cesserebbe di essere vostra proprietà.»

«Certamente», replicò il dignitoso Dorian. «Non mi lamenterei. Né voi avete alcun titolo per lamentarvi quando l’asino cessa di essere vostro perché lo abbassate nella scala cosmica.»

«Che cosa vi fa pensare», chiese Dalroy, «che io volessi abbassarlo?»

«È mia ferma convinzione», replicò Dorian Wimpole, severamente, «che voi voleste cavalcarlo» (poiché in effetti il capitano aveva una volta ripetuto il suo scherzoso gesto di gettare la grande gamba sopra il basto). «Non è così?»

«No», rispose il capitano, con innocenza, «io non cavalco mai un asino. Ne ho paura.»

«Paura di un asino!» esclamò Wimpole, incredulo.

«Paura di un paragone storico», disse Dalroy.

Vi fu una breve pausa, e Wimpole disse abbastanza freddamente: «Oh, be’, siamo sopravvissuti a quei paragoni.»

«Con facilità», rispose il capitano irlandese. «È meraviglioso con quanta facilità si sopravviva alla crocifissione di qualcun altro.»

«In questo caso», disse l’altro cupamente, «penso che sia la crocifissione dell’asino.»

«Diamine, dovete aver disegnato voi quella vecchia caricatura romana dell’asino crocifisso», disse Patrick Dalroy, con un’aria di una certa meraviglia. «Come bene vi siete conservato; ma sì, sembrate ancora giovane! Beh, naturalmente, se questo asino è crocifisso, dev’essere scrocifisso. Ma siete proprio sicuro», aggiunse, molto gravemente, «di saper scrocifiggere un asino? Vi assicuro che è una delle più rare arti umane. Tutta questione di destrezza. È come i medici con le malattie rare, sapete; la necessità sorge tanto di rado. Ammesso che, per i fini superiori del cosmo, io sia inadatto a occuparmi di questo asino, devo pur sentire un debole brivido di responsabilità nel consegnarlo a voi. Lo capirete, questo asino? È un asino di animo delicato. È un asino complesso. Come posso essere certo che, dopo una conoscenza tanto breve, coglierete ogni sfumatura delle sue piccole simpatie e antipatie?»

Il cane Quoodle, che era rimasto immobile come la sfinge all’ombra dei pini, si trascinò per un istante fin nel mezzo della strada e poi tornò indietro. Correva fuori quando si udiva un lieve rumore come di macinatura rotatoria; e correva indietro quando esso cessava. Ma Dorian Wimpole era troppo preso dalla sua scoperta filosofica per notare né il cane né la ruota.

«Non gli sederò sulla schiena, in ogni caso», disse con fierezza, «ma se fosse solo quello sarebbe una piccola cosa. Vi basti che l’avete lasciato nelle mani dell’unica persona che potesse davvero comprenderlo; uno che scruta i cieli e i mari per non trascurare la più piccola creatura.»

“This is a very curious creature,” said the Captain, anxiously, “he has all sorts of odd antipathies. He can’t stand a motor car, for instance, especially one that throbs like that while it’s standing still. He doesn’t mind a fur coat so much, but if you wear a brown velvet jacket under it, he bites you. And you must keep him out of the way of a certain kind of people. I don’t suppose you’ve met them; but they always think that anybody with less than two hundred a year is drunk and very cruel, and that anybody with more than two thousand a year is conducting the Day of Judgment. If you will keep our dear donkey from the society of such persons–Hullo! Hullo! Hullo!”

He turned in genuine disturbance, and dashed after the dog, who had dashed after the motor car and jumped inside. The Captain jumped in after the dog, to pull him out again. But before he could do so, he found the car was flying along too fast for any such leap. He looked up and saw the sign of “The Old Ship” erect in the front like a rigid banner; and Pump, with his cask and cheese, sitting solidly beside the driver.

The thing was more of an earthquake and transformation to him even than to any of the others; but he rose waveringly to his feet and shouted out to Wimpole.

“You’ve left it in the right hands. I’ve never been cruel to a motor.”

In the moonlight of the magic pine-wood far behind, Dorian and the donkey were left looking at each other.

To the mystical mind, when it is a mind at all (which is by no means always the case), there are no two things more impressive and symbolical than a poet and a donkey. And the donkey was a very genuine donkey, and the poet was a very genuine poet; however lawfully he might be mistaken for the other animal at times. The interest of the donkey in the poet will never be known. The interest of the poet in the donkey was perfectly genuine; and survived even that appalling private interview in the owlish secrecy of the woods.

But I think even the poet would have been enlightened if he had seen the white, set, frantic face of the man on the driver’s seat of his vanishing motor. If he had seen it he might have remembered the name, or, perhaps, even begun to understand the nature of a certain animal which is neither the donkey nor the oyster; but the creature whom man has always found it easiest to forget, since the hour he forgot God in a Garden.

«È una creatura molto curiosa,» disse il Capitano, con ansia, «ha ogni sorta di strane antipatie. Non sopporta un’automobile, per esempio, soprattutto una che rombi a quel modo mentre sta ferma. Non gli dispiace troppo una pelliccia, ma se sotto ci porti una giacca di velluto marrone, ti morde. E dovete tenerlo lontano da una certa specie di gente. Non credo che l’abbiate incontrata; ma costoro pensano sempre che chiunque abbia meno di duecento sterline l’anno sia ubriaco e assai crudele, e che chiunque ne abbia più di duemila stia amministrando il Giorno del Giudizio. Se terrete il nostro caro asino lontano dalla compagnia di simili persone… Ehilà! Ehilà! Ehilà!»

Si voltò in preda a un turbamento vero, e si lanciò dietro al cane, che s’era lanciato dietro l’automobile ed era saltato dentro. Il Capitano vi saltò dentro a sua volta, dietro al cane, per tirarlo fuori. Ma prima che potesse farlo, si accorse che l’auto volava troppo veloce per un simile balzo. Alzò lo sguardo e vide l’insegna della «Vecchia Nave» ritta sul davanti come uno stendardo rigido; e Pump, con la sua botte e il suo formaggio, seduto saldamente accanto al guidatore.

La cosa fu per lui, ancor più che per gli altri, un terremoto e una trasfigurazione; ma egli si levò malfermo in piedi e gridò a Wimpole.

«L’hai lasciata in buone mani. Io non sono mai stato crudele con un motore.»

Nel chiaro di luna del bosco di pini magico, lontano alle spalle, Dorian e l’asino rimasero a guardarsi l’un l’altro.

Per la mente mistica, quando è davvero una mente (il che non è affatto sempre il caso), non vi sono due cose più suggestive e simboliche di un poeta e di un asino. E l’asino era un asino verissimo, e il poeta era un poeta verissimo; per quanto legittimamente lo si potesse a volte scambiare per l’altro animale. L’interesse dell’asino per il poeta non si conoscerà mai. L’interesse del poeta per l’asino era perfettamente genuino; e sopravvisse persino a quel tremendo colloquio privato nel gufesco segreto dei boschi.

Ma credo che persino il poeta sarebbe stato illuminato se avesse visto il volto bianco, teso, frenetico dell’uomo al posto di guida del suo motore che svaniva. Se l’avesse visto, forse avrebbe ricordato il nome, o forse persino cominciato a comprendere la natura di un certo animale che non è né l’asino né l’ostrica; ma la creatura che all’uomo è sempre riuscito più facile dimenticare, dall’ora in cui dimenticò Dio in un Giardino.

CHAPTER XV: THE SONGS OF THE CAR CLUB

MORE than once as the car flew through black and silver fairylands of fir wood and pine wood, Dalroy put his head out of the side window and remonstrated with the chauffeur without effect. He was reduced at last to asking him where he was going.

“I’m goin’ ’ome,” said the driver in an undecipherable voice. “I’m a goin’ ’ome to my mar.”

“And where does she live?” asked Dalroy, with something more like diffidence than he had ever shown before in his life.

“Wiles,” said the man, “but I ain’t seen ’er since I was born. But she’ll do.”

“You must realise,” said Dalroy, with difficulty, “that you may be arrested–it’s the man’s own car; and he’s left behind with nothing to eat, so to speak.”

“’E’s got ’is dornkey,” grunted the man. “Let the stinker eat ’is dornkey, with thistle sauce. ’E would if ’e was as ’ollow as I was.”

Humphrey Pump opened the glass window that separated him from the rear part of the car, and turned to speak to his friend over his square elbow and shoulder.

“I’m afraid,” he said, “he won’t stop for anything just yet. He’s as mad as Moody’s aunt, as they say.”

“Do they say it?” asked the Captain, with a sort of anxiety. “They never said it in Ithaca.”

“Honestly, I think you’d better leave him alone,” answered Pump, with his sagacious face. “He’d just run us into a Scotch Express like Dandy Mutton did, when they said he was driving carelessly. We can send the car back to Ivywood somehow later on, and really, I don’t think it’ll do the gentleman any harm to spend a night with a donkey. The donkey might teach him something, I tell you.”

“It’s true he denied the Principle of Private Property,” said Dalroy, reflectively, “but I fancy he was thinking of a plain house fixed on the ground. A house on wheels, such as this, he might perhaps think a more permanent possession. But I never understand it;” and again he passed a weary palm across his open forehead. “Have you ever noticed, Hump, what is really odd about those people?”

The car shot on amid the comfortable silence of Pump, and then the Irishman said again:

“That poet in the pussy-cat clothes wasn’t half bad. Lord Ivywood isn’t cruel; but he’s inhuman. But that man wasn’t inhuman. He was ignorant, like most cultured fellows. But what’s odd about them is that they try to be simple and never clear away a single thing that’s complicated. If they have to choose between beef and pickles, they always abolish the beef. If they have to choose between a meadow and a motor, they forbid the meadow. Shall I tell you the secret? These men only surrender the things that bind them to other men. Go and dine with a temperance millionaire and you won’t find he’s abolished thehors d’oeuvres or the five courses or even the coffee. What he’s abolished is the port and sherry, because poor men like that as well as rich. Go a step farther, and you won’t find he’s abolished the fine silver forks and spoons, but he’s abolished the meat, because poor men like meat–when they can get it. Go a step farther, and you won’t find he goes without gardens or gorgeous rooms, which poor men can’t enjoy at all. But you will find he boasts of early rising, because sleep is a thing poor men can still enjoy. About the only thing they can still enjoy. Nobody ever heard of a modern philanthropist giving up petrol or typewriting or troops of servants. No, no! What he gives up must be some simple and universal thing. He will give up beef or beer or sleep–because these pleasures remind him that he is only a man.”

Humphrey Pump nodded, but still answered nothing; and the voice of the sprawling Dalroy took one of its upward turns of a sort of soaring flippancy; which commonly embodied itself in remembering some song he had composed.

“Such,” he said, “was the case of the late Mr. Mandragon, so long popular in English aristocratic society as a bluff and simple democrat from the West, until he was unfortunately sand-bagged by six men whose wives he had had shot by private detectives, on his incautiously landing on American soil.

“Mr. Mandragon the Millionaire, he wouldn’t have wine or wife,

He couldn’t endure complexity; he lived the simple life;

He ordered his lunch by megaphone in manly, simple tones,

And used all his motors for canvassing voters, and twenty telephones;

Besides a dandy little machine,

Cunning and neat as ever was seen,

With a hundred pulleys and cranks between,

Made of iron and kept quite clean,

To hoist him out of his healthful bed on every day of his life,

And wash him and brush him and shave him and dress him to live the Simple Life.

“Mr. Mandragon was most refined and quietly, neatly dressed,

Say all the American newspapers that know refinement best;

Quiet and neat the hair and hat, and the coat quiet and neat,

A trouser worn upon either leg, while boots adorned the feet;

And not, as anyone might expect,

A Tiger Skin, all striped and specked,

And a Peacock Hat with the tail erect,

A scarlet tunic with sunflowers decked–

That might have had a more marked effect,

And pleased the pride of a weaker man that yearned for wine or wife;

But fame and the flagon for Mr. Mandragon obscured the Simple Life.

“Mr. Mandragon the Millionaire, I am happy to say, is dead.

He enjoyed a quiet funeral in a crematorium shed,

And he lies there fluffy and soft and grey and certainly quite refined,

When he might have rotted to flowers and fruit with Adam and all mankind.

Or been eaten by bears that fancy blood,

Or burnt on a big tall tower of wood,

In a towering flame as a heathen should,

Or even sat with us here at food,

Merrily taking twopenny rum and cheese with a pocket knife,

But these were luxuries lost for him that lived for the Simple Life.”

CAPITOLO XV: I CANTI DEL CAR CLUB

PIÙ d’una volta, mentre la vettura volava attraverso neri e argentei paesi fatati di abeti e di pini, Dalroy sporgeva la testa dal finestrino laterale e rimostrava con l’autista, senza effetto. Alla fine si ridusse a chiedergli dove stesse andando.

«Vado a casa», disse l’autista con voce indecifrabile. «Vado a casa da mia madre.»

«E dove abita?» chiese Dalroy, con qualcosa di più simile alla timidezza di quanto avesse mai mostrato in vita sua.

«Nel Galles», disse l’uomo, «ma non la vedo da quando sono nato. Ma andrà bene.»

«Dovete rendervi conto», disse Dalroy, con difficoltà, «che potreste essere arrestato — la vettura è del padrone; e lui è rimasto indietro senza nulla da mangiare, per così dire.»

«Ha il suo asino», borbottò l’uomo. «Che il tanghero si mangi il suo asino, con salsa di cardi. Lo farebbe, se fosse vuoto come lo ero io.»

Humphrey Pump aprì il finestrino di vetro che lo separava dalla parte posteriore della vettura, e si girò per parlare all’amico al di sopra del gomito e della spalla squadrata.

«Temo», disse, «che per ora non si fermerà per nessuna ragione. È matto come la zia di Moody, come si suol dire.»

«Lo dicono?» chiese il capitano, con una sorta di ansia. «Non lo dicevano mai a Itaca.»

«Sinceramente, credo che fareste meglio a lasciarlo in pace», rispose Pump, con la sua faccia sagace. «Ci scaraventerebbe contro uno Scotch Express come fece Dandy Mutton, quando dissero che guidava con imprudenza. Potremo rimandare la vettura a Ivywood in qualche modo più tardi e, davvero, non credo che faccia alcun male al gentiluomo passare una notte con un asino. L’asino potrebbe insegnargli qualcosa, ve lo dico io.»

«È vero che ha negato il Principio della Proprietà Privata», disse Dalroy, riflessivo, «ma immagino che stesse pensando a una semplice casa fissata al suolo. Una casa su ruote, come questa, forse potrebbe considerarla un possesso più permanente. Ma io non lo capisco mai;» e di nuovo si passò una palma stanca sulla fronte scoperta. «Hai mai notato, Hump, che cosa c’è di davvero strano in quella gente?»

La vettura sfrecciava innanzi nel comodo silenzio di Pump, e poi l’irlandese riprese:

«Quel poeta vestito da gattino non era niente male. Lord Ivywood non è crudele; ma è disumano. Quell’uomo invece non era disumano. Era ignorante, come la maggior parte degli uomini colti. Ma ciò che c’è di strano in loro è che cercano di essere semplici e non sgombrano mai una sola cosa che sia complicata. Se devono scegliere fra il manzo e i sottaceti, aboliscono sempre il manzo. Se devono scegliere fra un prato e un motore, vietano il prato. Vuoi che ti dica il segreto? Questi uomini rinunciano soltanto alle cose che li legano agli altri uomini. Va’ a pranzo da un milionario astemio e non troverai che abbia abolito gli antipasti o le cinque portate o nemmeno il caffè. Ciò che ha abolito è il porto e lo sherry, perché i poveri li amano tanto quanto i ricchi. Fa’ un passo avanti, e non troverai che abbia abolito le raffinate forchette e i cucchiai d’argento, ma ha abolito la carne, perché i poveri amano la carne — quando riescono ad averla. Fa’ un altro passo, e non troverai che rinunci ai giardini o alle stanze sfarzose, delle quali i poveri non possono affatto godere. Ma troverai che si vanta di alzarsi presto, perché il sonno è una cosa di cui i poveri possono ancora godere. Circa l’unica cosa di cui possano ancora godere. Nessuno ha mai sentito di un moderno filantropo che rinunci alla benzina o alla dattilografia o a schiere di servitori. No, no! Ciò a cui rinuncia dev’essere qualcosa di semplice e universale. Rinuncerà al manzo o alla birra o al sonno — perché questi piaceri gli ricordano che è soltanto un uomo.»

Humphrey Pump annuì, ma continuò a non rispondere nulla; e la voce dello sdraiato Dalroy prese una delle sue impennate ascendenti verso una sorta di svolazzante leggerezza; la quale comunemente si incarnava nel ricordo di qualche canzone da lui composta.

«Tale», disse, «fu il caso del defunto signor Mandragon, così a lungo popolare nell’aristocratica società inglese come franco e semplice democratico venuto dall’Ovest, finché non fu purtroppo accoppato a colpi di sacchetto di sabbia da sei uomini le cui mogli egli aveva fatto assassinare da detective privati, avendo egli imprudentemente messo piede sul suolo americano.

«Il signor Mandragon il Milionario non voleva né vino né moglie,

Non sopportava la complessità; viveva la vita semplice;

Ordinava il pranzo col megafono, in toni virili e semplici,

E usava tutte le sue automobili per far campagna fra gli elettori, e venti telefoni;

Oltre a una graziosa macchinetta,

Ingegnosa e linda come mai se ne vide,

Con cento pulegge e manovelle in mezzo,

Fatta di ferro e tenuta ben pulita,

Per issarlo fuori dal suo salubre letto ogni giorno della sua vita,

E lavarlo e spazzolarlo e raderlo e vestirlo per vivere la Vita Semplice.

«Il signor Mandragon era raffinatissimo e vestito quieto, ordinato,

Lo dicono tutti i giornali americani che meglio conoscono la raffinatezza;

Quieti e ordinati i capelli e il cappello, e la giacca quieta e ordinata,

Un pantalone indossato su ciascuna gamba, mentre gli stivali adornavano i piedi;

E non, come qualcuno potrebbe aspettarsi,

Una Pelle di Tigre, tutta striata e picchiettata,

E un Cappello a Pavone con la coda eretta,

Una tunica scarlatta adorna di girasoli —

Che avrebbe potuto avere un effetto più marcato,

E allietare l’orgoglio di un uomo più debole, bramoso di vino o di moglie;

Ma la fama e la fiasca per il signor Mandragon oscurarono la Vita Semplice.

«Il signor Mandragon il Milionario, sono lieto di dirlo, è morto.

Godette di un quieto funerale in un capannone crematorio,

E là giace soffice e molle e grigio e certo assai raffinato,

Quando avrebbe potuto marcire in fiori e frutti con Adamo e tutta l’umanità.

O essere divorato dagli orsi che amano il sangue,

O arso su un’alta grande torre di legno,

In una fiamma torreggiante come un pagano dovrebbe,

O persino sedere con noi qui a mensa,

Prendendo allegramente rum da due soldi e formaggio con un temperino,

Ma questi erano lussi perduti per lui, che visse per la Vita Semplice.»

Mr. Pump had made many attempts to arrest this song, but they were as vain as all attempts to arrest the car. The angry chauffeur seemed, indeed, rather inspired to further energy by the violent vocal noises behind; and Pump again found it best to fall back on conversation.

“Well, Captain,” he said, amicably. “I can’t quite agree with you about those things. Of course, you can trust foreigners too much as poor Thompson did; but then you can go too far the other way. Aunt Sarah lost a thousand pounds that way. I told her again and again he wasn’t a nigger, but she wouldn’t believe me. And, of course, that was just the kind of thing to offend an ambassador if he was an Austrian. It seems to me, Captain, you aren’t quite fair to these foreign chaps. Take these Americans, now! There were many Americans went by Pebblewick, you may suppose. But in all the lot there was never a bad lot; never a nasty American, nor a stupid American–nor, well, never an American that I didn’t rather like.”

“I know,” said Dalroy, “you mean there was never an American who did not appreciate ‘The Old Ship.’”

“I suppose I do mean that,” answered the inn-keeper, “and somehow, I feel ‘The Old Ship’ might appreciate the American too.”

“You English are an extraordinary lot,” said the Irishman, with a sudden and sombre quietude. “I sometimes feel you may pull through after all.”

After another silence he said, “You’re always right, Hump, and one oughtn’t to think of Yankees like that. The rich are the scum of the earth in every country. And a vast proportion of the real Americans are among the most courteous, intelligent, self-respecting people in the world. Some attribute this to the fact that a vast proportion of the real Americans are Irishmen.”

Pump was still silent, and the Captain resumed in a moment.

“All the same,” he said, “it’s very hard for a man, especially a man of a small country like me, to understand how it must feel to be an American; especially in the matter of nationality. I shouldn’t like to have to write the American National Anthem, but fortunately there is no great probability of the commission being given. The shameful secret of my inability to write an American patriotic song is one that will die with me.”

“Well, what about an English one,” said Pump, sturdily. “You might do worse, Captain.”

“English, you bloody tyrant,” said Patrick, indignantly. “I could no more fancy a song by an Englishman than you could one by that dog.”

Mr. Humphrey Pump gravely took the paper from his pocket, on which he had previously inscribed the sin and desolation of grocers, and felt in another of his innumerable pockets for a pencil.

“Hullo,” cried Dalroy. “Are you going to have a shy at the Ballad of Quoodle?”

Quoodle lifted his ears at his name. Mr. Pump smiled a slight and embarrassed smile. He was secretly proud of Dalroy’s admiration for his previous literary attempts and he had some natural knack for verse as a game, as he had for all games; and his reading, though desultory, had not been merely rustic or low.

“On condition,” he said, deprecatingly, “that you write a song for the English.”

“Oh, very well,” said Patrick, with a huge sigh that really indicated the very opposite of reluctance. “We must do something till the thing stops, I suppose, and this seems a blameless parlour game. ‘Songs of the Car Club.’ Sounds quite aristocratic.”

And he began to make marks with a pencil on the fly-leaf of a little book he had in his pocket–Wilson’sNoctes Ambrosianae. Every now and then, however, he looked up and delayed his own composition by watching Pump and the dog, whose proceedings amused him very much. For the owner of “The Old Ship” sat sucking his pencil and looking at Mr. Quoodle with eyes of fathomless attention. Every now and then he slightly scratched his brown hair with the pencil, and wrote down a word. And the dog Quoodle, with that curious canine power of either understanding or most brazenly pretending to understand what is going on, sat erect with his head at an angle, as if he were sitting for his portrait.

Hence it happened that though Pump’s poem was a little long, as are often the poems of inexperienced poets, and though Dalroy’s poem was very short (being much hurried toward the end) the long poem was finished some time before the short one.

Therefore it was that there was first produced for the world the song more familiarly known as “No Noses,” or more correctly called “The Song of Quoodle.” Part of it ran eventually thus:

“They haven’t got no noses

The fallen sons of Eve,

Even the smell of roses

Is not what they supposes,

But more than mind discloses,

And more than men believe.

“They haven’t got no noses,

They cannot even tell

When door and darkness closes

The park a Jew encloses,

Where even the Law of Moses

Will let you steal a smell;

“The brilliant smell of water,

The brave smell of a stone,

The smell of dew and thunder

And old bones buried under,

Are things in which they blunder

And err, if left alone.

“The wind from winter forests,

The scent of scentless flowers,

The breath of bride’s adorning,

The smell of snare and warning,

The smell of Sunday morning,

God gave to us for ours.”

---

“And Quoodle here discloses

All things that Quoodle can;

They haven’t got no noses,

They haven’t got no noses,

And goodness only knowses

The Noselessness of Man.”

This poem also shows traces of haste in its termination, and the present editor (who has no aim save truth) is bound to confess that parts of it were supplied in the criticisms of the Captain, and even enriched (in later and livelier circumstances) by the Poet of the Birds himself. At the actual moment the chief features of this realistic song about dogs was a crashing chorus of “Bow-wow, wow,” begun by Mr. Patrick Dalroy; but immediately imitated (much more successfully) by Mr. Quoodle. In the face of all this Dalroy suffered some real difficulty in fulfilling the bargain by reading out his much shorter poem about what he imagined an Englishman might feel. Indeed there was something very rough and vague in his very voice as he read it out; as of one who had not found the key to his problem. The present compiler (who has no aim save truth) must confess that the verses ran as follows:

Il signor Pump aveva fatto molti tentativi per fermare questa canzone, ma erano stati vani come tutti i tentativi di fermare l’auto. Il furioso autista sembrava, anzi, piuttosto ispirato a ulteriori energie dai violenti rumori vocali alle spalle; e Pump trovò ancora una volta meglio rifugiarsi nella conversazione.

«Beh, Capitano», disse amichevolmente, «non posso proprio essere d’accordo con lei su queste cose. Certo, si può fidare troppo degli stranieri come ha fatto il povero Thompson; ma poi si può esagerare anche dall’altra parte. La zia Sarah perse mille sterline in quel modo. Glielo dissi più e più volte che non era un negro, ma lei non volle credermi. E, naturalmente, quello era proprio il tipo di cosa da offendere un ambasciatore se fosse stato austriaco. Mi sembra, Capitano, che lei non sia del tutto giusto con questi stranieri. Prendiamo gli americani, ad esempio! Passarono molti americani per Pebblewick, può immaginare. Ma in tutto il gruppo non ce n’era mai uno cattivo; né un americano sgradevole, né un americano stupido – né, beh, mai un americano che non mi piacesse particolarmente».

“Lo so”, disse Dalroy, “volete dire che non c’è mai stato un americano che non apprezzasse ‘La vecchia nave’.”

«Suppongo che sia proprio questo il mio pensiero», rispose l’oste «e in qualche modo ho la sensazione che anche “La Vecchia Nave” potrebbe apprezzare l’americano.»

«Voi inglesi siete un popolo straordinario», disse l’irlandese con una tranquillità improvvisa e cupa. «A volte ho la sensazione che forse ce la farete, dopotutto».

Dopo un altro silenzio, disse: «Hai sempre ragione, Hump, e non si dovrebbe pensare così dei yankee. I ricchi sono la feccia della terra in ogni paese. E una vasta proporzione di veri americani è tra le persone più cortesi, intelligenti, autoreggenti del mondo. Alcuni attribuiscono questo al fatto che una vasta proporzione dei veri americani sono irlandesi».

Pump era ancora silenzioso e il Capitano riprese un attimo dopo.

“Tuttavia”, disse, “è molto difficile per un uomo, specialmente uno di un piccolo paese come il mio, capire com’è sentirsi americani; soprattutto in materia di nazionalità. Non mi piacerebbe dover scrivere l’inno nazionale degli Stati Uniti, ma fortunatamente non c’è molta probabilità che mi venga affidato questo incarico. Il vergognoso segreto della mia incapacità di comporre un canto patriottico americano morirà con me.”

«Beh, e che dire di una inglese», disse Pump con decisione. «Potrebbe andarle peggio, Capitano».

«Inglese, tu maledetto tiranno», disse Patrick, indignato. «Non potrei mai immaginare una canzone di un inglese più di quanto tu possa immaginarne una di quel cane».

Il signor Humphrey Pump estrasse con solennità di tasca il foglio su cui aveva precedentemente annotato i peccati e la desolazione dei droghieri, e frugò in un’altra delle sue innumerevoli tasche per cercare una matita.

«Ehi!», esclamò Dalroy. «Avete intenzione di fare un tentativo con la Ballata di Quoodle?»

Quoodle drizzò le orecchie al suo nome. Il signor Pump sorrise con un sorriso lieve e imbarazzato. Era segretamente orgoglioso dell’ammirazione di Dalroy per i suoi precedenti tentativi letterari e aveva una certa attitudine naturale verso la poesia come gioco, così come ne aveva per tutti i giochi; e le sue letture, sebbene discontinue, non erano state semplicemente rustiche o volgari.

«Con la condizione», disse in tono modesto, «che tu scriva una canzone per gli inglesi.»

“Oh, benissimo,” disse Patrick con un enorme sospiro che in realtà indicava l’esatto opposto della riluttanza. “Dobbiamo fare qualcosa finché la cosa non si ferma, immagino, e questo sembra un gioco da salotto innocuo. ‘Canzoni del Car Club.’ Sembra proprio aristocratico.”

E cominciò a fare dei segni con una matita sulla carta di guardia di un piccolo libro che aveva in tasca: le Noctes Ambrosianae di Wilson. Di tanto in tanto, però, alzava lo sguardo e ritardava la propria composizione osservando Pump e il cane, i cui comportamenti lo divertivano molto. Infatti il proprietario dell’“Old Ship” stava seduto a succhiare la matita e guardava Mr. Quoodle con occhi di insondabile attenzione. Di tanto in tanto si grattava leggermente i capelli castani con la matita, e scriveva una parola. E il cane Quoodle, con quel curioso potere canino di comprendere o fingere spudoratamente di comprendere ciò che sta succedendo, stava seduto eretto con la testa inclinata, come se si stesse facendo ritrarre.

Perciò accadde che sebbene la poesia di Pump fosse un po’ lunga, come spesso sono le poesie dei poeti inesperti, e sebbene la poesia di Dalroy fosse molto breve (essendo stata scritta con molta fretta verso la fine), la poesia lunga fu finita qualche tempo prima della breve.

Fu così che per il mondo venne prodotta la prima canzone, più comunemente conosciuta come “Niente Nasi”, o, più correttamente chiamata “La Canzone di Quoodle.” Parte di essa alla fine andò così:

“Non hanno nessun naso”

I figli caduti di Eva

Anche il profumo delle rose

Non è come pensano loro,

Ma più della mente si rivela,

E più di quanto gli uomini credano.

“Non hanno naso,”

Non riescono nemmeno a dire

Quando la porta si chiude e cala l’oscurità

Il parco che un ebreo recinì,

Dove anche la Legge di Mosè

Vi lascerò rubare un odore;

“L’odore brillante dell’acqua,

L’audace profumo di una pietra,

L’odore di rugiada e tuono

E vecchie ossa sepolte sotto,

Le cose in cui sbagliano

E sbagliare, se lasciati soli.

“La brezza dalle foreste di inverno,

Il profumo dei fiori senza odore fiori,

Il respiro dell’ornamento della sposa,

L’odore di trappola e avvertimento,

Il profumo della mattina di domenica,

Dio ci ha dato per noi.”

---

“E Quoodle qui rivela

Tutte le cose che può fare Quoodle;

Non hanno naso,

Non hanno naso,

E solo Dio sa

L’assenza di naso dell’uomo.

Questa poesia mostra anche tracce di fretta nella sua conclusione, e l’attuale curatore (che non ha altro scopo se non la verità) è tenuto a confessare che parti di essa furono fornite nelle critiche del Capitano, ed addirittura arricchite (in circostanze successive e più vivaci) dal Poeta degli uccelli stesso. In quel momento preciso le caratteristiche principali di questa realistica canzone sui cane era un fragoroso coro di “Bau-bau, bau”, iniziato dal signor Patrick Dalroy; ma immediatamente imitato (con molto più successo) dal signor Quoodle. Di fronte a tutto ciò, Dalroy ebbe qualche reale difficoltà a mantenere la promessa leggendo ad alta voce la sua poesia molto più breve su quello che immaginava un inglese potesse provare. Infatti c’era qualcosa di molto grezzo e vago nella sua stessa voce mentre la leggeva; come se non avesse trovato la chiave del suo problema. L’attuale compilatore (che non ha altro scopo se non la verità) deve confessare che i versi erano i seguenti:

“St. George he was for England,

And before he killed the dragon

He drank a pint of English ale

Out of an English flagon.

For though he fast right readily

In hair-shirt or in mail,

It isn’t safe to give him cakes

Unless you give him ale.

“St. George he was for England,

And right gallantly set free

The lady left for dragon’s meat

And tied up to a tree;

But since he stood for England

And knew what England means,

Unless you give him bacon,

You mustn’t give him beans.

“St. George he was for England,

And shall wear the shield he wore

When we go out in armour,

With the battle-cross before;

But though he is jolly company

And very pleased to dine,

It isn’t safe to give him nuts

Unless you give him wine.

“Very philosophical song that,” said Dalroy, shaking his head solemnly, “full of deep thought. I really think that is about the truth of the matter, in the case of the Englishman. Your enemies say you’re stupid, and you boast of being illogical–which is about the only thing you do that really is stupid. As if anybody ever made an Empire or anything else by saying that two and two make five. Or as if anyone was ever the stronger fornot understanding anything–if it were only tip-cat or chemistry. But thisis true about you Hump. You English are supremely an artistic people, and therefore you go by associations, as I said in my song. You won’t have one thing without the other thing that goes with it. And as you can’t imagine a village without a squire and parson, or a college without port and old oak, you get the reputation of a Conservative people. But it’s because you’re sensitive, Hump, not because you’re stupid, that you won’t part with things. It’s lies, lies and flattery they tell you, Hump, when they tell you you’re fond of compromise. I tell ye, Hump, every real revolution is a compromise. D’ye think Wolfe Tone or Charles Stuart Parnell never compromised? But it’s just because you’re afraid of a compromise that you won’t have a revolution. If you really overhauled ‘The Old Ship’–or Oxford–you’d have to make up your mind what to take and what to leave, and it would break your heart, Humphrey Pump.”

He stared in front of him with a red and ruminant face, and at length added, somewhat more gloomily,

“This aesthetic way we have, Hump, has only two little disadvantages which I will now explain to you. The first is exactly what has sent us flying in this contraption. When the beautiful, smooth, harmonious thing you’ve made is worked by a new type, in a new spirit, then I tell you it would be better for you a thousand times to be living under the thousand paper constitutions of Condorcet and Sieyès. When the English oligarchy is run by an Englishman who hasn’t got an English mind–then you have Lord Ivywood and all this nightmare, of which God could only guess the end.”

The car had beaten some roods of dust behind it, and he ended still more darkly:

“And the other disadvantage, my amiable aesthete, is this. If ever, in blundering about the planet, you come on an island in the Atlantic–Atlantis, let us say–which won’t acceptall your pretty picture–to which you can’t give everything–why you will probably decide to give nothing. You will say in your hearts: ‘Perhaps they will starve soon’; and you will become, for that island, the deafest and the most evil of all the princes of the earth.”

It was already daybreak, and Pump, who knew the English boundaries almost by intuition, could tell even through the twilight that the tail of the little town they were leaving behind was of a new sort, the sort to be seen in the western border. The chauffeur’s phrase about his mother might merely have been a music-hall joke; but certainly he had driven darkly in that direction.

White morning lay about the grey stony streets like spilt milk. A few proletarian early risers, wearier at morning than most men at night, seemed merely of opinion that it was no use crying over it. The two or three last houses, which looked almost too tired to stand upright, seemed to have moved the Captain into another sleepy explosion.

“There are two kinds of idealists, as everybody knows–or must have thought of. There are those who idealize the real and those who (precious seldom) realise the ideal. Artistic and poetical people like the English generally idealize the real. This I have expressed in a song, which–”

“No, really,” protested the innkeeper, “really now, Captain–”

“This I have expressed in a song,” repeated Dalroy, in an adamantine manner, “which I will now sing with every circumstance of leisure, loudness, or any other–”

He stopped because the flying universe seemed to stop. Charging hedgerows came to a halt, as if challenged by the bugle. The racing forests stood rigid. The last few tottering houses stood suddenly at attention. For a noise like a pistol-shot from the car itself had stopped all that race, as a pistol-shot might start any other.

The driver clambered out very slowly, and stood about in various tragic attitudes round the car. He opened an unsuspected number of doors and windows in the car, and touched things and twisted things and felt things.

“I must back as best I can to that there garrige, sir,” he said, in a heavy and husky tone they had not heard from him before.

Then he looked round on the long woods and the last houses, and seemed to gnaw his lip, like a great general who has made a great mistake. His brow seemed as black as ever, yet his voice, when he spoke again, had fallen many further degrees toward its dull and daily tone.

“Yer see, this is a bit bad,” he said. “It’ll be a beastly job even at the best plices, if I’m gettin’ back at all.”

“Getting back,” repeated Dalroy, opening the blue eyes of a bull. “Back where?”

“Well, yer see,” said the chauffeur, reasonably, “I was bloody keen to show ’im it was me drove the car and not ’im. By a bit o’ bad luck, I done damage to ’is car. Well–ifyou can stick in ’is car–”

«San Giorgio era per l’Inghilterra,

E prima di uccidere il drago

Bevve una pinta di birra inglese

Da un boccale inglese.

Perché, per quanto digiuni di buon grado

In cilicio o in cotta di maglia,

Non è prudente dargli dolci

Se non gli dai anche birra.

«San Giorgio era per l’Inghilterra,

E con gran valore liberò

La dama lasciata in pasto al drago

E legata a un albero;

Ma poiché stava per l’Inghilterra

E sapeva che cosa l’Inghilterra significhi,

Se non gli dai pancetta,

Non devi dargli fagioli.

«San Giorgio era per l’Inghilterra,

E porterà lo scudo che portava

Quando usciremo in armi,

Con la croce di battaglia innanzi;

Ma per quanto sia allegra compagnia

E ben lieto di pranzare,

Non è prudente dargli noci

Se non gli dai vino.

«Canzone molto filosofica, questa», disse Dalroy, scuotendo il capo con solennità, «piena di profondo pensiero. Credo davvero che questa sia press’a poco la verità della faccenda, nel caso dell’inglese. I tuoi nemici dicono che sei stupido, e tu ti vanti di essere illogico — che è circa l’unica cosa che fai a essere davvero stupida. Come se qualcuno avesse mai fatto un Impero o qualsiasi altra cosa dicendo che due e due fanno cinque. O come se qualcuno fosse mai divenuto più forte per non capire nulla — fosse anche solo la lippa o la chimica. Ma questo è vero riguardo a te, Hump. Voi inglesi siete un popolo supremamente artistico, e perciò procedete per associazioni, come ho detto nella mia canzone. Non volete una cosa senza l’altra che le va insieme. E poiché non riuscite a immaginare un villaggio senza uno squire e un parroco, o un collegio senza porto e vecchia quercia, vi guadagnate la fama di popolo conservatore. Ma è perché siete sensibili, Hump, non perché siete stupidi, che non volete separarvi dalle cose. Sono menzogne, menzogne e lusinghe quelle che ti raccontano, Hump, quando ti dicono che ami il compromesso. Ti dico, Hump, che ogni vera rivoluzione è un compromesso. Credi che Wolfe Tone o Charles Stuart Parnell non abbiano mai sceso a compromessi? Ma è proprio perché hai paura di un compromesso che non vuoi una rivoluzione. Se davvero mettessi mano a ‘La Vecchia Nave’ — o a Oxford — dovresti decidere che cosa prendere e che cosa lasciare, e ti spezzerebbe il cuore, Humphrey Pump.»

Fissava davanti a sé con volto rosso e ruminante, e infine aggiunse, in tono alquanto più cupo:

«Questo nostro modo estetico, Hump, ha solo due piccoli svantaggi che ora ti spiegherò. Il primo è esattamente ciò che ci ha spediti a volare in questo trabiccolo. Quando la bella cosa liscia e armoniosa che avete creato viene fatta funzionare da un tipo nuovo, in uno spirito nuovo, allora ti dico che sarebbe meglio per voi mille volte vivere sotto le mille costituzioni di carta di Condorcet e Sieyès. Quando l’oligarchia inglese è retta da un inglese che non ha una mente inglese — allora hai Lord Ivywood e tutto questo incubo, di cui solo Dio potrebbe indovinare la fine.»

La vettura si era lasciata dietro qualche pertica di polvere, ed egli concluse ancor più oscuramente:

«E l’altro svantaggio, mio amabile esteta, è questo. Se mai, brancolando per il pianeta, ti imbatterai in un’isola dell’Atlantico — Atlantide, diciamo — che non accetterà tutto il tuo bel quadretto — cui non potrai dare ogni cosa — ebbene, probabilmente deciderai di non darle nulla. Direte in cuor vostro: ‘Forse presto moriranno di fame’; e diverrete, per quell’isola, il più sordo e il più malvagio di tutti i principi della terra.»

Era già l’alba, e Pump, che conosceva i confini inglesi quasi per intuito, poteva capire anche attraverso il crepuscolo che la coda della cittadina che si lasciavano dietro era di una nuova specie, quella che si vede lungo il confine occidentale. La frase dell’autista sulla madre poteva essere stata soltanto una battuta da caffè-concerto; ma di certo egli aveva guidato oscuramente in quella direzione.

Il bianco mattino giaceva sulle grigie strade di pietra come latte versato. Alcuni proletari mattinieri, più stanchi al mattino di quanto la maggior parte degli uomini lo sia di notte, sembravano semplicemente dell’avviso che non valesse la pena piangerci sopra. Le due o tre ultime case, che parevano troppo stanche per reggersi in piedi, sembravano aver spinto il capitano in un altro sonnacchioso scoppio.

«Ci sono due specie di idealisti, come tutti sanno — o devono aver pensato. Ci sono quelli che idealizzano il reale e quelli che (assai di rado) realizzano l’ideale. Le persone artistiche e poetiche come gli inglesi in genere idealizzano il reale. Questo l’ho espresso in una canzone, che —»

«No, davvero», protestò il locandiere, «davvero ora, capitano —»

«Questo l’ho espresso in una canzone», ripeté Dalroy, in modo adamantino, «che ora canterò con ogni circostanza di lentezza, di fragore, o di qualsiasi altra —»

Si fermò perché l’universo volante parve fermarsi. Le siepi lanciate al galoppo si arrestarono, come sfidate dalla tromba. Le foreste in corsa rimasero rigide. Le ultime case traballanti stettero improvvisamente sull’attenti. Poiché un rumore come un colpo di pistola proveniente dalla vettura stessa aveva arrestato tutta quella corsa, come un colpo di pistola potrebbe avviarne un’altra.

L’autista si arrampicò fuori assai lentamente, e si aggirò in varie tragiche pose attorno alla vettura. Aprì un insospettato numero di portiere e finestrini della vettura, e toccò cose e girò cose e tastò cose.

«Devo tornare indietro come meglio posso fino a quel garage là, signore», disse, con un tono pesante e rauco che non gli avevano mai udito prima.

Poi si volse a guardare i lunghi boschi e le ultime case, e parve mordersi il labbro, come un grande generale che ha commesso un grande errore. La fronte gli pareva nera come sempre, eppure la sua voce, quando parlò di nuovo, era scesa di molti gradi ancora verso il suo tono spento e quotidiano.

«Vedete, la faccenda è un po’ brutta», disse. «Sarà un lavoraccio persino nei posti migliori, ammesso che ci torni.»

«Tornare», ripeté Dalroy, spalancando gli occhi azzurri di un toro. «Tornare dove?»

«Beh, vedete», disse l’autista, ragionevolmente, «avevo una maledetta voglia di mostrargli che ero io a guidare la vettura e non lui. Per un po’ di malasorte, ho fatto un danno alla sua vettura. Beh — se voi potete restare nella sua vettura —»

Captain Patrick Dalroy sprang out of the car so rapidly that he almost reeled and slipped upon the road. The dog sprang after him, barking furiously.

“Hump,” said Patrick, quietly. “I’ve found out everything about you. I know what always bothered me about the Englishman.”

Then, after an instant’s silence, he said, “That Frenchman was right who said (I forget how he put it) that you march to Trafalgar Square to rid yourself of your temper; not to rid yourself of your tyrant. Our friend was quite ready to rebel, rushing away. To rebel sitting still was too much for him. Do you readPunch? I am sure you do. Pump andPunch must be almost the only survivors of the Victorian Age. Do you remember an old joke in an excellent picture, representing two ragged Irishmen with guns, waiting behind a stone wall to shoot a landlord? One of the Irishmen says the landlord is late, and adds, ‘I hope no accident’s happened to the poor gentleman.’ Well, it’s all perfectly true; I knew that Irishman intimately, but I want to tell you a secret about him. He was an Englishman.”

The chauffeur had backed with breathless care to the entrance of the garage, which was next door to a milkman’s or merely separated from it by a black and lean lane, looking no larger than the crack of a door. It must, however, have been larger than it looked, because Captain Dalroy disappeared down it.

He seemed to have beckoned the driver after him; at any rate that functionary instantly followed. The functionary came out again in an almost guilty haste, touching his cap and stuffing loose papers into his pocket. Then the functionary returned yet again from what he called the “garrige,” carrying larger and looser things over his arm.

All this did Mr. Humphrey Pump observe, not without interest. The place, remote as it was, was evidently arendez-vous for motorists. Otherwise a very tall motorist, throttled and masked in the most impenetrable degree, would hardly have strolled up to speak to him. Still less would the tall motorist have handed him a similar horrid disguise of wraps and goggles, in a bundle over his arm. Least of all would any motorist, however tall, have said to him from behind the cap and goggles, “Put on these things, Hump, and then we’ll go into the milk shop. I’m waiting for the car. Which car, my seeker after truth? Why the car I’m going to buy for you to drive.”

The remorseful chauffeur, after many adventures, did actually find his way back to the little moonlit wood where he had left his master and the donkey. But his master and the donkey had vanished.

Il capitano Patrick Dalroy balzò fuori dall’automobile così di scatto che quasi barcollò e scivolò sulla strada. Il cane balzò dietro di lui, abbaiando furiosamente.

«Hump», disse Patrick, con calma. «Ho scoperto tutto di te. So che cosa mi ha sempre lasciato perplesso a proposito dell’inglese».

Poi, dopo un istante di silenzio, disse: «Aveva ragione quel francese che disse (dimentico come lo formulò) che tu marci a Trafalgar Square per liberarti del tuo malumore; non per liberarti del tuo tiranno. Il nostro amico era prontissimo a ribellarsi correndo via. Ribellarsi restando seduto immobile era troppo per lui. Leggi il Punch? Sono certo che sì. Il Pump e il Punch devono essere quasi gli unici superstiti dell’Età Vittoriana. Ricordi una vecchia battuta in una vignetta eccellente, che rappresentava due irlandesi cenciosi col fucile, in attesa dietro un muro di pietra di sparare a un latifondista? Uno degli irlandesi dice che il latifondista è in ritardo, e aggiunge: “Spero che non sia capitato qualche incidente al povero signore”. Ebbene, è tutto perfettamente vero; conoscevo intimamente quell’irlandese, ma voglio dirti un segreto sul suo conto. Era un inglese».

L’autista aveva fatto retromarcia con trepida cautela fino all’ingresso del garage, che era adiacente a una latteria, o soltanto separato da essa da un vicolo nero e smilzo, non più largo, all’apparenza, della fessura d’una porta. Doveva però essere più largo di quanto sembrasse, perché il capitano Dalroy vi scomparve dentro.

Pareva avesse fatto cenno all’autista di seguirlo; comunque quel funzionario lo seguì all’istante. Il funzionario ne uscì di nuovo con una fretta quasi colpevole, toccandosi il berretto e ficcandosi in tasca fogli sciolti. Poi il funzionario tornò ancora una volta da quella che egli chiamava la “garrige”, portando cose più grandi e più sciolte sul braccio.

Tutto ciò osservò il signor Humphrey Pump, non senza interesse. Il luogo, per remoto che fosse, era evidentemente un rendez-vous per automobilisti. Altrimenti un automobilista altissimo, imbacuccato e mascherato al grado più impenetrabile, difficilmente si sarebbe avvicinato per parlargli. Ancor meno l’alto automobilista gli avrebbe porto un simile orribile travestimento di panni e occhialoni, in un fagotto sul braccio. Meno che mai un automobilista, per alto che fosse, gli avrebbe detto da dietro il berretto e gli occhialoni: «Metti su questa roba, Hump, e poi entreremo nella latteria. Aspetto l’automobile. Quale automobile, mio cercatore di verità? Ma l’automobile che sto per comprare perché tu la guidi».

L’autista pieno di rimorso, dopo molte avventure, ritrovò davvero la via del boschetto rischiarato dalla luna dove aveva lasciato il suo padrone e l’asino. Ma il suo padrone e l’asino erano svaniti.

CHAPTER XVI: THE SEVEN MOODS OF DORIAN

THAT timeless clock of all lunatics, which was so bright in the sky that night, may really have had some elfin luck about it, like a silver penny. Not only had it initiated Mr. Hibbs into the mysteries of Dionysius, and Mr. Bullrose into the arboreal habits of his ancestors, but one night of it made a very considerable and rather valuable change in Mr. Dorian Wimpole, the Poet of the Birds. He was a man neither foolish nor evil, any more than Shelley; only a man made sterile by living in a world of indirectness and insincerity, with words rather than with things. He had not had the smallest intention of starving his chauffeur; he did not realise that there was worse spiritual murder in merely forgetting him. But as hour after hour passed over him, alone with the donkey and the moon, he went through a raging and shifting series of frames of mind, such as his cultured friends would have described as moods.

The First Mood, I regret to say, was one of black and grinding hatred. He had no notion of the chauffeur’s grievance, and could only suppose he had been bribed or intimidated by the demonic donkey-torturers. But Mr. Wimpole was much more capable at that moment of torturing a chauffeur than Mr. Pump had ever been of torturing a donkey; for no sane man can hate an animal. He kicked the stones in the road, sending them flying into the forest, and wished that each one of them was a chauffeur. The bracken by the roadside he tore up by the roots, as representing the hair of the chauffeur, to which it bore no resemblance. He hit with his fist such trees, as, I suppose, seemed in form and expression most reminiscent of the chauffeur; but desisted from this, finding that in this apparently one-sided contest the tree had rather the best of it. But the whole wood and the whole world had become a kind of omnipresent and pantheistic chauffeur, and he hit at him everywhere.

The thoughtful reader will realise that Mr. Wimpole had already taken a considerable upward stride in what he would have called the cosmic scale. The next best thing to really loving a fellow creature is really hating him: especially when he is a poorer man separated from you otherwise by mere social stiffness. The desire to murder him is at least an acknowledgment that he is alive. Many a man has owed the first white gleams of the dawn of Democracy in his soul to a desire to find a stick and beat the butler. And we have it on the unimpeachable local authority of Mr. Humphrey Pump that Squire Merriman chased his librarian through three villages with a horse-pistol; and was a Radical ever after.

His rage also did him good merely as a relief, and he soon passed into a second and more positive mood of meditation.

“The damnable monkeys go on like this,” he muttered, “and then they call a donkey one of the Lower Animals. Ride on a donkey would he? I’d like to see the donkey riding on him for a bit. Good old man.”

The patient ass turned mild eyes on him when he patted it, and Dorian Wimpole discovered, with a sort of subconscious surprise, that he really was fond of the donkey. Deeper still in his subliminal self he knew that he had never been fond of an animal before. His poems about fantastic creatures had been quite sincere, and quite cold. When he said he loved a shark, he meant he saw no reason for hating a shark, which was right enough. There is no reason for hating a shark, however much reason there may be for avoiding one. There is no harm in a craken if you keep it in a tank–or in a sonnet.

But he also realised that his love of creatures had been turned round and was working from the other end. The donkey was a companion, and not a monstrosity. It was dear because it was near, not because it was distant. The oyster had attracted him because it was utterly unlike a man; unless it be counted a touch of masculine vanity to grow a beard. The fancy is no idler than that he had himself used, in suggesting a sort of feminine vanity in the permanence of a pearl. But in that maddening vigil among the mystic pines, he found himself more and more drawn toward the donkey, because it was more like a man than anything else around him; because it had eyes to see, and ears to hear–and the latter even unduly developed.

“He that hath ears to hear, let him hear,” he said, scratching those grey hairy flappers with affection. “Haven’t you lifted your ears toward Heaven? And will you be the first to hear the Last Trumpet?”

The ass rubbed his nose against him with what seemed almost like a human caress. And Dorian caught himself wondering how a caress from an oyster could be managed. Everything else around him was beautiful, but inhuman. Only in the first glory of anger could he really trace in a tall pine-tree the features of an ex-taxi-cabman from Kennington. Trees and ferns had no living ears that they could wag nor mild eyes that they could move. He patted the donkey again.

But the donkey had reconciled him to the landscape, and in his third mood he began to realise how beautiful it was. On a second study, he was not sure it was so inhuman. Rather he felt that its beauty at least was half human; that the aureole of the sinking moon behind the woods was chiefly lovely because it was like the tender-coloured aureole of an early saint; and that the young trees were, after all, noble because they held up their heads like virgins. Cloudily there crowded into his mind ideas with which it was imperfectly familiar, especially an idea which he had heard called “The Image of God.” It seemed to him more and more that all these things, from the donkey to the very docks and ferns by the roadside, were dignified and sanctified by their partial resemblance to something else. It was as if they were baby drawings: the wild, crude sketches of Nature in her first sketch-books of stone.

CAPITOLO XVI: I SETTE UMORI DI DORIAN

QUELL’atemporale orologio di tutti i lunatici, che era così luminoso in cielo quella notte, può davvero aver avuto in sé una certa fortuna elfica, come un soldo d’argento. Non solo aveva iniziato il signor Hibbs ai misteri di Dioniso, e il signor Bullrose alle abitudini arboree dei suoi antenati, ma una sua notte operò un mutamento assai considerevole e piuttosto prezioso nel signor Dorian Wimpole, il Poeta degli Uccelli. Era un uomo né sciocco né malvagio, non più di quanto lo fosse Shelley; solo un uomo reso sterile dal vivere in un mondo di indirettezza e insincerità, con le parole piuttosto che con le cose. Non aveva avuto la minima intenzione di far morire di fame il suo autista; non si rendeva conto che vi era un assassinio spirituale peggiore nel semplice dimenticarlo. Ma via via che le ore gli passavano sopra, solo con l’asino e la luna, attraversò una furente e cangiante serie di stati d’animo, quali i suoi colti amici avrebbero definito umori.

Il Primo Umore, mi dispiace dirlo, fu di nero e macinante odio. Non aveva alcuna nozione del torto subito dall’autista, e poteva soltanto supporre che fosse stato corrotto o intimidito dai demoniaci torturatori di asini. Ma il signor Wimpole era in quel momento assai più capace di torturare un autista di quanto il signor Pump fosse mai stato di torturare un asino; poiché nessun uomo sano di mente può odiare un animale. Prendeva a calci le pietre sulla strada, scagliandole nella foresta, e desiderava che ciascuna di esse fosse un autista. La felce sul ciglio della strada la sradicò, come rappresentante i capelli dell’autista, ai quali non aveva alcuna somiglianza. Colpiva con il pugno quegli alberi che, suppongo, gli parevano nella forma e nell’espressione più rammentanti l’autista; ma desistette da ciò, trovando che in quel contesa apparentemente unilaterale l’albero aveva piuttosto la meglio. Ma l’intero bosco e l’intero mondo erano divenuti una specie di autista onnipresente e panteistico, ed egli lo colpiva dappertutto.

Il lettore riflessivo capirà che il signor Wimpole aveva già compiuto un notevole balzo verso l’alto in ciò che egli avrebbe chiamato la scala cosmica. La cosa migliore, dopo l’amare davvero un proprio simile, è l’odiarlo davvero: specialmente quando è un uomo più povero, separato da te per null’altro che per la rigidezza sociale. Il desiderio di ucciderlo è per lo meno un riconoscimento che egli è vivo. Più d’un uomo ha dovuto i primi bianchi barlumi dell’alba della Democrazia nella sua anima al desiderio di trovare un bastone e bastonare il maggiordomo. E lo apprendiamo dall’inoppugnabile autorità locale del signor Humphrey Pump che lo Squire Merriman inseguì il suo bibliotecario per tre villaggi con una pistola da arcione; e fu Radicale per sempre dopo di ciò.

Anche la sua ira gli fece bene semplicemente come sollievo, ed egli passò presto a un secondo e più positivo umore di meditazione.

«Le maledette scimmie vanno avanti così», mormorò, «e poi chiamano l’asino uno degli Animali Inferiori. Lo cavalcherebbe, l’asino? Mi piacerebbe veder l’asino cavalcare lui per un po’. Bravo vecchio.»

Il paziente somaro volse su di lui occhi miti quando lo accarezzò, e Dorian Wimpole scoprì, con una sorta di subconscia sorpresa, che gli era davvero affezionato, all’asino. Più a fondo ancora nel suo io subliminale sapeva di non essere mai stato affezionato a un animale prima d’allora. Le sue poesie su creature fantastiche erano state del tutto sincere, e del tutto fredde. Quando diceva di amare uno squalo, intendeva che non vedeva ragione per odiare uno squalo, il che era abbastanza giusto. Non c’è ragione per odiare uno squalo, per quanta ragione possa esservi per evitarne uno. Non c’è alcun male in un kraken, se lo tieni in una vasca — o in un sonetto.

Ma si rese conto anche che il suo amore per le creature si era rovesciato e operava dall’altra estremità. L’asino era un compagno, e non una mostruosità. Era caro perché era vicino, non perché era lontano. L’ostrica lo aveva attratto perché era del tutto dissimile da un uomo; a meno che non si voglia contare un tocco di vanità maschile il farsi crescere la barba. La fantasia non è più oziosa di quella che egli stesso aveva usato, suggerendo una sorta di vanità femminile nella permanenza di una perla. Ma in quella folle veglia fra i mistici pini, si trovava sempre più attratto verso l’asino, perché somigliava a un uomo più di qualunque altra cosa intorno a lui; perché aveva occhi per vedere, e orecchie per udire — e queste ultime persino indebitamente sviluppate.

«Chi ha orecchi per intendere, intenda», disse, grattando con affetto quei grigi pelosi orecchioni. «Non hai forse levato le orecchie verso il Cielo? E sarai tu il primo a udire l’Ultima Tromba?»

Il somaro gli strofinò il naso addosso con quella che pareva quasi una carezza umana. E Dorian si sorprese a chiedersi come potesse gestirsi una carezza da parte di un’ostrica. Tutto il resto attorno a lui era bello, ma disumano. Solo nel primo fulgore dell’ira poteva davvero rintracciare in un alto pino i lineamenti di un ex-tassista di Kennington. Alberi e felci non avevano orecchie vive che potessero dimenare né miti occhi che potessero muovere. Accarezzò di nuovo l’asino.

Ma l’asino lo aveva riconciliato col paesaggio, e nel suo terzo umore cominciò a rendersi conto di quanto fosse bello. A un secondo esame, non era sicuro che fosse così disumano. Sentiva piuttosto che la sua bellezza, almeno, era per metà umana; che l’aureola della luna calante dietro i boschi era incantevole soprattutto perché somigliava alla tenue aureola colorata di un santo dei primi tempi; e che i giovani alberi erano, dopotutto, nobili perché reggevano alta la testa come vergini. Nebulosamente si affollavano nella sua mente idee con cui aveva imperfetta dimestichezza, specialmente un’idea che aveva sentito chiamare «L’Immagine di Dio». Gli pareva sempre più che tutte queste cose, dall’asino fino ai romici e alle felci sul ciglio della strada, fossero dignificate e santificate dalla loro parziale somiglianza con qualcos’altro. Era come se fossero disegni infantili: gli schizzi selvaggi e grezzi della Natura nei suoi primi album di schizzi di pietra.

He had flung himself on a pile of pine-needles to enjoy the gathering darkness of the pinewoods as the moon sank behind them. There is nothing more deep and wonderful than really impenetrable pinewoods where the nearer trees show against the more shadowy; a tracery of silver upon grey and of grey upon black.

It was by this time, in pure pleasure and idleness that he picked up a pine-needle to philosophise about it.

“Think of sitting on needles!” he said. “Yet, I suppose this is the sort of needle that Eve, in the old legend, used in Eden. Aye, and the old legend was right, too! Think of sitting on all the needles in London! Think of sitting on all the needles in Sheffield! Think of sitting on any needles, except on all the needles of Paradise! Oh, yes, the old legend was right enough. The very needles of God are softer than the carpets of men.”

He took a pleasure in watching the weird little forest animals creeping out from under the green curtains of the wood. He reminded himself that in the old legend they had been as tame as the ass, as well as being as comic. He thought of Adam naming the animals, and said to a beetle, “I should callyou Budger.”

The slugs gave him great entertainment, and so did the worms. He felt a new and realistic interest in them which he had not known before; it was, indeed, the interest that a man feels in a mouse in a dungeon; the interest of any man tied by the leg and forced to see the fascination of small things. Creatures of the wormy kind, especially, crept out at very long intervals; yet he found himself waiting patiently for hours for the pleasure of their acquaintance. One of them rather specially arrested his eye, because it was a little longer than most worms and seemed to be turning its head in the direction of the donkey’s left foreleg. Also, it had a head to turn, which most worms have not.

Dorian Wimpole did not know much about exact Natural History, except what he had once got up very thoroughly from an encyclopaedia for the purposes of a sympatheticvilanelle. But as this information was entirely concerned with the conjectural causes of laughter in the Hyena, it was not directly helpful in this case. But though he did not know much Natural History, he knew some. He knew enough to know that a worm ought not to have a head, and especially not a squared and flattened head, shaped like a spade or a chisel. He knew enough to know that a creeping thing with a head of that pattern survives in the English country sides, though it is not common. In short, he knew enough to step across the road and set a sharp and savage boot-heel on the neck and spine of the creature, breaking it into three black bits that writhed once more before they stiffened.

Then he gave out a great explosive sigh. The donkey, whose leg had been in such danger, looked at the dead adder with eyes that had never lost their moony mildness. Even Dorian, himself, looked at it for a long time, and with feelings he could neither arrest nor understand, before he remembered that he had been comparing the little wood to Eden.

“And even in Eden,” he said at last; and then the words of Fitzgerald failed upon his lips.

And while he was warring with such words and thoughts, something happened about him and behind him; something he had written about a hundred times and read about a thousand; something he had never seen in his life. It flung faintly across the broad foliage a wan and pearly light far more mysterious than the lost moonshine. It seemed to enter through all the doors and windows of the woodland, pale and silent but confident, like men that keep a tryst; soon its white robes had threads of gold and scarlet: and the name of it was morning.

For some time past, loud and in vain, all the birds had been singing to the Poet of the Birds. But when that minstrel actually saw broad daylight breaking over wood and road, the effect on him was somewhat curious. He stood staring at it in gaping astonishment, until it had fulfilled the fulness of its shining fate; and the pine-cones and the curling ferns and the live donkey and the dead viper were almost as distinct as they could be at noon, or in a Preraphaelite picture. And then the Fourth Mood fell upon him like a bolt from the blue, and he strode across and took the donkey’s bridle, as if to lead it along.

“Damn it all,” he cried, in a voice as cheerful as the cockcrow that rang recently from the remote village, “it’s not everybody who’s killed a snake.” Then he added, reflectively, “I bet Dr. Gluck never did. Come along, donkey, let’s have some adventures.”

The finding and fighting of positive evil is the beginning of all fun–and even of all farce. All the wild woodland looked jolly now the snake was killed. It was one of the fallacies of his literary clique to refer all natural emotions to literary names, but it might not untruly be said that he had passed out of the mood of Maeterlinck into the mood of Whitman, and out of the mood of Whitman into the mood of Stevenson. He had not been a hypocrite when he asked for gilded birds of Asia or purple polypi out of the Southern Seas; he was not a hypocrite now, when he asked for mere comic adventures along a common English road. It was his misfortune and not his fault if his first adventure was his last; and was much too comic to laugh at.

Already the wan morning had warmed into a pale blue and was spotted with those little plump pink clouds which must surely have been the origin of the story that pigs might fly. The insects of the grass chattered so cheerfully that every green tongue seemed to be talking. The skyline on every side was broken only by objects that encouraged such swashbucklering comedy. There was a windmill that Chaucer’s Miller might have inhabited or Cervantes’s champion charged. There was an old leaden church spire that might have been climbed by Robert Clive. Away toward Pebblewick and the sea, there were the two broken stumps of wood which Humphrey Pump declares to this day to have been the stands for an unsuccessful children’s swing; but which tourists always accept as the remains of the antique gallows. In the gaiety of such surroundings, it is small wonder if Dorian and the donkey stepped briskly along the road. The very donkey reminded him of Sancho Panza.

Si era gettato su un mucchio di aghi di pino per godersi l’addensarsi delle tenebre dei pineti mentre la luna calava dietro di essi. Non c’è nulla di più profondo e meraviglioso di pineti davvero impenetrabili, dove gli alberi più vicini si stagliano contro quelli più ombrosi; un merletto d’argento su grigio e di grigio su nero.

Fu a questo punto, per puro piacere e ozio, che raccolse un ago di pino per filosofarci sopra.

«Pensa a stare seduti sugli aghi!» disse. «Eppure, suppongo che questo sia il genere di ago che Eva, nella vecchia leggenda, usava in Eden. Sì, e la vecchia leggenda aveva ragione, anche! Pensa a stare seduti su tutti gli aghi di Londra! Pensa a stare seduti su tutti gli aghi di Sheffield! Pensa a stare seduti su aghi qualsiasi, tranne che su tutti gli aghi del Paradiso! Oh, sì, la vecchia leggenda aveva proprio ragione. Gli stessi aghi di Dio sono più morbidi dei tappeti degli uomini.»

Provava piacere nell’osservare i bizzarri animaletti della foresta che sbucavano da sotto le verdi cortine del bosco. Si rammentò che nella vecchia leggenda erano stati mansueti come il somaro, non meno che comici. Pensò ad Adamo che dava il nome agli animali, e disse a un coleottero: «Ti chiamerò Budger.»

Le lumache gli davano grande divertimento, e così i vermi. Provava per essi un interesse nuovo e realistico che non aveva conosciuto prima; era, in verità, l’interesse che un uomo prova per un topo in una segreta; l’interesse di chiunque sia legato per una gamba e costretto a vedere il fascino delle piccole cose. Le creature di specie vermiforme, specialmente, strisciavano fuori a intervalli assai lunghi; eppure egli si trovava ad attendere pazientemente per ore il piacere della loro conoscenza. Una di esse gli attirò in modo particolare lo sguardo, perché era un po’ più lunga della maggior parte dei vermi e pareva volgere la testa in direzione della zampa anteriore sinistra dell’asino. Inoltre, aveva una testa da volgere, cosa che la maggior parte dei vermi non ha.

Dorian Wimpole non sapeva molto di esatta Storia Naturale, salvo ciò che una volta aveva assai accuratamente ricavato da un’enciclopedia ai fini di una villanella compassionevole. Ma poiché quell’informazione riguardava interamente le cause congetturali del riso nella Iena, non era direttamente utile in questo caso. Ma per quanto non sapesse molta Storia Naturale, ne sapeva un poco. Ne sapeva abbastanza da sapere che un verme non dovrebbe avere una testa, e specialmente non una testa squadrata e appiattita, foggiata come una vanga o uno scalpello. Ne sapeva abbastanza da sapere che una cosa strisciante con una testa di quel modello sopravvive nelle campagne inglesi, benché non sia comune. In breve, ne sapeva abbastanza da attraversare la strada e posare un aguzzo e feroce tacco di stivale sul collo e sulla spina della creatura, spezzandola in tre neri pezzetti che si contorsero ancora una volta prima di irrigidirsi.

Poi emise un grande sospiro esplosivo. L’asino, la cui zampa era stata in tale pericolo, guardò la vipera morta con occhi che non avevano mai perduto la loro lunare mitezza. Persino Dorian stesso la guardò per lungo tempo, e con sentimenti che non riusciva né ad arrestare né a comprendere, prima di ricordare che aveva paragonato quel piccolo bosco all’Eden.

«E perfino in Eden», disse infine; e poi le parole di Fitzgerald gli vennero meno sulle labbra.

E mentre si dibatteva con tali parole e pensieri, qualcosa accadde intorno a lui e dietro di lui; qualcosa su cui aveva scritto un centinaio di volte e letto un migliaio; qualcosa che non aveva mai visto in vita sua. Scagliò debolmente attraverso l’ampio fogliame una luce smorta e perlacea assai più misteriosa del perduto chiaro di luna. Pareva entrare attraverso tutte le porte e le finestre del bosco, pallida e silenziosa ma sicura, come uomini che rispettano un convegno; presto le sue bianche vesti ebbero fili d’oro e di scarlatto: e il suo nome era mattino.

Da qualche tempo, forte e invano, tutti gli uccelli avevano cantato per il Poeta degli Uccelli. Ma quando quel menestrello vide effettivamente la piena luce del giorno rompere su bosco e strada, l’effetto su di lui fu alquanto curioso. Rimase a fissarla a bocca aperta per lo stupore, finché essa non ebbe compiuto la pienezza del suo splendente destino; e le pigne e le felci ricurve e l’asino vivo e la vipera morta erano quasi altrettanto distinti di quanto potessero esserlo a mezzogiorno, o in un quadro preraffaellita. E allora il Quarto Umore si abbatté su di lui come un fulmine a ciel sereno, ed egli attraversò a grandi passi e afferrò la briglia dell’asino, come per condurlo con sé.

«Diamine», gridò, con una voce allegra come il canto del gallo che di recente aveva risuonato dal remoto villaggio, «non è da tutti aver ucciso un serpente.» Poi aggiunse, riflessivo: «Scommetto che il dottor Gluck non l’ha mai fatto. Vieni, asino, andiamo in cerca di avventure.»

Il trovare e combattere il male positivo è il principio d’ogni divertimento — e persino d’ogni farsa. Tutto il bosco selvaggio pareva ora allegro, ora che il serpente era ucciso. Era una delle fallacie della sua cricca letteraria riferire tutte le emozioni naturali a nomi letterari, ma non si direbbe falsamente ch’egli era passato dall’umore di Maeterlinck all’umore di Whitman, e dall’umore di Whitman all’umore di Stevenson. Non era stato un ipocrita quando chiedeva dorati uccelli d’Asia o purpurei polipi dei Mari del Sud; non era un ipocrita ora, quando chiedeva mere comiche avventure lungo una comune strada inglese. Fu sua sventura e non sua colpa se la sua prima avventura fu l’ultima; ed era troppo comica perché vi si potesse ridere.

Già il pallido mattino si era scaldato in un azzurro tenue ed era macchiato di quelle piccole paffute nuvolette rosa che devono senz’altro aver dato origine alla favola che i maiali possano volare. Gli insetti dell’erba chiacchieravano tanto allegramente che ogni verde lingua pareva parlare. La linea dell’orizzonte da ogni lato era rotta solo da oggetti che incoraggiavano una tale spaccona commedia. C’era un mulino a vento che il Mugnaio di Chaucer avrebbe potuto abitare o il campione di Cervantes caricare. C’era un vecchio campanile di piombo che Robert Clive avrebbe potuto scalare. Verso Pebblewick e il mare, c’erano i due monconi spezzati di legno che Humphrey Pump dichiara ancor oggi essere stati i sostegni di un’altalena per bambini mal riuscita; ma che i turisti accettano sempre come i resti dell’antica forca. Nella gaiezza di tali dintorni, poca meraviglia se Dorian e l’asino procedevano di buon passo lungo la strada. Lo stesso asino gli rammentava Sancho Panza.

He did not wake out of this boisterous reverie of the white road and the wind till a motor horn had first hooted and then howled, till the ground had shaken with the shock of a stoppage, and till a human hand fell heavily and tightly on his shoulder. He looked up and saw the complete costume of a Police Inspector. He did not worry about the face. And there fell on him the Fifth, or Unexpected Mood, which is called by the vulgar Astonishment.

In despair he looked at the motor car itself that had anchored so abruptly under the opposite hedge. The man at the steering wheel was so erect and unresponsive that Dorian felt sure he was feasting his eyes on yet another policeman. But on the seat behind was a very different figure, a figure that baffled him all the more because he felt certain he had seen it somewhere. The figure was long and slim, with sloping shoulders, and the costume, which was untidy, yet contrived to give the impression that it was tidy on other occasions. The individual had bright yellow hair, one lock of which stuck straight up and was exalted, like the little horn in his favourite scriptures. Another tuft of it, in a bright but blinding manner, fell across and obscured the left optic, as in literal fulfilment of the parable of a beam in the eye. The eyes, with or without beams in them, looked a little bewildered, and the individual was always nervously resettling his necktie. For the individual went by the name of Hibbs, and had only recently recovered from experiences wholly new to him.

“What on earth do you want?” asked Wimpole of the policeman.

His innocent and startled face, and perhaps other things about his appearance, evidently caused the Inspector to waver.

“Well, it’s about this ’ere donkey, sir,” he said.

“Do you think I stole it?” cried the indignant aristocrat. “Well, of all the mad worlds! A pack of thieves steal my Limousine, I save their damned donkey’s life at the risk of my own–andI’m run in for stealing.”

The clothes of the indignant aristocrat probably spoke louder than his tongue; the officer dropped his hand, and after consulting some papers in his hand, walked across to consult with the unkempt gentleman in the car.

“That seems to be a similar cart and donkey,” Dorian heard him saying, “but the clothes don’t seem to fit your description of the men you saw.”

Now, Mr. Hibbs had extremely vague and wild recollections of the men he saw; he could not even tell what he had done and what he had merely dreamed. If he had spoken sincerely, he would have described a sort of green nightmare of forests, in which he found himself in the power of an ogre about twelve feet high, with scarlet flames for hair and dressed rather like Robin Hood. But a long course of what is known as “keeping the party together” had made it as unnatural to him to tell anyone (even himself) what he really thought about anything, as it would have been to spit–or to sing. He had at present only three motives and strong resolves: (1) not to admit that he had been drunk; (2) not to let anyone escape whom Lord Ivywood might possibly want to question; and (3) not to lose his reputation for sagacity and tact.

“This party has a brown velvet suit, you see, and a fur overcoat,” the Inspector continued, “and in the notes I have from you, you say the man wore a uniform.”

“When we say uniform,” said Mr. Hibbs, frowning intellectually, “when we sayuniform, of course–we must distinguish some of our friends who don’t quite see eye to eye with us, you know,” and he smiled with tender leniency, “some of our friends wouldn’t like it called auniform perhaps. But–of course–well, it wasn’t a police uniform, for instance. Ha! Ha!”

“I should hope not,” said the official, shortly.

“So–in a way–however,” said Hibbs, clutching his verbal talisman at last, “it might be brown velvet in the dark.”

The Inspector replied to this helpful suggestion with some wonder. “But it was a moon, like limelight,” he protested.

“Yars, yars,” cried Hibbs, in a high tone that can only be described as a hasty drawl. “Yars–discolours everything of course. The flowers and things–”

“But look here,” said the Inspector, “you said the principal man’s hair was red.”

“A blond type! A blond type!” said Hibbs, waving his hand with a solemn lightness. “Reddish, yellowish, brownish sort of hair, you know.” Then he shook his head and said with the heaviest solemnity the word was capable of carrying, “Teutonic, purely Teutonic.”

The Inspector began to feel some wonder that, even in the confusion following on Lord Ivywood’s fall, he had been put under the guidance of this particular guide. The truth was that Leveson, once more masking his own fears under his usual parade of hurry, had found Hibbs at a table by an open window, with wild hair and sleepy eyes, picking himself up with some sort of medicine. Finding him already fairly clear-headed in a dreary way, he had not scrupled to use the remains of his bewilderment to despatch him with the police in the first pursuit. Even the mind of a semi-recovered drunkard, he thought, could be trusted to recognise anyone so unmistakable as the Captain.

But, though the diplomatist’s debauch was barely over, his strange, soft fear and cunning were awake. He felt fairly certain the man in the fur coat had something to do with the mystery, as men with fur coats do not commonly wander about with donkeys. He was afraid of offending Lord Ivywood, and at the same time, afraid of exposing himself to a policeman.

“You have large discretion,” he said, gravely. “Very right you should have large discretion in the interests of the public. I think you would be quite authorised, for the present, in preventing the man’s escape.”

“And the other man?” inquired the officer, with knitted brow. “Do you suppose he has escaped?”

Non si destò da questa turbolenta fantasticheria della bianca strada e del vento finché un clacson non ebbe prima strombazzato e poi ululato, finché il terreno non ebbe tremato per l’urto di un arresto, e finché una mano umana non gli cadde pesante e stretta sulla spalla. Alzò lo sguardo e vide la completa uniforme di un Ispettore di Polizia. Non si curò del volto. E su di lui cadde il Quinto, o Inatteso Umore, che il volgo chiama Stupore.

Nella disperazione guardò l’automobile stessa che si era ancorata così bruscamente sotto la siepe di fronte. L’uomo al volante era così eretto e inespressivo che Dorian si sentì certo che stesse pascendo gli occhi su un altro poliziotto ancora. Ma sul sedile posteriore c’era una figura assai diversa, una figura che lo sconcertava tanto più in quanto si sentiva certo di averla vista da qualche parte. La figura era lunga e sottile, con spalle spioventi, e l’abito, che era sciatto, riusciva tuttavia a dare l’impressione di essere in ordine in altre occasioni. L’individuo aveva capelli di un giallo brillante, una ciocca dei quali si drizzava dritta in su ed era esaltata, come il piccolo corno nelle sue Scritture predilette. Un altro ciuffo di essi, in modo brillante ma accecante, ricadeva e oscurava l’occhio sinistro, come in letterale adempimento della parabola della trave nell’occhio. Gli occhi, con o senza travi dentro, avevano un’aria un po’ smarrita, e l’individuo si riaggiustava di continuo, nervosamente, la cravatta. Poiché l’individuo rispondeva al nome di Hibbs, e si era solo di recente ripreso da esperienze del tutto nuove per lui.

«Che diavolo volete?» chiese Wimpole al poliziotto.

Il suo volto innocente e trasecolato, e forse altre cose del suo aspetto, indussero evidentemente l’Ispettore a esitare.

«Beh, si tratta di quest’asino qui, signore», disse.

«Credete che l’abbia rubato io?» gridò l’indignato aristocratico. «Beh, di tutti i mondi impazziti! Una masnada di ladri mi ruba la Limousine, io salvo la vita al loro maledetto asino a rischio della mia — e vengo arrestato per furto.»

Gli abiti dell’indignato aristocratico parlarono probabilmente più forte della sua lingua; l’ufficiale abbassò la mano e, dopo aver consultato alcune carte che teneva in mano, attraversò per consultarsi con lo scarmigliato gentiluomo nella vettura.

«Quello sembra un carretto e un asino simili», udì Dorian che diceva, «ma gli abiti non paiono corrispondere alla vostra descrizione degli uomini che avete visto.»

Ora, il signor Hibbs aveva ricordi estremamente vaghi e confusi degli uomini che aveva visto; non sapeva nemmeno distinguere ciò che aveva fatto da ciò che aveva soltanto sognato. Se avesse parlato sinceramente, avrebbe descritto una specie di verde incubo di foreste, nel quale si era trovato in potere di un orco alto circa quattro metri, con fiamme scarlatte al posto dei capelli e vestito piuttosto come Robin Hood. Ma un lungo tirocinio in ciò che è noto come «tenere unito il partito» aveva reso per lui tanto innaturale dire a chicchessia (anche a se stesso) ciò che realmente pensava di una cosa qualsiasi, quanto lo sarebbe stato sputare — o cantare. Al momento aveva soltanto tre moventi e ferme risoluzioni: (1) non ammettere di essere stato ubriaco; (2) non lasciar sfuggire nessuno che Lord Ivywood potesse eventualmente voler interrogare; e (3) non perdere la sua reputazione di sagacia e tatto.

«Questo tale ha un abito di velluto bruno, vedete, e un soprabito di pelliccia», continuò l’Ispettore, «e negli appunti che ho da voi, dite che l’uomo indossava un’uniforme.»

«Quando diciamo uniforme», disse il signor Hibbs, aggrottando la fronte intellettualmente, «quando diciamo uniforme, naturalmente — dobbiamo distinguere alcuni dei nostri amici che non la vedono proprio come noi, sapete», e sorrise con tenera indulgenza, «ad alcuni dei nostri amici forse non piacerebbe chiamarla un’uniforme. Ma — naturalmente — be’, non era un’uniforme di polizia, per esempio. Ah! Ah!»

«Spererei di no», disse l’ufficiale, seccamente.

«Cosicché — in un certo senso — comunque», disse Hibbs, afferrando infine il suo talismano verbale, «al buio poteva sembrare velluto bruno.»

L’Ispettore replicò a questo utile suggerimento con una certa meraviglia. «Ma c’era la luna, come una luce di ribalta», protestò.

«Sìì, sìì», gridò Hibbs, in un tono acuto che si può solo descrivere come uno strascico frettoloso. «Sìì — scolora ogni cosa, naturalmente. I fiori e le cose —»

«Ma sentite», disse l’Ispettore, «avete detto che i capelli dell’uomo principale erano rossi.»

«Un tipo biondo! Un tipo biondo!» disse Hibbs, agitando la mano con solenne leggerezza. «Capelli rossicci, giallastri, brunastri, sapete.» Poi scosse il capo e disse con la più pesante solennità di cui la parola fosse capace: «Teutonico, puramente teutonico.»

L’Ispettore cominciò a provare una certa meraviglia che, persino nella confusione seguita alla caduta di Lord Ivywood, egli fosse stato posto sotto la guida di questa particolare guida. La verità era che Leveson, mascherando ancora una volta i propri timori sotto la sua consueta ostentazione di fretta, aveva trovato Hibbs a un tavolo presso una finestra aperta, con i capelli arruffati e gli occhi assonnati, che si rimetteva in sesto con una specie di medicina. Trovandolo già abbastanza lucido, in modo tetro, non aveva esitato a servirsi dei resti del suo smarrimento per spedirlo con la polizia al primo inseguimento. Persino la mente di un ubriaco semi-ripresosi, pensava, poteva essere fidata a riconoscere qualcuno tanto inconfondibile quanto il Capitano.

Ma, benché la sbornia del diplomatico fosse appena finita, la sua strana, molle paura e la sua astuzia erano sveglie. Era abbastanza certo che l’uomo dalla pelliccia avesse qualcosa a che fare col mistero, giacché gli uomini con la pelliccia non se ne vanno comunemente in giro con degli asini. Temeva di offendere Lord Ivywood e, allo stesso tempo, temeva di esporsi a un poliziotto.

«Avete ampia discrezionalità», disse, gravemente. «È giustissimo che abbiate ampia discrezionalità nell’interesse del pubblico. Credo che sareste pienamente autorizzato, per ora, a impedire la fuga dell’uomo.»

«E l’altro uomo?» domandò l’ufficiale, con la fronte aggrottata. «Supponete che sia fuggito?»

“Theother man,” repeated Hibbs However, regarding the distant windmill through half-closed lids, as if this were a new fine shade introduced into an already delicate question.

“Well, hang it all,” said the police officer, “you must know whether there were two men or one.”

Gradually it dawned, in a grey dawn of horror, over the brain of Hibbs that this was what he specially couldn’t know. He had always heard, and read in comic papers, that a drunken man “sees double” and beholds two lamp-posts, one of which is (as the Higher Critic would have said) purely subjective. For all he knew (being a mere novice) inebriation might produce the impression of the two men of his dream-like adventure, when in truth there had only been one.

“Two men, you know–one man,” he said with a sort of moody carelessness. “Well we can go into their numbers later; they can’t have a very large following.” Here he shook his head very firmly. “Quite impossible. And as the late Lord Goschen used to say, ‘You can prove anything by statistics.’”

And here came an interruption from the other side of the road.

“And how long am I to wait here for you and your Goschens, you silly goat,” were the intemperate wood-notes issuing from the Poet of the Birds. “I’m shot if I’ll stand this! Come along, donkey, and let’s pray for a better adventure next time. These are very inferior specimens of your own race.”

And seizing the bridle of the ass again, he strode past them swiftly, and almost as if urging the animal to a gallop.

Unfortunately this disdainful dash for liberty was precisely what was wanting to weigh down the rocking intelligence of the Inspector on the wrong side. If Wimpole had stood still a minute or two longer, the official, who was no fool, might have ended in disbelieving Hibbs’s story altogether. As it was, there was a scuffle, not without blows on both sides, and eventually the Honourable Dorian Wimpole, donkey and all, was marched off to the village, in which there was a Police Station; in which was a temporary cell; in which a Sixth Mood was experienced.

His complaints, however, were at once so clamorous and so convincing, and his coat was so unquestionably covered with fur, that after some questioning and cross purposes they agreed to take him in the afternoon to Ivywood House, where there was a magistrate incapacitated by a shot only recently extracted from his leg.

They found Lord Ivywood lying on a purple ottoman, in the midst of his Chinese puzzle of oriental apartments. He continued to look away as they entered, as if expecting, with Roman calm, the entrance of a recognised enemy. But Lady Enid Wimpole, who was attending to the wants of the invalid, gave a sharp cry of astonishment; and the next moment the three cousins were looking at each other. One could almost have guessed they were cousins, all being (as Mr. Hibbs subtly put it) a blond type. But two of the blond types expressed amazement, and one blond type merely rage.

“I am sorry, Dorian,” said Ivywood, when he had heard the whole story. “These fanatics are capable of anything, I fear, and you very rightly resent their stealing your car–”

“You are wrong, Philip,” answered the poet, emphatically. “I do not even faintly resent their stealing my car. What I do resent is the continued existence on God’s earth of this Fool” (pointing to the serious Hibbs) “and of that Fool” (pointing to the Inspector) “and–yes, by thunder, ofthat Fool, too” (and he pointed straight at Lord Ivywood). “And I tell you frankly, Philip, if there really are, as you say, two men who are bent on smashing your schemes and making your life a hell–I am very happy to put my car at their disposal. And now I’m off.”

“You’ll stop to dinner?” inquired Ivywood, with frigid forgiveness.

“No, thanks,” said the disappearing bard, “I’m going up to town.”

The Seventh Mood of Dorian Wimpole had a grand finale at the Café Royal, and consisted largely of oysters.

«L’altro uomo», ripeté Hibbs, comunque, osservando il lontano mulino a vento attraverso le palpebre socchiuse, come se si trattasse di una nuova, sottile sfumatura introdotta in una questione già delicata.

«Be’, che diamine», disse l’agente di polizia, «dovete pur sapere se gli uomini erano due o uno solo.»

A poco a poco si fece strada, in una grigia alba d’orrore, nel cervello di Hibbs, che proprio questo era ciò che egli non poteva sapere. Aveva sempre sentito dire, e letto sui giornali umoristici, che un ubriaco «vede doppio» e scorge due lampioni, uno dei quali è (come avrebbe detto l’Alto Critico) puramente soggettivo. Per quanto ne sapeva (essendo un semplice novizio), l’ebbrezza poteva produrre l’impressione dei due uomini della sua avventura onirica, quando in verità ce n’era stato uno solo.

«Due uomini, sapete… un uomo», disse con una sorta di svogliata noncuranza. «Be’, possiamo occuparci del loro numero più tardi; non possono avere un séguito molto numeroso.» Qui scosse il capo con grande fermezza. «Del tutto impossibile. E come soleva dire il defunto Lord Goschen, “Con le statistiche si può dimostrare qualsiasi cosa”.»

E qui giunse un’interruzione dall’altro lato della strada.

«E quanto ancora devo aspettarvi qui, voi e i vostri Goschen, sciocca capra», furono le intemperanti note silvestri che uscivano dal Poeta degli Uccelli. «Che mi venga un colpo se sopporto questo! Vieni, asino, e preghiamo per un’avventura migliore la prossima volta. Questi sono esemplari assai inferiori della tua stessa razza.»

E afferrando di nuovo le briglie dell’asino, li oltrepassò a grandi passi, quasi spronando la bestia al galoppo.

Purtroppo questo sdegnoso slancio verso la libertà era proprio ciò che mancava per far pendere dalla parte sbagliata l’oscillante intelligenza dell’Ispettore. Se Wimpole fosse rimasto immobile ancora un minuto o due, il funzionario, che non era uno sciocco, avrebbe forse finito col non credere affatto alla storia di Hibbs. Così com’era, ci fu una zuffa, non senza colpi da entrambe le parti, e alla fine l’Onorevole Dorian Wimpole, asino compreso, fu condotto al villaggio, nel quale c’era una Stazione di Polizia; nella quale c’era una cella provvisoria; nella quale fu sperimentato un Sesto Umore.

Le sue proteste, tuttavia, erano insieme così clamorose e così convincenti, e il suo cappotto era così indubitabilmente coperto di pelliccia, che dopo qualche interrogatorio e qualche equivoco acconsentirono a condurlo nel pomeriggio a Ivywood House, dove c’era un magistrato reso inabile da una pallottola estratta solo di recente dalla sua gamba.

Trovarono Lord Ivywood disteso su un’ottomana purpurea, in mezzo al suo rompicapo cinese di appartamenti orientali. Continuò a guardare altrove mentre entravano, come se attendesse, con romana calma, l’ingresso di un nemico riconosciuto. Ma Lady Enid Wimpole, che si prendeva cura dei bisogni dell’invalido, emise un acuto grido di stupore; e un attimo dopo i tre cugini si guardavano l’un l’altro. Si sarebbe quasi potuto indovinare che erano cugini, essendo tutti (come sottilmente osservò il signor Hibbs) di un tipo biondo. Ma due dei tipi biondi esprimevano stupore, e un tipo biondo soltanto furore.

«Mi dispiace, Dorian», disse Ivywood, quando ebbe udito tutta la storia. «Questi fanatici sono capaci di tutto, temo, e tu ben a ragione ti risenti che ti abbiano rubato l’automobile…»

«Ti sbagli, Philip», rispose il poeta, con enfasi. «Non mi risento nemmeno lontanamente che mi abbiano rubato l’automobile. Ciò di cui mi risento è la continua esistenza sulla terra di Dio di questo Sciocco» (indicando il grave Hibbs) «e di quello Sciocco» (indicando l’Ispettore) «e… sì, per tutti i fulmini, anche di quello Sciocco» (e puntò il dito dritto su Lord Ivywood). «E ti dico francamente, Philip, se davvero ci sono, come dici, due uomini decisi a mandare in frantumi i tuoi piani e a farti della vita un inferno… sono ben felice di mettere la mia automobile a loro disposizione. E ora me ne vado.»

«Ti fermi a cena?» chiese Ivywood, con gelido perdono.

«No, grazie», disse il bardo mentre scompariva, «vado in città.»

Il Settimo Umore di Dorian Wimpole ebbe un grandioso finale al Café Royal, e consisté in gran parte di ostriche.

CHAPTER XVII: THE POET IN PARLIAMENT

DURING the singular entrance and exit of Dorian Wimpole, M.P., J.P., etc., Lady Joan was looking out of the magic casements of that turret room which was now literally, and not only poetically, the last limit of Ivywood House. The old broken hole and black staircase up which the lost dog Quoodle used to come and go, had long ago been sealed up and cemented with a wall of exquisite Eastern workmanship. All through the patterns Lord Ivywood had preserved and repeated the principle that no animal shape must appear. But, like all lucid dogmatists, he perceived all the liberties his dogma allowed him. And he had irradiated this remote end of Ivywood with sun and moon and solar and starry systems, with the Milky Way for a dado and a few comets for comic relief. The thing was well done of its kind (as were all the things that Philip Ivywood got done for him); and if all the windows of the turret were closed with their peacock curtains, a poet with anything like a Hibbsian appreciation of the family champagne might almost fancy he was looking out across the sea on a night crowded with stars. And (what was yet more important) even Misysra (that exact thinker) could not call the moon a live animal without falling into idolatry.

But Joan, looking out of real windows on a real sky and sea, thought no more about the astronomical wall-paper than about any other wall-paper. She was asking herself in sullen emotionalism, and for the thousandth time, a question she had never been able to decide. It was the final choice between an ambition and a memory. And there was this heavy weight in the scale: that the ambition would probably materialise, and the memory probably wouldn’t. It has been the same weight in the same scale a million times since Satan became the prince of this world. But the evening stars were strengthening over the old sea-shore, and they also wanted weighing like diamonds.

As once before at the same stage of brooding, she heard behind her the swish of Lady Enid’s skirts, that never came so fast save for serious cause.

“Joan! Please do come! Nobody but you, I do believe, could move him.” Joan looked at Lady Enid and realised that the lady was close on crying. She turned a trifle pale and asked quietly for the question. “Philip says he’s going to London now, with that leg and all,” cried Enid, “and he won’t let us say a word.”

“But how did it all happen?” asked Joan.

Lady Enid Wimpole was quite incapable of explaining how it all happened, so the task must for the moment devolve on the author. The simple fact was that Ivywood in the course of turning over magazines on his sofa, happened to look at a paper from the Midlands.

“The Turkish news,” said Mr. Leveson, rather nervously, “is on the other side of the page.”

But Lord Ivywood continued to look at the side of the paper that did not contain the Turkish news, with the same dignity of lowered eyelids and unconscious brow with which he had looked at the Captain’s message when Joan found him by the turret.

On the page covered merely with casual, provincial happenings was a paragraph, “Echo of Pebblewick Mystery. Reported Reappearance of the Vanishing Inn.” Underneath was printed, in smaller letters:

“An almost incredible report from Wyddington announces that the mysterious ‘Sign of the Old Ship’ has once more been seen in this country; though it has long been relegated by scientific investigators to the limbo of old rustic superstitions. According to the local version, Mr. Simmons, a dairyman of Wyddington, was serving in his shop when two motorists entered, one of them asking for a glass of milk. They were in the most impenetrable motoring panoply, with darkened goggles and waterproof collars turned up, so that nothing can be recalled of them personally, except that one was a person of unusual stature. In a few moments, this latter individual went out of the shop again and returned with a miserable specimen out of the street, one of the tattered loafers that linger about our most prosperous towns, tramping the streets all night and even begging in defiance of the police. The filth and disease of the creature were so squalid that Mr. Simmons at first refused to serve him with the glass of milk which the taller motorist wished to provide for him. At length, however, Mr. Simmons consented, and was immediately astonished by an incident against which he certainly had a more assured right to protest.

“The taller motorist, saying to the loafer, ‘but, man, you’re blue in the face,’ made a species of signs to the smaller motorist, who thereupon appears to have pierced a sort of cylindrical trunk or chest that seemed to be his only luggage, and drawn from it a few drops of a yellow liquid which he deliberately dropped into the ragged creature’s milk. It was afterward discovered to be rum, and the protests of Mr. Simmons may be imagined. The tall motorist, however, warmly defended his action, having apparently some wild idea that he was doing an act of kindness. ‘Why, I found the man nearly fainting,’ he said. ‘If you’d picked him off a raft, he couldn’t be more collapsed with cold and sickness; and if you’d picked him off a raft you’d have given him rum–yes, by St. Patrick, if you were a bloody pirate and made him walk the plank afterward.’ Mr. Simmons replied with dignity, that he did not know how it was with rafts, and could not permit such language in his shop. He added that he would lay himself open to a police prosecution if he permitted the consumption of alcohol in his shop; since he did not display a sign. The motorist then made the amazing reply, ‘But youdo display a sign, you jolly old man. Did you think I couldn’t find my way to the sign of The Old Ship, you sly boots?’ Mr. Simmons was now fully convinced of the intoxication of his visitors, and refusing a glass of rum rather boisterously offered him, went outside his shop to look round for a policeman. To his surprise he found the officer engaged in dispersing a considerable crowd, which was staring up at some object behind him. On looking round (he states in his deposition) he ‘saw what was undoubtedly one of the low tavern signs at one time common in England.’ He was wholly unable to explain its presence outside his premises, and as it undoubtedly legalised the motorist’s action, the police declined to move in the matter.

CAPITOLO XVII: IL POETA IN PARLAMENTO

DURANTE il singolare ingresso e uscita di Dorian Wimpole, M.P., J.P., ecc., Lady Joan guardava fuori dalle magiche invetriate di quella stanza nella torretta che era ormai letteralmente, e non soltanto poeticamente, l’ultimo limite di Ivywood House. Il vecchio buco sfondato e la nera scala per cui il cane smarrito Quoodle soleva andare e venire erano stati da tempo sigillati e cementati con un muro di squisita fattura orientale. In tutti i decori Lord Ivywood aveva conservato e ripetuto il principio che nessuna forma animale dovesse apparire. Ma, come tutti i lucidi dogmatici, egli scorgeva tutte le libertà che il suo dogma gli concedeva. E aveva irradiato questa remota estremità di Ivywood di sole e di luna e di sistemi solari e stellari, con la Via Lattea per zoccolatura e qualche cometa come sollievo comico. La cosa era ben fatta nel suo genere (come lo erano tutte le cose che Philip Ivywood si faceva fare); e se tutte le finestre della torretta erano chiuse con le loro tende di pavone, un poeta dotato di qualcosa come un hibbsiano apprezzamento dello champagne di famiglia avrebbe quasi potuto immaginare di guardare oltre il mare in una notte gremita di stelle. E (ciò che era ancor più importante) perfino Misysra (quell’esatto pensatore) non poteva chiamare la luna un animale vivo senza cadere nell’idolatria.

Ma Joan, guardando da finestre reali un cielo e un mare reali, non pensava alla carta da parati astronomica più che a qualsiasi altra carta da parati. Si domandava, in un cupo turbamento, e per la millesima volta, una domanda che non era mai stata capace di risolvere. Era la scelta definitiva tra un’ambizione e un ricordo. E c’era questo grave peso sul piatto della bilancia: che l’ambizione si sarebbe probabilmente concretata, e il ricordo probabilmente no. È stato lo stesso peso sullo stesso piatto un milione di volte da quando Satana divenne il principe di questo mondo. Ma le stelle della sera si facevano più intense sopra la vecchia riva del mare, ed esse pure chiedevano d’essere pesate come diamanti.

Come già una volta allo stesso punto delle sue cupe riflessioni, udì dietro di sé il fruscìo delle gonne di Lady Enid, che non giungeva mai così rapido se non per grave motivo.

«Joan! Vieni, ti prego! Nessuno tranne te, ne sono convinta, potrebbe smuoverlo.» Joan guardò Lady Enid e comprese che la dama era sul punto di piangere. Si fece un poco pallida e chiese con calma di che si trattasse. «Philip dice che va a Londra adesso, con quella gamba e tutto», gridò Enid, «e non ci lascia dire una parola.»

«Ma com’è successo tutto quanto?» chiese Joan.

Lady Enid Wimpole era del tutto incapace di spiegare come fosse successo tutto quanto, sicché il compito deve per il momento ricadere sull’autore. Il semplice fatto era che Ivywood, mentre sfogliava le riviste sul suo divano, gli capitò di posare lo sguardo su un giornale delle Midlands.

«Le notizie dalla Turchia», disse il signor Leveson, piuttosto nervosamente, «sono sull’altra facciata della pagina.»

Ma Lord Ivywood continuò a guardare la facciata del giornale che non conteneva le notizie dalla Turchia, con la stessa dignità di palpebre abbassate e di fronte inconsapevole con cui aveva guardato il messaggio del Capitano quando Joan lo aveva trovato presso la torretta.

Sulla pagina coperta soltanto di casuali avvenimenti provinciali c’era un trafiletto: «Eco del Mistero di Pebblewick. Segnalata la Ricomparsa della Locanda che Scompare.» Sotto era stampato, in caratteri più piccoli:

«Una notizia quasi incredibile da Wyddington annuncia che la misteriosa “Insegna della Vecchia Nave” è stata ancora una volta avvistata in questo paese; sebbene sia stata da tempo relegata dagli investigatori scientifici nel limbo delle vecchie superstizioni rustiche. Secondo la versione locale, il signor Simmons, lattaio di Wyddington, serviva nella sua bottega quando entrarono due automobilisti, uno dei quali chiese un bicchiere di latte. Erano nella più impenetrabile bardatura da automobilisti, con occhialoni scuriti e colletti impermeabili rialzati, sicché nulla si può ricordare di loro personalmente, se non che uno era persona di statura inconsueta. In pochi istanti, quest’ultimo individuo uscì di nuovo dalla bottega e tornò con un misero esemplare raccolto dalla strada, uno di quei laceri sfaccendati che si aggirano intorno alle nostre città più prospere, battendo le vie tutta la notte e persino mendicando a dispetto della polizia. La sudiciura e la malattia della creatura erano così squallide che il signor Simmons dapprima rifiutò di servirgli il bicchiere di latte che l’automobilista più alto desiderava procurargli. Alla fine, tuttavia, il signor Simmons acconsentì, e fu immediatamente sbalordito da un fatto contro il quale aveva certo un più fondato diritto di protestare.

«L’automobilista più alto, dicendo allo sfaccendato “ma, amico, hai la faccia livida”, fece una specie di cenni all’automobilista più piccolo, il quale a quel punto pare abbia forato una sorta di baule o cassa cilindrica che sembrava essere il suo unico bagaglio, e ne abbia tratto qualche goccia di un liquido giallo che deliberatamente lasciò cadere nel latte della cenciosa creatura. Si scoprì in séguito che era rum, e le proteste del signor Simmons si possono immaginare. L’alto automobilista, tuttavia, difese calorosamente il suo operato, avendo evidentemente qualche bizzarra idea di compiere un atto di gentilezza. “Ma se ho trovato quest’uomo quasi svenuto”, disse. “Se l’aveste raccolto da una zattera, non potrebbe essere più prostrato dal freddo e dal malessere; e se l’aveste raccolto da una zattera gli avreste dato del rum… sì, per San Patrizio, anche foste stati un sanguinario pirata e gli aveste poi fatto camminare sull’asse.” Il signor Simmons replicò con dignità che non sapeva come stessero le cose con le zattere, e che non poteva permettere simile linguaggio nella sua bottega. Aggiunse che si sarebbe esposto a un’azione giudiziaria se avesse permesso il consumo di alcol nella sua bottega, giacché non esponeva alcuna insegna. L’automobilista fece allora la sbalorditiva risposta: “Ma voi un’insegna la esponete, mio allegro vecchietto. Credevate che non avrei saputo trovare la via fino all’insegna della Vecchia Nave, furbacchione?” Il signor Simmons era ormai pienamente convinto dell’ubriachezza dei suoi visitatori e, rifiutando un bicchiere di rum offertogli piuttosto rumorosamente, uscì dalla bottega a cercarsi intorno un poliziotto. Con sua sorpresa trovò l’agente intento a disperdere una considerevole folla, che fissava in alto un qualche oggetto dietro di lui. Voltandosi a guardare (dichiara nella sua deposizione) egli “vide quella che era indubbiamente una di quelle basse insegne da taverna un tempo comuni in Inghilterra.” Era del tutto incapace di spiegarne la presenza fuori dai suoi locali, e poiché essa indubbiamente legalizzava l’operato dell’automobilista, la polizia si rifiutò di muoversi nella faccenda.

“Later. The two motorists have apparently left the town, unmolested, in a small second-hand two-seater. There is no clue to their destination, except it be indicated by a single incident. It appears that when they were waiting for the second glass of milk, one of them drew attention to a milk can of a shape seemingly unfamiliar to him, which was, of course, the Mountain Milk now so much recommended by doctors. The taller motorist (who seemed in every way strangely ignorant of modern science and social life) asked his companion where it came from, receiving, of course, the reply that it is manufactured in the model village of Peaceways, under the personal superintendence of its distinguished and philanthropic inventor, Dr. Meadows. Upon this the taller person, who appeared highly irresponsible, actually bought the whole can; observing, as he tucked it under his arm, that it would help him to remember the address.

“Later. Our readers will be glad to hear that the legend of ‘The Old Ship’ sign has once more yielded to the wholesome scepticism of science. Our representative reached Wyddington after the practical jokers, or whatever they were, had left; but he searched the whole frontage of Mr. Simmons’s shop, and we are in a position to assure the public that there is no trace of the alleged sign.”

Lord Ivywood laid down the newspaper and looked at the rich and serpentine embroideries on the wall with the expression that a great general might have if he saw a chance of really ruining his enemy, if he would also ruin all his previous plan of campaign. His pallid and classic profile was as immovable as a cameo; but anyone who had known him at all would have known that his brain was going like a motor car that has broken the speed limit long ago.

Then he turned his head and said, “Please tell Hicks to bring round the long blue car in half an hour; it can be fitted up for a sofa. And ask the gardener to cut a pole of about four feet nine inches, and put a cross-piece for a crutch. I’m going up to London to-night.”

Mr. Leveson’s lower jaw literally fell with astonishment.

“The Doctor said three weeks,” he said. “If I may ask it, where are you going?”

“St. Stephens, Westminster,” answered Ivywood.

“Surely,” said Mr. Leveson, “I could take a message.”

“You could take a message,” assented Ivywood, “I’m afraid they would not allow you to make a speech.”

It was a moment or two afterward that Enid Wimpole had come into the room, and striven in vain to shake his decision. Then it was that Joan had been brought out of the turret and saw Philip standing, sustained upon a crutch of garden timber; and admired him as she had never admired him before. While he was being helped downstairs, while he was being propped in the car with such limited comfort as was possible, she did really feel in him something worthy of his ancient roots, worthy of such hills and of such a sea. For she felt God’s wind from nowhere which is called the Will; and is man’s only excuse upon this earth. In the small toot of the starting motor she could hear a hundred trumpets, such as might have called her ancestors and his to the glories of the Third Crusade.

Such imaginary military honours were not, at least in the strategic sense, undeserved. Lord Ivywood really had seen the whole map of the situation in front of him, and swiftly formed a plan to meet it, in a manner not unworthy of Napoleon. The realities of the situation unrolled themselves before him, and his mind was marking them one by one as with a pencil.

First, he knew that Dalroy would probably go to the Model Village. It was just the sort of place he would go to. He knew Dalroy was almost constitutionally incapable of not kicking up some kind of row in a place of that kind.

Second, he knew that if he missed Dalroy at this address, it was very likely to be his last address; he and Mr. Pump were quite clever enough to leave no more hints behind.

Third, he guessed, by careful consideration of map and clock, that they could not get to so remote a region in so cheap a car under something like two days, nor do anything very conclusive in less than three. Thus, he had just time to turn round in.

Fourth, he realised that ever since that day when Dalroy swung round the sign-board and smote the policeman into the ditch, Dalroy had swung round the Ivywood Act on Lord Ivywood. He (Lord Ivywood) had thought, and might well have thought rightly, that by restricting the old sign-posts to a few places so select that they can afford to be eccentric, and forbidding such artistic symbols to all other places, he could sweep fermented liquor for all practical purposes out of the land. The arrangement was exactly that at which all such legislation is consciously or unconsciously aiming. A sign-board could be a favour granted by the governing class to itself. If a gentleman wished to claim the liberties of a Bohemian, the path would be open. If a Bohemian wished to claim the liberties of a gentleman, the path would be shut. So, gradually, Lord Ivywood had thought, the old signs which can alone sell alcohol, will dwindle down to mere curiosities, like Audit Ale or the Mead that may still be found in the New Forest. The calculation was by no means unstatesmanlike. But, like many other statesmanlike calculations, it did not take into account the idea of dead wood walking about. So long as his flying foes might set up their sign anywhere, it mattered little whether the result was enjoyment or disappointment for the populace. In either case it must mean constant scandal or riot. If there was one thing worse than the appearance of “The Old Ship” it was its disappearance.

He realised that his own law was letting them loose every time; for the local authorities hesitated to act on the spot, in defiance of a symbol now so exclusive and therefore impressive. He realised that the law must be altered. Must be altered at once. Must be altered, if possible, before the fugitives broke away from the Model Village of Peaceways.

«Più tardi. I due automobilisti hanno a quanto pare lasciato la città, indisturbati, su una piccola due posti di seconda mano. Non v’è indizio sulla loro destinazione, se non quello indicato da un unico episodio. Pare che, mentre aspettavano il secondo bicchiere di latte, uno di loro abbia richiamato l’attenzione su un bidone del latte di forma a lui apparentemente sconosciuta, che era, naturalmente, il Latte di Montagna ora tanto raccomandato dai medici. L’automobilista più alto (che sembrava in ogni modo stranamente ignaro della scienza e della vita sociale moderne) domandò al compagno da dove venisse, ricevendo, naturalmente, la risposta che è prodotto nel villaggio modello di Peaceways, sotto la personale sovrintendenza del suo illustre e filantropico inventore, il dottor Meadows. A questo il più alto dei due, che appariva altamente irresponsabile, comprò addirittura l’intero bidone; osservando, mentre se lo ficcava sotto il braccio, che l’avrebbe aiutato a ricordare l’indirizzo.

«Più tardi. I nostri lettori saranno lieti di apprendere che la leggenda dell’insegna della “Vecchia Nave” ha ancora una volta ceduto al salutare scetticismo della scienza. Il nostro inviato ha raggiunto Wyddington dopo che i burloni, o qualunque cosa fossero, se n’erano andati; ma ha esaminato l’intera facciata della bottega del signor Simmons, e siamo in grado di assicurare al pubblico che non v’è traccia della presunta insegna.»

Lord Ivywood posò il giornale e guardò i ricchi e serpentini ricami sulla parete con l’espressione che potrebbe avere un grande generale se scorgesse la possibilità di rovinare davvero il nemico, a patto di rovinare anche tutto il proprio piano di campagna precedente. Il suo pallido e classico profilo era immobile come un cammeo; ma chiunque lo avesse conosciuto anche solo un poco avrebbe capito che il suo cervello andava come un’automobile che ha superato da un pezzo il limite di velocità.

Poi voltò il capo e disse: «Vi prego di dire a Hicks di portar fuori la lunga automobile blu tra mezz’ora; la si può allestire a mo’ di divano. E chiedete al giardiniere di tagliare un palo di circa quattro piedi e nove pollici, e di mettervi una traversa a croce per una gruccia. Vado a Londra questa notte.»

La mascella inferiore del signor Leveson cadde letteralmente per lo stupore.

«Il Dottore ha detto tre settimane», disse. «Se posso chiederlo, dove andate?»

«St. Stephen’s, Westminster», rispose Ivywood.

«Di certo», disse il signor Leveson, «potrei portare io un messaggio.»

«Potreste portare un messaggio», convenne Ivywood, «ma temo che non vi permetterebbero di tenere un discorso.»

Fu un momento o due dopo che Enid Wimpole entrò nella stanza, e si sforzò invano di scuotere la sua decisione. Fu allora che Joan venne condotta fuori dalla torretta e vide Philip in piedi, sostenuto da una gruccia di legname da giardino; e lo ammirò come non lo aveva mai ammirato prima. Mentre lo aiutavano a scendere le scale, mentre lo puntellavano nell’automobile con quel poco di conforto che era possibile, ella sentì davvero in lui qualcosa di degno delle sue antiche radici, degno di quelle colline e di quel mare. Poiché sentì il vento di Dio venuto dal nulla che si chiama la Volontà; ed è l’unica scusa dell’uomo su questa terra. Nel piccolo squillo del motore che si avviava poteva udire cento trombe, quali avrebbero potuto chiamare i suoi antenati e quelli di lui alle glorie della Terza Crociata.

Simili immaginari onori militari non erano, almeno in senso strategico, immeritati. Lord Ivywood aveva davvero visto dinanzi a sé l’intera mappa della situazione, e rapidamente formato un piano per farvi fronte, in un modo non indegno di Napoleone. Le realtà della situazione si dispiegavano davanti a lui, e la sua mente le segnava a una a una come con una matita.

Primo, sapeva che Dalroy sarebbe probabilmente andato al Villaggio Modello. Era proprio il genere di luogo dove sarebbe andato. Sapeva che Dalroy era quasi costituzionalmente incapace di non sollevare qualche sorta di baccano in un luogo di quel genere.

Secondo, sapeva che se avesse mancato Dalroy a quell’indirizzo, era assai probabile che fosse il suo ultimo indirizzo; lui e il signor Pump erano abbastanza scaltri da non lasciarsi dietro altri indizi.

Terzo, indovinò, con attenta considerazione della mappa e dell’orologio, che non potevano raggiungere una regione tanto remota con un’automobile tanto scadente in meno di qualcosa come due giorni, né fare alcunché di molto conclusivo in meno di tre. Così, aveva appena il tempo di volgersi attorno.

Quarto, si rese conto che fin da quel giorno in cui Dalroy fece roteare l’insegna e scaraventò il poliziotto nel fossato, Dalroy aveva rivolto la Legge Ivywood contro Lord Ivywood. Egli (Lord Ivywood) aveva pensato, e poteva ben aver pensato a ragione, che, restringendo le vecchie insegne a pochi luoghi tanto scelti da potersi permettere d’essere eccentrici, e vietando simili simboli artistici a tutti gli altri luoghi, avrebbe potuto spazzar via a ogni effetto pratico i liquori fermentati dal paese. La disposizione era esattamente quella cui ogni legislazione del genere mira consciamente o inconsciamente. Un’insegna poteva essere un favore che la classe dirigente concedeva a se stessa. Se un gentiluomo desiderava rivendicare le libertà di un bohémien, la via sarebbe stata aperta. Se un bohémien desiderava rivendicare le libertà di un gentiluomo, la via sarebbe stata chiusa. Così, a poco a poco, aveva pensato Lord Ivywood, le vecchie insegne che sole possono vendere alcol si sarebbero ridotte a mere curiosità, come l’Audit Ale o l’idromele che si può ancora trovare nella New Forest. Il calcolo non era affatto privo di senso di Stato. Ma, come molti altri calcoli da uomo di Stato, non teneva conto dell’idea di legno morto che va in giro. Fintanto che i suoi nemici volanti potevano piantare la loro insegna dovunque, poco importava se il risultato fosse godimento o delusione per la popolazione. In entrambi i casi doveva significare costante scandalo o tumulto. Se c’era una cosa peggiore della comparsa della “Vecchia Nave”, era la sua scomparsa.

Si rese conto che la sua stessa legge li lasciava liberi ogni volta; poiché le autorità locali esitavano ad agire sul posto, a dispetto di un simbolo ora così esclusivo e perciò imponente. Si rese conto che la legge doveva essere modificata. Doveva essere modificata subito. Doveva essere modificata, se possibile, prima che i fuggitivi si allontanassero dal Villaggio Modello di Peaceways.

He realised that it was Thursday. This was the day on which any private member of Parliament could introduce any private bill of the kind called “non-contentious,” and pass it without a division, so long as no particular member made any particular fuss. He realised that it was improbable that any particular member would make any particular fuss about Lord Ivywood’s own improvement on Lord Ivywood’s own Act.

Finally, he realised that the whole case could be met by so slight an improvement as this. Change the words of the Act (which he knew by heart, as happier men might know a song): “If such sign be present liquids containing alcohol can be sold on the premises,” to these other words: “Liquids containing alcohol can be sold, if previously preserved for three days on the premises”; it was mate in a few moves. Parliament could never reject or even examine so slight an emendation. And the revolution of “The Old Ship” and the late King of Ithaca would be crushed for ever.

It does undoubtedly show, as we have said, something Napoleonic in the man’s mind that the whole of this excellent and even successful plan was complete long before he saw the great glowing clock on the towers of Westminster; and knew he was in time.

It was unfortunate, perhaps, that about the same time, or not long after, another gentleman of the same rank, and indirectly of the same family, having left the restaurant in Regent Street and the tangle of Piccadilly, had drifted serenely down Whitehall, and had seen the same great golden goblin’s eye on the tall tower of St. Stephen.

The Poet of the Birds, like most aesthetes, had known as little of the real town as he had of the real country. But he had remembered a good place for supper; and as he passed certain great cold clubs, built of stone and looking like Assyrian Sarcophagi, he remembered that he belonged to many of them. And so when he saw afar off, sitting above the river, what has been very erroneously described as the best club in London, he suddenly remembered that he belonged to that too. He could not at the moment recall what constituency in South England it was that he sat for; but he knew he could walk into the place if he wanted to. He might not so have expressed the matter, but he knew that in an oligarchy things go by respect for persons and not for claims; by visiting cards and not by voting cards. He had not been near the place for years, being permanently paired against a famous Patriot who had accepted an important government appointment in a private madhouse. Even in his silliest days, he had never pretended to feel any respect for modern politics, and made all haste to put his “leaders” and the mad patriot’s “leaders” on the well selected list of the creatures whom man forgets. He had made one really eloquent speech in the House (on the subject of gorillas), and then found he was speaking against his party. It was an indescribable sort of place, anyhow. Even Lord Ivywood did not go to it except to do some business that could be done nowhere else; as was the case that night.

Ivywood was what is called a peer by courtesy; his place was in the Commons, and for the time being on the Opposition side. But, though he visited the House but seldom, he knew far too much about it to go into the Chamber itself. He limped into the Smoking Room (though he did not smoke), procured a needless cigarette and a much-needed sheet of note-paper, and composed a curt but careful note to the one member of the government whom he knew must be in the House. Having sent it up to him, he waited.

Outside, Mr. Dorian Wimpole also waited, leaning on the parapet of Westminster Bridge and looking down the river. He was becoming one with the oysters in a more solemn and solid sense than he had hitherto conceived possible, and also with a strictly Vegetarian beverage which bears the noble and starry name of Nuits. He felt at peace with all things, even in a manner with politics. It was one of those magic hours of evening when the red and golden lights of men are already lit along the river, and look like the lights of goblins, but daylight still lingers in a cold and delicate green. He felt about the river something of that smiling and glorious sadness which two Englishmen have expressed under the figure of the white wood of an old ship fading like a phantom; Turner, in painting, and Henry Newbolt, in poetry. He had come back to earth like a man fallen from the moon; he was at bottom not only a poet but a patriot, and a patriot is always a little sad. Yet his melancholy was mixed up with that immutable yet meaningless faith which few Englishmen, even in modern times, fail to feel at the unexpected sight either of Westminster or of that height on which stands the temple of St. Paul.

“While flows the sacred river,

While stands the sacred hill,”

he murmured in some schoolboy echo of the ballad of Lake Regillus,

“While flows the sacred river,

While stands the sacred hill,

The proud old pantaloons and nincompoops,

Who yawn at the very length of their own lies

in that accursed sanhedrim where

people put each other’s hats on in a poisonous

room with no more windows than hell

Shall have such honour still.”

Relieved by this rendering of Macaulay in the style known among his cultured friends asvers libre, or poesy set free from the shackles of formal metre, he strolled toward the members’ entrance and went in.

Lacking Lord Ivywood’s experience, he strolled into the Common’s Chamber itself and sat down on a green bench, under the impression that the House was not sitting. He was, however, gradually able to distinguish some six or eight drowsy human forms from the seats on which they sat; and to hear a senile voice with an Essex accent, saying, all on one note, and without beginning or end, in a manner which it is quite impossible to punctuate,

Si rese conto che era Giovedì. Era il giorno in cui qualsiasi membro privato del Parlamento poteva presentare qualsiasi progetto di legge privato del tipo detto «non contenzioso», e farlo passare senza una votazione, purché nessun particolare membro sollevasse alcuna particolare protesta. Si rese conto che era improbabile che alcun particolare membro sollevasse alcuna particolare protesta contro il miglioramento apportato da Lord Ivywood alla Legge stessa di Lord Ivywood.

Infine, si rese conto che l’intero caso poteva essere risolto con un miglioramento tanto lieve quanto questo. Cambiare le parole della Legge (che sapeva a memoria, come uomini più felici potrebbero sapere una canzone): «Se tale insegna è presente, i liquidi contenenti alcol possono essere venduti sul posto», in queste altre parole: «I liquidi contenenti alcol possono essere venduti, se previamente conservati per tre giorni sul posto»; era matto in poche mosse. Il Parlamento non avrebbe mai potuto respingere e nemmeno esaminare un emendamento tanto lieve. E la rivoluzione della «Vecchia Nave» e del defunto Re di Itaca sarebbe stata schiacciata per sempre.

Mostra indubbiamente, come abbiamo detto, qualcosa di napoleonico nella mente dell’uomo il fatto che l’intero di questo eccellente e persino riuscito piano fosse completo assai prima ch’egli scorgesse il grande orologio rosseggiante sulle torri di Westminster; e sapesse d’essere in tempo.

Fu forse sfortunato che all’incirca nello stesso tempo, o non molto dopo, un altro gentiluomo dello stesso rango, e indirettamente della stessa famiglia, avendo lasciato il ristorante di Regent Street e il groviglio di Piccadilly, fosse disceso serenamente lungo Whitehall, e avesse veduto lo stesso grande occhio di folletto dorato sull’alta torre di St. Stephen.

Il Poeta degli Uccelli, come la maggior parte degli esteti, conosceva altrettanto poco la città reale quanto la campagna reale. Ma si era ricordato di un buon posto per la cena; e mentre passava accanto a certi grandi e freddi circoli, costruiti di pietra e simili a Sarcofagi Assiri, si ricordò di appartenere a molti di essi. E così quando scorse in lontananza, seduto al di sopra del fiume, ciò che è stato assai erroneamente descritto come il miglior circolo di Londra, si ricordò improvvisamente di appartenere anche a quello. Non riusciva in quel momento a rammentare quale collegio elettorale dell’Inghilterra meridionale rappresentasse; ma sapeva di poter entrare in quel luogo se lo avesse voluto. Non avrebbe forse espresso così la cosa, ma sapeva che in un’oligarchia le cose vanno per rispetto delle persone e non delle rivendicazioni; per biglietti da visita e non per schede di voto. Non si era avvicinato a quel luogo da anni, essendo permanentemente accoppiato in astensione con un celebre Patriota che aveva accettato un importante incarico di governo in un manicomio privato. Persino nei suoi giorni più sciocchi, non aveva mai preteso di sentire alcun rispetto per la politica moderna, e s’affrettò a mettere i suoi «leader» e i «leader» del folle patriota sulla ben scelta lista delle creature che l’uomo dimentica. Aveva pronunciato un discorso davvero eloquente alla Camera (sul tema dei gorilla), e poi aveva scoperto di star parlando contro il proprio partito. Era comunque un luogo indescrivibile. Perfino Lord Ivywood non vi si recava se non per sbrigare qualche affare che non poteva sbrigarsi altrove; com’era il caso quella notte.

Ivywood era ciò che si chiama un pari per cortesia; il suo posto era ai Comuni, e per il momento dal lato dell’Opposizione. Ma, benché visitasse la Camera di rado, ne sapeva fin troppo per entrare nell’Aula stessa. Zoppicò fino alla Sala Fumatori (benché non fumasse), si procurò una superflua sigaretta e un assai necessario foglio di carta da lettere, e compose una nota brusca ma accurata all’unico membro del governo che sapeva dover essere alla Camera. Avendogliela fatta recapitare, attese.

Fuori, anche il signor Dorian Wimpole attendeva, appoggiato al parapetto del Ponte di Westminster e guardando giù lungo il fiume. Stava diventando tutt’uno con le ostriche in un senso più solenne e solido di quanto avesse finora concepito possibile, e anche con una bevanda strettamente Vegetariana che porta il nobile e stellato nome di Nuits. Si sentiva in pace con tutte le cose, persino in un certo modo con la politica. Era una di quelle magiche ore della sera in cui le luci rosse e dorate degli uomini sono già accese lungo il fiume, e paiono le luci dei folletti, ma la luce del giorno ancora indugia in un verde freddo e delicato. Provava per il fiume qualcosa di quella sorridente e gloriosa tristezza che due Inglesi hanno espresso sotto la figura del bianco legno di una vecchia nave che svanisce come un fantasma; Turner, nella pittura, e Henry Newbolt, nella poesia. Era tornato sulla terra come un uomo caduto dalla luna; era in fondo non solo un poeta ma un patriota, e un patriota è sempre un poco triste. Eppure la sua malinconia era mescolata a quella immutabile eppure priva di significato Fede che pochi Inglesi, persino in tempi moderni, mancano di provare all’inatteso spettacolo o di Westminster o di quell’altura su cui sorge il tempio di San Paolo.

«Mentre scorre il sacro fiume,

Mentre s’erge il sacro colle,»

mormorò in qualche eco scolastica della ballata del Lago Regillo,

«Mentre scorre il sacro fiume,

Mentre s’erge il sacro colle,

I fieri vecchi pantaloni e stupidi babbei,

Che sbadigliano alla lunghezza stessa delle proprie menzogne

in quel maledetto sinedrio dove

la gente si mette in testa a vicenda i cappelli in una velenosa

stanza con non più finestre dell’inferno

Avranno ancora tale onore.»

Sollevato da questa resa di Macaulay nello stile noto tra i suoi colti amici come vers libre, ossia poesia liberata dalle catene del metro formale, si diresse verso l’ingresso dei membri ed entrò.

Privo dell’esperienza di Lord Ivywood, entrò nell’Aula stessa dei Comuni e sedette su una panca verde, sotto l’impressione che la Camera non fosse in seduta. Riuscì tuttavia, a poco a poco, a distinguere una sei o otto sonnolente forme umane dai seggi su cui sedevano; e a udire una voce senile con accento dell’Essex che diceva, tutta su una sola nota, e senza principio né fine, in un modo assolutamente impossibile da punteggiare,

“… no wish at all that this proposal should be regarded except in the right way and have tried to put it in the right way and cannot think the honourable member was altogether adding to his reputation in putting it in what those who think with me must of course consider the wrong way and I for one am free to say that if in his desire to settle this great question he takes this hasty course and this revolutionary course about slate pencils he may not be able to prevent the extremists behind him from applying it to lead pencils and while I should be the last to increase the heat and the excitement and the personalities of this debate if I could possibly help it I must confess that in my opinion the honourable gentleman has himself encouraged that heat and personality in a manner that he now doubtless regrets I have no desire to use abusive terms indeed you Mr. Speaker would not allow me of course to use abusive terms but I must tell the honourable member face to face that the perambulators with which he has twitted me cannot be germane to this discussion I should be the last person…”

Dorian Wimpole had softly risen to go, when he was arrested by the sight of someone sliding into the House and handing a note to the solitary young man with heavy eyelids who was at that moment governing all England from the Treasury Bench. Seeing him go out, Dorian had a sickening sweetness of hope (as he might have said in his earlier poems), that something intelligible might happen after all, and followed him out almost with alacrity.

The solitary and sleepy governor of Great Britain went down into the lower crypts of its temple of freedom and turned into an apartment where Wimpole was astonished to see his cousin Ivywood sitting at a little table with a large crutch leaning beside him, as serene as Long John Silver. The young man with the heavy eyelids sat down opposite him and they had a conversation which Wimpole, of course, did not hear. He withdrew into an adjoining room where he managed to procure coffee and a liqueur; an excellent liqueur which he had forgotten and of which he had more than one glass.

But he had so posted himself that Ivywood could not come out without passing him, and he waited for what might happen with exquisite patience. The only thing that seemed to him queer was that every now and then a bell rang in several rooms at once. And whenever the bell rang, Lord Ivywood nodded, as if he were part of the electrical machinery. And whenever Lord Ivywood nodded the young man turned and sped upstairs like a mountaineer, returning in a short time to resume the conversation. On the third occasion the poet began to observe that many others from the other rooms could be heard running upstairs at the sound of this bell, and returning with the slightly less rapid step which expresses relief after a duty done. Yet did he not know that this duty was Representative Government; and that it is thus that the cry of Cumberland or Cornwall can come to the ears of an English King.

Suddenly the sleepy young man sprang erect, uninspired by any bell, and strode out once more. The poet could not help hearing him say as he left the table, jotting down something with a pencil: “Alcohol can be sold if previously preserved for three days on the premises. I think we can do it, but you can’t come on for half an hour.”

Saying this, he darted upstairs again, and when Dorian saw Ivywood come out laboriously, afterward, on his large country crutch, he had exactly the same revulsion in his favour that Joan had had. Jumping up from his table, which was in one of the private dining-rooms, he touched the other on the elbow and said:

“I want to apologise to you, Philip, for my rudeness this afternoon. Honestly, I am sorry. Pinewoods and prison-cells try a man’s temper, but I had no rag of excuse for not seeing that for neither of them were you to blame. I’d no notion you were coming up to town tonight; with your leg and all. You mustn’t knock yourself up like this. Do sit down a minute.”

It seemed to him that the bleak face of Philip softened a little; how far he really softened will never be known until such men as he are understood by their fellows. It is certain that he carefully unhooked himself from his crutch and sat down opposite his cousin. Whereupon his cousin struck the table so that it rang like a dinner-bell and called out, “Waiter!” as if he were in a crowded restaurant. Then, before Lord Ivywood could protest, he said:

“It’s awfully jolly that we’ve met. I suppose you’ve come up to make a speech. Ishould like to hear it. We haven’t always agreed; but, by God, if there’s anything good left in literature it’s your speeches reported in a newspaper. That thing of yours that ended, ‘death and the last shutting of the iron doors of defeat’–Why you must go back to Strafford’s last speech for such English. Do let me hear your speech! I’ve got a seat upstairs, you know.”

“If you wish it,” said Ivywood hurriedly, “but I shan’t make much of a speech to-night.” And he looked at the wall behind Wimpole’s head with thunderous wrinkles thickening on his brow. It was essential to his brilliant and rapid scheme, of course, that the Commons should make no comment at all on his little alteration in the law.

An attendant hovered near in response to the demand for a waiter, and was much impressed by the presence and condition of Lord Ivywood. But as that exalted cripple resolutely refused anything in the way of liquor, his cousin was so kind as to have a little more himself, and resumed his remarks.

“It’s about this public-house affair of yours, I suppose. I’d like to hear you speak on that. P’raps I’ll speak myself. I’ve been thinking about it a good deal all day, and a good deal of last night, too. Now, here’s what I should say to the House, if I were you. To begin with, can you abolish the public-house? Are youimportant enough now to abolish the public-house? Whether it’s right or wrong, can you in the long run prevent haymakers having ale any more than you can prevent me having this glass of Chartreuse?”

«… nessun desiderio affatto che questa proposta sia considerata se non nel modo giusto e ho cercato di presentarla nel modo giusto e non posso pensare che l’onorevole membro accrescesse del tutto la propria reputazione presentandola in quello che coloro che la pensano come me devono naturalmente considerare il modo sbagliato e io per parte mia son libero di dire che se nel suo desiderio di risolvere questa grande questione egli intraprende questo corso avventato e questo corso rivoluzionario riguardo alle matite di ardesia potrebbe non essere in grado di impedire agli estremisti che gli stanno dietro di applicarlo alle matite di piombo e per quanto io sarei l’ultimo ad accrescere il calore e l’eccitazione e le personalità di questo dibattito se solo potessi evitarlo devo confessare che a mio parere l’onorevole gentiluomo ha egli stesso incoraggiato quel calore e quella personalità in un modo che ora senza dubbio rimpiange non ho alcun desiderio di usare termini offensivi anzi voi signor Presidente non mi permettereste naturalmente di usare termini offensivi ma devo dire all’onorevole membro faccia a faccia che le carrozzine con cui mi ha punzecchiato non possono essere pertinenti a questa discussione io sarei l’ultima persona…»

Dorian Wimpole si era alzato pian piano per andarsene, quando fu trattenuto dalla vista di qualcuno che scivolava nella Camera e porgeva un biglietto al solitario giovane dalle palpebre pesanti che in quel momento governava tutta l’Inghilterra dal Banco del Tesoro. Vedendolo uscire, Dorian provò una nauseante dolcezza di speranza (come avrebbe detto nei suoi primi versi) che qualcosa d’intelligibile potesse dopotutto accadere, e lo seguì fuori quasi con alacrità.

Il solitario e assonnato governatore della Gran Bretagna discese nelle cripte inferiori del suo tempio della libertà e svoltò in una stanza dove Wimpole fu stupito di vedere suo cugino Ivywood seduto a un tavolinetto con una grande gruccia appoggiata accanto a lui, sereno come Long John Silver. Il giovane dalle palpebre pesanti sedette di fronte a lui ed ebbero una conversazione che Wimpole, naturalmente, non udì. Egli si ritirò in una stanza attigua dove riuscì a procurarsi caffè e un liquore; un eccellente liquore che aveva dimenticato e di cui bevve più di un bicchiere.

Ma si era appostato in modo tale che Ivywood non poteva uscire senza passargli accanto, e attese ciò che poteva accadere con squisita pazienza. L’unica cosa che gli parve strana era che di tanto in tanto una campanella suonava in più stanze contemporaneamente. E ogni volta che la campanella suonava, Lord Ivywood annuiva, come se fosse parte del macchinario elettrico. E ogni volta che Lord Ivywood annuiva, il giovane si voltava e schizzava di sopra come un alpinista, tornando in breve tempo a riprendere la conversazione. Alla terza occasione il poeta cominciò a osservare che molti altri, dalle altre stanze, si udivano correre di sopra al suono di questa campanella, e tornare con il passo un poco meno rapido che esprime il sollievo dopo un dovere compiuto. Eppure egli non sapeva che questo dovere era il Governo Rappresentativo; e che è così che il grido del Cumberland o della Cornovaglia può giungere alle orecchie di un Re inglese.

Improvvisamente l’assonnato giovane balzò in piedi, non ispirato da alcuna campanella, e uscì di nuovo a grandi passi. Il poeta non poté fare a meno di udirlo dire mentre lasciava il tavolo, annotando qualcosa con una matita: «L’alcol può essere venduto se previamente conservato per tre giorni sul posto. Credo che possiamo farcela, ma tu non puoi intervenire prima di mezz’ora.»

Detto questo, guizzò di nuovo di sopra, e quando Dorian vide Ivywood uscire faticosamente, poco dopo, sulla sua grande gruccia di campagna, provò esattamente lo stesso moto di simpatia in suo favore che aveva provato Joan. Balzando dal suo tavolo, che era in una delle salette da pranzo private, toccò l’altro al gomito e disse:

«Voglio scusarmi con te, Philip, per la mia scortesia di questo pomeriggio. Sinceramente, mi dispiace. Le pinete e le celle di prigione mettono a dura prova il carattere di un uomo, ma non avevo il minimo straccio di scusa per non vedere che di nessuna delle due eri tu il colpevole. Non avevo idea che venissi in città stasera; con la tua gamba e tutto. Non devi sfiancarti così. Siediti un minuto.»

Gli parve che il volto arcigno di Philip si addolcisse un poco; quanto davvero si addolcì non si saprà mai finché uomini come lui non saranno compresi dai loro simili. È certo che si sganciò con cura dalla sua gruccia e sedette di fronte al cugino. Al che il cugino batté sul tavolo tanto che risuonò come un campanello da pranzo e gridò: «Cameriere!» come se fosse in un ristorante affollato. Poi, prima che Lord Ivywood potesse protestare, disse:

«È terribilmente bello che ci siamo incontrati. Suppongo tu sia venuto a tenere un discorso. Mi piacerebbe udirlo. Non siamo sempre stati d’accordo; ma, per Dio, se è rimasto qualcosa di buono nella letteratura sono i tuoi discorsi riportati sui giornali. Quella tua cosa che finiva con “la morte e l’ultimo serrarsi delle ferree porte della sconfitta”… Perché bisogna risalire all’ultimo discorso di Strafford per un simile inglese. Lascia che io oda il tuo discorso! Ho un posto di sopra, sai.»

«Se lo desideri», disse Ivywood in fretta, «ma non farò gran che di un discorso questa notte.» E guardò la parete dietro la testa di Wimpole con tempestose rughe che gli si addensavano sulla fronte. Era essenziale al suo brillante e rapido stratagemma, s’intende, che i Comuni non facessero alcun commento sulla sua piccola modifica alla legge.

Un inserviente indugiò lì presso in risposta alla richiesta di un cameriere, e fu assai colpito dalla presenza e dalle condizioni di Lord Ivywood. Ma poiché quell’illustre storpio rifiutò risolutamente qualsiasi cosa in fatto di liquori, il cugino fu così gentile da prenderne ancora un poco per sé, e riprese le sue osservazioni.

«Si tratta di questa tua faccenda dell’osteria, suppongo. Mi piacerebbe sentirti parlare di questo. Forse parlerò io stesso. Ci ho pensato parecchio tutto il giorno, e parecchio anche la notte scorsa. Ora, ecco cosa direi alla Camera, se fossi in te. Tanto per cominciare, puoi abolire l’osteria? Sei abbastanza importante, ora, da abolire l’osteria? Che sia giusto o sbagliato, puoi alla lunga impedire ai falciatori di avere la birra più di quanto tu possa impedire a me di avere questo bicchiere di Chartreuse?»

The attendant, hearing the word, once more drew near; but heard no further order; or, rather, the orders he heard were such as he was less able to cope with.

“Remember the curate!” said Dorian, abstractedly shaking his head at the functionary, “remember the sensible little High-Church curate, who when asked for a Temperance Sermon preached on the text ‘Suffer us not to be overwhelmed in the water-floods.’ Indeed, indeed, Philip, you are in deeper waters than you know.You will abolish ale!You will make Kent forget hop-poles, and Devonshire forget cider! The fate of the Inn is to be settled in that hot little room upstairs! Take care its fate and yours are not settled in the Inn. Take care Englishmen don’t sit in judgment on you as they do on many another corpse at an inquest–at a common public-house! Take care that the one tavern that is really neglected and shut up and passed like a house of pestilence is not the tavern in which I drink to-night, and that merely because it is the worst tavern on the King’s highway. Take care this place where we sit does not get a name like any pub where sailors are hocussed or girls debauched. That is what I shall say to them,” said he, rising cheerfully, “that’s what I shall say. See you to it,” he cried with sudden passion and apparently to the waiter, “see you to it if the sign that is destroyed is not the sign of ‘The Old Ship’ but the sign of the Mace and Bauble, and, in the words of a highly historical brewer, if we see a dog bark at your going.”

Lord Ivywood was observing him with a deathly quietude; another idea had come into his fertile mind. He knew his cousin, though excited, was not in the least intoxicated; he knew he was quite capable of making a speech and even a good one. He knew that any speech, good or bad, would wreck his whole plan and send the wild inn flying again. But the orator had resumed his seat and drained his glass, passing a hand across his brow. And he remembered that a man who keeps a vigil in a wood all night and drinks wine on the following evening is liable to an accident that is not drunkenness, but something much healthier.

“I suppose your speech will come on pretty soon,” said Dorian, looking at the table. “You’ll let me know when it does, of course. Really and truly, I don’t want to miss it. And I’ve forgotten all the ways here, and feel pretty tired. You’ll let me know?”

“Yes,” said Lord Ivywood.

Stillness fell along all the rooms until Lord Ivywood broke it by saying:

“Debate is a most necessary thing; but there are times when it rather impedes than assists parliamentary government.”

He received no reply. Dorian still sat as if looking at the table, but his eyelids had lightly fallen; he was asleep. Almost at the same moment the Member of Government, who was nearly asleep, appeared at the entrance of the long room and made some sort of weary signal.

Philip Ivywood raised himself on his crutch and stood for a moment looking at the sleeping man. Then he and his crutch trailed out of the long room, leaving the sleeping man behind. Nor was that the only thing that he left behind. He also left behind an unlighted cigarette and his honour and all the England of his father’s; everything that could really distinguish that high house beside the river from any tavern for the hocussing of sailors. He went upstairs and did his business in twenty minutes in the only speech he had ever delivered without any trace of eloquence. And from that hour forth he was the naked fanatic; and could feed on nothing but the future.

L’inserviente, udita la parola, si fece di nuovo vicino; ma non udì altro ordine; o, piuttosto, gli ordini che udì furono tali che seppe fronteggiare ancor meno.

«Ricòrdati del curato!» disse Dorian, scuotendo distrattamente il capo verso il funzionario, «ricòrdati di quel giudizioso, piccolo curato d’Alta Chiesa che, richiesto d’un Sermone sulla Temperanza, predicò sul versetto: “Non lasciarci travolgere dalle piene delle acque”. Davvero, davvero, Philip, sei in acque più profonde di quanto tu sappia. Abolirai la birra! Farai dimenticare al Kent i pali del luppolo, e al Devonshire il sidro! Il destino della Taverna si decide in quella stanzetta bollente di sopra! Bada che il destino suo e il tuo non si decidano nella Taverna. Bada che gli inglesi non ti siedano a giudicare come fanno con più d’un cadavere all’inchiesta del coroner: in una comune bettola, in una osteria! Bada che l’unica taverna davvero trascurata e sprangata e schivata come una casa appestata non sia proprio quella in cui io bevo stanotte, e questo solo perché è la peggiore taverna sulla strada maestra del Re. Bada che questo luogo dove sediamo non si guadagni un nome pari a quello di qualunque bettola dove i marinai vengano drogati o le ragazze sedotte. Ecco ciò che dirò loro», disse, alzandosi allegramente, «ecco ciò che dirò. Bada tu a questo», gridò con improvvisa passione e a quanto pareva rivolto al cameriere, «bada tu a questo: che l’insegna distrutta non sia quella della ‘Vecchia Nave’ ma quella della Mazza e del Bubbolo, e, per dirla con le parole di un birraio assai storico, bada se vedremo un cane abbaiare al tuo andartene.»

Lord Ivywood lo osservava con una quiete mortale; un’altra idea gli era venuta nella mente feconda. Sapeva che il cugino, per quanto eccitato, non era affatto ubriaco; sapeva che era perfettamente capace di fare un discorso, e persino uno buono. Sapeva che un discorso qualunque, buono o cattivo, avrebbe mandato in rovina tutto il suo piano e rimesso in fuga la taverna ribelle. Ma l’oratore aveva ripreso il suo posto e vuotato il bicchiere, passandosi una mano sulla fronte. E si ricordò che un uomo il quale veglia in un bosco per tutta la notte e beve vino la sera seguente è soggetto a un accidente che non è ubriachezza, ma qualcosa di assai più salubre.

«Immagino che il tuo discorso verrà presto», disse Dorian, guardando il tavolo. «Me lo farai sapere, naturalmente. Sul serio, non voglio perdermelo. E ho scordato tutte le vie di qui, e mi sento piuttosto stanco. Me lo farai sapere?»

«Sì», disse Lord Ivywood.

Un silenzio calò per tutte le sale, finché Lord Ivywood non lo ruppe dicendo:

«Il dibattito è cosa quanto mai necessaria; ma vi sono momenti in cui più intralcia che assecondare il governo parlamentare.»

Non ricevette risposta. Dorian sedeva ancora come se guardasse il tavolo, ma le palpebre gli erano dolcemente calate; dormiva. Quasi nello stesso istante il Membro del Governo, che era quasi addormentato, comparve all’ingresso della lunga sala e fece una specie di stanco segnale.

Philip Ivywood si sollevò sulla stampella e rimase un momento a guardare l’uomo addormentato. Poi lui e la sua stampella si trascinarono fuori dalla lunga sala, lasciandosi alle spalle l’uomo addormentato. Né fu quella l’unica cosa che si lasciò alle spalle. Si lasciò alle spalle anche una sigaretta non accesa e il suo onore e tutta l’Inghilterra di suo padre; tutto ciò che poteva davvero distinguere quell’alta dimora in riva al fiume da una qualsiasi taverna in cui si drogano i marinai. Salì di sopra e sbrigò la sua faccenda in venti minuti, nell’unico discorso che avesse mai pronunciato senza traccia di eloquenza. E da quell’ora in poi fu il fanatico nudo e crudo; e non poté più nutrirsi d’altro che del futuro.

CHAPTER XVIII: THE REPUBLIC OF PEACEWAYS

IN a hamlet round about Windermere, let us say, or somewhere in Wordsworth’s country, there could be found a cottage, in which could be found a cottager. So far all is as it should be; and the visitor would first be conscious of a hearty and even noisy elderly man, with an apple face and a short white beard. This person would then loudly proffer to the visitor the opportunity of seeing his father, a somewhat more elderly man, with a somewhat longer white beard, but still “up and about.” And these two together would then initiate the neophyte into the joys of the society of a grandfather, who was more than a hundred years old, and still very proud of the fact.

This miracle, it seemed, had been worked entirely on milk. The subject of this diet the oldest of the three men continued to discuss in enormous detail. For the rest, it might be said that his pleasures were purely arithmetical. Some men count their years with dismay, and he counted his with a juvenile vanity. Some men collect stamps or coins, and he collected days. Newspaper men interviewed him about the historic times through which he had lived, without eliciting anything whatever; except that he had apparently taken to an exclusive milk diet at about the age when most of us leave it off. Asked if he was alive in 1815, he said that was the very year he found it wasn’t any milk, but must be Mountain Milk, like Dr. Meadows says. Nor would his calculating creed of life have allowed him to understand you if you had said that in a meadowland oversea that lies before the city of Brussels, boys of his old school in that year gained the love of the gods and died young.

It was the philanthropic Dr. Meadows, of course, who discovered this deathless tribe, and erected on it the whole of his great dietetic philosophy, to say nothing of the houses and dairies of Peaceways. He attracted many pupils and backers among the wealthy and influential; young men who were, so to speak, training for extreme old age, infant old men, embryo nonagenarians. It would be an exaggeration to say that they watched joyfully for the first white hair as Fascination Fledgeby watched for his first whisker; but it is quite true to say that they seemed to have scorned the beauty of woman and the feasting of friends and, above all, the old idea of death with glory; in comparison with this vision of the sports of second childhood.

Peaceways was in its essential plan much like what we call a Garden City; a ring of buildings where the work people did their work, with a pretty ornamental town in the centre, where they lived in the open country outside. This was no doubt much healthier than the factory system in the great towns and may have partly accounted for the serene expression of Dr. Meadows and his friends, if any part of the credit can be spared from the splendours of Mountain Milk. The place lay far from the common highways of England, and its inhabitants were enabled to enjoy their quiet skies and level woods almost undisturbed, and fully absorb whatever may be valuable in the Meadows method and view; until one day a small and very dirty motor drove into the middle of their town. It stopped beside one of those triangular islets of grass that are common at forked roads, and two men in goggles, one tall and the other short, got out and stood on the central space of grass, as if they were buffoons about to do tricks. As, indeed, they were.

Before entering the town they had stopped by a splendid mountain stream quickening and thickening rapidly into a river; unhelmed and otherwise eased themselves, eaten a little bread bought at Wyddington and drank the water of the widening current which opened on the valley of Peaceways.

“I’m beginning quite to like water,” said the taller of the two knights. “I used to think it a most dangerous drink. In theory, of course, it ought only to be given to people who are fainting. It’s really good for them, much better than brandy. Besides, think of wasting good brandy on people who are fainting! But I don’t go so far as I did; I shouldn’t insist on a doctor’s prescription before I allow people water. That was the too severe morality of youth; that was my innocence and goodness. I thought that if I fell once, water-drinking might become a habit. But I do see the good side of water now. How good it is when you’re really thirsty, how it glitters and gurgles! How alive it is! After all, it’s the best of drinks, after the other. As it says in the song:

“Feast on wine or fast on water,

And your honour shall stand sure;

God Almighty’s son and daughter,

He the valiant, she the pure.

If an angel out of heaven

Brings you other things to drink,

Thank him for his kind intentions,

Go and pour them down the sink.

“Tea is like the East he grows in,

A great yellow Mandarin,

With urbanity of manner,

And unconsciousness of sin;

All the women, like a harem,

At his pig-tail troop along,

And, like all the East he grows in,

He is Poison when he’s strong.

“Tea, although an Oriental,

Is a gentleman at least;

Cocoa is a cad and coward,

Cocoa is a vulgar beast;

Cocoa is a dull, disloyal,

Lying, crawling cad and clown,

And may very well be grateful

To the fool that takes him down.

“As for all the windy waters,

They were rained like trumpets down,

When good drink had been dishonoured

By the tipplers of the town.

When red wine had brought red ruin,

And the death-dance of our times,

Heaven sent us Soda Water

As a torment for our crimes.”

“Upon my soul, this water tastes quite nice. I wonder what vintage now?” and he smacked his lips with solemnity. “It tastes just like the year 1881 tasted.”

CAPITOLO XVIII: LA REPUBBLICA DI PEACEWAYS

IN un villaggio nei dintorni di Windermere, poniamo, o in qualche luogo nella terra di Wordsworth, si sarebbe potuto trovare un cottage, nel quale si sarebbe potuto trovare un contadino. Fin qui tutto è come dev’essere; e il visitatore avvertirebbe dapprima la presenza di un cordiale e persino rumoroso uomo anziano, dal viso di mela e dalla corta barba bianca. Costui offrirebbe poi ad alta voce al visitatore l’opportunità di vedere suo padre, un uomo un po’ più anziano, con una barba bianca un po’ più lunga, ma ancora «in piedi e in giro». E questi due insieme inizierebbero poi il neofita alle gioie della compagnia di un nonno, che aveva più di cent’anni, ed era ancora molto fiero del fatto.

Questo miracolo, a quanto pareva, era stato operato interamente col latte. L’argomento di questa dieta il più vecchio dei tre uomini continuava a discutere con enorme dovizia di particolari. Per il resto, si potrebbe dire che i suoi piaceri erano puramente aritmetici. Certi uomini contano i propri anni con sgomento, ed egli contava i suoi con una giovanile vanità. Certi uomini collezionano francobolli o monete, ed egli collezionava giorni. I giornalisti lo intervistavano sui tempi storici che aveva attraversato, senza cavarne alcunché; se non che egli si era, a quanto pare, dato a una dieta esclusivamente lattea all’incirca all’età in cui la maggior parte di noi la abbandona. Interrogato se fosse vivo nel 1815, disse che fu proprio l’anno in cui scoprì che non era latte qualunque, ma doveva essere Latte di Montagna, come dice il dottor Meadows. Né il suo calcolatore credo di vita gli avrebbe permesso di capirvi se gli aveste detto che in una prateria d’oltremare che si stende dinanzi alla città di Bruxelles, i ragazzi della sua vecchia scuola in quell’anno conquistarono l’amore degli dèi e morirono giovani.

Fu il filantropico dottor Meadows, naturalmente, a scoprire questa tribù immortale, e a erigervi sopra l’intera sua grande filosofia dietetica, per non dire delle case e delle latterie di Peaceways. Attirò molti allievi e sostenitori tra i ricchi e gli influenti; giovani che si allenavano, per così dire, alla estrema vecchiaia, bambini vegliardi, novantenni in embrione. Sarebbe un’esagerazione dire che spiavano gioiosamente il primo capello bianco come Fascination Fledgeby spiava il suo primo pelo di barba; ma è del tutto vero dire che sembravano aver disprezzato la bellezza della donna e il banchettare con gli amici e, soprattutto, la vecchia idea della morte con gloria; in confronto a questa visione dei sollazzi di una seconda fanciullezza.

Peaceways era nel suo piano essenziale molto simile a ciò che chiamiamo una Giardino Città; un anello di edifici dove i lavoranti svolgevano il loro lavoro, con una graziosa e ornata cittadina al centro, mentre essi vivevano nella campagna aperta all’esterno. Ciò era senza dubbio assai più salubre del sistema delle fabbriche nelle grandi città e può in parte spiegare la serena espressione del dottor Meadows e dei suoi amici, se parte del merito può essere sottratta agli splendori del Latte di Montagna. Il luogo giaceva lontano dalle comuni strade maestre d’Inghilterra, e i suoi abitanti erano posti in grado di godere dei loro cieli quieti e dei loro boschi pianeggianti quasi indisturbati, e di assorbire pienamente quanto vi possa essere di prezioso nel metodo e nella visione di Meadows; finché un giorno una piccola e assai sporca automobile penetrò nel bel mezzo della loro città. Si fermò accanto a una di quelle isolette triangolari d’erba che sono comuni ai bivi, e due uomini con gli occhialoni, uno alto e l’altro basso, ne scesero e stettero sullo spazio centrale d’erba, come buffoni sul punto di fare i loro giochi. Come, in effetti, erano.

Prima di entrare in città si erano fermati presso uno splendido torrente di montagna che rapidamente s’affrettava e s’ingrossava in un fiume; si erano tolti gli elmi e altrimenti sollevati, avevano mangiato un po’ di pane comprato a Wyddington e bevuto l’acqua della corrente che s’allargava aprendosi sulla valle di Peaceways.

«Comincio quasi a farmi piacere l’acqua», disse il più alto dei due cavalieri. «Un tempo la ritenevo una bevanda pericolosissima. In teoria, si capisce, dovrebbe essere data soltanto a chi sviene. È davvero un bene per loro, assai meglio del brandy. Del resto, pensa a sprecare del buon brandy su gente che sviene! Ma non mi spingo tanto oltre quanto facevo; non insisterei per una ricetta del medico prima di concedere alla gente l’acqua. Quella era la troppo severa moralità della giovinezza; quella era la mia innocenza e bontà. Pensavo che se fossi caduto una volta, il bere acqua sarebbe potuto diventare un’abitudine. Ma ora vedo il lato buono dell’acqua. Com’è buona quando si ha davvero sete, come scintilla e gorgoglia! Com’è viva! Dopotutto, è la migliore delle bevande, dopo l’altra. Come dice la canzone:

«Banchetta col vino o digiuna con l’acqua,

E il tuo onore resterà saldo;

Figlio e figlia dell’Onnipotente Iddio,

Egli il valoroso, ella la pura.

Se un angelo giù dal cielo

Ti porta altre cose da bere,

Ringrazialo per le sue gentili intenzioni,

E va’ a versarle giù nel lavandino.

«Il tè è come l’Oriente in cui cresce,

Un grande Mandarino giallo,

Con urbanità di modi,

E incoscienza del peccato;

Tutte le donne, come un harem,

Al suo codino sfilano in schiera,

E, come tutto l’Oriente in cui cresce,

È Veleno quando è forte.

«Il tè, per quanto Orientale,

È almeno un gentiluomo;

Il cacao è un mascalzone e un vigliacco,

Il cacao è una bestia volgare;

Il cacao è uno scialbo, sleale,

Mendace, strisciante mascalzone e buffone,

E può ben essere grato

Allo sciocco che lo trangugia.

«Quanto a tutte le ventose acque,

Furono piovute giù come trombe,

Quando la buona bevanda era stata disonorata

Dai beoni della città.

Quando il vino rosso ebbe recato rossa rovina,

E la morte-danza dei nostri tempi,

il Cielo ci mandò l’Acqua di Soda

Come tormento per i nostri delitti.»

«Sull’anima mia, quest’acqua ha un sapore piuttosto gradevole. Mi domando di che annata sarà?» e schioccò le labbra con solennità. «Sa esattamente di come sapeva l’anno 1881.»

“You can fancy anything in the tasting way,” returned his shorter companion. “Mr. Jack, who was always up to his tricks, did serve plain water in those little glasses they drink liqueurs out of, and everyone swore it was a delicious liqueur, and wanted to know where they could get it–all except old Admiral Guffin, who said it tasted too strong of olives. But water’s much the best for our game, certainly.”

Patrick nodded, and then said:

“I doubt if I could do it, if it weren’t for the comfort of looking at that,” and he kicked the rum-keg, “and feeling we shall have a good swig at it some day. It feels like a fairy-tale, carrying that about–as if rum were a pirate’s treasure, as if it were molten gold. Besides, we can have such fun with it with other people –what was that joke I thought of this morning? Oh, I remember! Where’s that milk can of mine?”

For the next twenty minutes he was industriously occupied with his milk can and the cask; Pump watching him with an interest amounting to anxiety. Lifting his head, however, at the end of that time, he knotted his red brows and said, “What’s that?”

“What’s what?” asked the other traveller.

“That!” said Captain Patrick Dalroy, and pointed to a figure approaching on the road parallel to the river, “I mean, what’s it for?”

The figure had a longish beard and very long hair falling far below its shoulders. It had a serious and steadfast expression. It was dressed in what the inexperienced Mr. Pump at first took to be its nightgown; but afterward learned to be its complete goats’ hair tunic, unmixed even with a thread of the destructive and deadly wool of the sheep. It had no boots on its feet. It walked very swiftly to a particular turn of the stream and then turned very sharply (since it had accomplished its constitutional), and walked back toward the perfect town of Peaceways.

“I suppose it’s somebody from that milk place,” said Humphrey Pump, indulgently. “They seem to be pretty mad.”

“I don’t mind that so much,” said Dalroy, “I’m mad myself sometimes. But a madman has only one merit and last link with God. A madman is always logical. Now what is the logical connection between living on milk and wearing your hair long? Most of us lived on milk when we had no hair at all. How do they connect it up? Are there any heads even for a synopsis? Is it, say, ‘milk–water–shaving-water– shaving–hair?’ Is it ‘milk–kindness–unkindness–convicts–hair?’ What is the logical connection between having too much hair and having far too few boots? Whatcan it be? Is it ‘hair–hair-trunk– leather-trunk–leather-boots?’ Is it ‘hair–beard–oysters– seaside–paddling–no boots?’ Man is liable to err–especially when every mistake he makes is called a movement–but why should all the lunacies live together?”

“Because all the lunatics should live together,” said, Humphrey, “and if you’d seen what happened up at Crampton, with the farming-out idea, you’d know. It’s all very well, Captain; but if people can prevent a guest of great importance being buried up to the neck in farm manure, they will. They will, really.” He coughed almost apologetically. He was about to attempt a resumption of the conversation, when he saw his companion slap the milk can and keg back into the car, and get into it himself. “You drive,” he said, “drive me where those things live; you know, Hump.”

They did not, however, arrive in the civic centre of such things without yet another delay. They left the river and followed the man with the long hair and the goatskin frock; and he stopped as it happened at a house on the outskirts of the village. The adventurers stopped also, out of curiosity, and were at first relieved to see the man almost instantly reappear, having transacted his business with a quickness that seemed incredible. A second glance showed them it was not the man, but another man dressed exactly like him. A few minutes more of inquisitive delay, showed them many of the kilty and goatish sect going in and out of this particular place, each clad in his innocent uniform.

“This must be the temple and chapel,” muttered Patrick, “it must be here they sacrifice a glass of milk to a cow, or whatever it is they do. Well, the joke is pretty obvious, but we must wait for a lull in the crowding of the congregation.”

When the last long-haired phantom had faded up the road, Dalroy sprang from the car and drove the sign-board deep into the earth with savage violence, and then very quietly knocked at the door.

The apparent owner of the place, of whom the two last of the long-haired and bare-footed idealists were taking a rather hurried farewell, was a man curiously ill-fitted for the part he seemed cast for in the only possible plot.

Both Pump and Dalroy thought they had never seen a man look so sullen. His face was of the rubicund sort that does not suggest jollity, but merely a stagnant indigestion in the head. His mustache hung heavy and dark, his brows yet heavier and darker. Dalroy had seen something of the sort on the faces of defeated people disgracefully forced into submission, but he could not make head or tail of it in connection with the priggish perfections of Peaceways. It was all the odder because he was manifestly prosperous; his clothes were smartly cut in something of the sporting manner, and the inside of his house was at least four times grander than the outside.

But what mystified them most was this, that he did not so much exhibit the natural curiosity of a gentleman whose private house is entered by strangers, but rather an embarrassed and restless expectation. During Dalroy’s eager apologies and courteous inquiries about the direction and accommodations of Peaceways, his eye (which was of the boiled gooseberry order) perpetually wandered from them to the cupboard and then again to the window, and at last he got up and went to look out into the road.

«In fatto di sapore ci si può immaginare qualsiasi cosa», ribatté il compagno più basso. «Il signor Jack, che era sempre pronto ai suoi scherzi, serviva pura acqua in quei bicchierini con cui si bevono i liquori, e tutti giuravano che era un delizioso liquore, e volevano sapere dove poterlo procurare… tutti tranne il vecchio Ammiraglio Guffin, che disse che sapeva troppo di olive. Ma l’acqua è di gran lunga la migliore per il nostro gioco, di certo.»

Patrick annuì, e poi disse:

«Dubito che ci riuscirei, se non fosse per il conforto di guardare quello», e diede un calcio al barilotto di rum, «e di sentire che un giorno o l’altro ce ne faremo una bella sorsata. Sembra una fiaba, portarselo appresso… come se il rum fosse il tesoro di un pirata, come se fosse oro fuso. Inoltre, ci possiamo divertire un mondo con esso alle spalle degli altri… qual era quello scherzo che mi è venuto in mente stamattina? Oh, ricordo! Dov’è quel mio bidone del latte?»

Per i venti minuti successivi fu industriosamente occupato col suo bidone del latte e la botticella; Pump lo osservava con un interesse che rasentava l’ansia. Alzando il capo, tuttavia, al termine di quel tempo, aggrottò le rosse sopracciglia e disse: «Cos’è quello?»

«Cos’è cosa?» chiese l’altro viaggiatore.

«Quello!» disse il Capitano Patrick Dalroy, indicando una figura che si avvicinava sulla strada parallela al fiume, «voglio dire, a che serve?»

La figura aveva una barba piuttosto lunga e capelli lunghissimi che le ricadevano assai al di sotto delle spalle. Aveva un’espressione seria e ferma. Era vestita di quella che l’inesperto signor Pump prese dapprima per la sua camicia da notte; ma che apprese poi essere la sua completa tunica di pelo di capra, non contaminata neppure da un filo della distruttiva e mortale lana della pecora. Non aveva stivali ai piedi. Camminò assai rapidamente fino a una certa ansa del ruscello e poi si voltò di scatto (avendo compiuto la sua passeggiata igienica), e tornò indietro verso la perfetta città di Peaceways.

«Suppongo sia qualcuno di quel posto del latte», disse Humphrey Pump, con indulgenza. «Sembrano piuttosto matti.»

«Non m’importa poi tanto di quello», disse Dalroy, «anch’io sono matto a volte. Ma un pazzo ha un solo merito e un ultimo legame con Dio. Un pazzo è sempre logico. Ora, qual è la connessione logica tra il vivere di latte e il portare i capelli lunghi? La maggior parte di noi visse di latte quando non aveva capelli affatto. Come mettono insieme la cosa? Ci sono almeno dei titoli per una sinossi? È, poniamo, “latte–acqua–acqua da barba–rasatura–capelli”? È “latte–gentilezza–sgarbo–galeotti–capelli”? Qual è la connessione logica tra l’avere troppi capelli e l’avere troppo pochi stivali? Cosa mai può essere? È “capelli–baule di capelli–baule di cuoio–stivali di cuoio”? È “capelli–barba–ostriche–spiaggia–sguazzare–niente stivali”? L’uomo è incline all’errore… specie quando ogni errore che commette vien chiamato un movimento… ma perché tutte le follie dovrebbero vivere insieme?»

«Perché tutti i lunatici dovrebbero vivere insieme», disse Humphrey, «e se aveste visto cos’è successo lassù a Crampton, con quell’idea dell’appalto, lo sapreste. Va tutto molto bene, Capitano; ma se la gente può impedire che un ospite di grande importanza venga sepolto fino al collo nel letame di fattoria, lo farà. Lo farà, davvero.» Tossì quasi in tono di scusa. Stava per tentare di riprendere la conversazione, quando vide il compagno ricacciare il bidone del latte e il barilotto nell’automobile, e salirvi lui stesso. «Guida tu», disse, «portami dove vivono quelle cose; lo sai, Hump.»

Non giunsero, tuttavia, nel centro civico di tali cose senza ancora un altro indugio. Lasciarono il fiume e seguirono l’uomo dai lunghi capelli e dal saio di pelle di capra; ed egli si fermò, guarda caso, presso una casa ai margini del villaggio. Anche gli avventurieri si fermarono, per curiosità, e furono dapprima sollevati nel vedere l’uomo riapparire quasi all’istante, avendo sbrigato i suoi affari con una prontezza che pareva incredibile. Una seconda occhiata mostrò loro che non era l’uomo, ma un altro uomo vestito esattamente come lui. Ancora qualche minuto di curioso indugio mostrò loro molti membri della setta gonnellata e caprina entrare e uscire da questo particolare luogo, ciascuno vestito della sua innocente uniforme.

«Questo dev’essere il tempio e la cappella», mormorò Patrick, «dev’essere qui che sacrificano un bicchiere di latte a una mucca, o qualunque cosa sia che fanno. Be’, lo scherzo è piuttosto ovvio, ma dobbiamo aspettare una tregua nell’affollarsi della congregazione.»

Quando l’ultimo fantasma dai lunghi capelli si fu dileguato su per la strada, Dalroy balzò dall’automobile e conficcò l’insegna in profondità nella terra con selvaggia violenza, e poi bussò molto tranquillamente alla porta.

L’apparente padrone del luogo, dal quale gli ultimi due degli idealisti dai lunghi capelli e dai piedi nudi stavano prendendo un congedo piuttosto affrettato, era un uomo curiosamente inadatto alla parte per cui pareva scritturato nell’unica trama possibile.

Sia Pump sia Dalroy pensarono di non aver mai visto un uomo dall’aria così tetra. Il suo viso era di quel tipo rubicondo che non suggerisce allegria, ma soltanto una stagnante indigestione nella testa. I suoi baffi pendevano pesanti e scuri, le sue sopracciglia ancora più pesanti e scure. Dalroy aveva visto qualcosa del genere sui volti di gente sconfitta e vergognosamente costretta alla sottomissione, ma non riusciva a raccapezzarcisi in rapporto alle pedantesche perfezioni di Peaceways. Era tanto più strano in quanto egli era manifestamente prospero; i suoi abiti erano tagliati con eleganza in un certo stile sportivo, e l’interno della sua casa era almeno quattro volte più grandioso dell’esterno.

Ma ciò che più li lasciava perplessi era questo, che egli non tanto esibiva la naturale curiosità di un gentiluomo nella cui casa privata entrano degli estranei, quanto piuttosto un’attesa imbarazzata e inquieta. Durante le premurose scuse di Dalroy e le cortesi domande sulla direzione e le sistemazioni di Peaceways, il suo occhio (che era del genere uva spina bollita) vagava perpetuamente da loro alla credenza e poi di nuovo alla finestra, e alla fine si alzò e andò a guardare fuori nella strada.

“Oh, yes, sir; very healthy place, Peaceways,” he said, peering through the lattice. “Very … dash it, what do they mean? … Very healthy place. Of course they have their little ways.”

“Only drink pure milk, don’t they?” asked Dalroy.

The householder looked at him with a rather wild eye and grunted.

“Yes; so they say,” and he went again to the window.

“I’ve bought some of it,” said Patrick, patting his pet milk can, which he carried under his arm, as if unable to be separated from Dr. Meadows’s discovery. “Have a glass of milk, sir.”

The man’s boiled eye began to bulge in anger–or some other emotion.

“What do you want?” he muttered, “are you ’tecs or what?”

“Agents and Distributors of the Meadows’s Mountain Milk,” said the Captain, with simple pride, “taste it?”

The dazed householder took a glass of the blameless liquid and sipped it; and the change on his face was extraordinary.

“Well, I’m jiggered,” he said, with a broad and rather coarse grin. “That’s a queer dodge. You’re in the joke, I see.” Then he went again restlessly to the window; and added, “but if we’re all friends, why the blazes don’t the others come in? I’ve never known trade so slow before.”

“Who are the others?” asked Mr. Pump.

“Oh, the usual Peaceways people,” said the other. “They generally come here before work. Dr. Meadows don’t work them for very long hours, that wouldn’t be healthy or whatever he calls it; but he’s particular about their being punctual. I’ve seen ’em running, with all their pure-minded togs on, when the hooter gave the last call.”

Then he abruptly opened the front door and called out impatiently, but not loudly:

“Come along in if you’re coming. You’ll give the show away if you play the fool out there.”

Patrick looked out also and the view of the road outside was certainly rather singular. He was used to crowds, large and small, collecting outside houses which he had honoured with the sign of “The Old Ship,” but they generally stared up at it in unaffected wonder and amusement. But outside this open door, some twenty or thirty persons in what Pump had called their night-gowns were moving to and fro like somnambulists, apparently blind to the presence of the sign; looking at the other side of the road, looking at the horizon, looking at the clouds of morning; and only occasionally stopping to whisper to each other. But when the owner of the house called to one of these ostentatiously abstracted beings and asked him hoarsely what the devil was the matter, it was natural for the milk-fed one to turn his feeble eye toward the sign. The gooseberry eyes followed his, and the face to which they belonged was a study in apoplectic astonishment.

“What the hell have you done to my house?” he demanded. “Of course they can’t come in if this thing’s here.”

“I’ll take it down, if you like,” said Dalroy, stepping out and picking it up like a flower from the front garden (to the amazement of the men in the road, who thought they had strayed into a nursery fairy-tale), “but I wish, in return, you’d give me some idea of what the blazes all this means.”

“Wait till I’ve served these men,” replied his host.

The goat-garbed persons went very sheepishly (or goatishly) into the now signless building, and were rapidly served with raw spirits, which Mr. Pump suspected to be of no very superior quality. When the last goat was gone, Captain Dalroy said:

“I mean that all this seems to me topsy-turvy. I understood that as the law stands now, if there’s a sign they are allowed to drink and if there isn’t they aren’t.”

“The Law!” said the man, in a voice thick with scorn. “Do you think these poor brutes are afraid of the Law as they are of the Doctor?”

“Why should they be afraid of the Doctor?” asked Dalroy, innocently. “I always heard that Peaceways was a self-governing republic.”

“Self-governing be damned,” was the illiberal reply. “Don’t he own all the houses and could turn ’em out in a snow storm? Don’t ’e pay all the wages and could starve ’em stiff in a month? The Law!” And he snorted. A moment after he squared his elbows on the table and began to explain more fully.

“I was a brewer about here and had the biggest brewery in these parts. There were only two houses which didn’t belong to me, and the magistrates took away their licenses after a time. Ten years ago you could see Hugby’s Ales written beside every sign in the county. Then came these cursed Radicals, and our leader, Lord Ivywood, must go over to their side about it, and let this Doctor buy all the land under some new law that there shan’t be any pubs at all. And so my business is ruined so that he can sell his milk. Luckily I’d done pretty well before and had some compensation, of course; and I still do a fair trade on the Q.T., as you see. But of course that don’t amount to half the old one, for they’re afraid of old Meadows finding out. Snuffling old blighter!”

And the gentleman with the good clothes spat on the carpet.

“I am a Radical myself,” said the Irishman, rather coldly, “for all information on the Conservative party I must refer you to my friend, Mr. Pump, who is, of course, in the inmost secrets of his leaders. But it seems to me very rum sort of Radicalism to eat and drink at the orders of a master who is a madman, merely because he’s also a millionaire. 0 Liberty, what very complicated and even unsatisfactory social developments are committed in thy name! Why don’t they kick the old ass round the town a bit? No boots? Is that why they’re allowed no boots? Oh, roll him down hill in a milk can: he can’t object to that.”

“I don’t know,” said Pump, in his ruminant way, “Master Christian’s aunt did, but ladies are more particular, of course.”

“Look here!” cried Dalroy, in some excitement, “if I stick up that sign outside, and stay here to help, will you defy them? You’d be strictly within the law, and any private coercion I can promise you they shall repent. Plant the sign and sell the stuff openly like a man, and you may stand in English history like a deliverer.”

«Oh, sì, signore; luogo assai salubre, Peaceways» disse, sbirciando attraverso la grata. «Assai… accidenti, che intendono?… Assai salubre. Certo, hanno le loro piccole usanze.»

«Bevono soltanto latte puro, non è vero?» chiese Dalroy.

Il padrone di casa lo guardò con occhio piuttosto stralunato e grugnì.

«Sì; così dicono» e tornò di nuovo alla finestra.

«Ne ho comprato un po’» disse Patrick, dando un colpetto al suo caro bidone del latte, che portava sotto il braccio, come se non riuscisse a separarsi dalla scoperta del dottor Meadows. «Prenda un bicchiere di latte, signore.»

L’occhio bollito dell’uomo cominciò a sporgere per l’ira – o qualche altra emozione.

«Che cosa volete?» borbottò, «siete sbirri o cosa?»

«Agenti e distributori del Latte di Montagna di Meadows» disse il capitano, con semplice orgoglio, «lo assaggia?»

Il padrone di casa, stordito, prese un bicchiere dell’incolpevole liquido e ne sorseggiò; e il mutamento sul suo volto fu straordinario.

«Beh, che io sia dannato» disse, con un largo e piuttosto grossolano ghigno. «È un bello scherzo. Siete in combutta, lo vedo.» Poi tornò di nuovo irrequieto alla finestra; e aggiunse: «ma se siamo tutti amici, perché diavolo gli altri non entrano? Non ho mai visto il commercio così fiacco prima d’ora.»

«Chi sono gli altri?» chiese il signor Pump.

«Oh, la solita gente di Peaceways» disse l’altro. «Di solito vengono qui prima del lavoro. Il dottor Meadows non li fa lavorare per orari molto lunghi, non sarebbe salubre o come diavolo lo chiama lui; ma è puntiglioso sulla loro puntualità. Li ho visti correre, con tutti i loro abiti dall’animo puro addosso, quando la sirena dava l’ultimo richiamo.»

Poi aprì bruscamente la porta d’ingresso e chiamò con impazienza, ma non a voce alta:

«Venite dentro, se dovete venire. Rovinerete tutta la messinscena se fate lo scemo là fuori.»

Anche Patrick guardò fuori, e la vista della strada all’esterno era certamente piuttosto singolare. Era abituato alle folle, grandi e piccole, che si radunavano davanti alle case da lui onorate con l’insegna della «Vecchia Nave», ma di solito la fissavano con schietta meraviglia e divertimento. Ma fuori da quella porta aperta, una ventina o trentina di persone in quelle che Pump aveva chiamato le loro camicie da notte si muovevano avanti e indietro come sonnambuli, apparentemente ciechi alla presenza dell’insegna; guardando l’altro lato della strada, guardando l’orizzonte, guardando le nubi del mattino; e solo di tanto in tanto fermandosi a bisbigliare l’uno con l’altro. Ma quando il proprietario della casa chiamò uno di questi esseri ostentatamente distratti e gli domandò con voce rauca che diavolo avesse, fu naturale che il nutrito a latte volgesse il suo occhio fiacco verso l’insegna. Gli occhi da uva spina seguirono i suoi, e il volto cui appartenevano fu uno studio di apoplettico stupore.

«Che diavolo avete fatto alla mia casa?» domandò. «Di certo non possono entrare se c’è questa cosa qui.»

«La toglierò, se vuole» disse Dalroy, uscendo e raccogliendola come un fiore dal giardino antistante (con lo stupore degli uomini nella strada, che si credettero capitati in una fiaba da vivaio), «ma vorrei, in cambio, che mi deste un’idea di che diavolo significhi tutto questo.»

«Aspetti che abbia servito questi uomini» rispose il suo ospite.

Le persone vestite da capra entrarono molto pecorescamente (o caprescamente) nell’edificio ormai privo d’insegna, e furono rapidamente servite di acquaviti grezze, che il signor Pump sospettò essere di qualità nient’affatto superiore. Quando l’ultima capra se ne fu andata, il capitano Dalroy disse:

«Voglio dire che tutto questo mi pare a rovescio. Avevo capito che, per come sta la legge adesso, se c’è un’insegna è loro permesso bere, e se non c’è non lo è.»

«La Legge!» disse l’uomo, con voce densa di disprezzo. «Crede che questi poveri bruti abbiano paura della Legge quanto ne hanno del Dottore?»

«Perché mai dovrebbero avere paura del Dottore?» chiese Dalroy, ingenuamente. «Ho sempre sentito dire che Peaceways era una repubblica che si governa da sé.»

«Che si governi da sé col diavolo» fu l’illiberale replica. «Non possiede lui tutte le case e non potrebbe cacciarli fuori in una tormenta di neve? Non paga lui tutti i salari e non potrebbe ridurli alla fame in un mese? La Legge!» E sbuffò. Un momento dopo puntò i gomiti sul tavolo e cominciò a spiegare più a fondo.

«Ero un birraio da queste parti e avevo la birreria più grande di questa zona. C’erano solo due locali che non mi appartenevano, e dopo un po’ di tempo i magistrati tolsero loro la licenza. Dieci anni fa si poteva vedere “Birre Hugby” scritto accanto a ogni insegna della contea. Poi vennero questi maledetti Radicali, e il nostro capo, Lord Ivywood, dovette passare dalla loro parte in proposito, e lasciar comprare a questo Dottore tutta la terra sotto qualche nuova legge secondo cui non ci sarebbero più stati pub. E così i miei affari sono rovinati perché lui possa vendere il suo latte. Per fortuna me l’ero cavata piuttosto bene prima e ho avuto un qualche indennizzo, naturalmente; e faccio ancora un discreto commercio sotto banco, come vede. Ma naturalmente non ammonta neppure alla metà di quello di prima, perché hanno paura che il vecchio Meadows lo scopra. Vecchio farabutto piagnucoloso!»

E il signore dai bei vestiti sputò sul tappeto.

«Io stesso sono un Radicale» disse l’irlandese, piuttosto freddamente, «per ogni informazione sul partito Conservatore devo rimandarvi al mio amico, il signor Pump, il quale è, naturalmente, nei più intimi segreti dei suoi capi. Ma mi pare una ben strana specie di Radicalismo mangiare e bere agli ordini di un padrone che è un pazzo, solo perché è anche milionario. O Libertà, quali sviluppi sociali assai complicati e persino insoddisfacenti si commettono nel tuo nome! Perché non prendono a calci il vecchio asino per il paese un po’? Niente stivali? È per questo che non gli sono concessi stivali? Oh, fatelo rotolare giù per la collina in un bidone del latte: a quello non può obiettare.»

«Non saprei» disse Pump, nella sua maniera ruminante, «la zia del signorino Christian sì che obiettò, ma le signore sono più schizzinose, naturalmente.»

«Senta un po’!» esclamò Dalroy, con una certa concitazione, «se pianto quell’insegna là fuori, e resto qui a dare una mano, li sfiderà? Sareste rigorosamente nei limiti della legge, e qualunque coercizione privata le prometto che se ne pentiranno. Pianti l’insegna e venda la roba apertamente come un uomo, e potrà stare nella storia inglese come un liberatore.»

Mr. Hugby, of Hugby’s Ales, only looked gloomily at the table. His was not the sort of drinking nor the sort of drink-selling on which the revolutionary sentiment flourishes.

“Well,” said the Captain, “will you come with me and say ‘Hear, hear!’ and ‘How true!’–‘What matchless eloquence!’ if I make a speech in the market-place? Come along! There’s room in our car.”

“Well, I’ll come with you, if you like,” replied Mr. Hugby, heavily. “It’s true if yours is allowed we might get our trade back, too.” And putting on a silk hat he followed the Captain and the innkeeper out to their little car. The model village was not an appropriate background for Mr. Hugby’s silk hat. Indeed, the hat somehow seemed to bring out by contrast all that was fantastic in the place.

It was a superb morning, some hours after sunrise. The edges of the sky touching the ring of dim woods and distant hills were still jewelled with the tiny transparent clouds of daybreak, delicate red and green or yellow. But above the vault of Heaven rose through turquoise into a torrid and solid blue in which the other clouds, the colossal cumuli, tumbled about like a celestial pillow-fight. The bulk of the houses were as white as the clouds, so that it looked (to use another simile) as if some of the whitewashed cottages were flying and falling about the sky. But most of the white houses were picked out here and there with bright colours, here an ornament in orange or there a stripe of lemon yellow, as if by the brush of a baby giant. The houses had no thatching (thatching is not hygienic) but were mostly covered with a sort of peacock green tiles bought cheap at a Preraphaelite Bazaar; or, less frequently, by some still more esoteric sort of terra cotta bricks. The houses were not English, nor homelike, nor suited to the landscape; for the houses had not been built by free men for themselves, but at the fancy of a whimsical lord. But considered as a sort of elfin city in a pantomime it was a really picturesque background for pantomimic proceedings.

I fear Mr. Dalroy’s proceedings from the first rather deserved that name. To begin with, he left the sign, the cask, and the keg all wrapped and concealed in the car, but removed all the wraps of his own disguise, and stood on the central patch of grass in that green uniform that looked all the more insolent for being as ragged as the grass. Even that was less ragged than his red hair, which no red jungle of the East could imitate. Then he took out, almost tenderly, the large milk can, and deposited it, almost reverently, on the island of turf. Then he stood beside it, like Napoleon beside a gun, with an expression of tremendous seriousness and even severity. Then he drew his sword, and with that flashing weapon, as with a flail, lashed and thrashed the echoing metal can till the din was deafening, and Mr. Hugby hastily got out of the car and withdrew to a slight distance, stopping his ears. Mr. Pump sat solidly at the steering wheel, well knowing it might be necessary to start in some haste.

“Gather, gather, gather, Peaceways,” shouted Patrick, still banging on the can and lamenting the difficulties of adapting “Macgregor’s Gathering” to the name and occasion, “We’re landless,landless, landless, Peaceways!”

Two or three of the goat-clad, recognising Mr. Hugby with a guilty look, drew near with great caution, and the Captain shouted at them as if they were an army covering Salisbury Plain.

“Citizens,” he roared, saying anything that came into his head, “try the only original unadulterated Mountain Milk, for which alone Mahomet came to the mountain. The original milk of the land flowing with milk and honey; the high quality of which could alone have popularised so unappetising a combination. Try our milk! None others are genuine! Who can do without milk. Even whales can’t do without milk. If any lady or gentleman keeps a favourite whale at home, now’s their chance! The early whale catches the milk. Just look at our milk! If you say you can’t look at the milk, because it’s in the can–well, look at the can! You must look at the can! You simply must! When Duty whispers low ‘Thou Must!’” he bellowed at the top of his voice in a highly impromptu peroration, “When Duty whispers low ‘Thou Must,’ the Youth replies, ‘I can!’” And with the word “Can” he hit the can with a shocking and shattering noise, like a peal of demoniac bells of steel.

This introductory speech is open to criticism from those who regard it as intended for the study rather than the stage. The present chronicler (who has no aim save truth) is bound to record that for its own unscrupulous purpose it was extremely successful: a great mass of the citizens of Peaceways having been attracted by the noise of one man shouting like a crowd. There are crowds who do not care to revolt; but there are no crowds who do not like someone else to do it for them; a fact which the safest oligarchs may be wise to learn.

But Dalroy’s ultimate triumph (I regret to say) consisted in actually handing to a few of the foremost of his audience some samples of his blameless beverage. The fact was certainly striking. Some were paralysed with surprise. Some were abruptly broken double with laughter. Many chuckled. Some cheered. All looked radiantly toward the eccentric orator.

And yet the radiance died quietly and suddenly from their faces. And only because one little old man had joined the group; a little old man in white linen with a white pointed beard and a white powder-puff of hair like thistledown: a man whom almost every man present could have killed with the left arm.

Il signor Hugby, delle Birre Hugby, si limitò a fissare cupamente il tavolo. Il suo non era il genere di bevute né il genere di vendita di bevande su cui prospera il sentimento rivoluzionario.

«Ebbene» disse il capitano, «verrà con me a dire “Bravo, bravo!” e “Come è vero!” – “Quale ineguagliabile eloquenza!” se tengo un discorso nella piazza del mercato? Andiamo! C’è posto nella nostra automobile.»

«Beh, verrò con lei, se vuole» rispose il signor Hugby, pesantemente. «È vero che se la sua è permessa potremmo riavere anche il nostro commercio.» E, calcandosi in testa un cilindro di seta, seguì il capitano e il locandiere fino alla loro piccola automobile. Il villaggio modello non era uno sfondo appropriato per il cilindro di seta del signor Hugby. Anzi, il cappello pareva in qualche modo far risaltare per contrasto tutto ciò che di fantastico c’era in quel luogo.

Era una mattina superba, alcune ore dopo l’alba. I margini del cielo che toccavano l’anello di boschi indistinti e di colline lontane erano ancora ingioiellati dalle minuscole nuvole trasparenti dell’aurora, delicato rosso e verde o giallo. Ma in alto la volta del Cielo si levava rosata attraverso il turchese fino a un blu torrido e compatto in cui le altre nuvole, i colossali cumuli, si accapigliavano come in una celestiale battaglia di guanciali. Il grosso delle case era bianco come le nuvole, sicché pareva (per usare un’altra similitudine) che alcuni dei cottage imbiancati a calce volassero e cadessero per il cielo. Ma la maggior parte delle case bianche era punteggiata qua e là di colori vivaci, qui un ornamento in arancione o là una striscia di giallo limone, come dal pennello di un gigante bambino. Le case non avevano tetti di paglia (la paglia non è igienica) ma erano per lo più coperte da una sorta di tegole verde pavone comprate a poco prezzo a un Bazar Preraffaellita; o, meno di frequente, da qualche specie ancora più esoterica di mattoni in terracotta. Le case non erano inglesi, né accoglienti, né adatte al paesaggio; poiché le case non erano state costruite da uomini liberi per sé, ma a capriccio di un lord bizzarro. Ma, considerato come una sorta di città fatata in una pantomima, era davvero uno sfondo pittoresco per procedimenti pantomimici.

Temo che i procedimenti del signor Dalroy meritassero, fin da principio, piuttosto quel nome. Tanto per cominciare, lasciò l’insegna, il barile e il barilotto tutti avvolti e nascosti nell’automobile, ma si tolse tutti gli involti del proprio travestimento, e rimase sul lembo centrale d’erba in quella divisa verde che pareva tanto più insolente per essere cenciosa quanto l’erba. Persino quella era meno cenciosa dei suoi capelli rossi, che nessuna giungla rossa d’Oriente avrebbe potuto imitare. Poi tirò fuori, quasi teneramente, il grande bidone del latte, e lo depose, quasi con riverenza, sull’isola di zolla erbosa. Poi vi stette accanto, come Napoleone accanto a un cannone, con un’espressione di tremenda serietà e persino severità. Poi sguainò la spada, e con quella lampeggiante arma, come con un correggiato, sferzò e batté il risonante bidone di metallo finché il fracasso fu assordante, e il signor Hugby uscì in fretta dall’automobile e si ritirò a una certa distanza, tappandosi le orecchie. Il signor Pump sedeva saldamente al volante, sapendo bene che poteva rendersi necessario partire in gran fretta.

«Radunatevi, radunatevi, radunatevi, Peaceways» gridava Patrick, sempre battendo sul bidone e lamentando le difficoltà di adattare “Macgregor’s Gathering” al nome e all’occasione, «Siamo senza terra, senza terra, senza terra, Peaceways!»

Due o tre di quelli vestiti da capra, riconoscendo il signor Hugby con aria colpevole, si avvicinarono con gran cautela, e il capitano gridò loro come se fossero un’armata schierata sulla piana di Salisbury.

«Cittadini» ruggì, dicendo qualunque cosa gli passasse per la testa, «provate l’unico originale e non adulterato Latte di Montagna, per il quale soltanto Maometto venne alla montagna. Il latte originale della terra che scorre latte e miele; la cui alta qualità soltanto poteva aver reso popolare un accostamento così poco appetitoso. Provate il nostro latte! Nessun altro è genuino! Chi può fare a meno del latte. Neppure le balene possono fare a meno del latte. Se una qualche dama o gentiluomo tiene una balena prediletta a casa, ecco la loro occasione! La balena mattiniera acchiappa il latte. Guardate soltanto il nostro latte! Se dite che non potete guardare il latte, perché è nel bidone – beh, guardate il bidone! Dovete guardare il bidone! Semplicemente dovete! Quando il Dovere sussurra piano “Tu Devi!”» tuonò a squarciagola in una peroraziona altamente improvvisata, «Quando il Dovere sussurra piano “Tu Devi”, il Giovane risponde: “Io Posso!”» E con la parola “Posso” colpì il bidone con un fragore terribile e frantumante, come uno scampanio di demoniache campane d’acciaio.

Questo discorso introduttivo è passibile di critica da parte di chi lo consideri destinato allo studio piuttosto che al palcoscenico. Il presente cronista (che non ha altro scopo che la verità) è tenuto a registrare che, per il suo proprio scopo senza scrupoli, ebbe estremo successo: una gran massa dei cittadini di Peaceways era stata attirata dal fracasso di un solo uomo che gridava come una folla. Vi sono folle che non hanno voglia di rivoltarsi; ma non vi sono folle cui non piaccia che qualcun altro lo faccia per loro; fatto che gli oligarchi più prudenti farebbero bene ad apprendere.

Ma il trionfo ultimo di Dalroy (mi duole dirlo) consistette nel consegnare effettivamente ad alcuni tra i più avanzati del suo uditorio qualche campione della sua incolpevole bevanda. Il fatto fu certamente sorprendente. Alcuni furono paralizzati dalla sorpresa. Alcuni si piegarono di colpo in due dalle risa. Molti ridacchiarono. Alcuni acclamarono. Tutti guardarono raggianti verso l’eccentrico oratore.

Eppure il fulgore si spense quieto e improvviso dai loro volti. E solo perché un piccolo vecchio si era unito al gruppo; un piccolo vecchio in lino bianco con una bianca barba a punta e un bianco piumino di capelli come lanugine di cardo: un uomo che quasi ogni uomo presente avrebbe potuto uccidere col braccio sinistro.

CHAPTER XIX: THE HOSPITALITY OF THE CAPTAIN

DR. MOSES MEADOWS, whether that was his name or an Anglicised version of it, had certainly come in the first instance from a little town in Germany and his first two books were written in German. His first two books were his best, for he began with a genuine enthusiasm for physical science, and this was adulterated with nothing worse than a hatred of what he thought was superstition, and what many of us think is the soul of the state. The first enthusiasm was most notable in the first book, which was concerned to show that “in the female not upsprouting of the whiskers was from the therewith increasing arrested mentality derived.” In his second book he came more to grips with delusions, and for some time he was held to have proved (to everyone who agreed with him already) that the Time Ghost had been walking particularly “rapidly, lately; and that the Christus Mythus was by the alcoholic mind’s trouble explained.” Then, unfortunately, he came across the institution called Death, and began to argue with it. Not seeing any rational explanation of this custom of dying, so prevalent among his fellow-citizens, he concluded that it was merely traditional (which he thought meant “effete”), and began to think of nothing but ways of evading or delaying it. This had a rather narrowing effect on him, and he lost much of that acrid ardour which had humanised the atheism of his youth, when he would almost have committed suicide for the pleasure of taunting God with not being there. His later idealism grew more and more into materialism and consisted of his changing hypotheses and discoveries about the healthiest foods. There is no need to detain the reader over what has been called his Oil Period; his Sea-weed Period has been authoritatively expounded in Professor Nym’s valuable little work; and on the events of his Glue Period it is, perhaps, not very generous to dwell. It was during his prolonged stay in England that he chanced on the instance of the longevity of milk consumers, and built on it a theory which was, at the beginning at least, sincere. Unfortunately it was also successful: wealth flowed in to the inventor and proprietor of Mountain Milk, and he began to feel a fourth and last enthusiasm, which, also, can come late in life and have a narrowing effect on the mind.

In the altercation which naturally followed on his discovery of the antics of Mr. Patrick Dalroy, he was very dignified, but naturally not very tolerant; for he was quite unused to anything happening in spite of him, or anything important even happening without him, in the land that lay around. At first he hinted severely that the Captain had stolen the milk can from the milk-producing premises, and sent several workmen to count the cans in each shed; but Dalroy soon put him right about that.

“I bought it in a shop at Wyddington,” he said, “and since then I have used no other. You’ll hardly believe me” he said, with some truth, “but when I went into that shop I was quite a little man. I had one glass of your Mountain Milk; and look at me now.”

“You have no right to sell the milk here,” said Dr. Meadows, with the faintest trace of a German accent. “You are not in my employment; I am not responsible for your methods. You are not a representative of the business.”

“I’m an Advertisement,” said the Captain. “We advertise you all over England. You see that lean, skimpy, little man over there,” pointing to the indignant Mr. Pump, “He’s Before Taking Meadows’s Mountain Milk. I’m After,” added Mr. Dalroy, with satisfaction.

“You shall laugh at the magistrate,” said the other, with a thickening accent.

“I shall,” agreed Patrick. “Well, I’ll make a clean breast of it, sir. The truth is it isn’t your milk at all. It has quite a different taste. These gentlemen will tell you so.”

A smothered giggle sent all the blood to the eminent capitalist’s face.

“Then, either you have stolen my can and are a thief,” he said, stamping, “or you have introduced inferior substances into my discovery and are an adulterer–er–”

“Try adulteratist,” said Dalroy, kindly. “Prince Albert always said ‘adulteratarian.’ Dear old Albert! It seems like yesterday! But it is, of course, today. And it’s as true as daylight that this stuff tastes different. I can’t tell you what the taste is” (subdued guffaws from the outskirts of the crowd). “It’s something between the taste of your first sugar-stick and the fag-end of your father’s cigar. It’s as innocent as Heaven and as hot as hell. It tastes like a paradox. It tastes like a prehistoric inconsistency–I trust I make myself clear. The men who taste it most are the simplest men that God has made, and it always reminds them of the salt, because it is made out of sugar. Have some!”

And with a gesture of staggering hospitality, he shot out his long arm with the little glass at the end of it. The despotic curiosity in the Prussian overcame even his despotic dignity. He took a sip of the liquid, and his eyes stood out from his face.

“You’ve been mixing something with the milk,” were the first words that came to him.

“Yes,” answered Dalroy, “and so have you, unless you’re a swindler. Why is your milk advertised as different from everyone else’s milk, if you haven’t made the difference? Why does a glass of your milk cost threepence, and a glass of ordinary milk, a penny, if you haven’t put twopennorth of something into it? Now, look here, Dr. Meadows. The Public Analyst who would judge this, happens to be an honest man. I have a list of the twenty-one and a half honest men still employed in such posts. I make you a fair offer. He shall decide what it is I add to the milk, if you let him decide what it is you add to the milk. You must add something to the milk, or what can all these wheels and pumps and pulleys be for? Will you tell me, here and now, what you add to the milk which makes it so exceedingly Mountain?”

CAPITOLO XIX: L’OSPITALITÀ DEL CAPITANO

IL DOTTOR MOSES MEADOWS, che fosse questo il suo nome o una sua versione anglicizzata, era certamente giunto in prima istanza da una cittadina della Germania, e i suoi primi due libri furono scritti in tedesco. I suoi primi due libri furono i migliori, poiché egli cominciò con un genuino entusiasmo per la scienza fisica, e questo non era adulterato da nulla di peggio di un odio per ciò che egli riteneva superstizione, e che molti di noi ritengono l’anima dello Stato. Il primo entusiasmo era più cospicuo nel primo libro, che si proponeva di dimostrare che «nella femmina il non-germogliare dei baffi era dalla con-ciò-crescente arrestata mentalità derivato». Nel suo secondo libro venne più alle prese con le illusioni, e per qualche tempo fu ritenuto aver provato (a chiunque già concordasse con lui) che il Tempo-Fantasma aveva camminato particolarmente «rapidamente, di recente; e che il Christus Mythus era dal turbamento della mente alcolica spiegato». Poi, sfortunatamente, s’imbatté nell’istituzione chiamata Morte, e cominciò a discutere con essa. Non vedendo alcuna spiegazione razionale di questa consuetudine del morire, così prevalente tra i suoi concittadini, concluse che era meramente tradizionale (il che, secondo lui, significava «infiacchito»), e cominciò a non pensare ad altro che a modi di eluderla o di ritardarla. Ciò ebbe su di lui un effetto piuttosto restringente, e perdette molto di quell’acre ardore che aveva reso umano l’ateismo della sua gioventù, quando avrebbe quasi commesso suicidio per il piacere di beffare Dio del non esserci. Il suo idealismo più tardo si mutò sempre più in materialismo e consistette nei suoi cangianti ipotesi e scoperte intorno ai cibi più salubri. Non occorre trattenere il lettore su quello che è stato chiamato il suo Periodo dell’Olio; il suo Periodo delle Alghe è stato autorevolmente esposto nella pregevole operetta del professor Nym; e sugli eventi del suo Periodo della Colla non è, forse, molto generoso soffermarsi. Fu durante il suo prolungato soggiorno in Inghilterra che s’imbatté nel caso della longevità dei consumatori di latte, e vi costruì sopra una teoria che era, almeno al principio, sincera. Sfortunatamente era anche di successo: la ricchezza affluì all’inventore e proprietario del Latte di Montagna, ed egli cominciò a sentire un quarto e ultimo entusiasmo, il quale, anch’esso, può venire tardi nella vita e avere un effetto restringente sulla mente.

Nell’alterco che seguì naturalmente alla scoperta delle stravaganze del signor Patrick Dalroy, egli fu molto dignitoso, ma naturalmente non molto tollerante; poiché era del tutto disabituato a che accadesse alcunché a suo dispetto, o che alcunché d’importante accadesse persino senza di lui, nella terra che gli giaceva intorno. Dapprima insinuò severamente che il capitano avesse rubato il bidone del latte dai locali di produzione del latte, e mandò diversi operai a contare i bidoni in ogni capanno; ma Dalroy lo mise presto in chiaro su ciò.

«L’ho comprato in un negozio a Wyddington» disse, «e da allora non ne ho usato altro. Stenterà a credermi» disse, con una certa verità, «ma quando entrai in quel negozio ero un ometto ben piccolo. Bevvi un bicchiere del suo Latte di Montagna; e mi guardi adesso.»

«Non ha alcun diritto di vendere il latte qui» disse il dottor Meadows, con la più tenue traccia di un accento tedesco. «Non è alle mie dipendenze; non sono responsabile dei suoi metodi. Non è un rappresentante dell’azienda.»

«Sono una Réclame» disse il capitano. «La pubblicizziamo per tutta l’Inghilterra. Vede quell’omino magro e striminzito laggiù» indicando l’indignato signor Pump, «lui è il “Prima di prendere il Latte di Montagna di Meadows”. Io sono il “Dopo”» aggiunse il signor Dalroy, con soddisfazione.

«Riderà davanti al magistrato» disse l’altro, con accento che s’ispessiva.

«Riderò» convenne Patrick. «Ebbene, le vuoto il sacco, signore. La verità è che non è affatto il suo latte. Ha un sapore del tutto diverso. Questi signori glielo diranno.»

Una risatina soffocata mandò tutto il sangue al volto dell’eminente capitalista.

«Allora, o avete rubato il mio bidone e siete un ladro» disse, pestando i piedi, «o avete introdotto sostanze inferiori nella mia scoperta e siete un adultero – er –»

«Provi adulteratista» disse Dalroy, gentilmente. «Il principe Alberto diceva sempre “adulteratariano”. Caro vecchio Alberto! Pare ieri! Ma è, naturalmente, oggi. Ed è vero come la luce del giorno che questa roba ha un sapore diverso. Non saprei dirle quale sia il sapore» (risate soffocate dai margini della folla). «È qualcosa tra il sapore del vostro primo bastoncino di zucchero e il mozzicone del sigaro di vostro padre. È innocente come il Cielo e caldo come l’inferno. Ha il sapore di un paradosso. Ha il sapore di un’incoerenza preistorica – confido di rendermi chiaro. Gli uomini che ne colgono di più il sapore sono gli uomini più semplici che Dio abbia fatto, ed esso rammenta loro sempre il sale, perché è fatto di zucchero. Ne prenda un po’!»

E con un gesto di sbalorditiva ospitalità, sparò il lungo braccio col piccolo bicchiere all’estremità. La dispotica curiosità nel prussiano ebbe la meglio persino sulla sua dispotica dignità. Prese un sorso del liquido, e gli occhi gli schizzarono fuori dal volto.

«Avete mescolato qualcosa col latte» furono le prime parole che gli vennero.

«Sì» rispose Dalroy, «e anche voi, a meno che non siate un imbroglione. Perché il vostro latte è reclamizzato come diverso dal latte di tutti gli altri, se non avete fatto la differenza? Perché un bicchiere del vostro latte costa tre pence, e un bicchiere di latte ordinario un penny, se non ci avete messo due pence di qualcosa? Ora, senta un po’, dottor Meadows. L’Analista Pubblico che dovrebbe giudicare questo si dà il caso che sia un uomo onesto. Ho una lista dei ventun uomini e mezzo onesti ancora impiegati in tali posti. Le faccio un’offerta leale. Egli deciderà che cosa aggiungo io al latte, se lei lascia che decida che cosa aggiunge lei al latte. Qualcosa deve pur aggiungere al latte, altrimenti a che possono servire tutte queste ruote e pompe e pulegge? Vuol dirmi, qui e ora, che cosa aggiunge al latte che lo rende così straordinariamente di Montagna?»

There was a long silence, full of the same sense of submerged mirth in the mob. But the philanthropist had fallen into a naked frenzy in the sunlight, and shaking his fists aloft in a way unknown to all the English around him, he cried out:

“Ach! but I know what you add! I know what you add! It is the Alcohol! And you have no sign and you shall laugh at a magistrate.”

Dalroy, with a bow, retired to the car, removed a number of wrappings and produced the prodigious wooden sign-post of “The Old Ship,” with its blue three-decker and red St. George’s cross conspicuously displayed. This he planted on his narrow territory of turf and looked round serenely.

“In this old oak-panelled inn of mine,” he said, “I will laugh at a million magistrates. Not that there’s anything unhygienic about this inn. No low ceilings or stuffiness here. Windows open everywhere, except in the floor. And as I hear some are saying there ought always to be food sold with fermented liquor, why, my dear Dr. Meadows, I’ve got a cheese here that will make another man of you. At least, we’ll hope so. We can but try.”

But Dr. Meadows was long past being merely angry. The exhibition of the sign had put him into a serious difficulty. Like most sceptics, like even the most genuine sceptics such as Bradlaugh, he was as legal as he was sceptical. He had a profound fear, which also had in it something better than fear, of being ultimately found in the wrong in a police court or a public inquiry. And he also suffered the tragedy of all such men living in modern England; that he must always be certain to respect the law, while never being certain of what it was. He could only remember generally that Lord Ivywood, when introducing or defending the great Ivywood Act on this matter, had dwelt very strongly on the unique and significant nature of the sign. And he could not be certain that if he disregarded it altogether, he might not eventually be cast in heavy damages–or even go to prison, in spite of his success in business. Of course he knew quite well that he had a thousand answers to such nonsense: that a patch of grass in the road couldn’t be an inn; that the sign wasn’t even produced when the Captain began to hand round the rum. But he also knew quite well that in the black peril we call British law that is not the point. He had heard points quite as obvious urged to a judge and urged in vain. At the bottom of his mind he found this fact: rich as he was, Lord Ivywood had made him–and on which side would Lord Ivywood be?

“Captain,” said Humphrey Pump, speaking for the first time, “we’d better be getting away. I feel it in my bones.”

“Inhospitable innkeeper!” cried the Captain, indignantly. “And after I have gone out of the way to license your premises! Why, this is the dawn of peace in the great city of Peaceways. I don’t despair of Dr. Meadows tossing off another bumper before we’ve done. For the moment, Brother Hugby will engage.”

As he spoke, he served out milk and rum at random; and still the Doctor had too much terror of our legal technicalities to make a final interference. But when Mr. Hugby, of Hugby’s Ales, heard his name called, he first of all jumped so as almost to dislodge the silk hat, then he stood quite still. Then he accepted a glass of the new Mountain Milk; and then his very face became full of speech, before he had spoken a word.

“There’s a motor coming along the road from the far hills,” said Humphrey, quietly. “It’ll be across the last bridge down stream in ten minutes and come up on this side.”

“Well,” said the Captain, impatiently, “I suppose you’ve seen a motor before.”

“Not in this valley all this morning,” answered Pump.

“Mr. Chairman,” said Mr. Hugby, feeling a dim disposition to say “Mr. Vice,” in memory of old commercial banquets, “I’m sure we’re all law-abiding people here, and wish to remain friends, especially with our good friend the Doctor; may he never want a friend or a bottle–that is in short, anything he wants, as we go up the hill of prosperity, and so on. But, as our friend here with the sign-board seems to be within his rights, well, I think the time’s come when we can look at these things more broadly, so to speak. Now I know it’s quite true those dirty little pubs do a lot of harm to a property, and you get a lot of ignorant people there who are just like pigs; and I don’t say our friend the Doctor hasn’t done good by clearing ’em away. But a big, well-managed business with plenty of capital behind it is quite another thing. Well, friends, you all know that I was originally in the Trade; though I have, of course, left off selling under the new regulations.” Here the goats looked rather guiltily at their cloven hoofs. “But I’ve got my little bit and I wouldn’t mind putting it into this ‘Old Ship’ here, if our friend would allow it to be run on business lines. And especially if he’d enlarge the premises a bit. Ha! ha! And if our good friend, the Doctor–”

“You rascal fellow!” spluttered Meadows, “your goot friend the doctor will make you dance before a magistrate.”

“Now, don’t be unbusinesslike,” reasoned the brewer. “It won’t hurt your sales. It’s quite a different public, don’t you see? Do talk like a business man.”

“I am not a business man,” said the scientist, with fiery eyes, “I am a servant of humanity.”

“Then,” said Dalroy, “why do you never do what your master tells you?”

“The motor has crossed the river,” said Humphrey Pump.

“You would undo all my works,” cried the Doctor, with sincere passion. “When I have built this town myself, when I have made it sober and healthful myself, when I am awake and about before anyone in the town myself, watching over its interests–you would ruin all to sell your barbaric and fundamentally beastly beer. And then you call me a goot friend. I am not a goot friend!”

Vi fu un lungo silenzio, colmo dello stesso senso di ilarità sommersa nella calca. Ma il filantropo era caduto in una nuda frenesia alla luce del sole, e scuotendo i pugni in alto in un modo ignoto a tutti gli inglesi intorno a lui, gridò:

«Ach! ma io so che cosa aggiungete! So che cosa aggiungete! È l’Alcol! E non avete alcuna insegna e riderete davanti a un magistrato.»

Dalroy, con un inchino, si ritirò all’automobile, tolse un certo numero di involti e produsse il prodigioso palo dell’insegna in legno della «Vecchia Nave», col suo vascello a tre ponti azzurro e la rossa Croce di San Giorgio cospicuamente esibiti. Lo piantò sul suo angusto territorio di zolla erbosa e si guardò intorno serenamente.

«In questa mia vecchia locanda dai pannelli di quercia» disse, «riderò di un milione di magistrati. Non che ci sia alcunché di antigienico in questa locanda. Niente soffitti bassi né aria viziata qui. Finestre aperte dappertutto, tranne che nel pavimento. E poiché sento dire da alcuni che dovrebbe sempre vendersi del cibo insieme al liquore fermentato, ebbene, mio caro dottor Meadows, ho qui un formaggio che farà di lei un altro uomo. Almeno, lo speriamo. Non possiamo che provare.»

Ma il dottor Meadows era da tempo oltre il semplice essere arrabbiato. L’esibizione dell’insegna lo aveva posto in una seria difficoltà. Come la maggior parte degli scettici, come persino i più genuini scettici quale Bradlaugh, egli era tanto legalista quanto scettico. Aveva un profondo timore, che in sé aveva anche qualcosa di meglio del timore, di essere infine trovato dalla parte del torto in un tribunale di polizia o in un’inchiesta pubblica. E soffriva anche la tragedia di tutti gli uomini simili che vivono nell’Inghilterra moderna: che dev’essere sempre certo di rispettare la legge, senza mai essere certo di che cosa essa fosse. Poteva solo ricordare in generale che Lord Ivywood, nell’introdurre o nel difendere la grande Legge Ivywood in questa materia, aveva insistito molto fortemente sulla singolare e significativa natura dell’insegna. E non poteva essere certo che, se l’avesse ignorata del tutto, non potesse alla fine essere condannato a pesanti danni – o persino andare in prigione, a dispetto del suo successo negli affari. Naturalmente sapeva assai bene di avere mille risposte a simili sciocchezze: che un lembo d’erba nella strada non poteva essere una locanda; che l’insegna non era stata neppure esibita quando il capitano aveva cominciato a distribuire il rum. Ma sapeva anche assai bene che nel nero pericolo che noi chiamiamo legge britannica non è quello il punto. Aveva sentito addurre a un giudice, e addurre invano, punti altrettanto ovvi. In fondo alla sua mente trovava questo fatto: per quanto ricco fosse, era stato Lord Ivywood a farlo tale – e da quale parte sarebbe stato Lord Ivywood?

«Capitano» disse Humphrey Pump, parlando per la prima volta, «faremmo meglio a filarcela. Lo sento nelle ossa.»

«Locandiere inospitale!» esclamò il capitano, indignato. «E dopo che mi sono fatto in quattro per licenziarle i locali! Ma questa è l’alba della pace nella grande città di Peaceways. Non dispero che il dottor Meadows tracanni un altro bicchiere prima che abbiamo finito. Per il momento, il fratello Hugby prenderà la parola.»

Mentre parlava, distribuiva latte e rum a casaccio; e ancora il Dottore aveva troppo terrore dei nostri cavilli legali per fare un’interferenza definitiva. Ma quando il signor Hugby, delle Birre Hugby, sentì chiamare il proprio nome, dapprima sobbalzò così da quasi far cadere il cilindro di seta, poi rimase del tutto immobile. Poi accettò un bicchiere del nuovo Latte di Montagna; e poi il suo stesso volto si fece pieno di parole, prima ancora che avesse proferito parola.

«C’è un’automobile che arriva lungo la strada dalle colline lontane» disse Humphrey, tranquillamente. «Attraverserà l’ultimo ponte più a valle tra dieci minuti e risalirà da questo lato.»

«Ebbene» disse il capitano, con impazienza, «suppongo che tu abbia già visto un’automobile prima d’ora.»

«Non in questa vallata per tutta la mattinata» rispose Pump.

«Signor Presidente» disse il signor Hugby, provando una vaga disposizione a dire «Signor Vice», in memoria di vecchi banchetti commerciali, «sono certo che siamo tutti gente rispettosa della legge, qui, e desideriamo rimanere amici, specialmente col nostro buon amico il Dottore; possa egli non aver mai bisogno d’un amico o d’una bottiglia – vale a dire, insomma, di qualunque cosa desideri, mentre saliamo la collina della prosperità, e così via. Ma, poiché il nostro amico qui con l’insegna pare essere nei suoi diritti, beh, penso che sia venuto il momento in cui possiamo guardare a queste cose più ampiamente, per così dire. Ora, so bene che è verissimo che quei sudici piccoli pub fanno molto danno a una proprietà, e ci si trova un mucchio di gente ignorante che è proprio come i porci; e non dico che il nostro amico il Dottore non abbia fatto del bene sbarazzandosene. Ma un grande affare ben gestito con parecchio capitale alle spalle è tutt’altra cosa. Ebbene, amici, sapete tutti che ero originariamente nel Commercio; sebbene abbia, naturalmente, smesso di vendere sotto le nuove disposizioni.» Qui le capre guardarono piuttosto colpevolmente i loro zoccoli fessi. «Ma ho il mio gruzzoletto e non mi dispiacerebbe metterlo in questa “Vecchia Nave” qui, se il nostro amico permettesse che fosse condotta secondo criteri d’affari. E specialmente se ampliasse un poco i locali. Ah! ah! E se il nostro buon amico, il Dottore –»

«Farabutto d’un tipo!» sbottò Meadows, «il vostro buon amico il dottore vi farà ballare davanti a un magistrato.»

«Suvvia, non sia poco pratico degli affari» ragionò il birraio. «Non danneggerà le sue vendite. È tutt’altro pubblico, non vede? Parli pure da uomo d’affari.»

«Io non sono un uomo d’affari» disse lo scienziato, con occhi di fuoco, «sono un servitore dell’umanità.»

«Allora» disse Dalroy, «perché non fa mai ciò che il suo padrone le ordina?»

«L’automobile ha attraversato il fiume» disse Humphrey Pump.

«Voi disfareste tutte le mie opere» gridò il Dottore, con sincera passione. «Quando ho costruito questa città io stesso, quando l’ho resa sobria e salubre io stesso, quando sono desto e in piedi prima di chiunque in città io stesso, vegliando sui suoi interessi – voi rovinereste tutto per vendere la vostra birra barbara e fondamentalmente bestiale. E poi mi chiamate un buon amico. Io non sono un buon amico!»

“That I can’t say,” growled Hugby, “but if it comes to that–aren’t you trying to sell–”

A motor car drove up with a white explosion of dust, and about six very dusty people got out of it. Even through the densest disguise of the swift motorist, Pump perceived in many of them the peculiar style and bodily carriage of the police. The most evident exception was a long and more slender figure, which, on removing its cap and goggles, disclosed the dark and drooping features of J. Leveson, Secretary. He walked across to the little, old millionaire, who instantly recognized him and shook hands. They confabulated for some little time, turning over some official documents. Dr. Meadows cleared his throat and said to the whole crowd.

“I am very glad to be able to announce to you all that this extraordinary outrage has been too late attempted. Lord Ivywood, with the promptitude he so invariably shows, has immediately communicated to places of importance such as this a most just and right alteration of the law, which exactly meets the present case.

“We shall sleep in jail tonight,” said Humphrey, Pump. “I know it in my bones.”

“It is enough to say,” proceeded the millionaire, “that by the law as it now stands, any innkeeper, even if he display a sign, is subject to imprisonment if he sells alcohol on premises where it has not been previously kept for three days.”

“I thought it would be something like that,” muttered Pump. “Shall we give up, Captain, or shall we try a bolt for it?”

Even the impudence of Dalroy appeared for the instant dazed and stilled. He was staring forlornly up into the abyss of sky above him, as if, like Shelley, he could get inspiration from the last and purest clouds and the perfect hues of the ends of Heaven.

At last he said, in a soft and meditative voice, the single syllable,

“Sells!”

Pump looked at him sharply with a remarkable expression growing on his grim face. But the Doctor was far too rabidly rejoicing in his triumph to understand the Captain’s meaning.

“Sells alcohol, are the exact words,” he insisted, brandishing the blue oblong of the new Act of Parliament.

“So far as I am concerned they are inexact words,” said Captain Dalroy, with polite indifference. “I have not been selling alcohol, I have been giving it away. Has anybody here paid me money? Has anybody here seen anybody else pay me money? I’m a philanthropist just like Dr. Meadows. I’m his living image!”

Mr. Leveson and Dr. Meadows looked across at each other, and on the face of the first was consternation, and on the second a full return of all his terrors of the complicated law.

“I shall remain here for several weeks,” continued the Captain, leaning elegantly on the can, “and shall give away, gratis, such supplies of this excellent drink as may be demanded by the citizens. It appears that there is no such supply at present in this district, and I feel sure that no person present can object to so strictly legal and highly charitable an arrangement.”

In this he was apparently in error; for several persons present seemed to object to it. But curiously enough it was not the withered and fanatical face of the philanthropist Meadows, nor the dark and equine face of the official Leveson, which stood out most vividly as a picture of protest. The face most strangely unsympathetic with this form of charity was that of the ex-proprietor of Hugby’s Ales. His gooseberry eyes were almost dropping from his head and his words sprang from his lips before he could stop them.

“And you blooming well think you can come here like a big buffoon, you beast, and take away all my trade–”

Old Meadows turned on him with the swiftness of an adder.

“And what is your trade, Mr. Hugby?” he asked.

The brewer bubbled with a sort of bursting anger. The goats all looked at the ground as is, according to a Roman poet, the habit of the lower animals. Man (in the character of Mr. Patrick Dalroy) taking advantage of a free but fine translation of the Latin passage, “looked aloft, and with uplifted eyes beheld his own hereditary skies.”

“Well, all I can say is,” roared Mr. Hugby, “if the police come all this way and can’t lock up a dirty loafer whose coat’s all in rags, there’s an end of me paying these fat infernal taxes and–”

“Yes,” said Dalroy, in a voice that fell like an axe, “there is an end of you, please God. It’s brewers like you that have made the inns stink with poison, till even good men asked for no inns at all. And you are worse than the teetotallers, for you prevented what they never knew. And as for you, eminent man of science, great philanthropist, idealist and destroyer of inns, let me give one cold fact for your information. You are not respected. You are obeyed. Why should I or anyone respect you particularly? You say you built this town and get up at daybreak to watch this town. You built it for money and you watch it for more money. Why should I respect you because you are fastidious about food, that your poor old digestion may outlive the hearts of better men? Why should you be the god of this valley, whose god is your belly, merely because you do not even love your god, but only fear him? Go home to your prayers, old man; for all men shall die. Read the Bible, if you like, as they do in your German home; and I suppose you once read it to pick texts as you now read it to pick holes. I don’t read it myself, I’m afraid, but I remember some words in old Mulligan’s translation; and I leave them with you. ‘Unless God,’” and he made a movement with his arm, so natural and yet so vast that for an instant the town really looked like a toy of bright coloured cardboard at the feet of the giant; “‘unless God build the city, their labour is but lost that build it; unless God keep the city, the watchman watcheth in vain. It is lost labour that you rise up early in the morning and eat the bread of carefulness; while He giveth His beloved sleep.’ Try and understand what that means, and never mind whether it’s Elohistic. And now, Hump, we’ll away and away. I’m tired of the green tiles over there. Come, fill up my cup,” and he banged down the cask in the car, “come saddle my horses and call out my men. And tremble, gay goats, in the midst of your glee; for you’ve no’ seen the last of my milk can and me.”

This song was joyously borne away with Mr. Dalroy in the disappearing car; and the motorists were miles beyond pursuit from Peaceways before they thought of halting again. But they were still beside the bank of that noble and enlarging river; and in a place of deep fern and fairy-ribboned birches with the glowing and gleaming water behind them, Patrick asked his friend to stop the car.

“By the way,” said Humphrey, suddenly, “there was one thing I didn’t understand. Why was he so afraid of the Public Analyst? What poison and chemicals does he put in the milk?”

“H20,” answered the Captain, “I take it without milk myself.”

And he bent over as if to drink of the stream, as he had done at daybreak.

«Questo non saprei dirlo» ringhiò Hugby, «ma se è per quello – non state cercando anche voi di vendere –»

Un’automobile si accostò con una bianca esplosione di polvere, e ne scesero sei persone assai impolverate. Persino attraverso il più fitto travestimento dell’automobilista veloce, Pump ravvisò in molti di loro il caratteristico stile e portamento del corpo della polizia. L’eccezione più evidente era una figura lunga e più slanciata, la quale, togliendosi berretto e occhialoni, rivelò i tratti scuri e cascanti di J. Leveson, Segretario. Attraversò fino al piccolo, vecchio milionario, che lo riconobbe all’istante e gli strinse la mano. Confabularono per un po’ di tempo, sfogliando alcuni documenti ufficiali. Il dottor Meadows si schiarì la gola e disse a tutta la folla.

«Sono lietissimo di potervi annunciare a tutti che questo straordinario oltraggio è stato tentato troppo tardi. Lord Ivywood, con la prontezza che egli mostra così invariabilmente, ha immediatamente comunicato a luoghi d’importanza come questo una giustissima e correttissima modifica della legge, che risponde esattamente al presente caso.

«Dormiremo in gattabuia stanotte» disse Humphrey Pump. «Lo so nelle ossa.»

«Basti dire» proseguì il milionario, «che per la legge così com’è ora, qualunque locandiere, anche se esibisca un’insegna, è passibile di carcerazione se vende alcol in locali dove esso non sia stato precedentemente tenuto per tre giorni.»

«Pensavo sarebbe stato qualcosa del genere» borbottò Pump. «Ci arrendiamo, capitano, o tentiamo una fuga?»

Persino la sfrontatezza di Dalroy parve per un istante sbigottita e ammutolita. Fissava sconsolato l’abisso di cielo sopra di sé, come se, al pari di Shelley, potesse trarre ispirazione dalle ultime e più pure nuvole e dalle perfette tinte dei confini del Cielo.

Alla fine disse, con voce soave e meditativa, la sola sillaba:

«Vende!»

Pump lo guardò acutamente con una notevole espressione che gli cresceva sul volto arcigno. Ma il Dottore era troppo rabbiosamente rallegrato dal proprio trionfo per comprendere il senso del capitano.

«Vende alcol, sono le parole esatte» insistette, brandendo il rettangolo azzurro della nuova Legge del Parlamento.

«Per quanto mi riguarda sono parole inesatte» disse il capitano Dalroy, con cortese indifferenza. «Non ho venduto alcol, l’ho regalato. Qualcuno qui mi ha pagato del denaro? Qualcuno qui ha visto qualcun altro pagarmi del denaro? Sono un filantropo proprio come il dottor Meadows. Sono la sua immagine vivente!»

Il signor Leveson e il dottor Meadows si guardarono a vicenda, e sul volto del primo c’era la costernazione, e sul secondo un pieno ritorno di tutti i suoi terrori della complicata legge.

«Rimarrò qui per diverse settimane» continuò il capitano, appoggiandosi elegantemente al bidone, «e distribuirò, gratis, tali scorte di questa eccellente bevanda quali possano essere richieste dai cittadini. Pare che al momento non vi sia simile scorta in questo distretto, e sono ben certo che nessuna persona presente possa obiettare a un accordo così rigorosamente legale e altamente caritatevole.»

In ciò era apparentemente in errore; poiché diverse persone presenti parvero obiettarvi. Ma, curiosamente, non fu l’avvizzito e fanatico volto del filantropo Meadows, né il volto scuro ed equino del funzionario Leveson, a spiccare più vividamente come quadro di protesta. Il volto più stranamente poco solidale con questa forma di Carità fu quello dell’ex proprietario delle Birre Hugby. I suoi occhi da uva spina quasi gli cascavano dalla testa e le parole gli balzarono dalle labbra prima che potesse trattenerle.

«E vi mettete maledettamente in testa di poter venire qui come un grosso buffone, bestia che siete, e portarmi via tutto il mio commercio –»

Il vecchio Meadows si voltò verso di lui con la rapidità di una vipera.

«E qual è il vostro commercio, signor Hugby?» chiese.

Il birraio ribollì con una sorta di scoppiante ira. Le capre guardarono tutte a terra, come è, secondo un poeta romano, l’abitudine degli animali inferiori. L’Uomo (nella persona del signor Patrick Dalroy) approfittando di una libera ma bella traduzione del passo latino, «guardò in alto, e con occhi levati contemplò i propri cieli aviti».

«Ebbene, tutto quello che posso dire è» ruggì il signor Hugby, «che se la polizia fa tutta questa strada e non riesce a mettere dentro un lurido fannullone che ha il cappotto tutto a brandelli, ho finito di pagare queste grasse maledette tasse e –»

«Sì» disse Dalroy, con una voce che calò come una scure, «hai finito, per grazia di Dio. Sono birrai come te che hanno fatto puzzare le locande di veleno, finché persino gli uomini onesti hanno chiesto che non vi fossero locande affatto. E sei peggio degli astemi, perché tu hai impedito ciò che essi non hanno mai conosciuto. E in quanto a te, eminente uomo di scienza, grande filantropo, idealista e distruttore di locande, lascia che ti dia un freddo fatto per tua informazione. Tu non sei rispettato. Tu sei obbedito. Perché mai io o chiunque dovremmo rispettarti in particolare? Dici di aver costruito questa città e di alzarti all’alba a vegliare su questa città. L’hai costruita per denaro e la vegli per altro denaro. Perché dovrei rispettarti perché sei schizzinoso sul cibo, affinché la tua povera vecchia digestione possa sopravvivere ai cuori di uomini migliori? Perché dovresti essere il dio di questa vallata, il cui dio è il tuo ventre, solo perché non ami nemmeno il tuo dio, ma soltanto lo temi? Torna a casa alle tue preghiere, vecchio; poiché tutti gli uomini moriranno. Leggi la Bibbia, se ti pare, come fanno nella tua casa tedesca; e suppongo che una volta la leggessi per scegliere i versetti come ora la leggi per cercare il pelo nell’uovo. Io non la leggo, temo, ma ricordo alcune parole nella traduzione del vecchio Mulligan; e te le lascio. “Se non è Dio,”» e fece un movimento col braccio, così naturale eppure così vasto che per un istante la città parve davvero un giocattolo di cartone dai colori vivaci ai piedi del gigante; «“se non è Dio a costruire la città, vana è la fatica di chi la costruisce; se non è Dio a custodire la città, invano veglia il guardiano. È fatica sprecata che vi leviate di buon mattino e mangiate il pane degli affanni; mentre Egli dà il sonno ai suoi diletti.” Cerca di capire che cosa significhi, e non t’importi se sia Elohista. E ora, Hump, via, e via ce ne andiamo. Sono stanco delle tegole verdi laggiù. Suvvia, riempimi la coppa» e sbatté giù il barile nell’automobile, «suvvia, sellate i miei cavalli e chiamate i miei uomini. E tremate, allegre capre, in mezzo alla vostra baldoria; ché non avete visto l’ultima del mio bidone del latte e di me.»

Questa canzone fu gioiosamente portata via con il signor Dalroy nell’automobile che spariva; e gli automobilisti erano miglia oltre ogni inseguimento da Peaceways prima di pensare a fermarsi di nuovo. Ma erano ancora accanto alla sponda di quel nobile e ampliantesi fiume; e in un luogo di felci profonde e di betulle fasciate di nastri fatati con l’acqua ardente e scintillante alle loro spalle, Patrick chiese all’amico di fermare l’automobile.

«A proposito» disse Humphrey, all’improvviso, «c’era una cosa che non ho capito. Perché aveva tanta paura dell’Analista Pubblico? Che veleno e sostanze chimiche mette nel latte?»

«H2O» rispose il capitano, «io lo prendo senza latte.»

E si chinò come per bere dal ruscello, come aveva fatto all’alba.

CHAPTER XX: THE TURK AND THE FUTURISTS

MR. ADRIAN CROOKE was a successful chemist whose shop was in the neighbourhood of Victoria, but his face expressed more than is generally required in a successful chemist. It was a curious face, prematurely old and like parchment, but acute and decisive, with real headwork in every line of it. Nor was his conversation, when he did converse, out of keeping with this: he had lived in many countries, and had a rich store of anecdote about the more quaint and sometimes the more sinister side of his work, visions of the vapour of eastern drugs or guesses at the ingredients of Renascence poisons. He himself, it need hardly be said, was a most respectable and reliable apothecary, or he would not have had the custom of families, especially among the upper classes; but he enjoyed as a hobby, the study of the dark days and lands where his science had lain sometimes on the borders of magic and sometimes upon the borders of murder. Hence it often happened that persons, who in their serious senses were well aware of his harmless and useful habits, would leave his shop on some murky and foggy night, with their heads so full of wild tales of the eating of hemp or the poisoning of roses, they could hardly help fancying that the shop, with its glowing moon of crimson or saffron, like bowls of blood and sulphur, was really a house of the Black Art.

It was doubtless for such conversational pleasures, in part, that Hibbs However entered the shop; as well as for a small glass of the same restorative medicine which he had been taking when Leveson found him by the open window. But this did not prevent Hibbs from expressing considerable surprise and some embarrassment when Leveson entered the same chemist’s and asked for the same chemical. Indeed, Leveson looked harassed and weary enough to want it.

“You’ve been out of town, haven’t you?” said Leveson. “No luck. They got away again on some quibble. The police wouldn’t make the arrest; and even old Meadows thought it might be illegal. I’m sick of it. Where are you going?”

“I thought,” said Mr. Hibbs, “of dropping in at this Post-Futurist exhibition. I believe Lord Ivywood will be there; he is showing it to the Prophet. I don’t pretend to know much about art, but I hear it’s very fine.”

There was a long silence and Mr. Leveson said, “People always prejudiced against new ideas.”

Then there was another long silence and Mr. Hibbs said, “After all, they said the same of Whistler.”

Refreshed by this ritual, Mr. Leveson became conscious of the existence of Crooke, and said to him, cheerfully, “That’s so in your department, too, isn’t it? I suppose the greatest pioneers in chemistry were unpopular in their own time.”

“Look at the Borgias,” said Mr. Crooke. “They got themselves quite disliked.”

“You’re very flippant, you know,” said Leveson, in a fatigued way. “Well, so long. Are you coming, Hibbs?”

And the two gentlemen, who were both attired in high hats and afternoon callers’ coats, betook themselves down the street. It was a fine, sunny day, the twin of the day before that had shone so brightly on the white town of Peaceways; and their walk was a pleasant one, along a handsome street with high houses and small trees that overlooked the river all the way. For the pictures were exhibited in a small but famous gallery, a rather rococo building of which the entrance steps almost descended upon the Thames. The building was girt on both sides and behind with gaudy flower-beds, and on the top of the steps, in front of the Byzantine doorway, stood their old friend, Misysra Ammon, smiling broadly, and in an unusually sumptuous costume. But even the sight of that fragrant eastern flower did not seem to revive altogether the spirits of the drooping Secretary.

“You have coome,” said the beaming Prophet, “to see the decoration? It is approo-ooved. I haf approo-ooved it.”

“We came to see the Post-Futurist pictures,” began Hibbs; but Leveson was silent.

“There are no pictures,” said the Turk, simply, “if there had been I could not haf approo-ooved. For those of our Religion pictures are not goo-ood; they are Idols, my friendss. Loo-ook in there,” and he turned and darted a solemn forefinger just under his nose toward the gates of the gallery; “Loo-ook in there and you will find no Idols. No Idols at all. I have most carefully loo-ooked into every one of the frames. Every one I have approo-ooved. No trace of ze Man form. No trace of ze Animal form. All decoration as goo-ood as the goo-oodest of carpets; it harms not. Lord Ivywood smile of happiness; for I tell him Islam indeed progresses. Ze old Moslems allow to draw the picture of the vegetable. Here I hunt even for the vegetable. And there is no vegetable.”

Hibbs, whose trade was tact, naturally did not think it wise that the eminent Misysra should go on lecturing from a tall flight of steps to the whole street and river, so he had slipped past with a general proposal to go in and see. The Prophet and the Secretary followed; and all entered the outer hall where Lord Ivywood stood with the white face of a statue. He was the only statue the New Moslems were allowed to worship.

On a sofa like a purple island in the middle of the sea of floor sat Enid Wimpole, talking eagerly to her cousin, Dorian; doing, in fact, her best to prevent the family quarrel, which threatened to follow hard on the incident at Westminster. In the deeper perspective of the rooms Lady Joan Brett was floating about. And if her attitude before the Post-Futurist pictures could not be called humble, or even inquiring, it is but just to that school to say that she seemed to be quite as bored with the floor that she walked on, and the parasol she held. Bit by bit other figures or groups of that world drifted through the Exhibition of the Post-Futurists. It is a very small world, but it is just big enough and just small enough to govern a country–that is, a country with no religion. And it has all the vanity of a mob; and all the reticence of a secret society.

CAPITOLO XX: IL TURCO E I FUTURISTI

IL SIGNOR ADRIAN CROOKE era un farmacista di successo la cui bottega si trovava nei pressi di Victoria, ma il suo volto esprimeva più di quanto in genere si richiede a un farmacista di successo. Era un volto curioso, prematuramente vecchio e simile a pergamena, ma acuto e deciso, con vero lavorio mentale in ogni sua linea. Né la sua conversazione, quando conversava, era in disaccordo con ciò: aveva vissuto in molti paesi, e possedeva un ricco tesoro di aneddoti sul lato più bizzarro e talvolta più sinistro del suo lavoro, visioni del vapore di droghe orientali o congetture sugli ingredienti dei veleni del Rinascimento. Egli stesso, non occorre dirlo, era uno speziale assai rispettabile e affidabile, altrimenti non avrebbe avuto la clientela delle famiglie, specialmente tra le classi superiori; ma godeva, come passatempo, dello studio dei giorni e delle terre oscure dove la sua scienza era giaciuta talora ai confini della Magia e talora ai confini dell’omicidio. Perciò accadeva spesso che persone, le quali nei loro sensi seri erano ben consapevoli delle sue innocue e utili abitudini, lasciassero la sua bottega in qualche fosca e nebbiosa notte, con la testa così piena di storie selvagge del mangiare la canapa o dell’avvelenare le rose, che a stento potevano trattenersi dall’immaginare che la bottega, con la sua raggiante luna cremisi o zafferano, come coppe di sangue e zolfo, fosse davvero una casa dell’Arte Nera.

Fu senza dubbio, in parte, per tali piaceri conversativi che Hibbs, comunque, entrò nella bottega; oltre che per un piccolo bicchiere della stessa medicina ricostituente che stava prendendo quando Leveson lo trovò presso la finestra aperta. Ma ciò non impedì a Hibbs di esprimere considerevole sorpresa e un certo imbarazzo quando Leveson entrò dallo stesso farmacista e chiese lo stesso preparato chimico. Invero, Leveson pareva abbastanza tormentato e stanco da averne bisogno.

«Sei stato fuori città, non è vero?» disse Leveson. «Niente da fare. Ci sono scappati di nuovo per qualche cavillo. La polizia non ha voluto fare l’arresto; e persino il vecchio Meadows pensava che potesse essere illegale. Ne ho abbastanza. Dove vai?»

«Pensavo» disse il signor Hibbs, «di fare un salto a questa mostra Post-Futurista. Credo che Lord Ivywood sarà là; la sta mostrando al Profeta. Non pretendo di saperne molto d’arte, ma sento dire che è molto bella.»

Vi fu un lungo silenzio e il signor Leveson disse: «La gente sempre prevenuta contro le idee nuove.»

Poi vi fu un altro lungo silenzio e il signor Hibbs disse: «In fondo, dissero lo stesso di Whistler.»

Ristorato da questo rituale, il signor Leveson divenne consapevole dell’esistenza di Crooke, e gli disse, allegramente: «È così anche nel tuo campo, non è vero? Suppongo che i più grandi pionieri della chimica fossero impopolari ai loro tempi.»

«Guardi i Borgia» disse il signor Crooke. «Si fecero parecchio detestare.»

«Lei è molto irriverente, sa» disse Leveson, in modo affaticato. «Beh, arrivederci. Vieni, Hibbs?»

E i due gentiluomini, entrambi abbigliati in alti cilindri e cappotti da visita pomeridiana, s’incamminarono giù per la strada. Era una bella giornata di sole, gemella di quella dell’altro ieri che aveva brillato così luminosa sulla bianca città di Peaceways; e la loro passeggiata fu piacevole, lungo un bel viale con alte case e piccoli alberi che dominavano il fiume per tutto il percorso. Poiché i quadri erano esposti in una galleria piccola ma famosa, un edificio piuttosto rococò i cui gradini d’ingresso quasi scendevano sul Tamigi. L’edificio era cinto su entrambi i lati e sul retro da sgargianti aiuole fiorite, e in cima ai gradini, davanti al portale bizantino, stava il loro vecchio amico, Misysra Ammon, sorridendo largamente, e in un costume insolitamente sontuoso. Ma persino la vista di quel fragrante fiore d’Oriente non parve rianimare del tutto lo spirito dell’abbattuto Segretario.

«Siete venu-uti» disse il raggiante Profeta, «a vedere la decorazione? È appro-o-ovata. L’ho appro-o-ovata io.»

«Siamo venuti a vedere i quadri Post-Futuristi» cominciò Hibbs; ma Leveson taceva.

«Non ci sono quadri» disse il turco, semplicemente, «se ci fossero stati non avrei potuto appro-o-ovare. Per quelli della nostra Religione i quadri non sono buo-oni; sono Idoli, amici miei. Guarda-ate là dentro» e si voltò e scagliò un solenne indice appena sotto il naso verso i cancelli della galleria; «Guarda-ate là dentro e non troverete alcun Idolo. Nessun Idolo affatto. Ho guarda-ato con la massima cura in ognuna delle cornici. Ognuna l’ho appro-o-ovata. Nessuna traccia della forma dell’Uomo. Nessuna traccia della forma dell’Animale. Tutta decorazione buo-ona come il più buo-ono dei tappeti; non nuoce. Lord Ivywood sorride di felicità; poiché gli dico che l’Islam invero progredisce. I vecchi Musulmani permettevano di disegnare il quadro della verdura. Qui io cerco persino la verdura. E non c’è verdura.»

Hibbs, il cui mestiere era il tatto, naturalmente non ritenne saggio che l’eminente Misysra continuasse a tenere conferenza da un’alta rampa di gradini all’intera strada e al fiume, sicché scivolò oltre con una generica proposta di entrare a vedere. Il Profeta e il Segretario seguirono; ed entrarono tutti nell’atrio esterno dove Lord Ivywood stava col volto bianco di una statua. Era la sola statua che ai Nuovi Musulmani fosse concesso adorare.

Su un sofà come un’isola purpurea in mezzo al mare del pavimento sedeva Enid Wimpole, parlando animatamente al cugino, Dorian; facendo, in effetti, del suo meglio per prevenire la lite familiare, che minacciava di seguire da presso l’incidente di Westminster. Nella prospettiva più profonda delle sale Lady Joan Brett fluttuava qua e là. E se il suo atteggiamento davanti ai quadri Post-Futuristi non poteva dirsi umile, né tantomeno indagatore, è giusto verso quella scuola dire che pareva altrettanto annoiata dal pavimento su cui camminava, e dal parasole che teneva. A poco a poco altre figure o gruppi di quel mondo passarono alla deriva per l’Esposizione dei Post-Futuristi. È un mondo assai piccolo, ma è appena abbastanza grande e appena abbastanza piccolo da governare un paese – vale a dire, un paese senza religione. E ha tutta la vanità di una folla; e tutta la reticenza di una società segreta.

Leveson instantly went up to Lord Ivywood, pulled papers from his pocket and was plainly telling him of the escape from Peaceways. Ivywood’s face hardly changed; he was, or felt, above some things; and one of them was blaming a servant before the servant’s social superiors. But no one could say he looked less like cold marble than before.

“I made all possible inquiries about their subsequent route,” the Secretary was heard saying, “and the most serious feature is that they seem to have taken the road for London.”

“Quite so,” replied the statue, “they will be easier to capture here.”

Lady Enid, by a series of assurances (most of which were, I regret to say, lies) had succeeded in preventing the scandal of her cousin, Dorian, actually cutting her cousin, Philip. But she knew very little of the masculine temper if she really thought she had prevented the profound intellectual revolt of the poet against the politician. Ever since he heard Mr. Hibbs say, “Yars! Yars!”, and order his arrest by a common policeman, the feelings of Dorian Wimpole had flowed for some four days and nights in a direction highly contrary to the ideals of Mr. Hibbs, and the sudden appearance of that blameless diplomatist quickened the mental current to a cataract. But as he could not insult Hibbs, whom socially he did not even know; and could not insult Ivywood, with whom he had just had a formal reconciliation, it was absolutely necessary that he should insult something else instead. All watchers for the Dawn will be deeply distressed to know that the Post-Futurist School of Painting received the full effects of this perverted wrath. In vain did Mr. Leveson affirm from time to time, “People always prejudiced against new ideas.” Vainly did Mr. Hibbs say at the proper intervals, “After all, they said the same of Whistler.” Not by such decent formalities was the frenzy of Dorian to be appeased.

“That little Turk has more sense than you have,” he said, “he passes it as a good wall-paper. I should say it was a bad wall-paper; the sort of wall-paper that gives a sick man fever when he hasn’t got it. But to call it pictures–you might as well call it seats for the Lord Mayor’s Show. A seat isn’t a seat if you can’t see the Lord Mayor’s Show. A picture isn’t a picture if you can’t see any picture. You can sit down at home more comfortably than you can at a procession. And you can walk about at home more comfortably than you can at a picture gallery. There’s only one thing to be said for a street show or a picture show–and that is whether there is anything to be shown. Now, then! Show me something!”

“Well,” said Lord Ivywood, good humouredly, motioning toward the wall in front of him, “let me show you the ‘Portrait of an Old Lady.’”

“Well,” said Dorian, stolidly, “which is it?”

Mr. Hibbs made a hasty gesture of identification, but was so unfortunate as to point to the picture of “Rain in the Apennines,” instead of the “Portrait of an Old Lady,” and his intervention increased the irritation of Dorian Wimpole. Most probably, as Mr. Hibbs afterward explained, it was because a vivacious movement of the elbow of Mr. Wimpole interfered with the exact pointing of the forefinger of Mr. Hibbs. In any case, Mr. Hibbs was sharply and horridly fixed by embarrassment; so that he had to go away to the refreshment bar and eat three lobster-patties, and even drink a glass of that champagne that had once been his ruin. But on this occasion he stopped at one glass, and returned with a full diplomatic responsibility.

He returned to find that Dorian Wimpole had forgotten all the facts of time, place, and personal pride, in an argument with Lord Ivywood, exactly as he had forgotten such facts in an argument with Patrick Dalroy, in a dark wood with a donkey-cart. And Philip Ivywood was interested also; his cold eyes even shone; for though his pleasure was almost purely intellectual, it was utterly sincere.

“And I do trust the untried; I do follow the inexperienced,” he was saying quietly, with his fine inflections of voice. “You say this is changing the very nature of Art. I want to change the very nature of Art. Everything lives by turning into something else. Exaggeration is growth.”

“But exaggeration of what?” demanded Dorian. “I cannot see a trace of exaggeration in these pictures; because I cannot find a hint of what it is they want to exaggerate. You can’t exaggerate the feathers of a cow or the legs of a whale. You can draw a cow with feathers or a whale with legs for a joke–though I hardly think such jokes are in your line. But don’t you see, my good Philip, that even then the joke depends on its looking like a cow and not only like a thing with feathers. Even then the joke depends on the whale as well as the legs. You can combine up to a certain point; you can distort up to a certain point; after that you lose the identity; and with that you lose everything. A Centaur is so much of a man with so much of a horse. The Centaur must not be hastily identified with the Horsy Man. And the Mermaid must be maidenly; even if there is something fishy about her social conduct.”

“No,” said Lord Ivywood, in the same quiet way, “I understand what you mean, and I don’t agree. I should like the Centaur to turn into something else, that is neither man nor horse.”

“But not something that has nothing of either?” asked the poet.

“Yes,” answered Ivywood, with the same queer, quiet gleam in his colourless eyes, “something that has nothing of either.”

“But what’s the good?” argued Dorian. “A thing that has changed entirely has not changed at all. It has no bridge of crisis. It can remember no change. If you wake up tomorrow and you simplyare Mrs. Dope, an old woman who lets lodgings at Broadstairs –well, I don’t doubt Mrs. Dope is a saner and happier person than you are. But in what way haveyou progressed? What part ofyou is better? Don’t you see this prime fact of identity is the limit set on all living things?”

Leveson andò all’istante da Lord Ivywood, estrasse dei fogli dalla tasca e chiaramente gli stava riferendo della fuga da Peaceways. Il volto di Ivywood non mutò quasi; egli era, o si sentiva, al di sopra di certe cose; e una di esse era il rimproverare un servitore davanti ai superiori sociali del servitore. Ma nessuno avrebbe potuto dire che apparisse meno simile a freddo marmo di prima.

«Ho fatto tutte le indagini possibili sul loro percorso successivo» si udì dire il Segretario, «e l’aspetto più grave è che paiono aver preso la strada per Londra.»

«Proprio così» replicò la statua, «saranno più facili da catturare qui.»

Lady Enid, con una serie di rassicurazioni (la maggior parte delle quali erano, mi duole dirlo, menzogne) era riuscita a impedire lo scandalo che suo cugino Dorian tagliasse effettivamente i ponti con suo cugino Philip. Ma conosceva assai poco il temperamento maschile se davvero pensava di aver impedito la profonda rivolta intellettuale del poeta contro il politico. Fin da quando aveva sentito il signor Hibbs dire «Ya! Ya!», e ordinarne l’arresto a un comune poliziotto, i sentimenti di Dorian Wimpole erano fluiti per quattro giorni e quattro notti in una direzione altamente contraria agli ideali del signor Hibbs, e l’improvvisa comparsa di quel candido diplomatico affrettò la corrente mentale a una cateratta. Ma poiché non poteva insultare Hibbs, che socialmente non conosceva nemmeno; e non poteva insultare Ivywood, col quale aveva appena avuto una formale riconciliazione, era assolutamente necessario che insultasse invece qualcos’altro. Tutti coloro che vegliano l’Alba saranno profondamente addolorati di sapere che la Scuola di Pittura Post-Futurista ricevette tutti gli effetti di questa pervertita collera. Invano il signor Leveson affermò di tanto in tanto: «La gente sempre prevenuta contro le idee nuove.» Invano il signor Hibbs disse agli intervalli opportuni: «In fondo, dissero lo stesso di Whistler.» Non con tali decorose formalità doveva essere placata la frenesia di Dorian.

«Quel piccolo turco ha più buonsenso di lei» disse, «lo fa passare per una buona carta da parati. Io direi che è una cattiva carta da parati; il tipo di carta da parati che dà la febbre a un malato quando non ce l’ha. Ma chiamarli quadri – tanto varrebbe altrettanto chiamarli seggi per la Sfilata del Lord Mayor. Un seggio non è un seggio se non si può vedere la Sfilata del Lord Mayor. Un quadro non è un quadro se non si può vedere alcun quadro. Ci si può sedere a casa più comodamente che a una processione. E ci si può passeggiare a casa più comodamente che a una galleria di quadri. C’è una sola cosa da dirsi a favore di uno spettacolo di strada o di uno spettacolo di quadri – ed è se ci sia qualcosa da mostrare. Ora, dunque! Mi mostri qualcosa!»

«Ebbene» disse Lord Ivywood, di buon umore, accennando alla parete di fronte a sé, «mi lasci mostrarle il “Ritratto di una Vecchia Signora”.»

«Ebbene» disse Dorian, imperturbabile, «quale sarebbe?»

Il signor Hibbs fece un frettoloso gesto d’identificazione, ma fu così sfortunato da indicare il quadro «Pioggia sugli Appennini» invece del «Ritratto di una Vecchia Signora», e il suo intervento accrebbe l’irritazione di Dorian Wimpole. Con ogni probabilità, come il signor Hibbs spiegò in seguito, fu perché un vivace movimento del gomito del signor Wimpole interferì con l’esatta indicazione dell’indice del signor Hibbs. In ogni caso, il signor Hibbs fu bruscamente e orribilmente inchiodato dall’imbarazzo; sicché dovette recarsi al banco dei rinfreschi e mangiare tre pasticcini di aragosta, e persino bere un bicchiere di quello champagne che una volta era stato la sua rovina. Ma in questa occasione si fermò a un bicchiere, e tornò con piena responsabilità diplomatica.

Tornò per scoprire che Dorian Wimpole aveva dimenticato tutti i fatti di tempo, luogo e orgoglio personale, in una discussione con Lord Ivywood, esattamente come aveva dimenticato tali fatti in una discussione con Patrick Dalroy, in un bosco buio con un carretto tirato da un asino. E anche Philip Ivywood era interessato; i suoi freddi occhi persino brillavano; poiché sebbene il suo piacere fosse quasi puramente intellettuale, era del tutto sincero.

«E io mi fido dell’inesperimentato; io seguo l’inesperto» stava dicendo tranquillamente, con le sue fini inflessioni di voce. «Lei dice che questo muta la natura stessa dell’Arte. Io voglio mutare la natura stessa dell’Arte. Tutto vive trasformandosi in qualcos’altro. L’esagerazione è crescita.»

«Ma esagerazione di che cosa?» incalzò Dorian. «Non riesco a scorgere una traccia di esagerazione in questi quadri; perché non riesco a trovare un accenno di che cosa sia ciò che vogliono esagerare. Non si possono esagerare le piume di una mucca o le zampe di una balena. Si può disegnare una mucca con le piume o una balena con le zampe per scherzo – benché io stenti a credere che simili scherzi siano nel suo genere. Ma non vede, mio buon Philip, che anche allora lo scherzo dipende dal suo apparire come una mucca e non soltanto come una cosa con le piume. Anche allora lo scherzo dipende dalla balena tanto quanto dalle zampe. Si può combinare fino a un certo punto; si può distorcere fino a un certo punto; oltre quello si perde l’identità; e con ciò si perde tutto. Un Centauro è tanto d’uomo e tanto di cavallo. Il Centauro non va frettolosamente identificato con l’Uomo Cavallino. E la Sirena dev’essere fanciullesca; anche se c’è qualcosa di pesciforme nella sua condotta sociale.»

«No» disse Lord Ivywood, nello stesso modo tranquillo, «capisco che cosa intende, e non sono d’accordo. Mi piacerebbe che il Centauro si trasformasse in qualcos’altro, che non fosse né uomo né cavallo.»

«Ma non in qualcosa che non abbia nulla dell’uno né dell’altro?» chiese il poeta.

«Sì» rispose Ivywood, con lo stesso bizzarro, tranquillo bagliore nei suoi occhi scoloriti, «qualcosa che non abbia nulla né dell’uno né dell’altro.»

«Ma a che pro?» argomentò Dorian. «Una cosa che è mutata interamente non è mutata affatto. Non ha ponte di crisi. Non può ricordare alcun mutamento. Se lei si sveglia domani ed è semplicemente la signora Dope, una vecchia che affitta stanze a Broadstairs – beh, non dubito che la signora Dope sia una persona più sana e più felice di lei. Ma in che modo lei ha progredito? Quale parte di lei è migliore? Non vede che questo fatto primario dell’identità è il limite posto a tutte le cose viventi?»

“No,” said Philip, with suppressed but sudden violence, “I deny that any limit is set upon living things.”

“Why, then I understand,” said Dorian, “why, though you make such good speeches, you have never written any poetry.”

Lady Joan, who was looking with tedium at a rich pattern of purple and green in which Misysra attempted to interest her (imploring her to disregard the mere title, which idolatrously stated it as “First Communion in the Snow”), abruptly turned her full face to Dorian. It was a face to which few men could feel indifferent, especially when thus suddenly shown them.

“Why can’t he write poetry?” she asked. “Do you mean he would resent the limits of metre and rhyme and so on?”

The poet reflected for a moment and then said, “Well, partly; but I mean more than that too. As one can be candid in the family, I may say that what everyone says about him is that he has no humour. But that’s not my complaint at all. I think my complaint is that he has no pathos. That is, he does not feel human limitations. That is, he will not write poetry.”

Lord Ivywood was looking with his cold, unconscious profile into a little black and yellow picture called “Enthusiasm”; but Joan Brett leaned across to him with swarthy eagerness and cried quite provocatively,

“Dorian says you’ve no pathos. Have you any pathos? He says it’s a sense of human limitations.”

Ivywood did not remove his gaze from the picture of “Enthusiasm,” but simply said “No; I have no sense of human limitations.” Then he put up his elderly eyeglass to examine the picture better. Then he dropped it again and confronted Joan with a face paler than usual.

“Joan,” he said, “I would walk where no man has walked; and find something beyond tears and laughter. My road shall be my road indeed; for I will make it, like the Romans. And my adventures shall not be in the hedges and the gutters, but in the borders of the ever advancing brain. I will think what was unthinkable until I thought it; I will love what never lived until I loved it–I will be as lonely as the First Man.”

“They say,” she said, after a silence, “that the first man fell.”

“You mean the priests?” he answered. “Yes, but even they admit that he discovered good and evil. So are these artists trying to discover some distinction that is still dark to us.”

“Oh,” said Joan, looking at him with a real and unusual interest, “then you don’tsee anything in the pictures, yourself?”

“I see the breaking of the barriers,” he answered, “beyond that I see nothing.”

She looked at the floor for a little time and traced patterns with her parasol, like one who has really received food for thought. Then she said, suddenly,

“But perhaps the breaking of barriers might be the breaking of everything.”

The clear and colourless eyes looked at her quite steadily.

“Perhaps,” said Lord Ivywood.

Dorian Wimpole made a sudden movement a few yards off, where he was looking at a picture, and said, “Hullo! What’s this?” Mr. Hibbs was literally gaping in the direction of the entrance.

Framed in that fine Byzantine archway stood a great big, bony man in threadbare but careful clothes, with a harsh, high-featured, intelligent face, to which a dark beard under the chin gave something of the Puritanic cast. Somehow his whole personality seemed to be pulled together and explained when he spoke with a North Country accent.

“Weel, lards,” he said, genially, “t’hoose be main great on t’pictures. But I coom for suthin’ in a moog. Haw! Haw!”

Leveson and Hibbs looked at each other. Then Leveson rushed from the room. Lord Ivywood did not move a finger; but Mr. Wimpole, with a sort of poetic curiosity, drew nearer to the stranger, and studied him.

“It’s perfectly awful,” cried Enid Wimpole, in a loud whisper, “the man must be drunk.”

“Na, lass,” said the man with gallantry, “a’ve not been droonk, nobbut at Hurley Fair, these years and all; a’m a decent lad and workin’ ma way back t’Wharfdale. No harm in a moog of ale, lass.”

“Are you quite sure,” asked Dorian Wimpole, with a singular sort of delicate curiosity, “are you quitesure you’re not drunk.”

“A’m not droonk,” said the man, jovially.

“Even if these were licensed premises,” began Dorian, in the same diplomatic manner.

“There’s t’sign on t’hoose,” said the stranger.

The black, bewildered look on the face of Joan Brett suddenly altered. She took four steps toward the doorway, and then went back and sat on the purple ottoman. But Dorian seemed fascinated with his inquiry into the alleged decency of the lad who was working his way to Wharfdale.

“Even if these were licensed premises,” he repeated, “drink could be refused you if you were drunk. Now, are youreally sure you’re not drunk. Would you know if it was raining, say?”

“Aye,” said the man, with conviction.

“Would you know any common object of your countryside,” inquired Dorian, scientifically, “a woman –let us say an old woman.”

“Aye,” said the man, with good humour.

“What on earth are you doing with the creature?” whispered Enid, feverishly.

“I am trying,” answered the poet, “to prevent a very sensible man from smashing a very silly shop. I beg your pardon, sir. As I was saying, would you know these things in a picture, now? Do you know what a landscape is and what a portrait is? Forgive my asking; you see we are responsible while we keep the place going.”

There soared up into the sky like a cloud of rooks the eager vanity of the North.

“We collier lads are none so badly educated, lad,” he said. “In the town a’ was born in there was a gallery of pictures as fine as Lunnon. Aye, and a’ knew ’em, too.”

“Thank you,” said Wimpole, pointing suddenly at the wall. “Would you be so kind, for instance, as to look at those two pictures. One represents an old woman and the other rain in the hills. It’s a mere formality. You shall have your drink when you’ve said which is which.”

The northerner bowed his huge body before the two frames and peered into them patiently. The long stillness that followed seemed to be something of a strain on Joan, who rose in a restless manner, first went to look out of a window and then went out of the front door.

At length the art-critic lifted a large, puzzled but still philosophical face.

“Soomehow or other,” he said, “a’ mun be droonk after all.”

“You have testified,” cried Dorian with animation. “You have all but saved civilization. And by God, you shall have your drink.”

And he brought from the refreshment table a huge bumper of the Hibbsian champagne, and declined payment by the rapid method of running out of the gallery on to the steps outside.

Joan was already standing there. Out the little side window she had seen the incredible thing she expected to see; which explained the ludicrous scene inside. She saw the red and blue wooden flag of Mr. Pump standing up in the flower-beds in the sun, as serenely as if it were a tall and tropical flower; and yet, in the brief interval between the window and the door it had vanished, as if to remind her it was a flying dream. But two men were in a little motor outside, which was in the very act of starting. They were in motoring disguise, but she knew who they were. All that was deep in her, all that was sceptical, all that was stoical, all that was noble, made her stand as still as one of the pillars of the porch; but a dog, bearing the name of Quoodle, sprang up in the moving car, and barked with joy at the mere sight of her, and though she had borne all else, something in that bestial innocence of an animal suddenly blinded her with tears.

It could not, however, blind her to the extraordinary fact that followed. Mr. Dorian Wimpole, attired in anything but motoring costume, dressed in that compromise between fashion and art which seems proper to the visiting of picture-galleries, did not by any means stand as still as one of the pillars of the porch. He rushed down the steps, ran after the car and actually sprang into it, without disarranging his Whistlerian silk hat.

“Good afternoon,” he said to Dalroy, pleasantly. “You owe me a motor-ride, you know.”

«No», disse Philip, con violenza repressa ma improvvisa, «nego che alcun limite sia posto agli esseri viventi».

«Ecco, allora capisco», disse Dorian, «perché, pur facendo discorsi così belli, non hai mai scritto un verso di poesia».

Lady Joan, che osservava con noia un ricco intreccio di viola e verde al quale Misysra cercava di interessarla (implorandola di non badare al mero titolo, che idolatricamente lo dichiarava «Prima Comunione nella Neve»), volse di colpo il viso pieno verso Dorian. Era un volto al quale pochi uomini potevano restare indifferenti, specie quando veniva loro mostrato così all’improvviso.

«Perché non può scrivere poesia?» chiese. «Vuoi dire che mal sopporterebbe i limiti del metro e della rima e così via?»

Il poeta rifletté un momento e poi disse: «Ebbene, in parte; ma intendo anche qualcosa di più. Poiché in famiglia si può essere sinceri, posso dire che ciò che tutti dicono di lui è che non ha umorismo. Ma non è affatto questa la mia lagnanza. Credo che la mia lagnanza sia che non ha pathos. Cioè, non sente i limiti umani. Cioè, non vuole scrivere poesia».

Lord Ivywood contemplava, col suo profilo freddo e inconsapevole, un quadretto nero e giallo intitolato «Entusiasmo»; ma Joan Brett si protese verso di lui con bruna impazienza e gridò in tono assai provocatorio:

«Dorian dice che non hai pathos. Ne hai un po’ di pathos? Dice che è il senso dei limiti umani».

Ivywood non distolse lo sguardo dal quadro dell’«Entusiasmo», ma disse semplicemente: «No; non ho alcun senso dei limiti umani». Poi sollevò il suo occhialino da vecchio per esaminare meglio il quadro. Poi lo lasciò ricadere e affrontò Joan con un volto più pallido del solito.

«Joan», disse, «io camminerei dove nessun uomo ha camminato; e troverei qualcosa al di là delle lacrime e del riso. La mia strada sarà davvero la mia strada; poiché la farò io, come i Romani. E le mie avventure non saranno nelle siepi e nei fossi, ma ai confini del cervello sempre in avanzamento. Penserò ciò che era impensabile finché non l’ho pensato; amerò ciò che non è mai vissuto finché non l’ho amato… sarò solo come il Primo Uomo».

«Dicono», disse lei, dopo un silenzio, «che il primo uomo cadde».

«Intendi i preti?» rispose lui. «Sì, ma perfino loro ammettono che scoprì il bene e il male. Così questi artisti cercano di scoprire qualche distinzione che a noi è ancora oscura».

«Oh», disse Joan, guardandolo con un interesse reale e insolito, «allora tu stesso non vedi nulla nei quadri?»

«Vedo l’infrangersi delle barriere», rispose, «al di là di ciò non vedo nulla».

Guardò il pavimento per un po’ di tempo e tracciò disegni col parasole, come chi ha davvero ricevuto materia di riflessione. Poi disse, all’improvviso:

«Ma forse l’infrangersi delle barriere potrebbe essere l’infrangersi di ogni cosa».

Gli occhi chiari e incolori la guardarono con assoluta fermezza.

«Forse», disse Lord Ivywood.

Dorian Wimpole fece un movimento improvviso a pochi metri di distanza, dove stava osservando un quadro, e disse: «Ehilà! Che c’è?» Il signor Hibbs stava letteralmente a bocca aperta in direzione dell’ingresso.

Incorniciato in quel bell’arco bizantino stava un uomo grande e grosso, ossuto, in abiti logori ma tenuti con cura, dal volto duro, dai lineamenti marcati e intelligente, al quale una barba scura sotto il mento dava qualcosa del taglio puritano. In qualche modo tutta la sua personalità pareva ricomporsi e spiegarsi quando parlava con l’accento delle contee del Nord.

«Beh, siùri», disse, con cordialità, «la ca’ l’è propri gran bela de quadri. Ma mi son vegnù per quaicoss in d’un bocàl. Ah! Ah!»

Leveson e Hibbs si guardarono. Poi Leveson si precipitò fuori dalla sala. Lord Ivywood non mosse un dito; ma il signor Wimpole, con una sorta di curiosità poetica, si avvicinò allo straniero e lo studiò.

«È assolutamente terribile», esclamò Enid Wimpole, in un sussurro sonoro, «quell’uomo dev’essere ubriaco».

«Na, tosa», disse l’uomo con galanteria, «mi son minga staa imbriàg, se non a la Fiera de Hurley, in tuti sti ann; son un brav fiö e me ne torni a pè fin a Wharfdale. Nissun mal in d’un bocàl de bira, tosa».

«Sei proprio sicuro», chiese Dorian Wimpole, con una singolare specie di delicata curiosità, «sei proprio sicuro di non essere ubriaco?»

«Son minga imbriàg», disse l’uomo, gioviale.

«Anche se questo fosse un locale con licenza», cominciò Dorian, nella stessa maniera diplomatica.

«Gh’è l’insegna su la ca’», disse lo straniero.

Lo sguardo cupo e smarrito sul volto di Joan Brett d’improvviso mutò. Fece quattro passi verso la soglia, poi tornò indietro e si sedette sull’ottomana viola. Ma Dorian pareva affascinato dalla sua indagine sulla presunta rispettabilità del giovanotto che se ne tornava a piedi verso Wharfdale.

«Anche se questo fosse un locale con licenza», ripeté, «da bere te lo potrebbero rifiutare se fossi ubriaco. Ora, sei davvero sicuro di non essere ubriaco? Sapresti dire, poniamo, se sta piovendo?»

«Aye», disse l’uomo, con convinzione.

«Sapresti riconoscere un qualunque oggetto comune della tua campagna», indagò Dorian, scientificamente, «una donna… diciamo una vecchia».

«Aye», disse l’uomo, di buon umore.

«Ma che diamine stai facendo con quella creatura?» sussurrò Enid, febbrilmente.

«Sto cercando», rispose il poeta, «di impedire a un uomo pieno di buonsenso di fracassare una bottega piena di sciocchezze. Vi chiedo scusa, signore. Come dicevo, sapreste riconoscere queste cose in un quadro, ora? Sapete che cos’è un paesaggio e che cos’è un ritratto? Perdonate la domanda; vedete, siamo responsabili finché teniamo aperto il locale».

Si levò verso il cielo come uno stormo di corvi l’ansiosa vanità del Nord.

«Nun altri fiö minatori sèm minga così mal istruii, fiö», disse. «In del paes indove son nassuu gh’era una galleria de quadri bela come quela de Londra. Aye, e mi je conossevi, anca».

«Grazie», disse Wimpole, indicando d’un tratto la parete. «Sareste così gentile, per esempio, da guardare quei due quadri. Uno raffigura una vecchia e l’altro la pioggia sulle colline. È una mera formalità. Avrete da bere quando avrete detto qual è l’uno e qual è l’altro».

Il settentrionale chinò l’enorme corpo davanti alle due cornici e vi scrutò dentro con pazienza. La lunga immobilità che seguì parve mettere Joan a una certa prova; ella si alzò con fare inquieto, prima andò a guardare fuori da una finestra e poi uscì dalla porta d’ingresso.

Alla fine il critico d’arte sollevò un volto grande, perplesso ma ancora filosofico.

«In d’una manera o in l’altra», disse, «devi propri vess imbriàg, dopotutt».

«Avete testimoniato», gridò Dorian con animazione. «Avete quasi salvato la civiltà. E, per Dio, avrete da bere».

E portò dal tavolo dei rinfreschi un colossale calice colmo dello champagne hibbsiano, e declinò il pagamento col rapido metodo di correre fuori dalla galleria sui gradini all’esterno.

Joan era già lì in piedi. Dalla piccola finestra laterale aveva visto la cosa incredibile che si aspettava di vedere; ciò che spiegava la scena ridicola all’interno. Aveva visto l’insegna di legno rossa e azzurra del signor Pump ergersi tra le aiuole al sole, serena come se fosse un fiore alto e tropicale; eppure, nel breve intervallo tra la finestra e la porta, era svanita, come per ricordarle che era un sogno volante. Ma due uomini erano in una piccola automobile là fuori, che era proprio in procinto di partire. Erano travestiti da automobilisti, ma lei sapeva chi erano. Tutto ciò che vi era di profondo in lei, tutto ciò che vi era di scettico, tutto ciò che vi era di stoico, tutto ciò che vi era di nobile, la fece restare immobile come uno dei pilastri del portico; ma un cane, che portava il nome di Quoodle, balzò su nell’auto in movimento, e abbaiò di gioia alla sola vista di lei, e sebbene ella avesse sopportato tutto il resto, qualcosa in quella bestiale innocenza di un animale d’un tratto la accecò di lacrime.

Non poté tuttavia accecarla al fatto straordinario che seguì. Il signor Dorian Wimpole, abbigliato in tutt’altro che una tenuta da automobilista, vestito in quel compromesso tra moda e arte che pare appropriato alla visita delle gallerie di quadri, non rimase affatto immobile come uno dei pilastri del portico. Si precipitò giù per i gradini, corse dietro all’auto e vi balzò dentro davvero, senza scomporre il suo cilindro di seta alla Whistler.

«Buon pomeriggio», disse a Dalroy, amabilmente. «Mi dovete un giro in automobile, sapete».

CHAPTER XXI: THE ROAD TO ROUNDABOUT

PATRICK DALROY looked at the invader with a heavy and yet humorous expression, and merely said, “I didn’t steal your car; really, I didn’t.”

“Oh, no,” answered Dorian, “I’ve heard all about it since, and as you’re rather the persecuted party, so to speak, it wouldn’t be fair not to tell you that I don’t agree much with Ivywood about all this. I disagree with him; or rather, to speak medically, he disagrees with me. He has, ever since I woke up after an oyster supper and found myself in the House of Commons with policemen calling out, ‘Who goes home?’”

“Indeed,” inquired Dalroy, drawing his red bushy eyebrows together. “Do the officials in Parliament say, ‘Who goes home?’”

“Yes,” answered Wimpole, indifferently, “it’s a part of some old custom in the days when Members of Parliament might be attacked in the street.”

“Well,” inquired Patrick, in a rational tone, “why aren’t they attacked in the street?”

There was a silence. “It is a holy mystery,” said the Captain at last. “But, ‘Who goes home?’–that is uncommonly good.”

The Captain had received the poet into the car with all possible expressions of affability and satisfaction, but the poet, who was keen-sighted enough about people of his own sort, could not help thinking that the Captain was a little absent-minded. As they flew thundering through the mazes of South London (for Pump had crossed Westminster Bridge and was making for the Surrey hills), the big blue eyes of the big red-haired man rolled perpetually up and down the streets; and, after longer and longer silences, he found expression for his thoughts.

“Doesn’t it strike you that there are a very large number of chemists in London nowadays?”

“Are there?” asked Wimpole, carelessly. “Well, there certainly are two very close to each other just over there.”

“Yes, and both the same name,” replied Dalroy, “Crooke. And I saw the same Mr. Crooke chemicalizing round the corner. He seems to be a highly omnipresent deity.”

“A large business, I suppose,” observed Dorian Wimpole.

“Too large for its profits, I should say,” said Dalroy. “What can people want with two chemists of the same sort within a few yards of each other? Do they put one leg into one shop and one into the other and have their corns done in both at once? Or, do they take an acid in one shop and an alkali in the next, and wait for the fizz? Or, do they take the poison in the first shop and the emetic in the second shop? It seems like carrying delicacy too far. It almost amounts to living a double life.”

“But, perhaps,” said Dorian, “he is an uproariously popular chemist, this Mr. Crooke. Perhaps there’s a rush on some specialty of his.”

“It seems to me,” said the Captain, “that there are certain limitations to such popularity in the case of a chemist. If a man sells very good tobacco, people may smoke more and more of it from sheer self-indulgence. But I never heard of anybody exceeding in cod-liver oil. Even castor-oil, I should say, is regarded with respect rather than true affection.”

After a few minutes of silence, he said, “Is it safe to stop here for an instant, Pump?”

“I think so,” replied Humphrey, “if you’ll promise me not to have any adventures in the shop.”

The motor car stopped before yet a fourth arsenal of Mr. Crooke and his pharmacy, and Dalroy went in. Before Pump and his companion could exchange a word, the Captain came out again, with a curious expression on his countenance, especially round the mouth.

“Mr. Wimpole,” said Dalroy, “will you give us the pleasure of dining with us this evening? Many would consider it an unceremonious invitation to an unconventional meal; and it may be necessary to eat it under a hedge or even up a tree; but you are a man of taste, and one does not apologise for Hump’s rum or Hump’s cheese to persons of taste. We will eat and drink of our best tonight. It is a banquet. I am not very certain whether you and I are friends or enemies, but at least there shall be peace tonight.”

“Friends, I hope,” said the poet, smiling, “but why peace especially tonight?”

“Because there will be war tomorrow,” answered Patrick Dalroy, “whichever side of it you may be on. I have just made a singular discovery.”

And he relapsed into his silence as they flew out of the fringe of London into the woods and hills beyond Croydon. Dalroy remained in the same mood of brooding, Dorian was brushed by the butterfly wing of that fleeting slumber that will come on a man hurried, through the air, after long lounging in hot drawing rooms; even the dog Quoodle was asleep at the bottom of the car. As for Humphrey Pump, he very seldom talked when he had anything else to do. Thus it happened that long landscapes and perspectives were shot past them like suddenly shifted slides, and long stretches of time elapsed before any of them spoke again. The sky was changing from the pale golds and greens of evening to the burning blue of a strong summer night, a night of strong stars. The walls of woodland that flew past them like long assegais, were mostly, at first, of the fenced and park-like sort; endless oblong blocks of black pinewood shut in by boxes of thin grey wood. But soon fences began to sink, and pinewoods to straggle, and roads to split and even to sprawl. Half an hour later Dalroy had begun to realise something romantic and even faintly reminiscent in the roll of the country, and Humphrey Pump had long known he was on the marches of his native land.

So far as the difference could be defined by a detail, it seemed to consist not so much in the road rising as in the road perpetually winding. It was more like a path; and even where it was abrupt or aimless, it seemed the more alive. They appeared to be ascending a big, dim hill that was built of a crowd of little hills with rounded tops; it was like a cluster of domes. Among these domes the road climbed and curled in multitudinous curves and angles. It was almost impossible to believe that it could turn itself and round on itself so often without tying itself in a knot and choking.

CAPITOLO XXI: LA STRADA PER ROUNDABOUT

PATRICK DALROY guardò l’invasore con un’espressione greve eppure spiritosa, e disse soltanto: «Non vi ho rubato l’automobile; davvero, non l’ho fatto».

«Oh, no», rispose Dorian, «da allora ho saputo ogni cosa, e poiché voi siete piuttosto la parte perseguitata, per così dire, non sarebbe leale non dirvi che non concordo granché con Ivywood su tutta questa faccenda. Non sono d’accordo con lui; o meglio, per dirla in termini medici, lui non è d’accordo con me. Lo è, fin da quando mi risvegliai dopo una cena a base di ostriche e mi ritrovai alla Camera dei Comuni con i poliziotti che gridavano: “Chi va a casa?”»

«Davvero», domandò Dalroy, aggrottando le sue folte sopracciglia rosse. «I funzionari in Parlamento dicono: “Chi va a casa?”»

«Sì», rispose Wimpole, con indifferenza, «fa parte di qualche antica usanza dei tempi in cui i membri del Parlamento potevano essere aggrediti per strada».

«Ebbene», domandò Patrick, in tono ragionevole, «perché non vengono aggrediti per strada?»

Ci fu un silenzio. «È un sacro mistero», disse infine il Capitano. «Ma “Chi va a casa?”… è straordinariamente bello».

Il Capitano aveva accolto il poeta nell’automobile con ogni possibile espressione di affabilità e soddisfazione, ma il poeta, che era abbastanza perspicace riguardo alla gente della propria specie, non poté fare a meno di pensare che il Capitano fosse un poco distratto. Mentre volavano rombando attraverso i labirinti della Londra meridionale (poiché Pump aveva attraversato il ponte di Westminster e puntava verso le colline del Surrey), i grandi occhi azzurri del grosso uomo dai capelli rossi rotolavano di continuo su e giù per le vie; e, dopo silenzi sempre più lunghi, trovò espressione ai suoi pensieri.

«Non vi colpisce che vi sia un numero grandissimo di farmacisti a Londra al giorno d’oggi?»

«Ce ne sono?» chiese Wimpole, con noncuranza. «Beh, di certo ce ne sono due assai vicini l’uno all’altro proprio là».

«Sì, ed entrambi con lo stesso nome», replicò Dalroy, «Crooke. E ho visto lo stesso signor Crooke armeggiare con le sue chimiche dietro l’angolo. Pare essere una divinità sommamente onnipresente».

«Un grande giro d’affari, suppongo», osservò Dorian Wimpole.

«Troppo grande per i suoi profitti, direi», disse Dalroy. «Che se ne fa la gente di due farmacisti dello stesso genere a pochi metri l’uno dall’altro? Mettono una gamba in una bottega e una nell’altra e si fanno curare i calli in entrambe nello stesso momento? Oppure prendono un acido in una bottega e un alcali in quella accanto, e aspettano l’effervescenza? Oppure prendono il veleno nella prima bottega e l’emetico nella seconda? Pare portare la delicatezza troppo oltre. Equivale quasi a vivere una doppia vita».

«Ma forse», disse Dorian, «egli è un farmacista clamorosamente popolare, questo signor Crooke. Forse c’è la ressa per qualche sua specialità».

«Mi pare», disse il Capitano, «che vi siano certi limiti a una simile popolarità nel caso di un farmacista. Se un uomo vende ottimo tabacco, la gente può fumarne sempre di più per pura auto-indulgenza. Ma non ho mai sentito di nessuno che eccedesse in olio di fegato di merluzzo. Perfino l’olio di ricino, direi, è considerato con rispetto più che con vero affetto».

Dopo alcuni minuti di silenzio, disse: «È prudente fermarsi qui per un istante, Pump?»

«Credo di sì», replicò Humphrey, «se mi promettete di non avere avventure nella bottega».

L’automobile si fermò davanti a un ulteriore, quarto arsenale del signor Crooke e della sua farmacia, e Dalroy entrò. Prima che Pump e il suo compagno potessero scambiarsi una parola, il Capitano uscì di nuovo, con una curiosa espressione sul volto, specie intorno alla bocca.

«Signor Wimpole», disse Dalroy, «volete farci il piacere di cenare con noi questa sera? Molti la considererebbero un invito senza cerimonie a un pasto non convenzionale; e potrebbe essere necessario consumarlo sotto una siepe o addirittura su un albero; ma voi siete un uomo di gusto, e non ci si scusa del rum di Hump o del formaggio di Hump con le persone di gusto. Mangeremo e berremo del nostro meglio stanotte. È un banchetto. Non sono affatto certo se voi ed io siamo amici o nemici, ma almeno stanotte vi sarà pace».

«Amici, lo spero», disse il poeta, sorridendo, «ma perché pace proprio stanotte?»

«Perché domani vi sarà guerra», rispose Patrick Dalroy, «da qualunque lato di essa voi possiate stare. Ho appena fatto una singolare scoperta».

E ricadde nel suo silenzio mentre volavano fuori dai margini di Londra verso i boschi e le colline oltre Croydon. Dalroy rimase nella medesima disposizione meditabonda, Dorian venne sfiorato dall’ala di farfalla di quel fuggevole sonno che coglie l’uomo trasportato in fretta, attraverso l’aria, dopo un lungo poltrire in caldi salotti; perfino il cane Quoodle dormiva sul fondo dell’auto. Quanto a Humphrey Pump, assai di rado parlava quando aveva qualcos’altro da fare. Così accadde che lunghi paesaggi e prospettive sfrecciassero accanto a loro come diapositive cambiate all’improvviso, e lunghi tratti di tempo trascorsero prima che alcuno di loro parlasse di nuovo. Il cielo mutava dai pallidi ori e verdi della sera all’azzurro ardente di una possente estiva notte, una notte di stelle intense. Le muraglie di bosco che sfilavano accanto a loro come lunghe zagaglie erano, dapprima, per lo più del tipo recintato e simile a un parco; interminabili blocchi oblunghi di nero pineto rinchiusi da casse di sottile legno grigio. Ma presto le recinzioni cominciarono ad abbassarsi, i pineti a disperdersi, e le strade a biforcarsi e persino a divagare disordinate. Mezz’ora dopo Dalroy aveva cominciato a percepire qualcosa di romantico e persino vagamente familiare nell’ondeggiare della campagna, e Humphrey Pump sapeva ormai da tempo di trovarsi ai confini della sua terra natia.

Per quanto la differenza potesse essere definita da un dettaglio, essa pareva consistere non tanto nella strada che saliva quanto nella strada che serpeggiava perpetuamente. Somigliava piuttosto a un sentiero; e persino là dove era brusca o senza meta, pareva tanto più viva. Sembrava che stessero salendo una grande, fosca collina fatta di una folla di piccole colline dalle cime arrotondate; era come un grappolo di cupole. Tra queste cupole la strada si arrampicava e si arricciava in moltitudini di curve e angoli. Era quasi impossibile credere che potesse voltarsi e ripiegarsi su se stessa così spesso senza annodarsi e strozzarsi.

“I say,” said Dalroy, breaking the silence suddenly, “this car will get giddy and fall down.”

“Perhaps,” said Dorian, beaming at him, “my car, as you may have noticed, was much steadier.”

Patrick laughed, but not without a shade of confusion. “I hope you got back your car all right,” he said. “This is really nothing for speed; but it’s an uncommonly good little climber, and it seems to have some climbing to do just now. And even more wandering.”

“The roads certainly seem to be very irregular,” said Dorian, reflectively.

“Well,” cried Patrick, with a queer kind of impatience, “you’re English and I’m not. You ought to know why the road winds about like this. Why, the Saints deliver us!” he cried, “it’s one of the wrongs of Ireland that she can’t understand England. England won’t understand herself, England won’t tell us why these roads go wriggling about. Englishmen won’t tell us! You won’t tell us!”

“Don’t be too sure,” said Dorian, with a quiet irony.

Dalroy, with an irony far from quiet emitted a loud yell of victory.

“Right,” he shouted. “More songs of the car club! We’re all poets here, I hope. Each shall write something about why the road jerks about so much. So much as this, for example,” he added, as the whole vehicle nearly rolled over in a ditch.

For, indeed, Pump appeared to be attacking such inclines as are more suitable for a goat than a small motor car. This may have been exaggerated in the emotions of his companions, who had both, for different reasons, seen much of mere flat country lately. The sensation was like a combination of trying to get into the middle of the maze at Hampton Court, and climbing the spiral staircase to the Belfry at Bruges.

“This is the right way to Roundabout,” said Dalroy, cheerfully, “charming place; salubrious spot. You can’t miss it. First to the left and right and straight on round the corner and back again. That’ll do for my poem. Get on, you slackers; why aren’t you writing your poems?”

“I’ll try one if you like,” said Dorian, treating his flattered egotism lightly. “But it’s too dark to write; and getting darker.”

Indeed they had come under a shadow between them and the stars, like the brim of a giant’s hat; only through the holes and rents in which the summer stars could now look down on them. The hill, like a cluster of domes, though smooth and even bare in its lower contours was topped with a tangle of spanning trees that sat above them like a bird brooding over its nest. The wood was larger and vaguer than the clump that is the crown of the hill at Chanctonbury, but was rather like it and held much the same high and romantic position. The next moment they were in the wood itself, and winding in and out among the trees by a ribbon of paths. The emerald twilight between the stems, combined with the dragon-like contortions of the great grey roots of the beeches, had a suggestion of monsters and the deep sea; especially as a long litter of crimson and copper-coloured fungi, which might well have been the more gorgeous types of anemone or jelly-fish, reddened the ground like a sunset dropped from the sky. And yet, contradictorily enough, they had also a strong sense of being high up; and even near to heaven; and the brilliant summer stars that stared through the chinks of the leafy roof might almost have been white starry blossoms on the trees of the wood.

But though they had entered the wood as if it were a house, their strongest sensation still was the rotatory; it seemed as if that high green house went round and round like a revolving lighthouse or the whiz-gig temple in the old pantomimes. The stars seemed, to circle over their heads; and Dorian felt almost certain he had seen the same beech-tree twice.

At length they came to a central place where the hill rose in a sort of cone in the thick of its trees, lifting its trees with it. Here Pump stopped the car, and clambering up the slope, came to the crawling colossal roots of a very large but very low beech-tree. It spread out to the four quarters of heaven more in the manner of an octopus than a tree, and within its low crown of branches there was a kind of hollow, like a cup, into which Mr. Humphrey Pump, of “The Old Ship,” Pebblewick, suddenly and entirely disappeared.

When he appeared it was with a kind of rope ladder, which he politely hung over the side for his companions to ascend by, but the Captain preferred to swing himself onto one of the octopine branches with a whirl of large wild legs worthy of a chimpanzee. When they were established there, each propped in the hollow against a branch, almost as comfortably as in an arm chair, Humphrey himself descended once more and began to take out their simple stores. The dog was still asleep in the car.

“An old haunt of yours, Hump, I suppose,” said the Captain. “You seem quite at home.”

“I am at home,” answered Pump, with gravity, “at the sign of ‘The Old Ship.’” And he stuck the old blue and red sign-board erect among the toadstools, as if inviting the passer-by to climb the trees for a drink.

The tree just topped the mound or clump of trees, and from it they could see the whole champaign of the country they had passed, with the silver roads roaming about in it like rivers. They were so exalted they could almost fancy the stars would burn them.

“Those roads remind me of the songs you’ve all promised,” said Dalroy at last. “Let’s have some supper, Hump, and then recite.”

Humphrey had hung one of the motor lanterns onto a branch above him, and proceeded by the light of it to tap the keg of rum and hand round the cheese.

“What an extraordinary thing,” exclaimed Dorian Wimpole, suddenly. “Why, I’m quite comfortable! Such a thing has never happened before, I should imagine. And how holy this cheese tastes.”

«Dico», disse Dalroy, rompendo d’improvviso il silenzio, «quest’auto avrà le vertigini e cadrà giù».

«Forse», disse Dorian, rivolgendogli un sorriso raggiante, «la mia auto, come forse avrete notato, era assai più stabile».

Patrick rise, ma non senza un’ombra d’imbarazzo. «Spero abbiate riavuto la vostra auto sana e salva», disse. «Questa non vale davvero nulla quanto a velocità; ma è una piccola arrampicatrice straordinariamente brava, e pare avere un po’ da arrampicare proprio adesso. E ancor più da vagabondare».

«Le strade paiono di certo molto irregolari», disse Dorian, pensosamente.

«Ebbene», esclamò Patrick, con una strana specie d’impazienza, «voi siete inglese e io no. Dovreste sapere perché la strada serpeggia così. Ma, che i Santi ci liberino!» gridò, «è uno dei torti dell’Irlanda che essa non riesca a comprendere l’Inghilterra. L’Inghilterra non vuole comprendere se stessa, l’Inghilterra non vuole dirci perché queste strade se ne vanno contorcendosi. Gli inglesi non vogliono dircelo! Voi non volete dircelo!»

«Non siatene troppo sicuro», disse Dorian, con una tranquilla ironia.

Dalroy, con un’ironia tutt’altro che tranquilla, emise un sonoro urlo di vittoria.

«Giusto», gridò. «Altre canzoni del club dell’automobile! Siamo tutti poeti qui, spero. Ciascuno scriva qualcosa sul perché la strada sobbalza così tanto. Tanto quanto questo, per esempio», aggiunse, mentre l’intero veicolo per poco non si rovesciava in un fosso.

Poiché, in effetti, Pump pareva affrontare pendii più adatti a una capra che a una piccola automobile. Ciò può essere stato esagerato nelle emozioni dei suoi compagni, i quali entrambi, per ragioni diverse, avevano di recente veduto molta pura campagna piatta. La sensazione era come una combinazione tra il tentare di raggiungere il centro del labirinto di Hampton Court e il salire la scala a chiocciola del Campanile di Bruges.

«Questa è la strada giusta per Roundabout», disse Dalroy, allegramente, «luogo incantevole; sito salubre. Non potete sbagliarla. Prima a sinistra e a destra e sempre dritto oltre l’angolo e di nuovo indietro. Andrà bene per la mia poesia. Datevi da fare, fannulloni; perché non state scrivendo le vostre poesie?»

«Ne tenterò una, se volete», disse Dorian, trattando con leggerezza il suo egotismo lusingato. «Ma è troppo buio per scrivere; e si fa sempre più buio».

In effetti erano giunti sotto un’ombra tra loro e le stelle, come la tesa del cappello di un gigante; solo attraverso i fori e gli squarci di essa le estive stelle potevano ora guardarli dall’alto. La collina, simile a un grappolo di cupole, benché liscia e persino spoglia nei suoi contorni inferiori, era sormontata da un groviglio di alberi arcuati che vi si posava sopra come un uccello che cova il proprio nido. Il bosco era più vasto e più indistinto del ciuffo che è la corona della collina di Chanctonbury, ma vi assomigliava piuttosto e occupava all’incirca la stessa posizione alta e romantica. Un istante dopo erano nel bosco stesso, e s’insinuavano dentro e fuori tra gli alberi lungo un nastro di sentieri. Il crepuscolo di smeraldo tra i fusti, unito alle contorsioni draconiche delle grandi radici grigie dei faggi, aveva un che di mostri e di mare profondo; tanto più che una lunga distesa di funghi cremisi e color rame, che ben avrebbero potuto essere i più splendidi tipi di anemoni o meduse, arrossava il suolo come un tramonto caduto dal cielo. Eppure, in modo abbastanza contraddittorio, avevano anche un forte senso di trovarsi in alto; e persino vicino al cielo; e le brillanti estive stelle che fissavano attraverso le fessure del tetto frondoso avrebbero potuto quasi essere bianchi fiori stellati sugli alberi del bosco.

Ma sebbene fossero entrati nel bosco come se fosse una casa, la loro sensazione più forte restava quella rotatoria; pareva che quell’alta casa verde girasse e rigirasse come un faro rotante o come il tempio giravolta delle vecchie pantomime. Le stelle parevano ruotare sopra le loro teste; e Dorian si sentiva quasi certo di aver visto due volte lo stesso faggio.

Alla fine giunsero a un luogo centrale dove la collina si levava in una sorta di cono nel folto dei suoi alberi, sollevando i suoi alberi con sé. Qui Pump fermò l’auto e, inerpicandosi su per il pendio, giunse alle striscianti, colossali radici di un faggio grandissimo ma bassissimo. Si estendeva ai quattro angoli del cielo più alla maniera di una piovra che di un albero, e dentro la sua bassa corona di rami vi era una sorta di cavità, come una coppa, nella quale il signor Humphrey Pump, della «Vecchia Nave», Pebblewick, d’improvviso e interamente scomparve.

Quando riapparve fu con una sorta di scala di corda, che appese cortesemente al bordo perché i suoi compagni vi salissero, ma il Capitano preferì slanciarsi su uno dei rami polipeschi con un turbinio di grandi gambe selvagge degno di uno scimpanzé. Quando si furono sistemati lassù, ciascuno appoggiato nella cavità contro un ramo, quasi comodo come in una poltrona, Humphrey stesso discese ancora una volta e cominciò a estrarre le loro semplici provviste. Il cane dormiva ancora nell’auto.

«Un tuo vecchio ritrovo, Hump, suppongo», disse il Capitano. «Sembri proprio a casa tua».

«Sono a casa», rispose Pump, con gravità, «all’insegna della “Vecchia Nave”». E piantò la vecchia insegna azzurra e rossa ritta tra i funghi velenosi, come a invitare il passante ad arrampicarsi sugli alberi per bere qualcosa.

L’albero sovrastava di poco il poggio o ciuffo di alberi, e da esso potevano vedere l’intera pianura della contrada che avevano attraversato, con le strade d’argento che vi vagavano dentro come fiumi. Erano tanto in alto da poter quasi immaginare che le stelle li bruciassero.

«Quelle strade mi ricordano le canzoni che avete tutti promesso», disse Dalroy alla fine. «Ceniamo un po’, Hump, e poi recitiamo».

Humphrey aveva appeso una delle lanterne dell’auto a un ramo sopra di sé, e procedette alla sua luce a spillare il barilotto di rum e a distribuire il formaggio.

«Che cosa straordinaria», esclamò d’improvviso Dorian Wimpole. «Diamine, sto proprio comodo! Una cosa simile non è mai accaduta prima, immagino. E che sapore santo ha questo formaggio».

“It has gone on a pilgrimage,” answered Dalroy, “or rather a Crusade. It’s a heroic, a fighting cheese. ‘Cheese of all Cheeses, Cheeses of all the world,’ as my compatriot, Mr. Yeats, says to the Something-or-other of Battle. It’s almost impossible that this cheese can have come out of such a coward as a cow. I suppose,” he added, wistfully, “I suppose it wouldn’t do to explain that in this case Hump had milked the bull. That would be classed by scientists among Irish legends–those that have the Celtic glamour and all that. No, I think this cheese must have come from that Dun Cow of Dunsmore Heath, who had horns bigger than elephant’s tusks, and who was so ferocious that one of the greatest of the old heroes of chivalry was required to do battle with it. The rum’s good, too. I’ve earned this glass of rum–earned it by Christian humility. For nearly a month I’ve lowered myself to the beasts of the field, and gone about on all fours like a teetotaller. Hump, circulate the bottle–I mean the cask–and let us have some of this poetry you’re so keen about. Each poem must have the same title, you know; it’s a rattling good title. It’s called ‘An Inquiry into the Causes geological, historical, agricultural, psychological, psychical, moral, spiritual and theological of the alleged cases of double, treble, quadruple and other curvature in the English Road, conducted by a specially appointed secret commission in a hole in a tree, by admittedly judicious and academic authorities specially appointed by themselves to report to the Dog Quoodle, having power to add to their number and also to take away the number they first thought of; God save the King.’” Having delivered this formula with blinding rapidity, he added rather breathlessly, “that’s the note to strike, the lyric note.”

For all his rather formless hilarity, Dalroy still impressed the poet as being moredistrait than the others, as if his mind were labouring with some bigger thing in the background. He was in a sort of creative trance; and Humphrey Pump, who knew him like his own soul, knew well that it was not mere literary creation. Rather it was a kind of creation which many modern moralists would call destruction. For Patrick Dalroy was, not a little to his misfortune, what is called a man of action; as Captain Dawson realised when he found his entire person a bright pea-green. Fond as he was of jokes and rhymes, nothing he could write or even sing ever satisfied him like something he could do.

Thus it happened that his contribution to the metrical inquiry into the crooked roads was avowedly hasty and flippant. While Dorian who was of the opposite temper, the temper that receives impressions instead of pushing out to make them, found his artist’s love of beauty fulfilled as it had never been before in that noble nest; and was far more serious and human than usual. Patrick’s verses ran:

“Some say that Guy of Warwick,

The man that killed the Cow,

And brake the mighty Boar alive,

Beyond the Bridge at Slough,

Went up against a Loathly Worm

That wasted all the Downs,

And so the roads they twist and squirm

(If I may be allowed the term)

From the writhing of the stricken Worm

That died in seven towns.

I see no scientific proof

That this idea is sound,

And I should say they wound about

To find the town of Roundabout,

The merry town of Roundabout

That makes the world go round.

“Some say that Robin Goodfellow,

Whose lantern lights the meads,

(To steal a phrase Sir Walter Scott

In heaven no longer needs)

Such dance around the trysting-place

The moonstruck lover leads;

Which superstition I should scout;

There is more faith in honest doubt,

(As Tennyson has pointed out)

Than in those nasty creeds.

But peace and righteousness (St. John)

In Roundabout can kiss,

And since that’s all that’s found about

The pleasant town of Roundabout,

The roads they simply bound about

To find out where it is.

“Some say that when Sir Lancelot

Went forth to find the Grail,

Grey Merlin wrinkled up the roads

For hope that he should fail;

All roads led back to Lyonesse

And Camelot in the Vale;

I cannot yield assent to this

Extravagant hypothesis,

The plain, shrewd Briton will dismiss

Such rumours (Daily Mail).

But in the streets of Roundabout

Are no such factions found,

Or theories to expound about

Or roll upon the ground about,

In the happy town of Roundabout

That makes the world go round.”

Patrick Dalroy relieved his feelings by finishing with a shout, draining a stiff glass of his sailor’s wine, turning restlessly on his elbow and looking across the landscape toward London.

Dorian Wimpole had been drinking golden rum and strong starlight and the fragrance of forests; and, though his verses, too, were burlesque, he read them more emotionally than was his wont.

“Before the Roman came to Rye or out to Severn strode,

The rolling English drunkard made the rolling English road.

A reeling road, a rolling road, that rambles round the shire,

And after him the parson ran, the sexton and the squire.

A merry road, a mazy road, and such as we did tread

That night we went to Birmingham by way of Beachy Head.

“I knew no harm of Bonaparte and plenty of the Squire,

And for to fight the Frenchmen I did not much desire;

But I did bash their baggonets because they came arrayed

To straighten out the crooked road an English drunkard made,

Where you and I went down the lane with ale-mugs in our hands

The night we went to Glastonbury by way of Goodwin Sands.

“His sins they were forgiven him; or why do flowers run

«È andato in pellegrinaggio», rispose Dalroy, «o meglio in Crociata. È un formaggio eroico, combattente. “Formaggio di tutti i Formaggi, Formaggi di tutto il mondo”, come dice il mio compatriota, il signor Yeats, al Non-so-che di Battaglia. È quasi impossibile che questo formaggio sia potuto uscire da una tale codarda quale una vacca. Suppongo», aggiunse, malinconicamente, «suppongo che non converrebbe spiegare che in questo caso Hump aveva munto il toro. Ciò verrebbe classificato dagli scienziati tra le leggende irlandesi… quelle che hanno l’incanto celtico e tutto il resto. No, credo che questo formaggio debba provenire da quella Vacca Bruna di Dunsmore Heath, che aveva corna più grandi delle zanne d’elefante, ed era tanto feroce che uno dei più grandi tra gli antichi eroi della cavalleria fu chiamato a darle battaglia. Anche il rum è buono. Mi sono guadagnato questo bicchiere di rum… me lo sono guadagnato con cristiana umiltà. Per quasi un mese mi sono abbassato alle bestie dei campi, e sono andato a quattro zampe come un astemio. Hump, fa’ circolare la bottiglia… voglio dire il barile… e concedici un po’ di questa poesia di cui sei così entusiasta. Ogni poesia deve avere lo stesso titolo, sai; è un titolo formidabile. Si intitola “Un’Indagine sulle Cause geologiche, storiche, agricole, psicologiche, psichiche, morali, spirituali e teologiche dei presunti casi di doppia, tripla, quadrupla e altra curvatura nella Strada inglese, condotta da una commissione segreta appositamente nominata dentro un buco in un albero, da autorità dichiaratamente giudiziose e accademiche appositamente nominate da se stesse per riferire al Cane Quoodle, con facoltà di aggiungere al proprio numero e anche di togliere il numero che avevano pensato dapprima; Dio salvi il Re”». Pronunciata questa formula con accecante rapidità, aggiunse piuttosto ansante: «ecco la nota da toccare, la nota lirica».

Con tutta la sua ilarità piuttosto informe, Dalroy continuava a colpire il poeta come più distratto degli altri, quasi la sua mente fosse alle prese con qualcosa di più grande sullo sfondo. Era in una sorta di trance creativa; e Humphrey Pump, che lo conosceva come la propria anima, sapeva bene che non era mera creazione letteraria. Era piuttosto una specie di creazione che molti moralisti moderni chiamerebbero distruzione. Poiché Patrick Dalroy era, non poco a sua sventura, ciò che si chiama un uomo d’azione; come il capitano Dawson comprese quando si ritrovò l’intera persona di un vivido verde pisello. Per quanto amasse gli scherzi e le rime, nulla che potesse scrivere o persino cantare lo appagava mai quanto qualcosa che potesse fare.

Così accadde che il suo contributo all’indagine metrica sulle strade storte fosse dichiaratamente frettoloso e sbrigativo. Mentre Dorian, che era del temperamento opposto, il temperamento che riceve impressioni invece di spingersi a crearle, trovò il suo artistico amore per la bellezza appagato come mai prima in quel nobile nido; e fu assai più serio e umano del solito. I versi di Patrick recitavano:

C’è chi dice che Guy di Warwick,

l’uomo che uccise la Vacca,

e domò vivo il possente Cinghiale,

oltre il Ponte di Slough,

mosse contro un Verme ripugnante

che devastava tutte le Downs,

e così le strade si torcono e si contorcono

(se mi è concesso il termine)

per il dimenarsi del Verme colpito

che morì in sette borghi.

Non vedo prova scientifica

che questa idea sia fondata,

e direi che serpeggiavano attorno

per trovare il borgo di Roundabout,

l’allegro borgo di Roundabout

che fa girare il mondo.

C’è chi dice che Robin Goodfellow,

la cui lanterna illumina i prati,

(per rubare una frase che Sir Walter Scott

in cielo più non gli serve)

guidi tale danza attorno al luogo dell’incontro

che l’amante rapito dalla luna conduce;

superstizione che io respingerei;

c’è più fede in un onesto dubbio,

(come Tennyson ha fatto notare)

che in quei laidi credi.

Ma pace e giustizia (san Giovanni)

a Roundabout possono baciarsi,

e poiché è tutto ciò che si trova intorno

al piacevole borgo di Roundabout,

le strade semplicemente rimbalzano attorno

per scoprire dove esso sia.

C’è chi dice che quando Sir Lancillotto

partì in cerca del Graal,

il grigio Merlino corrugò le strade

nella speranza ch’egli fallisse;

tutte le strade riconducevano a Lyonesse

e a Camelot nella Valle;

Non posso dare assenso a questa

stravagante ipotesi,

il semplice, accorto Britanno respingerà

simili dicerie (Daily Mail).

Ma nelle vie di Roundabout

non si trovano fazioni siffatte,

né teorie da esporre intorno

né su cui rotolarsi al suolo intorno,

nel felice borgo di Roundabout

che fa girare il mondo».

Patrick Dalroy sfogò i propri sentimenti concludendo con un grido, vuotando un bicchiere carico del suo vino da marinaio, rigirandosi inquieto sul gomito e guardando attraverso il paesaggio verso Londra.

Dorian Wimpole aveva bevuto rum dorato e forte luce di stelle e la fragranza delle foreste; e, benché anche i suoi versi fossero burleschi, li lesse con più emozione di quanto gli fosse consueto.

Prima che il Romano giungesse a Rye o marciasse fino al Severn,

l’ondeggiante ubriacone inglese fece l’ondeggiante strada inglese.

Una strada barcollante, una ondeggiante strada, che vaga per la contea,

e dietro a lui corsero il parroco, il sagrestano e lo squire.

Una strada allegra, una strada labirintica, e tale quale calpestammo

la notte che andammo a Birmingham passando per Beachy Head.

Non sapevo alcun male di Bonaparte e molto dello Squire,

e a combattere i Francesi non molto desideravo;

ma sfondai le loro baionette perché vennero schierati

a raddrizzare la storta strada che un ubriacone inglese fece,

là dove tu ed io scendemmo il viottolo con i boccali di birra in mano

la notte che andammo a Glastonbury passando per le Goodwin Sands.

I suoi peccati gli furono perdonati; o perché corrono i fiori

Behind him; and the hedges all strengthening in the sun?

The wild thing went from left to right and knew not which was which,

But the wild rose was above him when they found him in the ditch.

God pardon us, nor harden us; we did not see so clear

The night we went to Bannockburn by way of Brighton Pier.

“My friends, we will not go again or ape an ancient rage,

Or stretch the folly of our youth to be the shame of age,

But walk with clearer eyes and ears this path that wandereth,

And see undrugged in evening light the decent inn of death;

For there is good news yet to hear and fine things to be seen

Before we go to Paradise by way of Kensal Green.”

“Have you written one, Hump?” asked Dalroy. Humphrey, who had been scribbling hard under the lamp, looked up with a dismal face.

“Yes,” he said. “But I write under a great disadvantage. You see, I know why the road curves about.” And he read very rapidly, all on one note:

“The road turned first toward the left

Where Pinker’s quarry made the cleft;

The path turned next toward the right

Because the mastiff used to bite;

Then left, because of Slippery Height,

And then again toward the right.

We could not take the left because

It would have been against the laws;

Squire closed it in King William’s day

Because it was a Right of Way.

Still right; to dodge the ridge of chalk

Where Parson’s Ghost it used to walk,

Till someone Parson used to know

Met him blind drunk in Callao.

Then left, a long way round, to skirt

The good land where old Doggy Burt

Was owner of the Crown and Cup,

And would not give his freehold up;

Right, missing the old river-bed,

They tried to make him take instead

Right, since they say Sir Gregory

Went mad and let the Gypsies be,

And so they have their camp secure.

And, though not honest, they are poor,

And that is something; then along

And first to right–no, I am wrong!

Second to right, of course; the first

Is what the holy sisters cursed,

And none defy their awful oaths

Since the policeman lost his clothes

Because of fairies; right again,

What used to be High Toby Lane,

Left by the double larch and right

Until the milestone is in sight,

Because the road is firm and good

From past the milestone to the wood;

And I was told by Dr. Lowe

Whom Mr. Wimpole’s aunt would know,

Who lives at Oxford writing books,

And ain’t so silly as he looks;

The Romans did that little bit

And we’ve done all the rest of it;

By which we hardly seem to score;

Left, and then forward as before

To where they nearly hanged Miss Browne,

Who told them not to cut her down,

But loose the rope or let her swing,

Because it was a waste of string;

Left once again by Hunker’s Cleft,

And right beyond the elm, and left,

By Pill’s right by Nineteen Nicks

And left–”

“No! No! No’! Hump! Hump! Hump!” cried Dalroy in a sort of terror. “Don’t be exhaustive! Don’t be a scientist, Hump, and lay waste fairyland! How long does it go on? Is there a lot more of it?”

“Yes,” said Pump, in a stony manner. “There is a lot more of it.”

“And it’s all true?” inquired Dorian Wimpole, with interest.

“Yes,” replied Pump with a smile, “it’s all true.”

“My complaint, exactly,” said the Captain. “What you want is legends. What you want is lies, especially at this time of night, and on rum like this, and on our first and our last holiday. What do you think about rum?” he asked Wimpole.

“About this particular rum, in this particular tree, at this particular moment,” answered Wimpole, “I think it is the nectar of the younger gods. If you ask me in a general, synthetic sense what I think of rum–well, I think it’s rather rum.”

“You find it a trifle sweet, I suppose,” said Dalroy, with some bitterness. “Sybarite! By the way,” he said abruptly, “what a silly word that word ‘Hedonist’ is! The really self-indulgent people generally like sour things and not sweet; bitter things like caviar and curries or what not. It’s the Saints who like the sweets. At least I’ve known at least five women who were practically saints, and they all preferred sweet champagne. Look here, Wimpole! Shall I tell you the ancient oral legend about the origin of rum? I told you what you wanted was legends. Be careful to preserve this one, and hand it on to your children; for, unfortunately, my parents carelessly neglected the duty of handing it on to me. After the words ‘A Farmer had three sons …’ all that I owe to tradition ceases. But when the three boys last met in the village market-place, they were all sucking sugar-sticks. Nevertheless, they were all discontented, and, on that day parted for ever. One remained on his father’s farm, hungering for his inheritance. One went up to London to seek his fortune, as fortunes are found today in that town forgotten of God. The third ran away to sea. And the first two flung away their sugar-sticks in shame; and he on the farm was always drinking smaller and sourer beer for the love of money; and he that was in town was always drinking richer and richer wines, that men might see that he was rich. But he who ran away to sea actually ran on board with the sugar-stick in his mouth; and St. Peter or St. Andrew, or whoever is the patron of men in boats, touched it and turned it into a fountain for the comfort of men upon the sea. That is the sailor’s theory of the origin of rum. Inquiry addressed to any busy Captain with a new crew in the act of shipping an unprecedented cargo, will elicit a sympathetic agreement.”

“Your rum at least,” said Dorian, good-humouredly, “may well produce a fairy-tale. But, indeed, I think all this would have been a fairy-tale without it.”

Patrick raised himself from his arboreal throne, and leaned against his branch with a curious and sincere sense of being rebuked.

“Yours was a good poem,” he said, with seeming irrelevance, “and mine was a bad one. Mine was bad, partly because I’m not a poet as you are; but almost as much because I was trying to make up another song at the same time. And it went to another tune, you see.”

He looked out over the rolling roads and said almost to himself:

“In the city set upon slime and loam

They cry in their parliament ‘Who goes home?’

And there is no answer in arch or dome,

For none in the city of graves goes home.

Yet these shall perish and understand,

For God has pity on this great land.

Men that are men again; who goes home?

Tocsin and trumpeter! Who goes home?

For there’s blood on the field and blood on the foam,

And blood on the body when man goes home.

And a voice valedictory–Who is for Victory?

Who is for Liberty? Who goes home?”

Softly and idly as he had said this second rhyme, there were circumstances about his attitude that must have troubled or interested anyone who did not know him well.

“May I ask,” asked Dorian, laughing, “why it is necessary to draw your sword at this stage of the affair?”

“Because we have left the place called Roundabout,” answered Patrick, “and we have come to a place called Rightabout.”

And he lifted his sword toward London, and the grey glint upon it came from a low, grey light in the east.

dietro a lui; e le siepi tutte rinvigorite al sole?

La cosa selvaggia andò da sinistra a destra e non sapeva qual era quale,

ma la rosa selvatica era sopra di lui quando lo trovarono nel fosso.

Dio ci perdoni, né ci induri; non vedemmo così chiaro

la notte che andammo a Bannockburn passando per il Molo di Brighton.

Amici miei, non torneremo a andare né a scimmiottare un’antica ira,

né a protrarre la follia della gioventù fino a farne la vergogna dell’età,

ma percorreremo con occhi e orecchi più limpidi questo sentiero che vagabonda,

e vedremo, non drogati, nella luce della sera, la decorosa locanda della Morte;

poiché vi sono ancora buone novelle da udire e belle cose da vedere

prima di andare in Paradiso passando per Kensal Green».

«Ne hai scritta una, Hump?» chiese Dalroy. Humphrey, che aveva scarabocchiato di gran lena sotto la lampada, alzò lo sguardo con un volto lugubre.

«Sì», disse. «Ma scrivo con un grande svantaggio. Vedete, io so perché la strada fa le sue curve». E lesse assai rapidamente, tutto su una sola nota:

La strada voltò dapprima verso sinistra

dove la cava di Pinker fece la fenditura;

il sentiero voltò poi verso destra

perché il mastino soleva mordere;

poi a sinistra, per via di Slippery Height,

e poi di nuovo verso destra.

Non potevamo prendere a sinistra perché

sarebbe stato contro le leggi;

lo Squire la chiuse ai tempi di re Guglielmo

perché era un Diritto di Passaggio.

ancora a destra; per schivare il crinale di gesso

dove il Fantasma del Parroco soleva aggirarsi,

finché qualcuno che il Parroco conosceva

lo incontrò ubriaco fradicio a Callao.

poi a sinistra, un lungo giro, per costeggiare

la buona terra dove il vecchio Doggy Burt

era padrone della Corona e Coppa,

e non volle cedere il suo possedimento;

a destra, evitando il vecchio letto del fiume,

che cercarono di fargli prendere invece

a destra, poiché dicono che Sir Gregory

impazzì e lasciò in pace gli Zingari,

e così hanno il loro accampamento al sicuro.

E, benché non onesti, sono poveri,

e questo è qualcosa; poi avanti

e prima a destra… no, mi sbaglio!

La seconda a destra, s’intende; la prima

è quella che le sante sorelle maledirono,

e nessuno sfida i loro tremendi giuramenti

da quando il poliziotto perse i suoi abiti

per colpa delle fate; di nuovo a destra,

quella che era High Toby Lane,

a sinistra presso il doppio larice e a destra

finché la pietra miliare è in vista,

perché la strada è solida e buona

dalla pietra miliare in poi fino al bosco;

e me lo disse il dottor Lowe

che la zia del signor Wimpole conoscerebbe,

il quale vive a Oxford scrivendo libri,

e non è così sciocco come sembra;

I Romani fecero quel pezzetto

e noi abbiamo fatto tutto il resto;

dal che non pare si guadagni granché;

a sinistra, e poi avanti come prima

fin dove per poco non impiccarono Miss Browne,

che disse loro di non tirarla giù,

ma di allentare la fune o di lasciarla penzolare,

perché era uno spreco di corda;

ancora una volta a sinistra presso Hunker’s Cleft,

e a destra oltre l’olmo, e a sinistra,

presso Pill’s a destra presso Nineteen Nicks

e a sinistra…»

«No! No! No’! Hump! Hump! Hump!» gridò Dalroy in una sorta di terrore. «Non essere esauriente! Non fare lo scienziato, Hump, e non devastare il paese delle fate! Quanto va avanti? Ce n’è ancora molto?»

«Sì», disse Pump, in modo impassibile. «Ce n’è ancora molto».

«Ed è tutto vero?» domandò Dorian Wimpole, con interesse.

«Sì», replicò Pump con un sorriso, «è tutto vero».

«È esattamente la mia lagnanza», disse il Capitano. «Ciò che ti serve sono leggende. Ciò che ti serve sono menzogne, specie a quest’ora di notte, e su un rum come questo, e nella nostra prima e ultima vacanza. Che ne pensi del rum?» chiese a Wimpole.

«Riguardo a questo particolare rum, su questo particolare albero, in questo particolare momento», rispose Wimpole, «penso che sia il nettare degli dèi più giovani. Se mi chiedi in senso generale e sintetico cosa penso del rum… beh, penso che sia piuttosto bizzarro».

«Lo trovi un tantino dolce, suppongo», disse Dalroy, con una certa amarezza. «Sibarita! A proposito», disse bruscamente, «che parola sciocca è quella parola “Edonista”! Le persone davvero dedite all’auto-indulgenza in genere amano le cose aspre e non le dolci; cose amare come il caviale e i curry o che so io. Sono i Santi ad amare i dolci. Almeno ho conosciuto almeno cinque donne che erano praticamente sante, e tutte preferivano lo champagne dolce. Senti qua, Wimpole! Vuoi che ti racconti l’antica leggenda orale sull’origine del rum? Ti ho detto che ciò che volevi erano leggende. Bada di conservare questa, e di tramandarla ai tuoi figli; poiché, purtroppo, i miei genitori trascurarono con noncuranza il dovere di tramandarla a me. Dopo le parole “Un Contadino aveva tre figli…” tutto ciò che devo alla tradizione cessa. Ma quando gli ultimi tre ragazzi si incontrarono nella piazza del mercato del villaggio, succhiavano tutti bastoncini di zucchero. Nondimeno erano tutti scontenti, e, quel giorno, si separarono per sempre. Uno rimase nella fattoria del padre, bramando la propria eredità. Uno salì a Londra a cercar fortuna, come le fortune si trovano oggi in quella città dimenticata da Dio. Il terzo fuggì per mare. E i primi due gettarono via i loro bastoncini di zucchero per la vergogna; e quello nella fattoria beveva sempre birra più scarsa e più aspra per l’amore del denaro; e quello che era in città beveva vini sempre più pregiati, affinché gli uomini vedessero ch’era ricco. Ma colui che fuggì per mare corse davvero a bordo col bastoncino di zucchero in bocca; e san Pietro o sant’Andrea, o chiunque sia il patrono degli uomini sulle barche, lo toccò e lo mutò in una fontana per il conforto degli uomini sul mare. Questa è la teoria del marinaio sull’origine del rum. Un’indagine rivolta a qualunque Capitano indaffarato con un nuovo equipaggio nell’atto di imbarcare un carico senza precedenti, ne trarrà un solidale assenso».

«Il tuo rum, almeno», disse Dorian, di buon umore, «ben può produrre una fiaba. Ma, in verità, credo che tutto questo sarebbe stato una fiaba anche senza di esso».

Patrick si sollevò dal suo trono arboreo, e si appoggiò al ramo con una curiosa e sincera sensazione di essere stato rimproverato.

«La tua era una buona poesia», disse, con apparente noncuranza, «e la mia era pessima. La mia era pessima, in parte perché non sono un poeta come lo sei tu; ma quasi altrettanto perché stavo cercando di comporre un’altra canzone nello stesso tempo. E andava su un’altra melodia, vedi».

Guardò fuori sulle ondeggianti strade e disse quasi tra sé:

Nella città posata su melma e limo

gridano nel loro parlamento «Chi va a casa?»

E non v’è risposta in arco o cupola,

poiché nessuno nella città delle tombe va a casa.

Eppure costoro periranno e comprenderanno,

poiché Dio ha pietà di questa grande terra.

Uomini che sono di nuovo uomini; chi va a casa?

Campana a stormo e trombettiere! Chi va a casa?

Poiché c’è sangue sul campo e sangue sulla schiuma,

e sangue sul corpo quando l’uomo va a casa.

E una voce d’addio… Chi è per la Vittoria?

Chi è per la Libertà? Chi va a casa?»

Per quanto sommessamente e con noncuranza avesse recitato questa seconda rima, vi erano circostanze nel suo atteggiamento che avrebbero turbato o interessato chiunque non lo conoscesse bene.

«Posso chiedere», domandò Dorian, ridendo, «perché sia necessario sguainare la tua spada a questo punto della faccenda?»

«Perché abbiamo lasciato il luogo chiamato Roundabout», rispose Patrick, «e siamo giunti a un luogo chiamato Rightabout».

E levò la sua spada verso Londra, e il grigio bagliore su di essa veniva da una bassa, grigia luce a oriente.

CHAPTER XXII: THE CHEMISTRY OF MR. CROOKE

WHEN the celebrated Hibbs next visited the shop of Crooke, that mystic and criminologist chemist, he found the premises were impressively and even amazingly enlarged with decorations in the eastern style. Indeed, it would not have been too much to say that Mr. Crooke’s shop occupied the whole of one side of a showy street in the West End; the other side being a blank façade of public buildings. It would be no exaggeration to say that Mr. Crooke was the only shopkeeper for some distance round. Mr. Crooke still served in his shop, however; and politely hastened to serve his customer with the medicine that was customary. Unfortunately, for some reason or other, history was, in connection with this shop, only too prone to repeat itself. And after a vague but soothing conversation with the chemist (on the subject of vitriol and its effects on human happiness), Mr. Hibbs experienced the acute annoyance of once more beholding his most intimate friend, Mr. Joseph Leveson, enter the same fashionable emporium. But, indeed, Leveson’s own annoyance was much too acute for him to notice any on the part of Hibbs.

“Well,” he said, stopping dead in the middle of the shop, “here is a fine confounded kettle of fish!”

It is one of the tragedies of the diplomatic that they are not allowed to admit either knowledge or ignorance; so Hibbs looked gloomily wise; and said, pursing his lips, “you mean thegeneral situation.”

“I mean the situation about this everlasting business of the inn-signs,” said Leveson, impatiently. “Lord Ivywood went up specially, when his leg was really bad, to get it settled in the House in a small non-contentious bill, providing that the sign shouldn’t be enough if the liquor hadn’t been on the spot three days.”

“Oh, but,” said Hibbs, sinking his voice to a soft solemnity, as being one of the initiate, “a thing likethat can be managed, don’t you know.”

“Of course it can,” said the other, still with the same slightly irritable air. “It was. But it doesn’t seem to occur to you, any more than it did to his lordship, that there is rather a weak point after all in this business of passing acts quietly because they’re unpopular. Has it ever occurred to you that if a law is really kept too quiet to be opposed, it may also be kept too quiet to be obeyed. It’s not so easy to hush it up from a big politician without running the risk of hushing it up even from a common policeman.”

“But surely that can’t happen, by the nature of things?”

“Can’t it, by God,” said J. Leveson, appealing to a less pantheistic authority.

He unfolded a number of papers from his pocket, chiefly cheap local newspapers, but some of them letters and telegrams.

“Listen to this!” he said. “A curious incident occurred in the village of Poltwell in Surrey yesterday morning. The baker’s shop of Mr. Whiteman was suddenly besieged by a knot of the looser types of the locality, who appear to have demanded beer instead of bread; basing their claim on some ornamental object erected outside the shop; which object they asserted to be a sign-board within the meaning of the act. There, you see, they haven’t even heard of the new act! What do you think of this, from theClapton Conservator. ‘The contempt of Socialists for the law was well illustrated yesterday, when a crowd, collected round some wooden ensign of Socialism set up before Mr. Dugdale’s Drapery Stores, refused to disperse, though told that their action was contrary to the law. Eventually the malcontents joined the procession following the wooden emblem.’ And what do you say to this? ‘Stop-press news. A chemist in Pimlico has been invaded by a huge crowd, demanding beer; and asserting the provision of it to be among his duties. The chemist is, of course, well acquainted with his immunities in the matter, especially under the new act; but the old notion of the importance of the sign seems still to possess the populace and even, to a certain extent, to paralyze the police.’ What do you say to that? Isn’t it as plain as Monday morning that this Flying Inn has flown a day in front of us, as all such lies do?” There was a diplomatic silence.

“Well,” asked the still angry Leveson of the still dubious Hibbs, “what do you make of all that?”

One ill-acquainted with that relativity essential to all modern minds, might possibly have fancied that Mr. Hibbs could not make much of it. However that may be, his explanations or incapacity for explanations, were soon tested with a fairly positive test. For Lord Ivywood actually walked into the shop of Mr. Crooke.

“Good day, gentlemen,” he said, looking at them with an expression which they both thought baffling and even a little disconcerting. “Good morning, Mr. Crooke. I have a celebrated visitor for you.” And he introduced the smiling Misysra. The Prophet had fallen back on a comparatively quiet costume this morning, a mere matter of purple and orange or what not; but his aged face was now perennially festive.

“The Cause progresses,” he said. “Everywhere the Cause progresses. You heard his lordship’s beau-uti-ful speech?”

“I have heard many,” said Hibbs, gracefully, “that can be so described.”

“The Prophet means what I was saying about the Ballot Paper Amendment Act,” said Ivywood, casually. “It seems to be the alphabet of statesmanship to recognise now that the great oriental British Empire has become one corporate whole with the occidental one. Look at our universities, with their Mohammedan students; soon they may be a majority. Now are we,” he went on, still more quietly, “are we to rule this country under the forms of representative government? I do not pretend to believe in democracy, as you know, but I think it would be extremely unsettling and incalculable to destroy representative government. If we are to give Moslem Britain representative government, we must not make the mistake we made about the Hindoos and military organization–which led to the Mutiny. We must not ask them to make a cross on their ballot papers; for though it seems a small thing, it may offend them. So I brought in a little bill to make it optional between the old-fashioned cross and an upward curved mark that might stand for a crescent–and as it’s rather easier to make, I believe it will be generally adopted.”

CAPITOLO XXII: LA CHIMICA DEL SIGNOR CROOKE

QUANDO il celebre Hibbs visitò la volta seguente la bottega di Crooke, quel farmacista mistico e criminologo, trovò i locali impressionantemente e persino stupefacentemente ampliati con decorazioni in stile orientale. In effetti, non sarebbe stato troppo dire che la bottega del signor Crooke occupava un intero lato di una sfarzosa via del West End; l’altro lato essendo una nuda facciata di edifici pubblici. Non sarebbe un’esagerazione dire che il signor Crooke era l’unico bottegaio per un certo tratto all’intorno. Il signor Crooke serviva tuttavia ancora nella sua bottega; e si affrettò cortesemente a servire il suo cliente con la medicina consueta. Purtroppo, per qualche ragione o l’altra, la storia, in rapporto a questa bottega, era fin troppo incline a ripetersi. E dopo una conversazione vaga ma rassicurante col farmacista (sul tema del vetriolo e dei suoi effetti sulla felicità umana), il signor Hibbs provò l’acuto fastidio di scorgere ancora una volta il suo più intimo amico, il signor Joseph Leveson, entrare nel medesimo elegante emporio. Ma, in verità, il fastidio dello stesso Leveson era troppo acuto perché egli notasse quello da parte di Hibbs.

«Ebbene», disse, arrestandosi di colpo in mezzo alla bottega, «ecco un bel pasticcio maledetto!»

È una delle tragedie dei diplomatici che non è loro concesso di ammettere né conoscenza né ignoranza; così Hibbs assunse un’aria cupamente saggia; e disse, increspando le labbra: «intendi la situazione generale».

«Intendo la situazione riguardo a questa eterna faccenda delle insegne di taverna», disse Leveson, con impazienza. «Lord Ivywood si recò apposta, quando la sua gamba stava davvero male, a farla sistemare alla Camera con un piccolo disegno di legge non contenzioso, che stabiliva che l’insegna non sarebbe bastata se il liquore non fosse stato sul posto da tre giorni».

«Oh, ma», disse Hibbs, abbassando la voce a una morbida solennità, quale uno degli iniziati, «una cosa del genere si può gestire, non lo sai».

«Certo che si può», disse l’altro, sempre con la stessa aria lievemente irritabile. «Lo è stata. Ma non pare venirti in mente, non più di quanto venisse a sua signoria, che c’è dopotutto un punto piuttosto debole in questa faccenda di far passare leggi in sordina perché sono impopolari. Ti è mai venuto in mente che se una legge è davvero tenuta troppo in sordina per essere osteggiata, può anche essere tenuta troppo in sordina per essere obbedita? Non è così facile tenerla nascosta a un grosso politico senza correre il rischio di tenerla nascosta perfino a un comune poliziotto».

«Ma di certo ciò non può accadere, per la natura delle cose?»

«Non può, per Dio», disse J. Leveson, appellandosi a un’autorità meno panteistica.

Estrasse dispiegandoli una quantità di fogli dalla tasca, per lo più giornali locali da poco prezzo, ma alcuni erano lettere e telegrammi.

«Ascolta questo!» disse. «Un curioso incidente è accaduto ieri mattina nel villaggio di Poltwell nel Surrey. La bottega del fornaio, il signor Whiteman, è stata d’improvviso assediata da un capannello dei tipi più sregolati della località, i quali pare abbiano preteso birra invece di pane; fondando la loro pretesa su un certo oggetto ornamentale eretto fuori dalla bottega; oggetto che essi asserivano essere un’insegna ai sensi della legge. Ecco, vedi, non hanno nemmeno sentito parlare della nuova legge! Che ne pensi di questo, dal Clapton Conservator. “Il disprezzo dei Socialisti per la legge è stato ben illustrato ieri, quando una folla, radunatasi attorno a un certo vessillo di legno del Socialismo innalzato davanti ai Magazzini di Tessuti del signor Dugdale, si è rifiutata di disperdersi, benché le fosse stato detto che la sua azione era contraria alla legge. Alla fine i malcontenti si sono uniti alla processione che seguiva l’emblema di legno.” E che dici di questo? “Ultimissime. Un farmacista di Pimlico è stato invaso da una folla enorme, che pretendeva birra; e asseriva che il fornirla rientrasse tra i suoi doveri. Il farmacista è, naturalmente, ben al corrente delle sue immunità in materia, specie sotto la nuova legge; ma la vecchia nozione dell’importanza dell’insegna pare possedere ancora il popolino e persino, in una certa misura, paralizzare la polizia.” Che ne dici? Non è chiaro come il lunedì mattina che questa Taverna Volante è volata un giorno davanti a noi, come fanno tutte le menzogne di tal fatta?» Vi fu un diplomatico silenzio.

«Allora», chiese l’ancora adirato Leveson all’ancora dubbioso Hibbs, «che cosa ne ricavi di tutto ciò?»

Chi fosse poco pratico di quella relatività essenziale a tutte le menti moderne, avrebbe forse potuto immaginare che il signor Hibbs non ne ricavasse granché. Comunque sia, le sue spiegazioni, o incapacità di spiegazioni, furono presto messe alla prova con una prova alquanto concreta. Poiché Lord Ivywood entrò davvero nella bottega del signor Crooke.

«Buon giorno, signori», disse, guardandoli con un’espressione che a entrambi parve sconcertante e persino un poco imbarazzante. «Buon giorno, signor Crooke. Ho un visitatore celebre per voi». E presentò il sorridente Misysra. Il Profeta era ripiegato quella mattina su un costume relativamente sobrio, mera questione di viola e arancione o che so io; ma il suo volto attempato era ormai perennemente festoso.

«La Causa progredisce», disse. «Ovunque la Causa progredisce. Avete udito il bel-lis-simo discorso di sua signoria?»

«Ne ho uditi molti», disse Hibbs, con grazia, «che si possono descrivere così».

«Il Profeta intende ciò che dicevo a proposito della Legge di Emendamento sulla Scheda Elettorale», disse Ivywood, con noncuranza. «Pare essere l’abbicì dell’arte di governo riconoscere ormai che il grande Impero Britannico orientale è divenuto un tutt’uno corporativo con quello occidentale. Guardate le nostre università, coi loro studenti maomettani; presto potrebbero essere la maggioranza. Ora, dobbiamo noi», proseguì, ancor più pacatamente, «dobbiamo governare questo paese sotto le forme del governo rappresentativo? Non pretendo di credere nella democrazia, come sapete, ma penso che sarebbe estremamente destabilizzante e incalcolabile distruggere il governo rappresentativo. Se dobbiamo dare alla Britannia musulmana un governo rappresentativo, non dobbiamo commettere l’errore che commettemmo con gli Indù e l’organizzazione militare… che condusse all’Ammutinamento. Non dobbiamo chiedere loro di fare una croce sulle loro schede elettorali; poiché, benché paia cosa da poco, potrebbe offenderli. Così ho presentato una piccola legge per rendere facoltativa la scelta tra l’antiquata croce e un segno curvo verso l’alto che potrebbe stare per una mezzaluna… e poiché è piuttosto più facile da tracciare, credo che sarà generalmente adottato».

“And so,” said the radiant old Turk, “the little, light, easily made, curly mark is substituted for the hard, difficult, double-made, cutting both ways mark. It is the more good for hygi-e-ene. For you must know, and indeed our good and wise Chemist will tell you, that the Saracenic and the Arabian and the Turkish physicians were the first of all physicians; and taught all medicals to the barbarians of the Frankish territories. And many of the moost modern, the moost fashionable remedies, are thus of the oriental origin.”

“Yes, that is quite true,” said Crooke, in his rather cryptic and unsympathetic way, “the powder called Arenine, lately popularised by Mr. Boze, now Lord Helvellyn, who tried it first on birds, is made of plain desert sand. And what you see in prescriptions asCannabis Indiensis is what our lively neighbours of Asia describe more energetically as bhang.”

“And so-o–in the sa-ame way,” said Misysra, making soothing passes with his brown hand like a mesmerist, “in the sa-ame way the making of the crescent is hy-gienic; the making of the cross is non-hy-gienic. The crescent was a little wave, as a leaf, as a little curling feather,” and he waved his hand with real artistic enthusiasm toward the capering curves of the new Turkish decoration which Ivywood had made fashionable in many of the fashionable shops. “But when you make the cross you must make the one lineso-o,” and he swept the horizon with the brown hand, “and then you must go back and make the other line so-o,” and he made an upward gesture suggestive of one constrained to lift a pine-tree. “And then you become very ill.”

“As a matter of fact, Mr. Crooke,” said Ivywood, in his polite manner, “I brought the Prophet here to consult you as the best authority on the very point you have just mentioned–the use of hashish or the hemp-plant. I have it on my conscience to decide whether these oriental stimulants or sedatives shall come under the general veto we are attempting to impose on the vulgar intoxicants. Of course one has heard of the horrible and voluptuous visions, and a kind of insanity attributed to the Assassins and the Old Man of the Mountain. But, on the one hand, we must clearly discount much for the illimitable pro-Christian bias with which the history of these eastern tribes is told in this country. Would you say the effect of hashish was extremely bad?” And he turned first to the Prophet.

“You will see mosques,” said that seer with candour, “many mosques–more mosques–taller and taller mosques till they reach the moon and you bear a dreadful voice in the very high mosque calling the muezzin; and you will think it is Allah. Then you will see wives–many, many wives–more wives than you yet have. Then you will be rolled over and over in a great pink and purple sea–which is still wives. Then you will go to sleep. I have only done it once,” he concluded mildly.

“And what do you think about hashish, Mr. Crooke?” asked Ivywood, thoughtfully.

“I think it’s hemp at both ends,” said the Chemist.

“I fear,” said Lord Ivywood, “I don’t quite understand you.”

“A hempen drink, a murder, and a hempen rope. That’s my experience in India,” said Mr. Crooke.

“It is true,” said Ivywood, yet more reflectively, “that the thing is not Moslem in any sense in its origin. There is that against the Assassins always. And, of course,” he added, with a simplicity that had something noble about it, “their connection with St. Louis discredits them rather.”

After a space of silence, he said suddenly, looking at Crooke, “So it isn’t the sort of thing you chiefly sell?”

“No, my lord, it isn’t what I chiefly sell,” said the Chemist. He also looked steadily, and the wrinkles of his young-old face were like hieroglyphics.

“The Cause progress! Everywhere it progress!” cried Misysra, spreading his arms and relieving a momentary tension of which he was totally unaware. “The hygienic curve of the crescent will soon superimpose himself for your plus sign. You already use him for the short syllables in your dactyl; which is doubtless of oriental origin. You see the new game?”

He said this so suddenly that everyone turned round, to see him produce from his purple clothing a brightly coloured and highly polished apparatus from one of the grand toy-shops; which, on examination, seemed to consist of a kind of blue slate in a red and yellow frame; a number of divisions being already marked on the slate, about seventeen slate pencils with covers of different colours, and a vast number of printed instructions, stating that it was but recently introduced from the remote East, and was called Naughts and Crescents.

Strangely enough, Lord Ivywood, with all his enthusiasm, seemed almost annoyed at the emergence of this Asiatic discovery; more especially as he really wanted to look at Mr. Crooke, as hard as Mr. Crooke was looking at him.

Hibbs coughed considerately and said, “Of course all our things came from the East, and”–and he paused, being suddenly unable to remember anything but curry; to which he was very rightly attached. He then remembered Christianity, and mentioned that too. “Everything from the East is good, of course,” he ended, with an air of light omniscience.

Those who in later ages and other fashions failed to understand how Misysra had ever got a mental hold on men like Lord Ivywood, left out two elements in the man, which are very attractive, especially to other men. One was that there wasno subject on which the little Turk could not instantly produce a theory. The other was that though the theories were crowded, they were consistent. He was never known to accept an illogical compliment.

“You are in error,” he said, solemnly, to Hibbs, “because you say all things from the East are good. There is the east wind. I do not like him. He is not good. And I think very much that all the warmth and all the wealthiness and the colours and the poems and the religiousness that the East was meant to give you have been much poisoned by this accident, this east wind. When you see the green flag of the Prophet, you do not think of a green field in Summer, you think of a green wave in your seas of Winter; for you think it blown by the east wind. When you read of the moon-faced houris you think not of our moons like oranges but of your moons like snowballs–”

«E così», disse il raggiante vecchio Turco, «il piccolo, lieve, facile segno ricciuto viene sostituito al duro, difficile segno dal doppio tratto, che taglia in entrambi i sensi. È più buono per l’i-gi-ene. Poiché dovete sapere, e in verità il nostro buono e saggio Chimico ve lo dirà, che i medici saraceni e arabi e turchi furono i primi di tutti i medici; e insegnarono ogni scienza medica ai barbari dei territori franchi. E molti dei più moderni, dei più alla moda rimedi, sono così di origine orientale».

«Sì, è del tutto vero», disse Crooke, nel suo modo piuttosto criptico e scostante, «la polvere chiamata Arenina, resa popolare di recente dal signor Boze, ora Lord Helvellyn, che la provò dapprima sugli uccelli, è fatta di semplice sabbia del deserto. E ciò che vedete nelle ricette come Cannabis Indiensis è quello che i nostri vivaci vicini d’Asia descrivono più energicamente come bhang».

«E co-osì… allo ste-esso modo», disse Misysra, compiendo gesti rasserenanti con la mano bruna come un mesmerista, «allo ste-esso modo il tracciare la mezzaluna è i-gie-nico; il tracciare la croce è non-i-gie-nico. La mezzaluna era una piccola onda, come una foglia, come una piccola piuma arricciata», e agitò la mano con vero entusiasmo artistico verso le saltellanti volute della nuova decorazione turca che Ivywood aveva reso di moda in molte delle botteghe alla moda. «Ma quando fate la croce dovete fare la prima linea co-osì», e spazzò l’orizzonte con la mano bruna, «e poi dovete tornare indietro e fare l’altra linea co-osì», e fece un gesto verso l’alto, come di chi è costretto a sollevare un pino. «E allora divenite molto malati».

«A dire il vero, signor Crooke», disse Ivywood, nella sua maniera cortese, «ho condotto qui il Profeta per consultarvi quale migliore autorità sul punto stesso che avete or ora menzionato… l’uso dell’hashish o della pianta della canapa. Ho sulla coscienza il decidere se questi stimolanti o sedativi orientali debbano ricadere sotto il veto generale che stiamo tentando di imporre ai volgari inebrianti. Certo si è sentito parlare delle visioni orribili e voluttuose, e di una sorta di follia attribuita agli Assassini e al Vecchio della Montagna. Ma, da un lato, dobbiamo chiaramente scontare molto per lo sterminato pregiudizio pro-cristiano con cui la storia di queste tribù orientali è raccontata in questo paese. Direste che l’effetto dell’hashish è estremamente cattivo?» E si volse dapprima al Profeta.

«Vedrete moschee», disse quel veggente con candore, «molte moschee… altre moschee… moschee sempre più alte finché toccano la Luna e voi udite una voce tremenda nell’altissima moschea che chiama il muezzin; e penserete che sia Allah. Poi vedrete mogli… molte, molte mogli… più mogli di quante ne abbiate ancora. Poi sarete rotolato più e più volte in un grande mare rosa e viola… che è ancora mogli. Poi andrete a dormire. L’ho fatto una volta soltanto», concluse mitemente.

«E voi cosa pensate dell’hashish, signor Crooke?» chiese Ivywood, pensosamente.

«Penso che sia canapa a entrambe le estremità», disse il Chimico.

«Temo», disse Lord Ivywood, «di non comprendervi del tutto».

«Una bevanda di canapa, un omicidio, e una corda di canapa. Ecco la mia esperienza in India», disse il signor Crooke.

«È vero», disse Ivywood, ancor più riflessivamente, «che la cosa non è musulmana in alcun senso nella sua origine. C’è sempre questo contro gli Assassini. E, naturalmente», aggiunse, con una semplicità che aveva in sé qualcosa di nobile, «il loro legame con san Luigi li scredita piuttosto».

Dopo un intervallo di silenzio, disse d’improvviso, guardando Crooke: «Dunque non è il genere di cosa che vendete principalmente?»

«No, mio signore, non è ciò che vendo principalmente», disse il Chimico. Anch’egli guardava con fermezza, e le rughe del suo volto giovane-vecchio erano come geroglifici.

«La Causa progredire! Ovunque essa progredire!» gridò Misysra, allargando le braccia e allentando una momentanea tensione della quale era del tutto inconsapevole. «La curva igienica della mezzaluna presto si sovrapporrà al vostro segno più. Già lo usate per le sillabe brevi nel vostro dattilo; il quale è senza dubbio di origine orientale. Vedete il nuovo gioco?»

Disse ciò così all’improvviso che tutti si voltarono, per vederlo estrarre dai suoi indumenti viola un apparecchio dai vivaci colori e altamente lucidato, proveniente da uno dei grandi negozi di giocattoli; il quale, a un esame, pareva consistere in una sorta di lavagna azzurra in una cornice rossa e gialla; con un certo numero di divisioni già segnate sulla lavagna, una diciassettina di matite di ardesia con cappucci di colori diversi, e una vasta quantità di istruzioni stampate, che affermavano essere stato introdotto solo di recente dal remoto Oriente, e chiamarsi Zeri e Mezzelune.

Stranamente, Lord Ivywood, con tutto il suo entusiasmo, parve quasi seccato dall’emergere di questa scoperta asiatica; tanto più che desiderava davvero guardare il signor Crooke, con la stessa intensità con cui il signor Crooke guardava lui.

Hibbs tossì con riguardo e disse: «Naturalmente tutte le nostre cose vennero dall’Oriente, e»… e si arrestò, incapace d’un tratto di ricordare alcunché tranne il curry; al quale era assai giustamente affezionato. Poi si ricordò del Cristianesimo, e menzionò anche quello. «Tutto ciò che viene dall’Oriente è buono, naturalmente», concluse, con un’aria di lieve onniscienza.

Coloro che in epoche successive e altre mode non riuscirono a capire come Misysra avesse mai preso un ascendente mentale su uomini come Lord Ivywood, tralasciarono due elementi nell’uomo, che sono molto attraenti, specie per altri uomini. Uno era che non v’era argomento sul quale il piccolo Turco non potesse all’istante produrre una teoria. L’altro era che, per quanto affollate, le teorie erano coerenti. Non lo si vide mai accettare un complimento illogico.

«Siete in errore», disse, solennemente, a Hibbs, «perché dite che tutte le cose dall’Oriente sono buone. C’è il vento d’oriente. Non mi piace. Non è buono. E penso proprio che tutto il calore e tutta la ricchezza e i colori e i poemi e la religiosità che l’Oriente doveva darvi siano stati molto avvelenati da questo accidente, questo vento d’oriente. Quando vedete la verde bandiera del Profeta, non pensate a un verde campo d’estate, pensate a un’onda verde nei vostri mari d’inverno; poiché la credete soffiata dal vento d’oriente. Quando leggete delle uri dal volto di luna non pensate alle nostre lune come arance ma alle vostre lune come palle di neve…»

Here a new voice contributed to the conversation. Its contribution, though imperfectly understood, appeared to be “Nar! Why sh’d I wite for a little Jew in ’is dressin’ gown? Little Jews in their dressin’ gowns ’as their drinks, and we ’as our drinks. Bitter, miss.”

The speaker, who appeared to be a powerful person of the plastering occupation, looked round for the unmarried female he had ceremonially addressed; and seemed honestly abashed that she was not present.

Ivywood looked at the man with that expression of one turned to stone, which his physique made so effective in him. But J. Leveson, Secretary, could summon no such powers of self-petrification. Upon his soul the slaughter red of that unhallowed eve arose when first the Ship and he were foes; when he discovered that the poor are human beings, and therefore are polite and brutal within a comparatively short space of time. He saw that two other men were standing behind the plastering person, one of them apparently urging him to counsels of moderation; which was an ominous sign. And then he lifted his eyes and saw something worse than any omen.

All the glass frontage of the shop was a cloud of crowding faces. They could not be clearly seen, since night was closing in on the street; and the dazzling fires of ruby and amethyst which the lighted shop gave to its great globes of liquid, rather veiled than revealed them. But the foremost actually flattened and whitened their noses on the glass, and the most distant were nearer than Mr. Leveson wanted them. Also he saw a shape erect outside the shop; the shape of an upright staff and a square board. He could not see what was on the board. He did not need to see.

Those who saw Lord Ivywood at such moments understood why he stood out so strongly in the history of his time, in spite of his frozen face and his fanciful dogmas. He had all the negative nobility that is possible to man. Unlike Nelson and most of the great heroes, he knew not fear. Thus he was never conquered by a surprise, but was cold and collected when other men had lost their heads even if they had not lost their nerve.

“I will not conceal from you, gentlemen,” said Lord Ivywood, “that I have been expecting this. I will not even conceal from you that I have been occupying Mr. Crooke’s time until it occurred. So far from excluding the crowd, I suggest it would be an excellent thing if Mr. Crooke could accommodate them all in this shop. I want to tell, as soon as possible, as large a crowd as possible that the law is altered and this folly about the Flying Inn has ceased. Come in, all of you! Come in and listen!”

“Thank yer,” said a man connected in some way with motor buses, who lurched in behind the plasterer.

“Thanky, sir,” said a bright little clock-mender from Croydon, who immediately followed him.

“Thanks,” said a rather bewildered clerk from Camberwell, who came next in the rather bewildered procession.

“Thank you,” said Mr. Dorian Wimpole, who entered, carrying a large round cheese.

“Thank you,” said Captain Dalroy, who entered carrying a large cask of rum.

“Thank you very much,” said Mr. Humphrey Pump, who entered the shop carrying the sign of “The Old Ship.”

I fear it must be recorded that the crowd which followed them dispensed with all expressions of gratitude. But though the crowd filled the shop so that there was no standing room to spare, Leveson still lifted his gloomy eyes and beheld his gloomy omen. For, though there were very many more people standing in the shop, there seemed to be no less people looking in at the window.

“Gentlemen,” said Ivywood, “all jokes come to an end. This one has gone so far as to be serious; and it might have become impossible to correct public opinion, and expound to law-abiding citizens the true state of the law, had I not been able to meet so representative an assembly in so central a place. It is not pertinent to my purpose to indicate what I think of the jest which Captain Dalroy and his friends have been playing upon you for the last few weeks. But I think Captain Dalroy will himself concede that I am not jesting.”

“With all my heart,” said Dalroy, in a manner that was unusually serious and even sad. Then he added with a sigh, “And as you truly say, my jest has come to an end.”

“That wooden sign,” said Ivywood, pointing at the queer blue ship, “can be cut up for firewood. It shall lead decent citizens a devil’s dance no more. Understand it once and for all, before you learn it from policemen or prison warders. You are under a new law. That sign is the sign of nothing. You can no more buy and sell alcohol by having that outside your house, than if it were a lamp-post.”

“D’you meanter say, guv’ner,” said the plasterer, with a dawn of intelligence on his large face which was almost awful to watch, “that I ain’t to ’ave a glass o’ bitter?”

“Try a glass of rum,” said Patrick.

“Captain Dalroy,” said Lord Ivywood, “if you give one drop from that cask to that man, you are breaking the law and you shall sleep in jail.”

“Are you quite sure?” asked Dalroy, with a strange sort of anxiety. “I might escape.”

“I am quite sure,” said Ivywood. “I have posted the police with full powers for the purpose, as you will find. I mean that this business shall end here tonight.”

“If I find that pleeceman what told me I could ’ave a drink just now, I’ll knock ’is ’elmet into a fancy necktie, I will,” said the plasterer. “Why ain’t people allowed to know the law?”

“They ain’t got no right to alter the law in the dark like that,” said the clock-mender. “Damn the new law.”

“What is the new law?” asked the clerk.

“The words inserted by the recent Act,” said Lord Ivywood, with the cold courtesy of the Conqueror, “are to the effect that alcohol cannot be sold, even under a lawful sign, unless alcoholic liquors have been kept for three days on the premises. Captain Dalroy, that cask of yours has not, I think, been three days on these premises. I command you to seal it up and take it away.”

Qui una nuova voce si aggiunse alla conversazione. Il suo contributo, benché imperfettamente compreso, pareva essere: «Nar! Perché dovrei aspettà un ometto ebreo in vestaglia? Gli ometti ebrei in vestaglia si bevono le loro bevute, e noialtri ci beviamo le nostre. Una bitter, signorina.»

Chi aveva parlato, che sembrava un individuo robusto di professione stuccatore, si guardò intorno cercando la femmina nubile a cui si era cerimoniosamente rivolto; e parve onestamente confuso di non trovarla presente.

Ivywood guardò l’uomo con quell’espressione di chi è tramutato in pietra, che la sua costituzione fisica rendeva in lui così efficace. Ma J. Leveson, segretario, non poteva evocare simili poteri di autopietrificazione. Sulla sua anima si levava il rosso massacro di quella vigilia empia in cui per la prima volta la Nave e lui erano stati nemici; quando scoprì che i poveri sono esseri umani, e perciò sono cortesi e brutali in un lasso di tempo relativamente breve. Vide che altri due uomini stavano dietro allo stuccatore, e uno di loro pareva esortarlo a consigli di moderazione; il che era un segno di malaugurio. Poi alzò gli occhi e vide qualcosa di peggiore di qualunque presagio.

Tutta la vetrata della bottega era una nube di volti accalcati. Non si potevano vedere distintamente, poiché la notte calava sulla strada; e i fuochi abbaglianti di rubino e ametista che la bottega illuminata donava ai suoi grandi globi di liquido li velavano più che rivelarli. Ma i primi schiacciavano e sbiancavano davvero il naso contro il vetro, e i più lontani erano più vicini di quanto il signor Leveson desiderasse. Vide anche una forma eretta fuori della bottega; la forma di un’asta diritta e di una tavola quadrata. Non riusciva a vedere che cosa vi fosse scritto. Non aveva bisogno di vederlo.

Chi vedeva Lord Ivywood in simili momenti comprendeva perché egli spiccasse così fortemente nella storia del suo tempo, a dispetto del volto gelido e dei suoi dogmi bizzarri. Possedeva tutta la nobiltà negativa che è concessa all’uomo. A differenza di Nelson e della maggior parte dei grandi eroi, egli non conosceva la paura. Così non fu mai vinto da una sorpresa, ma restava freddo e padrone di sé quando altri avevano perso la testa, anche se non avevano perso il sangue freddo.

«Non vi nasconderò, signori,» disse Lord Ivywood, «che me lo aspettavo. Non vi nasconderò nemmeno che ho occupato il tempo del signor Crooke fino a quando ciò è accaduto. Lungi dall’escludere la folla, suggerisco che sarebbe cosa eccellente se il signor Crooke potesse accoglierli tutti in questa bottega. Voglio dire al più presto, alla folla più numerosa possibile, che la legge è mutata e che questa follia della Locanda Volante è finita. Entrate, tutti quanti! Entrate e ascoltate!»

«Grazie a lei,» disse un uomo in qualche modo legato agli autobus, che entrò barcollando dietro lo stuccatore.

«Grazie, signore,» disse un piccolo e vispo riparatore di orologi di Croydon, che lo seguì subito.

«Grazie,» disse un impiegato alquanto smarrito di Camberwell, che venne appresso nella processione alquanto smarrita.

«Grazie,» disse il signor Dorian Wimpole, che entrò portando un grande formaggio rotondo.

«Grazie,» disse il capitano Dalroy, che entrò portando una grande botte di rum.

«Grazie infinite,» disse il signor Humphrey Pump, che entrò nella bottega portando l’insegna della «Vecchia Nave».

Temo si debba registrare che la folla che li seguiva rinunciò a ogni espressione di gratitudine. Ma benché la folla riempisse la bottega al punto che non restava spazio per stare in piedi, Leveson tornò a levare gli occhi cupi e contemplò il suo cupo presagio. Poiché, sebbene vi fossero molte più persone in piedi nella bottega, non parevano essercene di meno a guardare dalla vetrina.

«Signori,» disse Ivywood, «ogni scherzo giunge alla fine. Questo si è spinto tanto oltre da diventare cosa seria; e sarebbe potuto divenire impossibile correggere l’opinione pubblica ed esporre ai cittadini rispettosi della legge il vero stato del diritto, se non avessi potuto incontrare un’assemblea tanto rappresentativa in un luogo tanto centrale. Non è pertinente al mio scopo indicare che cosa penso della beffa che il capitano Dalroy e i suoi amici vi hanno giocato nelle ultime settimane. Ma credo che il capitano Dalroy stesso ammetterà che io non sto scherzando.»

«Con tutto il cuore,» disse Dalroy, in un modo insolitamente serio e persino triste. Poi aggiunse con un sospiro: «E come dite giustamente, la mia beffa è giunta alla fine.»

«Quell’insegna di legno,» disse Ivywood, indicando la strana nave azzurra, «può essere spaccata per farne legna da ardere. Non guiderà più i cittadini perbene in una danza indiavolata. Capitelo una volta per tutte, prima di apprenderlo dai poliziotti o dai secondini della prigione. Siete sottoposti a una nuova legge. Quell’insegna non è insegna di nulla. Non potete comprare e vendere alcol tenendo quella cosa fuori della vostra casa, più di quanto potreste se fosse un lampione.»

«Vuol dì, capo,» disse lo stuccatore, con un albore d’intelligenza sul faccione che faceva quasi paura a vedersi, «che nun me devo beve un boccale de bitter?»

«Provi un bicchiere di rum,» disse Patrick.

«Capitano Dalroy,» disse Lord Ivywood, «se date una sola goccia di quella botte a quell’uomo, violate la legge e dormirete in prigione.»

«Ne siete proprio certo?» chiese Dalroy, con una strana sorta d’ansia. «Potrei fuggire.»

«Ne sono certissimo,» disse Ivywood. «Ho disposto la polizia con pieni poteri a tale scopo, come constaterete. Intendo che questa faccenda finisca qui stanotte.»

«Se trovo quer piedipiatti che m’ha detto che potevo beve un attimo fa, je pijo l’elmo e je lo riduco a ‘na bella cravatta, io,» disse lo stuccatore. «Perché nun se pò fà sapé la legge a la gente?»

«Nun c’hanno diritto de cambià la legge così ar buio,» disse il riparatore di orologi. «Ar diavolo la legge nova.»

«Qual è la nuova legge?» chiese l’impiegato.

«Le parole inserite dalla recente legge,» disse Lord Ivywood, con la fredda cortesia del Conquistatore, «stabiliscono che l’alcol non può essere venduto, neppure sotto un’insegna legittima, a meno che i liquori alcolici non siano stati custoditi per tre giorni sul luogo. Capitano Dalroy, quella vostra botte non è stata, credo, tre giorni in questi locali. Vi ordino di sigillarla e di portarla via.»

“Surely,” said Patrick, with an innocent air, “the best remedy would be to wait till ithas been three days on the premises. We might all get to know each other better.” And he looked round at the ever-increasing multitude with hazy benevolence.

“You shall do nothing of the kind,” said his lordship, with sudden fierceness.

“Well,” answered Patrick, wearily, “now I come to think of it, perhaps I won’t. I’ll have one drink here and go home to bed like a good little boy.”

“And the constables shall arrest you,” thundered Ivywood.

“Why, nothing seems to suit you,” said the surprised Dalroy. “Thank you, however, for explaining the new law so clearly–‘unless alcoholic liquors have been three days on the premises’ I shall remember it now. You always explain such things so clearly. You only made one legal slip. The constables will not arrest me.”

“And why not?” demanded the nobleman, white with passion.

“Because,” cried Patrick Dalroy; and his voice lifted itself like a lonely trumpet before the charge, “because I shall not have broken the law. Because alcoholic liquorshave been three days on these premises. Three months more likely. Because this is a common grog-shop, Philip Ivywood. Because that man behind the counter lives by selling spirits to all the cowards and hypocrites who are rich enough to bribe a bad doctor.”

And he pointed suddenly at the small medicine glass on the counter by Hibbs and Leveson.

“What is that man drinking?” he demanded.

Hibbs put out his hand hastily for his glass, but the indignant clock-mender had snatched it first and drained it at a gulp.

“Scortch,” he said, and dashed the glass to atoms on the floor. “Right you are too,” roared the plasterer, seizing a big medicine bottle in each hand. “We’re goin’ to ’ave a little of the fun now, we are. What’s in that big red bowl up there–I reckon it’s port. Fetch it down, Bill.”

Ivywood turned to Crooke and said, scarcely moving his lips of marble, “This is a lie.”

“It is the truth,” answered Crooke, looking back at him with equal steadiness. “Do you think you made the world, that you should make it over again so easily?”

“The world was made badly,” said Philip, with a terrible note in his voice, “andI will make it over again.”

Almost as he spoke the glass front of the shop fell inward, shattered, and there was wreckage among the moonlike, coloured bowls; almost as if spheres of celestial crystal cracked at his blasphemy. Through the broken windows came the roar of that confused tongue that is more terrible than the elements; the cry that the deaf kings have heard at last; the terrible voice of mankind. All the way down the long, fashionable street, lined with the Crooke plate-glass, that glass was crashing amid the cries of a crowd. Rivers of gold and purple wines sprawled about the pavement.

“Out in the open!” shouted Dalroy, rushing out of the shop, sign-board in hand, the dog Quoodle barking furiously at his heels, while Dorian with the cheese and Humphrey with the keg followed as rapidly as they could. “Goodnight, my lord.

“Perhaps our meeting next may fall,

At Tomworth in your castle hall.

“Come along, friends, and form up. Don’t waste time destroying property. We’re all to start now.”

“Where are we all going to?” asked the plasterer.

“We’re all going into Parliament,” answered the Captain, as he went to the head of the crowd.

The marching crowd turned two or three corners, and at the end of the next long street, Dorian Wimpole, who was toward the tail of the procession, saw again the grey Cyclops tower of St. Stephens, with its one great golden eye, as he had seen it against that pale green sunset that was at once quiet and volcanic on the night he was betrayed by sleep and by a friend. Almost as far off, at the head of the procession, he could see the sign with the ship and the cross going before them like an ensign, and hear a great voice singing–

“Men that are men again, Who goes home?

Tocsin and trumpeter! Who goes home?

The voice valedictory–who is for Victory?

Who is for Liberty? Who goes home?”

«Di certo,» disse Patrick, con aria innocente, «il miglior rimedio sarebbe aspettare finché non sia stato tre giorni sui locali. Potremmo tutti conoscerci meglio.» E si guardò intorno all’ognor crescente moltitudine con nebulosa benevolenza.

«Non farete nulla del genere,» disse sua signoria, con improvvisa ferocia.

«Ebbene,» rispose Patrick, stancamente, «ora che ci penso, forse non lo farò. Berrò un solo bicchiere qui e me ne andrò a casa a letto come un bravo bambino.»

«E le guardie vi arresteranno,» tuonò Ivywood.

«Diamine, nulla sembra andarvi a genio,» disse Dalroy sorpreso. «Grazie, comunque, per avermi spiegato la nuova legge con tanta chiarezza – “a meno che i liquori alcolici non siano stati tre giorni sui locali” – ora me la ricorderò. Spiegate sempre queste cose con tanta chiarezza. Avete commesso un solo scivolone giuridico. Le guardie non mi arresteranno.»

«E perché no?» chiese il nobiluomo, bianco di passione.

«Perché,» gridò Patrick Dalroy; e la sua voce si levò come una tromba solitaria prima della carica, «perché non avrò infranto la legge. Perché i liquori alcolici sono stati tre giorni su questi locali. Tre mesi, più probabilmente. Perché questa è una comune bettola, Philip Ivywood. Perché quell’uomo dietro il banco vive vendendo alcolici a tutti i codardi e gli ipocriti abbastanza ricchi da corrompere un cattivo medico.»

E d’un tratto indicò il piccolo bicchierino da medicina sul banco accanto a Hibbs e Leveson.

«Cosa sta bevendo quell’uomo?» domandò.

Hibbs allungò la mano in fretta verso il proprio bicchiere, ma l’indignato riparatore di orologi lo aveva già afferrato per primo e vuotato d’un sorso.

«Uisco,» disse, e scagliò il bicchiere in mille pezzi sul pavimento. «Avete ragione anche voi,» ruggì l’intonacatore, afferrando una grossa boccetta di medicina in ciascuna mano. «Ci facciamo un po’ di baldoria adesso, sissignore. Cosa c’è in quella grande coppa rossa lassù – scommetto che è porto. Tirala giù, Bill.»

Ivywood si volse a Crooke e disse, senza quasi muovere le labbra di marmo, «Questa è una menzogna.»

«È la verità,» rispose Crooke, ricambiando lo sguardo con pari fermezza. «Credete di aver fatto voi il mondo, da poterlo rifare tanto facilmente?»

«Il mondo fu fatto male,» disse Philip, con una nota terribile nella voce, «e io lo rifarò.»

Quasi mentre parlava, la vetrina del negozio cadde all’interno, in frantumi, e ci fu una rovina tra le coppe colorate simili a lune; quasi come se sfere di cristallo celeste si fossero incrinate alla sua bestemmia. Attraverso le finestre infrante giunse il ruggito di quella lingua confusa che è più terribile degli elementi; il grido che i re sordi hanno finalmente udito; la voce terribile dell’umanità. Per tutta la lunga e alla moda via, fiancheggiata dalle lastre di cristallo di Crooke, quel vetro andava in frantumi tra le grida di una folla. Fiumi di vini d’oro e di porpora si spandevano sul selciato.

«All’aperto!» gridò Dalroy, precipitandosi fuori dal negozio, l’insegna in mano, il cane Quoodle che abbaiava furiosamente alle sue calcagna, mentre Dorian col formaggio e Humphrey col barilotto lo seguivano più rapidamente che potevano. «Buonanotte, mio signore.

«Forse il nostro prossimo incontro cadrà,

Nel castello di Tomworth, nella vostra sala del castello.

«Venite, amici, e mettetevi in fila. Non sprecate tempo a distruggere proprietà. Dobbiamo partire tutti adesso.»

«Dove andiamo tutti quanti?» chiese l’intonacatore.

«Andiamo tutti in Parlamento,» rispose il Capitano, mentre si portava alla testa della folla.

La folla in marcia svoltò due o tre angoli, e in fondo alla successiva lunga via, Dorian Wimpole, che si trovava verso la coda del corteo, rivide la grigia torre ciclopica di St. Stephen, col suo unico grande occhio dorato, come l’aveva vista contro quel pallido tramonto verde, insieme quieto e vulcanico, nella notte in cui fu tradito dal sonno e da un amico. Quasi altrettanto lontano, in testa al corteo, poteva scorgere l’insegna con la nave e la croce che li precedeva come uno stendardo, e udire una gran voce che cantava –

«Uomini che sono di nuovo uomini, chi va a casa?

Campana a stormo e trombettiere! Chi va a casa?

La voce del commiato – chi è per la Vittoria?

Chi è per la Libertà? Chi va a casa?»

CHAPTER XXIII: THE MARCH ON IVYWOOD

THAT storm-spirit, or eagle of liberty, which is the sudden soul in a crowd, had descended upon London after a foreign tour of some centuries in which it had commonly alighted upon other capitals. It is always impossible to define the instant and the turn of mood which makes the whole difference between danger being worse than endurance and endurance being worse than danger. The actual outbreak generally has a symbolic or artistic, or, what some would call whimsical cause. Somebody fires off a pistol or appears in an unpopular uniform, or refers in a loud voice to a scandal that is never mentioned in the newspapers; somebody takes off his hat, or somebody doesn’t take off his hat; and a city is sacked before midnight. When the ever-swelling army of revolt smashed a whole street full of the shops of Mr. Crooke, the chemist, and then went on to Parliament, the Tower of London and the road to the sea, the sociologists hiding in their coal-cellars could think (in that clarifying darkness) of many material and spiritual explanations of such a storm in human souls; but of none that explained it quite enough. Doubtless there was a great deal of sheer drunkenness when the urns and goblets of Aesculapius were reclaimed as belonging to Bacchus: and many who went roaring down that road were merely stored with rich wines and liqueurs which are more comfortably and quietly digested at a City banquet or a West End restaurant. But many of these had been blind drunk twenty times without a thought of rebellion; you could not stretch the material explanation to cover a corner of the case. Much more general was a savage sense of the meanness of Crooke’s wealthy patrons, in keeping a door open for themselves which they had wantonly shut on less happy people. But no explanation can explain it; and no man can say when it will come.

Dorian Wimpole was at the tail of the procession, which grew more and more crowded every moment. For one space of the march he even had the misfortune to lose it altogether; owing to the startling activity which the rotund cheese when it escaped from his hands showed, in descending a somewhat steep road toward the river. But in recent days he had gained a pleasure in practical events which was like a second youth. He managed to find a stray taxi-cab; and had little difficulty in picking up again the trail of the extraordinary cortège. Inquiries addressed to a policeman with a black eye outside the House of Commons informed him sufficiently of the rebels’ line of retreat or advance, or whatever it was; and in a very short time he beheld the unmistakable legion once more. It was unmistakable, because in front of it there walked a red-headed giant, apparently carrying with him a wooden portion of some public building; and also because so big a crowd had never followed any man in England for a long time past. But except for such things the unmistakable crowd might well have been mistaken for another one. Its aspect had been altered almost as much as if it had grown horns or tusks; for many of the company walked with outlandish weapons like iron teeth or horns, bills and pole axes, and spears with strangely shaped heads. What was stranger still, whole rows and rows of them had rifles, and even marched with a certain discipline; and yet again, others seemed to have snatched up household or work-shop tools, meat axes, pick axes, hammers and even carving knives. Such things need be none the less deadly because they are domestic. They have figured in millions of private murders before they appeared in any public war.

Dorian was so fortunate as to meet the flame-haired Captain almost face to face, and easily fell into step with him at the head of the march. Humphrey Pump walked on the other side, with the celebrated cask suspended round his neck by something resembling braces, as if it were a drum. Mr. Wimpole had himself taken the opportunity of his brief estrangement to carry the cheese somewhat more easily in a very large, loose, waterproof knapsack on his shoulders. The effect in both cases was to suggest dreadful deformities in two persons who happened to be exceptionally cleanly built. The Captain, who seemed to be in tearing and towering spirits, gained great pleasure from this. But Dorian had his sources of amusement too.

“What have you been doing with yourselves since you lost my judicious guidance?” he asked, laughing, “and why are parts of you a dull review and parts of you a fancy dress ball? What have you been up to?”

“We’ve been shopping,” said Mr. Patrick Dalroy, with some pride. “We are country cousins. I know all about shopping; let us see, what are the phrases about it? Look at those rifles now! We got them quite at a bargain. We went to all the best gunsmiths in London, and we didn’t pay much. In fact, we didn’t pay anything. That’s what is called a bargain, isn’t it? Surely, I’ve seen in those things they send to ladies something about ‘giving them away.’ Then we went to a remnant sale. At least, it was a remnant sale when we left. And we bought that piece of stuff we’ve tied round the sign. Surely, it must be what ladies called chiffon?”

Dorian lifted his eyes and perceived that a very coarse strip of red rag, possibly collected from a dust bin, had been tied round the wooden sign-post by way of a red flag of revolution.

“Not what ladies call chiffon?” inquired the Captain with anxiety. “Well, anyhow, it is whatchiffoniers call it. But as I’m going to call on a lady shortly, I’ll try to remember the distinction.”

“Is your shopping over, may I ask?” asked Mr. Wimpole.

“All but one thing,” answered the other. “I must find a music shop–you know what I mean. Place where they sell pianos and things of that sort.”

CAPITOLO XXIII: LA MARCIA SU IVYWOOD

QUELLO spirito della tempesta, o aquila della libertà, che è l’improvvisa anima di una folla, era disceso su Londra dopo una tournée straniera di alcuni secoli, durante la quale si era comunemente posato su altre capitali. È sempre impossibile definire l’istante e la svolta d’umore che fanno tutta la differenza tra il pericolo che diventa peggiore della sopportazione e la sopportazione che diventa peggiore del pericolo. Lo scoppio vero e proprio ha in genere una causa simbolica o artistica, o, come alcuni direbbero, capricciosa. Qualcuno spara con una pistola, o compare in un’uniforme impopolare, o allude a voce alta a uno scandalo che non è mai menzionato sui giornali; qualcuno si toglie il cappello, o qualcuno non si toglie il cappello; e una città viene messa a sacco prima di mezzanotte. Quando l’esercito della rivolta, che si gonfiava di continuo, mandò in frantumi un’intera via piena di negozi del signor Crooke, il chimico, e poi proseguì verso il Parlamento, la Torre di Londra e la strada verso il mare, i sociologi nascosti nelle loro carbonaie potevano pensare (in quell’oscurità chiarificatrice) a molte spiegazioni materiali e spirituali di una simile tempesta negli animi umani; ma a nessuna che la spiegasse del tutto. Senza dubbio vi fu un bel po’ di pura ubriachezza quando le urne e i calici di Esculapio furono reclamati come appartenenti a Bacco: e molti che andavano ruggendo giù per quella strada erano semplicemente colmi di vini pregiati e liquori che si digeriscono più comodamente e più tranquillamente a un banchetto di città o in un ristorante del West End. Ma molti di costoro si erano ubriacati fino a perdere i sensi venti volte senza il minimo pensiero di ribellione; non si poteva stiracchiare la spiegazione materiale fino a coprire un angolo del caso. Assai più diffuso era un feroce senso della meschinità dei facoltosi clienti di Crooke, nel tenere aperta per sé una porta che avevano sconsideratamente chiuso a gente meno fortunata. Ma nessuna spiegazione può spiegarlo; e nessuno può dire quando verrà.

Dorian Wimpole si trovava in coda al corteo, che a ogni istante si faceva sempre più affollato. Per un tratto della marcia ebbe persino la sventura di perderlo del tutto; a causa della sorprendente attività che il rotondo formaggio, sfuggitogli di mano, dimostrò nel discendere una strada piuttosto ripida verso il fiume. Ma nei giorni recenti egli aveva acquistato un piacere per gli eventi pratici che era come una seconda giovinezza. Riuscì a trovare un taxi vagante; e non ebbe grande difficoltà a ritrovare la traccia dello straordinario corteo. Le domande rivolte a un poliziotto con un occhio nero fuori dalla Camera dei Comuni lo informarono a sufficienza sulla linea di ritirata o di avanzata dei ribelli, o qualunque cosa fosse; e in pochissimo tempo scorse di nuovo l’inconfondibile legione. Era inconfondibile, perché davanti a essa camminava un gigante dai capelli rossi, che apparentemente portava con sé una porzione lignea di qualche edificio pubblico; e anche perché una folla così grande non aveva più seguito alcun uomo in Inghilterra da lungo tempo. Ma, se non fosse per cose simili, l’inconfondibile folla avrebbe bene potuto essere scambiata per un’altra. Il suo aspetto era mutato quasi quanto se le fossero spuntate corna o zanne; poiché molti della compagnia camminavano con armi bizzarre come denti o corni di ferro, roncole e alabarde, e lance dalle punte stranamente foggiate. Cosa ancora più strana, intere file e file di essi avevano fucili, e marciavano persino con una certa disciplina; e altri ancora sembravano aver arraffato utensili domestici o da bottega, mannaie, picconi, martelli e persino coltelli da trinciare. Simili oggetti non sono meno letali per il fatto d’essere domestici. Hanno figurato in milioni di omicidi privati prima di comparire in una qualsiasi guerra pubblica.

Dorian ebbe la fortuna d’incontrare il Capitano dalla chioma di fiamma quasi faccia a faccia, e con facilità si mise al passo con lui in testa alla marcia. Humphrey Pump camminava sull’altro lato, con la celebre botticella sospesa al collo per mezzo di qualcosa che somigliava a bretelle, come se fosse un tamburo. Il signor Wimpole aveva egli stesso approfittato del suo breve smarrimento per portare il formaggio un po’ più agevolmente in un grandissimo e ampio zaino impermeabile sulle spalle. L’effetto, in entrambi i casi, era di suggerire deformità spaventose in due persone che si dava il caso fossero eccezionalmente ben fatte. Il Capitano, che pareva essere di spiriti sfrenati e traboccanti, ne traeva gran piacere. Ma anche Dorian aveva le sue fonti di divertimento.

«Cosa avete combinato da quando avete perduto la mia giudiziosa guida?» chiese ridendo, «e perché in parte sembrate una cupa rassegna militare e in parte un ballo in maschera? Cosa avete fatto?»

«Siamo stati a far compere,» disse il signor Patrick Dalroy, con un certo orgoglio. «Siamo cugini di campagna. So tutto sul far compere; vediamo, quali sono le frasi al riguardo? Guardate quei fucili, ora! Li abbiamo avuti proprio a buon prezzo. Siamo andati da tutti i migliori armaioli di Londra, e non abbiamo pagato molto. In effetti, non abbiamo pagato nulla. Questo è ciò che si chiama un affare, non è vero? Di certo ho visto, in quei foglietti che mandano alle signore, qualcosa sul “regalarle”. Poi siamo andati a una svendita di rimanenze. O almeno, era una svendita di rimanenze quando siamo usciti. E abbiamo comprato quel pezzo di stoffa che abbiamo legato intorno all’insegna. Di certo dev’essere ciò che le signore chiamano chiffon?»

Dorian alzò gli occhi e si accorse che una striscia di rozzissimo cencio rosso, forse raccolta da un bidone della spazzatura, era stata legata intorno all’asta lignea dell’insegna a mo’ di rossa bandiera della rivoluzione.

«Non ciò che le signore chiamano chiffon?» s’informò il Capitano con ansia. «Ebbene, comunque sia, è ciò che gli straccivendoli chiamano così. Ma poiché tra poco farò visita a una signora, cercherò di ricordare la distinzione.»

«Le vostre compere sono finite, posso chiedere?» domandò il signor Wimpole.

«Tutte tranne una cosa,» rispose l’altro. «Devo trovare un negozio di musica – sapete cosa intendo. Un posto dove vendono pianoforti e cose del genere.»

“Look here,” said Dorian, “this cheese is pretty heavy as it is. Have I got to carry a piano, too?”

“You misunderstand me,” said the Captain, calmly. And as he had never thought of music shops until his eye had caught one an instant before, he darted into the doorway. Returning almost immediately with a long parcel under his arm, he resumed the conversation.

“Did you go anywhere else,” asked Dorian, “except to shops?”

“Anywhere else!” cried Patrick, indignantly, “haven’t you got any country cousins? Of course we went to all the right places. We went to the Houses of Parliament. But Parliament isn’t sitting; so there are no eggs of the quality suitable for elections. We went to the Tower of London–you can’t tire country cousins like us. We took away some curiosities of steel and iron. We even took away the halberds from the Beef-eaters. We pointed out that for the purpose of eating beef (their only avowed public object) knives and forks had always been found more convenient. To tell the truth, they seemed rather relieved to be relieved of them.”

“And may I ask,” said the other with a smile, “where you are off to now?”

“Another beauty spot!” cried the Captain, boisterously, “no tiring the country cousin! I am going to show my young friends from the provinces what is perhaps the finest old country house in England. We are going to Ivywood, not far from that big watering place they call Pebblewick.”

“I see,” said Dorian; and for the first time looked back with intelligent trouble on his face, on the marching ranks behind him.

“Captain Dalroy,” said Dorian Wimpole, in a slightly altered tone, “there is one thing that puzzles me. Ivywood talked about having set the police to catch us; and though this is a pretty big crowd, I simply cannot believe that the police, as I knew them in my youth, could not catch us. But where are the police? You seem to have marched through half London with much (if you’ll excuse me) of the appearance of carrying murderous weapons. Lord Ivywood threatened that the police would stop us. Well, why didn’t they stop us?”

“Your subject,” said Patrick, cheerfully, “divides itself into three heads.”

“I hope not,” said Dorian.

“There really are three reasons why the police should not be prominent in this business; as their worst enemy cannot say that they were.”

He began ticking off the three on his own huge fingers; and seemed to be quite serious about it.

“First,” he said, “you have been a long time away from town. Probably you do not know a policeman when you see him. They do not wear helmets, as our line regiments did after the Prussians had won. They wear fezzes, because the Turks have won. Shortly, I have little doubt, they will wear pigtails, because the Chinese have won. It is a very interesting branch of moral science. It is called Efficiency.

“Second,” explained the Captain, “you have, perhaps, omitted to notice that a very considerable number of those wearing such fezzes are walking just behind us. Oh, yes, it’s quite true. Don’t you remember that the whole French Revolution really began because a sort of City Militia refused to fire on their own fathers and wives; and even showed some slight traces of a taste for firing on the other side? You’ll see lots of them behind; and you can tell them by their revolver belts and their walking in step; but don’t look back on them too much. It makes them nervous.”

“And the third reason?” asked Dorian.

“For the real reason,” answered Patrick, “I am not fighting a hopeless fight. People who have fought in real fights don’t, as a rule. But I noticed something singular about the very point you mention. Why are there no more police? Why are there no more soldiers? I will tell you. There really are very few policemen or soldiers left in England today.”

“Surely, that,” said Wimpole, “is an unusual complaint.”

“But very clear,” said the Captain, gravely, “to anyone who has ever seen sailors or soldiers. I will tell you the truth. Our rulers have come to count on the bare bodily cowardice of a mass of Englishmen, as a sheep dog counts on the cowardice of a flock of sheep. Now, look here, Mr. Wimpole, wouldn’t a shepherd be wise to limit the number of his dogs if he could make his sheep pay by it? At the end you might find millions of sheep managed by a solitary dog. But that is because they are sheep. Suppose the sheep were turned by a miracle into wolves. There are very few dogs they could not tear in pieces. But, what is my practical point, there are really very few dogs to tear.”

“You don’t mean,” said Dorian, “that the British Army is practically disbanded?”

“There are the sentinels outside Whitehall,” replied Patrick, in a low voice. “But, indeed, your question puts me in a difficulty. No; the army is not entirely disbanded, of course. But theBritish army–. Did you ever hear, Wimpole, of the great destiny of the Empire?”

“I seem to have heard the phrase,” replied his companion.

“It is in four acts,” said Dalroy. “Victory over barbarians. Employment of barbarians. Alliance with barbarians. Conquest by barbarians. That is the great destiny of Empire.”

“I think I begin to see what you mean,” returned Dorian Wimpole. “Of course Ivywood and the authorities do seem very prone to rely on the sepoy troops.”

“And other troops as well,” said Patrick. “I think you will be surprised when you see them.”

He tramped on for a while in silence and then said, with some air of abruptness, which yet did not seem to be entirely a changing of the subject,

“Do you know the man who lives now on the estate next to Ivywood?”

“No,” replied Dorian, “I am told he keeps himself very much to himself.”

“And his estate, too,” said Patrick, rather gloomily. “If you would climb his garden-wall, Wimpole, I think you would find an answer to a good many of your questions. Oh, yes, the right honourable gentlemen are making full provision for public order and national defence–in a way.”

«Senti un po’,» disse Dorian, «questo formaggio è già abbastanza pesante così com’è. Devo forse portare anche un pianoforte?»

«Mi fraintendete,» disse il Capitano, con calma. E poiché non aveva mai pensato ai negozi di musica finché il suo occhio non ne aveva colto uno un istante prima, si precipitò nell’ingresso. Tornando quasi subito con un lungo pacco sotto il braccio, riprese la conversazione.

«Siete andati altrove,» chiese Dorian, «oltre che nei negozi?»

«Altrove!» gridò Patrick, indignato, «non avete dei cugini di campagna, voi? Naturalmente siamo andati in tutti i posti giusti. Siamo andati alle Camere del Parlamento. Ma il Parlamento non è in seduta; sicché non ci sono uova della qualità adatta alle elezioni. Siamo andati alla Torre di Londra – non si stancano cugini di campagna come noi. Ci siamo portati via qualche curiosità d’acciaio e di ferro. Abbiamo persino portato via le alabarde ai Beefeater. Facemmo notare che, allo scopo di mangiar manzo (il loro unico dichiarato ufficio pubblico), coltelli e forchette si erano sempre rivelati più comodi. A dire la verità, parvero piuttosto sollevati d’esserne sollevati.»

«E posso chiedere,» disse l’altro con un sorriso, «dove siete diretti adesso?»

«A un altro luogo di bellezza!» gridò il Capitano, chiassosamente, «niente stanca il cugino di campagna! Sto per mostrare ai miei giovani amici delle province quella che è forse la più bella antica dimora di campagna d’Inghilterra. Andiamo a Ivywood, non lontano da quella grande località balneare che chiamano Pebblewick.»

«Capisco,» disse Dorian; e per la prima volta si voltò a guardare, con un turbamento intelligente sul volto, le file in marcia dietro di sé.

«Capitano Dalroy,» disse Dorian Wimpole, con tono leggermente mutato, «c’è una cosa che mi lascia perplesso. Ivywood parlava d’aver messo la polizia sulle nostre tracce; e benché questa sia una folla piuttosto grande, semplicemente non riesco a credere che la polizia, com’io la conoscevo in gioventù, non potesse acciuffarci. Ma dov’è la polizia? Pare che abbiate marciato attraverso mezza Londra con molta (se mi permettete) apparenza di portare armi micidiali. Lord Ivywood minacciò che la polizia ci avrebbe fermati. Ebbene, perché non ci ha fermati?»

«Il vostro argomento,» disse Patrick, allegramente, «si suddivide in tre capi.»

«Spero di no,» disse Dorian.

«Ci sono davvero tre ragioni per cui la polizia non dovrebbe farsi notare in questa faccenda; giacché il suo peggior nemico non può dire che l’abbia fatto.»

Cominciò a spuntarne tre sulle proprie enormi dita; e pareva prenderla del tutto sul serio.

«In primo luogo,» disse, «siete stato lontano dalla città per lungo tempo. Probabilmente non riconoscete un poliziotto quando ne vedete uno. Non portano elmi, come i nostri reggimenti di linea dopo che i prussiani ebbero vinto. Portano il fez, perché i turchi hanno vinto. Tra breve, ho pochi dubbi, porteranno il codino, perché i cinesi hanno vinto. È un ramo assai interessante della scienza morale. Si chiama Efficienza.

«In secondo luogo,» spiegò il Capitano, «avete forse omesso di notare che un buon numero di coloro che portano tali fez cammina proprio dietro di noi. Oh, sì, è verissimo. Non ricordate che l’intera Rivoluzione francese cominciò in realtà perché una specie di Milizia Cittadina rifiutò di far fuoco sui propri padri e sulle proprie mogli; e mostrò persino qualche lieve traccia di gusto nel far fuoco sull’altro fronte? Ne vedrete parecchi dietro; e potete riconoscerli dalle loro cinture da revolver e dal loro camminare al passo; ma non voltatevi a guardarli troppo. Li rende nervosi.»

«E la terza ragione?» chiese Dorian.

«Quanto alla vera ragione,» rispose Patrick, «non sto combattendo una battaglia disperata. La gente che ha combattuto in vere battaglie di norma non lo fa. Ma ho notato qualcosa di singolare proprio sul punto che menzionate. Perché non c’è più polizia? Perché non ci sono più soldati? Ve lo dirò. Restano davvero pochissimi poliziotti o soldati in Inghilterra, oggi.»

«Di certo questa,» disse Wimpole, «è una lagnanza insolita.»

«Ma assai chiara,» disse il Capitano, gravemente, «a chiunque abbia mai visto marinai o soldati. Vi dirò la verità. I nostri governanti sono giunti a contare sulla nuda vigliaccheria corporea di una massa d’inglesi, come un cane pastore conta sulla vigliaccheria di un gregge di pecore. Ora, guardate un po’, signor Wimpole, non sarebbe saggio un pastore a limitare il numero dei suoi cani se potesse farsi ripagare dalle sue pecore? Alla fine potreste trovare milioni di pecore governate da un solo cane. Ma questo perché sono pecore. Supponete che le pecore fossero mutate per miracolo in lupi. Sono ben pochi i cani che non potrebbero sbranare. Ma, ed ecco il mio punto pratico, ci sono davvero ben pochi cani da sbranare.»

«Non vorrete dire,» disse Dorian, «che l’Esercito britannico è praticamente sciolto?»

«Ci sono le sentinelle fuori da Whitehall,» rispose Patrick, a voce bassa. «Ma, in verità, la vostra domanda mi mette in difficoltà. No; l’esercito non è del tutto sciolto, naturalmente. Ma l’esercito britannico –. Avete mai sentito, Wimpole, del grande destino dell’Impero?»

«Mi pare d’aver udito la frase,» rispose il suo compagno.

«È in quattro atti,» disse Dalroy. «Vittoria sui barbari. Impiego dei barbari. Alleanza coi barbari. Conquista da parte dei barbari. Questo è il grande destino dell’Impero.»

«Credo di cominciare a capire cosa intendete,» ribatté Dorian Wimpole. «Certo Ivywood e le autorità sembrano molto inclini a fare affidamento sulle truppe sepoy.»

«E altre truppe pure,» disse Patrick. «Credo che resterete sorpreso quando le vedrete.»

Marciò per un po’ in silenzio e poi disse, con una certa aria di bruschezza, che tuttavia non pareva del tutto un cambiar discorso,

«Conoscete l’uomo che vive ora nella tenuta accanto a quella di Ivywood?»

«No,» rispose Dorian, «mi dicono che se ne sta molto per conto suo.»

«E anche la sua tenuta,» disse Patrick, piuttosto cupamente. «Se scavalcaste il muro del suo giardino, Wimpole, credo che trovereste una risposta a parecchie delle vostre domande. Oh, sì, gli onorevoli signori stanno provvedendo pienamente all’ordine pubblico e alla difesa nazionale – a modo loro.»

He fell into an almost sullen silence again; and several villages had been passed before he spoke again.

They tramped through the darkness; and dawn surprised them somewhere in the wilder and more wooded parts where the roads began to rise and roam. Dalroy gave an exclamation of pleasure and pointed ahead, drawing the attention of Dorian to the distance. Against the silver and scarlet bars of the daybreak could be seen afar a dark purple dome, with a crown of dark green leaves; the place they had called Roundabout.

Dalroy’s spirit seemed to revive at the sight, with the customary accompaniment of the threat of vocalism.

“Been making any poems lately?” he asked of Wimpole.

“Nothing particular,” replied the poet.

“Then,” said the Captain, portentously, clearing his throat, “you shall listen to one of mine, whether you like it or not–nay, the more you dislike it the longer and longer it will be. I begin to understand why soldiers want to sing when on the march; and also why they put up with such rotten songs.

“The Druids waved their golden knives

And danced around the Oak,

When they had sacrificed a man;

But though the learnèd search and scan

No single modern person can

Entirely see the joke;

But though they cut the throats of men

They cut not down the tree,

And from the blood the saplings sprang

Of oak-woods yet to be.

But Ivywood, Lord Ivywood,

He rots the tree as ivy would,

He clings and crawls as ivy would

About the sacred tree.

“King Charles he fled from Worcester fight

And hid him in an Oak;

In convent schools no man of tact

Would trace and praise his every act,

Or argue that he was in fact

A strict and sainted bloke;

But not by him the sacred woods

Have lost their fancies free,

And though he was extremely big,

He did not break the tree.

But Ivywood, Lord Ivywood,

He breaks the tree as ivy would

And eats the woods as ivy would

Between us and the sea.

“Great Collingwood walked down the glade

And flung the acorns free,

That oaks might still be in the grove

As oaken as the beams above

When the great Lover sailors love

Was kissed by Death at sea.

But though for him the oak-trees fell

To build the oaken ships,

The woodman worshipped what he smote

And honoured even the chips.

But Ivywood, Lord Ivywood,

He hates the tree as ivy would,

As the dragon of the ivy would,

That has us in his grips.”

They were ascending a sloping road, walled in on both sides by solemn woods, which somehow seemed as watchful as owls awake. Though daybreak was going over them with banners, scrolls of scarlet and gold, and with a wind like trumpets of triumph, the dark woods seemed to hold their secret like dark, cool cellars; nor was the strong sunlight seen in them, save in one or two brilliant shafts, that looked like splintered emeralds.

“I should not wonder,” said Dorian, “if the ivy does not find the tree knows a thing or two also.”

“The tree does,” assented the Captain. “The trouble was that until a little while ago the tree did not know that it knew.”

There was a silence; and as they went up the incline grew steeper and steeper, and the tall trees seemed more and more to be guarding something from sight, as with the grey shields of giants.

“Do you remember this road, Hump?” asked Dalroy of the innkeeper.

“Yes,” answered Humphrey Pump, and said no more; but few have ever heard such fulness in an affirmative.

They marched on in silence and about two hours afterward, toward eleven o’clock, Dalroy called a halt in the forest, and said that everybody had better have a few hours’ sleep. The impenetrable quality in the woods and the comparative softness of the carpet of beech-mast, made the spot as appropriate as the time was inappropriate. And if anyone thinks that common people, casually picked up in a street, could not follow a random leader on such a journey or sleep at his command in such a spot, given the state of the soul, then someone knows no history.

“I’m afraid,” said Dalroy, “you’ll have to have your supper for breakfast. I know an excellent place for having breakfast, but it’s too exposed for sleep. And sleep you must have; so we won’t unpack the stores just now. We’ll lie down like Babes in the Wood, and any bird of an industrious disposition is free to start covering me with leaves. Really, there are things coming, before which you will want sleep.”

When they resumed the march it was nearly the middle of the afternoon; and the meal which Dalroy insisted buoyantly on describing as breakfast was taken about that mysterious hour when ladies die without tea. The steep road had consistently grown steeper and steeper; and steeper; and at last, Dalroy said to Dorian Wimpole,

“Don’t drop that cheese again just here, or it will roll right away down into the woods. I know it will. No scientific calculations of grades and angles are necessary; because I have seen it do so myself. In fact, I have run after it.”

Wimpole realised they were mounting to the sharp edge of a ridge, and in a few moments he knew by the oddness in the shape of the trees what it had been that the trees were hiding.

They had been walking along a swelling, woodland path beside the sea. On a particular high plateau, projecting above the shore, stood some dwarfed and crippled apple-trees, of whose apples no man alive would have eaten, so sour and salt they must be. All the rest of the plateau was bald and featureless, but Pump looked at every inch of it, as if at an inhabited place.

“This is where we’ll have breakfast,” he said, pointing to the naked grassy waste. “It’s the best inn in England.”

Some of his audience began to laugh, but somehow suddenly ceased doing so, as Dalroy strode forward and planted the sign of “The Old Ship” on the desolate sea-shore.

“And now,” he said, “you have charge of the stores we brought, Hump, and we will picnic. As it said in a song I once sang,

“The Saracen’s Head out of Araby came,

King Richard riding in arms like flame,

And where he established his folk to be fed

He set up his spear, and the Saracen’s Head.”

It was nearly dusk before the mob, much swelled by the many discontented on the Ivywood estates, reached the gates of Ivywood House. Strategically, and for the purposes of a night surprise, this might have done credit to the Captain’s military capacity. But the use to which he put it actually was what some might call eccentric. When he had disposed his forces, with strict injunctions of silence for the first few minutes, he turned to Pump, and said,

“And now, before we do anything else, I’m going to make a noise.”

And he produced from under brown paper what appeared to be a musical instrument.

“A summons to parley?” inquired Dorian, with interest, “a trumpet of defiance, or something of that kind?”

“No,” said Patrick, “a serenade.”

Ricadde di nuovo in un silenzio quasi imbronciato; e furono attraversati parecchi villaggi prima che parlasse ancora.

Marciarono attraverso l’oscurità; e l’alba li sorprese in qualche luogo tra le parti più selvagge e boscose, dove le strade cominciavano a salire e a vagare. Dalroy diede un’esclamazione di piacere e indicò avanti a sé, richiamando l’attenzione di Dorian sulla lontananza. Contro le sbarre d’argento e scarlatte del far del giorno si vedeva lontano una scura cupola purpurea, con una corona di scure foglie verdi; il luogo che avevano chiamato Roundabout.

Lo spirito di Dalroy parve rianimarsi a quella vista, col consueto accompagnamento della minaccia del canto.

«Composto qualche poesia ultimamente?» chiese a Wimpole.

«Niente di particolare,» rispose il poeta.

«Allora,» disse il Capitano, con aria portentosa, schiarendosi la gola, «ascolterete una delle mie, che vi piaccia o no – anzi, più vi dispiace e più lunga e lunga sarà. Comincio a capire perché i soldati vogliano cantare quando sono in marcia; e anche perché sopportino canzoni così scadenti.

«I Druidi agitavano i loro coltelli d’oro

E danzavano intorno alla Quercia,

quand’avevano sacrificato un uomo;

ma per quanto i dotti scrutino e frughino

nessuna singola persona moderna può

cogliere del tutto la facezia;

ma benché tagliassero la gola agli uomini

non abbatterono l’albero,

e dal sangue spuntarono i virgulti

dei boschi di quercia ancora a venire.

Ma Ivywood, Lord Ivywood,

marcisce l’albero come farebbe l’edera,

s’aggrappa e striscia come farebbe l’edera

attorno al sacro albero.

«Re Carlo fuggì dalla battaglia di Worcester

e si nascose in una Quercia;

nelle scuole conventuali nessun uomo di tatto

vorrebbe ripercorrere e lodare ogni suo atto,

o sostenere che fosse in realtà

un tipo austero e santificato;

ma non per opera sua i sacri boschi

hanno perduto le loro libere fantasie,

e benché fosse straordinariamente grosso,

non spezzò l’albero.

Ma Ivywood, Lord Ivywood,

spezza l’albero come farebbe l’edera

e divora i boschi come farebbe l’edera

tra noi e il mare.

«Il grande Collingwood scese per la radura

e sparse liberamente le ghiande,

perché querce fossero ancora nel bosco

quercine come le travi lassù

quando il grande Amato che i marinai amano

fu baciato dalla Morte in mare.

Ma benché per lui cadessero le querce

a costruire le navi di quercia,

il boscaiolo venerava ciò che colpiva

e onorava persino le schegge.

Ma Ivywood, Lord Ivywood,

odia l’albero come farebbe l’edera,

come il drago dell’edera farebbe,

che ci tiene nella sua stretta.»

Stavano salendo per una strada in pendio, murata su entrambi i lati da boschi solenni, che in qualche modo parevano vigili come gufi svegli. Benché il far del giorno passasse sopra di loro con vessilli, rotoli di scarlatto e d’oro, e con un vento come trombe di trionfo, i boschi scuri parevano custodire il loro segreto come cantine buie e fresche; né vi si scorgeva il forte sole, salvo in uno o due fulgidi fasci, che parevano smeraldi scheggiati.

«Non mi meraviglierei,» disse Dorian, «se l’edera non scoprisse che anche l’albero sa una cosa o due.»

«L’albero lo sa,» convenne il Capitano. «Il guaio era che fino a poco tempo fa l’albero non sapeva di saperlo.»

Vi fu un silenzio; e mentre salivano, l’erta si fece sempre più ripida, e gli alti alberi parevano sempre più custodire qualcosa alla vista, come coi grigi scudi di giganti.

«Ti ricordi questa strada, Hump?» chiese Dalroy al locandiere.

«Sì,» rispose Humphrey Pump, e non disse altro; ma pochi hanno mai udito tanta pienezza in un’affermazione.

Marciarono in silenzio e circa due ore dopo, verso le undici in punto, Dalroy comandò l’alt nella foresta, e disse che tutti avrebbero fatto meglio a concedersi qualche ora di sonno. La qualità impenetrabile dei boschi e la relativa morbidezza del tappeto di faggiòla rendevano il luogo tanto appropriato quanto l’ora era inopportuna. E se qualcuno pensa che gente comune, raccolta a caso per strada, non potesse seguire un capo casuale in un simile viaggio o dormire al suo comando in un simile luogo, dato lo stato dell’anima, allora costui non conosce la storia.

«Temo,» disse Dalroy, «che dovrete fare colazione con la vostra cena. Conosco un posto eccellente per far colazione, ma è troppo esposto per il sonno. E di sonno dovete averne; sicché non disfaremo le provviste proprio ora. Ci coricheremo come i Bimbi nel Bosco, e qualunque uccello di disposizione operosa è libero di cominciare a coprirmi di foglie. Davvero, stanno per venire cose, prima delle quali vorrete dormire.»

Quando ripresero la marcia era quasi metà pomeriggio; e il pasto che Dalroy insisteva baldanzosamente nel definire colazione fu consumato verso quell’ora misteriosa in cui le signore muoiono senza il tè. La ripida strada s’era fatta costantemente più ripida e più ripida; e più ripida; e infine Dalroy disse a Dorian Wimpole,

«Non far cadere di nuovo quel formaggio proprio qui, o rotolerà giù fino in fondo, nei boschi. Lo so che lo farà. Non occorrono calcoli scientifici di pendenze e angoli; perché l’ho visto farlo io stesso. Anzi, gli sono corso dietro.»

Wimpole si rese conto che stavano salendo verso il filo tagliente di un crinale, e in pochi istanti capì, dalla stranezza nella forma degli alberi, cosa fosse ciò che gli alberi nascondevano.

Avevano camminato lungo un sentiero boschivo ondulato in riva al mare. Su un particolare alto pianoro, sporgente sopra la spiaggia, stavano alcuni meli nani e storpi, delle cui mele nessun vivente avrebbe mangiato, tanto dovevano essere aspre e salse. Tutto il resto del pianoro era brullo e privo di tratti distintivi, ma Pump ne osservava ogni pollice, come se fosse un luogo abitato.

«È qui che faremo colazione,» disse, indicando la nuda distesa erbosa. «È la migliore locanda d’Inghilterra.»

Parte del suo pubblico cominciò a ridere, ma d’un tratto cessò di farlo, mentre Dalroy avanzava a grandi passi e piantava l’insegna de «La Vecchia Nave» sulla desolata riva del mare.

«E ora,» disse, «tu hai la custodia delle provviste che abbiamo portato, Hump, e faremo un picnic. Come diceva una canzone che cantai un tempo,

«La Testa del Saraceno giunse dall’Arabia,

Re Richard cavalcando in armi come fiamma,

e dove stabilì che la sua gente fosse nutrita

piantò la sua lancia, e la Testa del Saraceno.»

Era quasi il crepuscolo prima che la folla, molto ingrossata dai numerosi scontenti delle tenute di Ivywood, raggiungesse i cancelli di Ivywood House. Strategicamente, e ai fini di una sorpresa notturna, ciò avrebbe potuto far onore alla capacità militare del Capitano. Ma l’uso che effettivamente ne fece fu quel che alcuni definirebbero eccentrico. Quando ebbe disposto le sue forze, con severe ingiunzioni di silenzio per i primi minuti, si volse a Pump, e disse,

«E ora, prima di fare qualsiasi altra cosa, farò rumore.»

E tirò fuori da sotto della carta marrone quello che pareva uno strumento musicale.

«Un invito a parlamentare?» s’informò Dorian, con interesse, «una tromba di sfida, o qualcosa del genere?»

«No,» disse Patrick, «una serenata.»

CHAPTER XXIV: THE ENIGMAS OF LADY JOAN

ON an evening when the sky was clear and only its fringes embroidered with the purple arabesques of the sunset, Joan Brett was walking on the upper lawn of the terraced garden at Ivywood, where the peacocks trail themselves about. She was not unlike one of the peacocks herself in beauty, and some might have said, in inutility; she had the proud head and the sweeping train; nor was she, in these days, devoid of the occasional disposition to scream. For, indeed, for some time past she had felt her existence closing round her with an incomprehensible quietude; and that is harder for the patience than an incomprehensible noise. Whenever she looked at the old yew hedges of the garden they seemed to be higher than when she saw them last; as if those living walls could still grow to shut her in. Whenever from the turret windows she had a sight of the sea, it seemed to be farther away. Indeed, the whole closing of the end of the turret wing with the new wall of eastern woodwork seemed to symbolise all her shapeless sensations. In her childhood the wing had ended with a broken-down door and a disused staircase. They led to an uncultivated copse and an abandoned railway tunnel, to which neither she nor anyone else ever wanted to go. Still, she knew what they led to. Now it seemed that this scrap of land had been sold and added to the adjoining estate; and about the adjoining estate nobody seemed to know anything in particular. The sense of things closing in increased upon her. All sorts of silly little details magnified the sensation. She could discover nothing about this new landlord next door, so to speak, since he was, it seemed, an elderly man who preferred to live in the greatest privacy. Miss Browning, Lord Ivywood’s secretary, could give her no further information than that he was a gentleman from the Mediterranean coast; which singular form of words seemed to have been put into her mouth. As a Mediterranean gentleman might mean anything from an American gentleman living in Venice to a black African on the edge of the Atlas, the description did not illuminate; and probably was not intended to do so. She occasionally saw his liveried servants going about; and their liveries were not like English liveries. She was also, in her somewhat morbid state, annoyed by the fact that the uniforms of the old Pebblewick militia had been changed, under the influence of the Turkishprestige in the recent war. They wore fezzes like the French Zouaves, which were certainly much more practical than the heavy helmets they used to wear. It was a small matter, but it annoyed Lady Joan, who was, like so many clever women, at once subtle and conservative. It made her feel as if the whole world was being altered outside, and she was not allowed to know about it.

But she had deeper spiritual troubles also, while, under the pathetic entreaties of old, Lady Ivywood and her own sick mother, she stayed on week after week at Ivywood House. If the matter be stated cynically (as she herself was quite capable of stating it) she was engaged in the established feminine occupation of trying to like a man. But the cynicism would have been false; as cynicism nearly always is; for during the most crucial days of that period, she had really liked the man.

She had liked him when he was brought in with Pump’s bullet in his leg; and was still the strongest and calmest man in the room. She had liked him when the hurt took a dangerous turn, and when he bore pain to admiration. She had liked him when he showed no malice against the angry Dorian; she had liked him with something like enthusiasm on the night he rose rigid on his rude crutch, and, crushing all remonstrance, made his rash and swift rush to London. But, despite the queer closing-in-sensations of which we have spoken, she never liked him better than that evening when he lifted himself laboriously on his crutch up the terraces of the old garden and came to speak to her as she stood among the peacocks. He even tried to pat a peacock in a hazy way, as if it were a dog. He told her that these beautiful birds were, of course, imported from the East–by the semi-eastern empire of Macedonia. But, all the same, Joan had a dim suspicion that he had never noticed before that there were any peacocks at Ivywood. His greatest fault was a pride in the faultlessness of his mental and moral strength; but, if he had only known, something faintly comic in the unconscious side of him did him more good with the woman than all the rest.

“They were said to be the birds of Juno,” he said, “but I have little doubt that Juno, like so much else of the Homeric mythology, has also an Asiatic origin.”

“I always thought,” said Joan, “that Juno was rather too stately for the seraglio.”

“You ought to know,” replied Ivywood, with a courteous gesture, “for Inever saw anyone who looked so like Juno as you do. But, indeed, there is a great deal of misunderstanding about the Arabian or Indian view of women. It is, somehow, too simple and solid for our paradoxical Christendom to comprehend. Even the vulgar joke against the Turks, that they like their brides fat, has in it a sort of distorted shadow of what I mean. They do not look so much at the individual, as at Womanhood and the power of Nature.”

“I sometimes think,” said Joan, “that these fascinating theories are a little strained. Your friend Misysra told me the other day that women had the highest freedom in Turkey; as they were allowed to wear trousers.”

Ivywood smiled his rare and dry smile. “The Prophet has something of a simplicity often found with genius,” he answered. “I will not deny that some of the arguments he has employed have seemed to me crude and even fanciful. But he is right at the root. There is a kind of freedom that consists in never rebelling against Nature; and I think they understand it in the Orient better than we do in the West. You see, Joan, it is all very well to talk about love in our narrow, personal, romantic way; but there is something higher than the love of a lover or the love of love.”

CAPITOLO XXIV: GLI ENIGMI DI LADY JOAN

IN una sera in cui il cielo era limpido e solo i suoi orli erano ricamati con gli arabeschi purpurei del tramonto, Joan Brett passeggiava sul prato superiore del giardino a terrazze di Ivywood, dove i pavoni si trascinano attorno. Ella stessa non era dissimile da uno dei pavoni in bellezza, e alcuni avrebbero detto in inutilità; aveva il capo altero e la coda strascicante; né era, in quei giorni, priva dell’occasionale disposizione a strillare. Poiché, in verità, da qualche tempo sentiva la propria esistenza chiudersi intorno a lei con un’incomprensibile quietudine; e ciò è più duro per la pazienza di un incomprensibile rumore. Ogni volta che guardava le vecchie siepi di tasso del giardino le parevano più alte di quando le aveva viste l’ultima volta; come se quelle mura viventi potessero ancora crescere per rinchiuderla. Ogni volta che dalle finestre della torretta aveva una visione del mare, esso sembrava più lontano. Anzi, l’intera chiusura dell’estremità dell’ala della torretta con la nuova parete di legname orientale pareva simboleggiare tutte le sue informi sensazioni. Nella sua fanciullezza l’ala terminava con una porta sconquassata e una scala in disuso. Conducevano a un bosco ceduo incolto e a una galleria ferroviaria abbandonata, dove né lei né alcun altro ebbero mai voglia di andare. Eppure sapeva a cosa conducevano. Ora sembrava che quel lembo di terra fosse stato venduto e aggiunto alla tenuta confinante; e della tenuta confinante nessuno pareva sapere alcunché di preciso. Il senso delle cose che si chiudevano intorno cresceva in lei. Ogni sorta di sciocchi piccoli dettagli ingigantiva la sensazione. Non riusciva a scoprire nulla su questo nuovo padrone della porta accanto, per così dire, giacché egli era, a quanto pareva, un uomo attempato che preferiva vivere nella più grande riservatezza. La signorina Browning, segretaria di Lord Ivywood, non seppe darle altra informazione se non che era un gentiluomo della costa mediterranea; singolare giro di parole che pareva esserle stato messo in bocca. Poiché un gentiluomo mediterraneo poteva significare qualunque cosa, da un gentiluomo americano che vive a Venezia a un nero africano ai margini dell’Atlante, la descrizione non illuminava; e probabilmente non era intesa a farlo. Ella scorgeva di quando in quando i suoi servi in livrea che andavano attorno; e le loro livree non erano come le livree inglesi. Era inoltre, nel suo stato alquanto morboso, infastidita dal fatto che le uniformi della vecchia milizia di Pebblewick fossero state cambiate, sotto l’influenza del prestigio turco nella recente guerra. Portavano il fez come gli Zuavi francesi, che erano certamente assai più pratici dei pesanti elmi che solevano portare. Era una faccenda da poco, ma infastidiva Lady Joan, che era, come tante donne intelligenti, insieme sottile e conservatrice. Le faceva sentire come se il mondo intero venisse mutato là fuori, e a lei non fosse concesso di saperne nulla.

Ma ella aveva anche più profondi turbamenti spirituali, mentre, dietro le patetiche suppliche della vecchia Lady Ivywood e della sua stessa madre malata, restava settimana dopo settimana a Ivywood House. Se la si vuole enunciare cinicamente (come lei stessa era ben capace di enunciarla), era impegnata nella consueta occupazione femminile di cercare di provar simpatia per un uomo. Ma il cinismo sarebbe stato falso; come il cinismo quasi sempre è; poiché durante i giorni più cruciali di quel periodo, l’uomo le era davvero piaciuto.

Le era piaciuto quando fu portato dentro con la pallottola di Pump nella gamba; ed era ancora l’uomo più forte e più calmo della stanza. Le era piaciuto quando la ferita prese una piega pericolosa, e quando egli sopportò il dolore in modo ammirevole. Le era piaciuto quando non mostrò rancore verso l’adirato Dorian; le era piaciuto con qualcosa come entusiasmo nella notte in cui si levò rigido sulla sua rozza gruccia, e, schiacciando ogni rimostranza, compì la sua avventata e rapida corsa a Londra. Ma, malgrado le curiose sensazioni di chiusura di cui abbiamo parlato, non le piacque mai tanto quanto in quella sera in cui si sollevò faticosamente sulla gruccia su per le terrazze del vecchio giardino e venne a parlarle mentre lei stava tra i pavoni. Cercò persino di accarezzare un pavone in modo distratto, come se fosse un cane. Le disse che questi bei uccelli erano, naturalmente, importati dall’Oriente – dal semi-orientale impero di Macedonia. Ma, ciò nondimeno, Joan ebbe il vago sospetto che egli non avesse mai notato prima che a Ivywood ci fossero pavoni. La sua colpa più grande era un orgoglio nell’impeccabilità della sua forza mentale e morale; ma, se solo l’avesse saputo, qualcosa di lievemente comico nel lato inconsapevole di sé gli faceva più bene, presso la donna, di tutto il resto.

«Si diceva fossero gli uccelli di Giunone,» disse, «ma ho pochi dubbi che Giunone, come tanta parte della mitologia omerica, abbia anch’essa un’origine asiatica.»

«Ho sempre pensato,» disse Joan, «che Giunone fosse un po’ troppo maestosa per il serraglio.»

«Dovreste ben saperlo,» rispose Ivywood, con un gesto cortese, «giacché non ho mai visto alcuno che somigliasse a Giunone quanto voi. Ma, in verità, c’è un gran malinteso circa la visione araba o indiana della donna. È, in qualche modo, troppo semplice e solida perché la nostra paradossale cristianità la comprenda. Persino la volgare beffa contro i turchi, che amano grasse le loro spose, contiene una specie di distorta ombra di ciò che intendo. Non guardano tanto all’individuo, quanto alla Femminilità e alla potenza della Natura.»

«Talvolta penso,» disse Joan, «che queste affascinanti teorie siano un po’ forzate. Il vostro amico Misysra mi diceva l’altro giorno che le donne godevano della più alta libertà in Turchia; poiché era loro concesso di portare i pantaloni.»

Ivywood sorrise del suo raro e arido sorriso. «Il Profeta ha qualcosa di quella semplicità che spesso si accompagna al genio,» rispose. «Non negherò che alcuni degli argomenti da lui impiegati mi siano parsi rozzi e perfino fantasiosi. Ma ha ragione alla radice. Esiste una specie di libertà che consiste nel non ribellarsi mai alla Natura; e credo che in Oriente la comprendano meglio di noi in Occidente. Vedete, Joan, va tutto molto bene parlare d’amore nel nostro modo angusto, personale, romantico; ma c’è qualcosa di più alto dell’amore di un amante o dell’amore dell’amore.»

“What is that?” asked Joan, looking down.

“The love of Fate,” said Lord Ivywood, with something like spiritual passion in his eyes. “Doesn’t Nietzsche say somewhere that the delight in destiny is the mark of the hero? We are mistaken if we think that the heroes and saints of Islam say ‘Kismet’ with bowed heads and in sorrow. They say ‘Kismet’ with a shout of joy. That which is fitting–that is what they really mean. In the Arabian tales, the most perfect prince is wedded to the most perfect princess–because it is fitting. The spiritual giants, the Genii, achieve it–that is, the purposes of Nature. In the selfish, sentimental European novels, the loveliest princess on earth might have run away with her middle-aged drawing-master. These things are not in the Path. The Turk rides out to wed the fairest queen of the earth; he conquers empires to do it; and he is not ashamed of his laurels.”

The crumpled violet clouds around the edge of the silver evening looked to Lady Joan more and more like vivid violet embroideries hemming some silver curtain in the closed corridor at Ivywood. The peacocks looked more lustrous and beautiful than they ever had before; but for the first time she really felt they came out of the land of the Arabian Nights.

“Joan,” said Philip Ivywood, very softly, in the twilight, “I am not ashamed of my laurels, I see no meaning in what these Christians call humility. I will be the greatest man in the world if I can; and I think I can. Therefore, something that is higher than love itself, Fate and what is fitting, make it right that I should wed the most beautiful woman in the world. And she stands among the peacocks and is more beautiful and more proud than they.”

Joan’s troubled eyes were on the violet horizon and her troubled lips could utter nothing but something like “don’t.”

“Joan,” said Philip, again, “I have told you, you are the woman one of the great heroes could have desired. Let me now tell you something I could have told no one to whom I had not thus spoken of love and betrothal. When I was twenty years old in a town in Germany, pursuing my education, I did what the West calls falling in love. She was a fisher-girl from the coast; for this town was near the sea. My story might have ended there. I could not have entered diplomacy with such a wife, but I should not have minded then. But a little while after, I wandered into the edges of Flanders, and found myself standing above some of the last grand reaches of the Rhine. And things came over me but for which I might be crying stinking fish to this day. I thought how many holy or lovely nooks that river had left behind, and gone on. It might anywhere in Switzerland have spent its weak youth in a spirit over a high crag, or anywhere in the Rhinelands lost itself in a marsh covered with flowers. But it went on to the perfect sea, which is the fulfilment of a river.”

Again, Joan could not speak; and again it was Philip who went on.

“Here is yet another thing that could not be said, till the hand of the prince had been offered to the princess. It may be that in the East they carry too far this matter of infant marriages. But look round on the mad young marriages that go to pieces everywhere! And ask yourself whether you don’t wish they had been infant marriages! People talk in the newspapers of the heartlessness of royal marriages. But you and I do not believe the newspapers, I suppose. We know there is no King in England; nor has been since his head fell before Whitehall. You know that you and I and the families are the Kings of England; and our marriages are royal marriages. Let the suburbs call them heartless. Let us say they need the brave heart that is the only badge of aristocracy. Joan,” he said, very gently, “perhaps you have been near a crag in Switzerland, or a marsh covered with flowers. Perhaps you have known–a fisher-girl. But there is something greater and simpler than all that; something you find in the great epics of the East–the beautiful woman, and the great man, and Fate.”

“My lord,” said Joan, using the formal phrase by an unfathomable instinct, “will you allow me a little more time to think of this? And let there be no notion of disloyalty, if my decision is one way or the other?”

“Why, of course,” said Ivywood, bowing over his crutch; and he limped off, picking his way among the peacocks.

For days afterward Joan tried to build the foundations of her earthly destiny. She was still quite young, but she felt as if she had lived thousands of years, worrying over the same question. She told herself again and again, and truly, that many a better woman than she had taken a second-best which was not so first-class a second-best. But there was something complicated in the very atmosphere. She liked listening to Philip Ivywood at his best, as anyone likes listening to a man who can really play the violin; but the great trouble always is that at certain awful moments you cannot be certain whether it is the violin or the man.

Moreover, there was a curious tone and spirit in the Ivywood household, especially after the wound and convalescence of Ivywood, about which she could say nothing except that it annoyed her somehow. There was something in it glorious–but also languorous. By an impulse by no means uncommon among intelligent, fashionable people, she felt a desire to talk to a sensible woman of the middle or lower classes; and almost threw herself on the bosom of Miss Browning for sympathy.

But Miss Browning, with her curling, reddish hair and white, very clever face, struck the same indescribable note. Lord Ivywood was assumed as a first principle; as if he were Father Time, or the Clerk of the Weather. He was called “He.” The fifth time he was called “He,” Joan could not understand why she seemed to smell the plants in the hot conservatory.

«Cosa sarebbe?» chiese Joan, abbassando lo sguardo.

«L’amore del Fato,» disse Lord Ivywood, con qualcosa come una passione spirituale negli occhi. «Non dice Nietzsche da qualche parte che la delizia nel destino è il segno dell’eroe? Ci inganniamo se pensiamo che gli eroi e i santi dell’Islam dicano “Kismet” a capo chino e nel dolore. Dicono “Kismet” con un grido di gioia. Ciò che è conveniente – ecco cosa intendono davvero. Nelle novelle arabe, il principe più perfetto è congiunto in nozze alla principessa più perfetta – perché è conveniente. I giganti spirituali, i Geni, lo compiono – cioè i fini della Natura. Nei romanzi europei egoisti e sentimentali, la più leggiadra principessa della terra potrebbe essere fuggita col suo maestro di disegno di mezz’età. Queste cose non sono nella Via. Il turco cavalca fuori a sposare la più bella regina della terra; conquista imperi per farlo; e non si vergogna dei suoi allori.»

Le nubi violette e spiegazzate intorno all’orlo della sera d’argento parvero a Lady Joan sempre più simili a vividi ricami violetti che orlavano una tenda d’argento nel corridoio chiuso di Ivywood. I pavoni parevano più lucenti e belli di quanto fossero mai stati prima; ma per la prima volta ella sentì davvero che venivano dalla terra delle Mille e una notte.

«Joan,» disse Philip Ivywood, molto sommessamente, nel crepuscolo, «non mi vergogno dei miei allori, non vedo alcun senso in ciò che questi cristiani chiamano umiltà. Sarò il più grande uomo del mondo se potrò; e credo di poterlo. Perciò, qualcosa che è più alto dell’amore stesso, il Fato e ciò che è conveniente, rendono giusto ch’io sposi la più bella donna del mondo. Ed ella sta tra i pavoni ed è più bella e più altera di loro.»

Gli occhi turbati di Joan erano sull’orizzonte violetto e le sue labbra turbate non seppero proferire altro che qualcosa come «non fatelo.»

«Joan,» disse Philip, di nuovo, «vi ho detto che siete la donna che uno dei grandi eroi avrebbe potuto desiderare. Lasciate che ora vi dica qualcosa che non avrei potuto dire a nessuno cui non avessi così parlato d’amore e di fidanzamento. Quando avevo vent’anni, in una città di Germania, mentre attendevo alla mia educazione, feci ciò che l’Occidente chiama cadere in amore. Era una pescatrice della costa; poiché questa città era vicina al mare. La mia storia sarebbe potuta finire lì. Non avrei potuto entrare nella diplomazia con una simile moglie, ma allora non me ne sarei curato. Ma poco tempo dopo, vagai fino ai margini delle Fiandre, e mi trovai in piedi sopra alcune delle ultime grandi anse del Reno. E mi vennero pensieri, senza i quali potrei ancor oggi andar gridando pesce puzzolente. Pensai a quanti sacri o incantevoli anfratti quel fiume si fosse lasciato alle spalle, per proseguire. Avrebbe potuto in un luogo qualsiasi della Svizzera spendere la sua debole giovinezza in uno spruzzo sopra un’alta rupe, o in un luogo qualsiasi delle Renanie perdersi in una palude coperta di fiori. Ma proseguì verso il mare perfetto, che è il compimento di un fiume.»

Di nuovo, Joan non seppe parlare; e di nuovo fu Philip a proseguire.

«Ecco ancora un’altra cosa che non si sarebbe potuta dire, finché la mano del principe non fosse stata offerta alla principessa. Può darsi che in Oriente spingano troppo oltre questa faccenda dei matrimoni infantili. Ma volgete lo sguardo ai folli matrimoni giovanili che vanno in pezzi dappertutto! E chiedetevi se non desideriate che fossero stati matrimoni infantili! La gente parla sui giornali della spietatezza dei matrimoni regali. Ma voi e io non crediamo ai giornali, suppongo. Sappiamo che non c’è alcun Re in Inghilterra; né v’è stato da quando la sua testa cadde dinanzi a Whitehall. Voi sapete che voi e io e le famiglie siamo i Re d’Inghilterra; e i nostri matrimoni sono matrimoni regali. Che i sobborghi li chiamino spietati. Diciamo che essi richiedono il cuore coraggioso che è l’unico blasone dell’aristocrazia. Joan,» disse, molto dolcemente, «forse siete stata presso una rupe in Svizzera, o una palude coperta di fiori. Forse avete conosciuto – una pescatrice. Ma c’è qualcosa di più grande e più semplice di tutto ciò; qualcosa che si trova nei grandi poemi epici dell’Oriente – la bella donna, e il grand’uomo, e il Fato.»

«Mio signore,» disse Joan, usando la frase formale per un imperscrutabile istinto, «vorrete concedermi un po’ più di tempo per riflettere su questo? E che non vi sia alcuna idea di slealtà, se la mia decisione sarà nell’uno o nell’altro senso?»

«Ma certamente,» disse Ivywood, inchinandosi sulla gruccia; e si allontanò zoppicando, scegliendo la via tra i pavoni.

Per giorni dopo Joan cercò di gettare le fondamenta del suo destino terreno. Era ancora assai giovane, ma si sentiva come se avesse vissuto migliaia d’anni, arrovellandosi sulla stessa questione. Si ripeté più e più volte, e con verità, che molte donne migliori di lei avevano preso un ripiego che non era un ripiego di così prima qualità. Ma c’era qualcosa di complicato nell’atmosfera stessa. Le piaceva ascoltare Philip Ivywood al suo meglio, come a chiunque piace ascoltare un uomo che sa davvero suonare il violino; ma il gran guaio è sempre che, in certi terribili momenti, non si può essere certi se sia il violino o l’uomo.

Inoltre, c’era un curioso tono e spirito nella casa Ivywood, specialmente dopo la ferita e la convalescenza di Ivywood, del quale non sapeva dir nulla se non che in qualche modo la infastidiva. C’era in esso qualcosa di glorioso – ma anche di languoroso. Per un impulso tutt’altro che raro tra le persone intelligenti e alla moda, ella sentì il desiderio di parlare con una donna assennata del ceto medio o inferiore; e quasi si gettò sul seno della signorina Browning in cerca di solidarietà.

Ma la signorina Browning, coi suoi capelli ricci rossicci e il volto bianco e molto intelligente, colpiva la stessa indescrivibile nota. Lord Ivywood era assunto come un primo principio; come se fosse Padre Tempo, o il Cancelliere del Meteo. Lo si chiamava «Lui». La quinta volta che lo si chiamò «Lui», Joan non riuscì a capire perché le parve di odorare le piante nella calda serra.

“You see,” said Miss Browning, “we mustn’t interfere with his career; that is the important thing. And, really, I think the quieter we keep about everything the better. I am sure he is maturing very big plans. You heard what the Prophet said the other night?”

“The last thing the Prophet said to me,” said the darker lady, in a dogged manner, “was that when we English see the English youth, we cry out ‘He is crescent!’ But when we see the English aged man, we cry out ‘He is cross!’”

A lady with so clever a face could not but laugh faintly; but she continued on a determined theme, “The Prophet said, you know, that all real love had in it an element of fate. And I am sure that is his view, too. People cluster round a centre as little stars do round a star; because a star is a magnet. You are never wrong when destiny blows behind you like a great big wind; and I think many things have been judged unfairly that way. It’s all very well to talk about the infant marriages in India.”

“Miss Browning,” said Joan, “are you interested in the infant marriages in India?”

“Well–” said Miss Browning.

“Is your sister interested in them? I’ll run and ask her,” cried Joan, plunging across the room to where Mrs. Mackintosh was sitting at a table scribbling secretarial notes.

“Well,” said Mrs. Mackintosh, turning up a rich-haired, resolute head, more handsome than her sister’s, “I believe the Indian way is the best. When people are left to themselves in early youth, any of them might marry anything. We might have married a nigger or a fish-wife or–a criminal.”

“Now, Mrs. Mackintosh,” said Joan, with black-browed severity, “you well know you would never have married a fish-wife. Where is Enid?” she ended suddenly.

“Lady Enid,” said Miss Browning, “is looking out music in the music room, I think.”

Joan walked swiftly through several long salons, and found her fair-haired and pallid relative actually at the piano.

“Enid,” cried Joan, “you know I’ve always been fond of you. For God’s sake tell me what is the matter with this house? I admire Philip as everybody does. But what is the matter with the house? Why do all these rooms and gardens seem to be shutting me in and in and in? Why does everything look more and more the same? Why does everybody say the same thing? Oh, I don’t often talk metaphysics; but there is a purpose in this. That’s the only way of putting it; there is a purpose. And I don’t know what it is.”

Lady Enid Wimpole played a preliminary bar or two on the piano. Then she said,

“Nor do I, Joan. I don’t indeed. I know exactly what you mean. But it’s just because there is a purpose that I have faith in him and trust him.” She began softly to play a ballad tune of the Rhineland; and perhaps the music suggested her next remark. “Suppose you were looking at some of the last reaches of the Rhine, where it flows–”

“Enid!” cried Joan, “if you say ‘into the North Sea,’ I shall scream. Scream, do you hear, louder than all the peacocks together.”

“Well,” expostulated Lady Enid, looking up rather wildly, “The Rhinedoes flow into the North Sea, doesn’t it?”

“I dare say,” said Joan, recklessly, “but the Rhine might have flowed into the Round Pond, before you would have known or cared, until–”

“Until what?” asked Enid; and her music suddenly ceased. “Until something happened that I cannot understand,” said Joan, moving away.

“You are something I cannot understand,” said Enid Wimpole. “But I will play something else, if this annoys you.” And she fingered the music again with an eye to choice.

Joan walked back through the corridor of the music room, and restlessly resumed her seat in the room with the two lady secretaries.

“Well,” asked the red-haired and good-humoured Mrs. Mackintosh, without looking up from her work of scribbling, “have you discovered anything?”

For some moments Joan appeared to be in a blacker state of brooding than usual; then she said, in a candid and friendly tone, which somehow contrasted with her knit and swarthy brows– “No, really. At least I think I’ve only found out two things; and they are only things about myself. I’ve discovered that I do like heroism, but I don’t like hero worship.”

“Surely,” said Miss Browning, in the Girton manner, “the one always flows from the other.”

“I hope not,” said Joan.

“But what else can you do with the hero?” asked Mrs. Mackintosh, still without looking up from her writing, “except worship him?”

“You might crucify him,” said Joan, with a sudden return of savage restlessness, as she rose from her chair. “Things seem to happen then.”

“Aren’t you tired?” asked the Miss Browning who had the clever face.

“Yes,” said Joan, “and the worst sort of tiredness; when you don’t even know what you’re tired of. To tell the honest truth, I think I’m tired of this house.”

“It’s very old, of course, and parts of it are still dismal,” said Miss Browning, “but he has enormously improved it. The decoration, with the moon and stars, down in the wing with the turret is really–”

Away in the distant music room, Lady Enid, having found the music she preferred, was fingering its prelude on the piano. At the first few notes of it, Joan Brett stood up, like a tigress.

“Thanks–” she said, with a hoarse softness, “that’s it, of course! and that’s just what we all are! She’s found the right tune now.”

“What tune is it?” asked the wondering secretary.

“The tune of harp, sackbut, psaltery, dulcimer and all kinds of music,” said Joan, softly and fiercely, “when we shall bow down and worship the Golden Image that Nebuchadnezzar the King has set up. Girls! Women! Do you know what this place is? Do you know why it is all doors within doors and lattice behind lattice; and everything is curtained and cushioned; and why the flowers that are so fragrant here are not the flowers of our hills?”

«Vedete», disse Miss Browning, «non dobbiamo interferire con la sua carriera; questa è la cosa importante. E, davvero, penso che sia meglio non parlare di nulla. Sono sicura che sta maturando piani molto grandi. Avete sentito quello che ha detto il Profeta l’altra sera?»

“L’ultima cosa che il profeta mi ha detto”, disse la signora più scura in tono ostinato, “è stata che quando noi inglesi vediamo un giovane inglese esclamiamo ‘È in ascesa!’, ma quando vediamo un vecchio inglese esclamiamo ‘È crociato!’”

Una signora con un volto così intelligente non poté fare a meno di ridere debolmente; ma continuò su un tema determinato: “Il Profeta disse, sapete, che tutto l’amore reale aveva in sé un elemento del destino. E sono sicura che questa è anche la sua opinione. Le persone si raggruppano attorno a un centro come le piccole stelle fanno attorno a una stella; perché una stella è un magnete. Non sbagliate mai quando il destino soffia dietro di voi come un grande, grosso vento; e penso che molte cose siano state giudicate ingiustamente in questo modo. È tutto molto bene parlare dei matrimoni infantili in India.”

“Signorina Browning,” disse Giovanna, “si interessa dei matrimoni infantili in India?”

«Beh» disse la signorina Browning.

«La tua sorella è interessata a loro? Corro a chiederglielo», esclamò Giovanna, attraversando la stanza fino al punto in cui la signora MacKintosh era seduta a un tavolo scrivendo appunti da segretaria.

“Beh,” disse la signora Mackintosh, sollevando una testa dai capelli ricchi e risoluta, più bella di quella della sorella, “credo che il modo indiano sia il migliore. Quando le persone sono lasciate a se stesse nella prima giovinezza, chiunque potrebbe sposare chiunque. Potremmo aver sposato un negro o una pescivendola o… un criminale.”

«Ora, signora Mackintosh», disse Giovanna con severità e aggrottando le sopracciglia scure, «lei sa benissimo che non avrebbe mai sposato una venditrice di pesce. Dov’è Enid?» concluse improvvisamente.

“La signorina Enid,” disse la signorina Browning, “sta cercando della musica nella sala da musica, credo.”

Giovanna camminò rapidamente attraverso diversi lunghi saloni e trovò il suo parente biondo e pallido effettivamente al pianoforte.

«Enid», esclamò Joan, «sai che sono sempre stata affezionata a te. Per l’amor di Dio dimmi cos’è che non va in questa casa? Ammiro Philip come tutti lo ammirano. Ma qual è il problema con la casa? Perché tutte queste stanze e giardini sembrano chiudermi dentro, sempre più dentro? Perché tutto appare sempre più uguale? Perché tutti dicono le stesse cose? Oh, non parlo spesso di metafisica; ma in questo c’è uno scopo. Questa è l’unica maniera per dirlo; c’è uno scopo. E io non so quale sia».

La signora Enid Wimpole suonò un paio di battute preliminari al pianoforte. Poi disse:

“Nemmeno io, Giovanna. Proprio così. So esattamente cosa intendi. Ma è proprio perché c’è uno scopo che ho fede in lui e mi fido di lui.” Cominciò dolcemente a suonare una melodia di ballata della Renania; e forse la musica suggerì il suo prossimo commento. “Supponiamo che tu stia guardando alcune delle ultime svolte del Reno, dove scorre…”

«Enid!» gridò Joan «se dici “nel Mare del Nord”, strillerò. Strillerò, mi senti, più forte di tutti i pavoni messi insieme».

«Beh», esclamò Lady Enid alzando gli occhi con aria piuttosto smarrita, «il Reno sfocia nel Mare del Nord, no?»

«Oserei dire», disse Giovanna in modo sconsiderato, «che il Reno avrebbe potuto sfociare nel Serpentine prima che tu lo sapessi o ti importasse, fino a quando…»

«Fino a quando?» chiese Enid e la sua musica cessò improvvisamente. «Fino a che non accadde qualcosa che non riesco a capire», disse Giovanna allontanandosi.

«Sei qualcosa che non riesco a capire», disse Enid Wimpole. «Ma suonerò qualcos’altro se questo ti dà fastidio». E di nuovo sfiorò la tastiera con cura, cercando di scegliere il brano adatto.

Giovanna tornò indietro attraverso il corridoio della sala da musica e riprese irrequieta posto nella stanza con le due segretarie donne.

«Bene», chiese la rossa e di buon umore signora Mackintosh senza alzare lo sguardo dal suo lavoro di scarabocchiatura, «avete scoperto qualcosa?»

Per alcuni istanti Giovanna sembrò in uno stato di meditazione più cupo del solito; poi disse, con un tono schietto e amichevole che contrastava in qualche modo con le sue sopracciglia aggrottate e scure: “No, davvero. Almeno credo di aver scoperto solo due cose; e sono solo cose su me stessa. Ho scoperto che mi piace l’eroismo, ma non mi piace il culto dell’eroe.”

“Certo,” disse la signorina Browning, nel modo di Girton, “l’uno deriva sempre dall’altro.”

“Spero di no”, disse Giovanna.

“Ma che altro si può fare con l’eroe?”, chiese la signora Mackintosh senza ancora alzare lo sguardo dalla scrittura, “se non adorarlo?”

“Potreste crocifiggerlo”, disse Giovanna con un improvviso ritorno di selvaggia irrequietezza mentre si alzava dalla sedia, “allora sembra che le cose accadano”.

“Non è stanca?”, chiese la signorina Browning dal viso intelligente.

“Sì”, disse Giovanna, “e il peggior tipo di stanchezza: quando non sai nemmeno di cosa sei stanca. Per dire la verità onesta, credo di essere stanca di questa casa.”

“È molto vecchia, naturalmente, e alcune parti sono ancora squallide”, disse Miss Browning, “ma lui l’ha migliorata enormemente. La decorazione con la luna e le stelle, giù nell’ala con il torrione è davvero–”

Nella lontana sala da musica, lady Enid, avendo trovato la musica che preferiva, stava suonando il suo preludio al pianoforte. Alle prime note, Joan Brett si alzò in piedi come una tigre.

«Grazie» disse con una voce rauca e soffice «è proprio questo, naturalmente! ed è esattamente quello che siamo tutti noi! Ha trovato la melodia giusta adesso.»

“Che melodia è questa?”, chiese il segretario meravigliato.

«La melodia dell’arpa, del salterio, della cetra, del liuto e di tutti i tipi di musica», disse Giovanna dolcemente ma con fermezza, «quando ci inchineremo e adoreremo l’Immagine Dorata che Nabucodonosor il Re ha eretto. Ragazze! Donne! Sapete cos’è questo luogo? Sapete perché è tutto porte dentro porte e grate dietro grate; e tutto è drappeggiato e imbottito; e perché i fiori che qui sono così profumati non sono i fiori delle nostre colline?»

From the distant and slowly darkening music room, Enid Wimpole’s song came thin and clear:

“Less than the dust beneath thy chariot wheel,

Less than the rust that never stained thy sword–”

“Do you know what we are?” demanded Joan Brett, again. “We are a Harem.”

“Why, what can you mean?” cried the younger girl, in great agitation. “Why, Lord Ivywood has never–”

“I know he has never. I am not sure,” said Joan, “even whether he would ever. I shall never understand that man, nor will anybody else. But I tell you that is the spirit. That is what weare. And this room stinks of polygamy as certainly as it smells of tube-roses.”

“Why, Joan,” cried Lady Enid, entering the room like a well-bred ghost, “what on earth is the matter with you. You all look as white as sheets.”

Joan took no heed of her but went on with her own obstinate argument.

“And, besides,” she said, “if there’s one thing we do know about him it is that he believes on principle in doing things slowly. He calls it evolution and relativity and the expanding of an idea into larger ideas. How do we know he isn’t doing that slowly; getting us accustomed to living like this, so that it may be the less shock when he goes further–steeping us in the atmosphere before he actually introduces,” and she shuddered, “the institution. Is it any more calmly outrageous a scheme than any other of Ivywood’s schemes; than a sepoy commander-in-chief, or Misysra preaching in Westminster Abbey, or the destruction of all the inns in England? I will not wait and expand. I will not be evolved. I will not develop into something that is not me. My feet shall be outside these walls if I walk the roads for it afterward; or I will scream as I would scream trapped in any den by the Docks.”

She swept down the rooms toward the turret, with a sudden passion for solitude; but as she passed the astronomical wood-carving that had closed up the end of the old wing, Enid saw her strike it with her clinched hand.

It was in the turret that she had a strange experience. She was again, later on, using its isolation to worry out the best way of having it out with Philip, when he should return from his visit to London; for to tell old Lady Ivywood what was on her mind would be about as kind and useful as describing Chinese tortures to a baby. The evening was very quiet, of the pale grey sort, and all that side of Ivywood lay before her eyes, undisturbed. She was the more surprised when her dreaming took note of a sort of stirring in the grey-purple dusk of the bushes; of whisperings; and of many footsteps. Then the silence settled down again; and then it was startlingly broken by a big voice singing in the dark distance. It was accompanied by faint sounds that might have been from the fingering of some lute or viol:

“Lady, the light is dying in the skies,

Lady, and let us die when honour dies,

Your dear, dropped glove was like a gauntlet flung,

When you and I were young.

For something more than splendour stood; and ease was not the only good

About the woods in Ivywood when you and I were young.

“Lady, the stars are falling pale and small,

Lady, we will not live if life be all

Forgetting those good stars in heaven hung

When all the world was young,

For more than gold was in a ring, and love was not a little thing

Between the trees in Ivywood when all the world was young.”

The singing ceased; and the bustle in the bushes could hardly be called more than a whisper. But sounds of the same sort and somewhat louder seemed wafted round corners from other sides of the house; and the whole night seemed full of something that was alive, but was more than a single man.

She heard a cry behind her, and Enid rushed into the room as white as one of the lilies.

“What awful thing is happening?” she cried. “The courtyard is full of men shouting, and there are torches everywhere and–”

Joan heard a tramp of men marching and heard, afar off, another song, sung on a more derisive note, something like–

“But Ivywood, Lord Ivywood,

He rots the tree as ivy would.”

“I think,” said Joan, thoughtfully, “it is the End of the World.”

“But where are the police?” wailed her cousin. “They don’t seem to be anywhere about since they wore those fezzes. We shall be murdered or–”

Three thundering and measured blows shook the decorative wood panelling at the end of the wing; as if admittance were demanded with the club of a giant. Enid remembered that she had thought Joan’s little blow energetic, and shuddered. Both the girls stared at the stars and moons and suns blazoned on that sacred wall that leapt and shuddered under the strokes of the doom.

Then the sun fell from Heaven, and the moon and stars dropped down and were scattered about the Persian carpet; and by the opening of the end of the world, Patrick Dalroy came in, carrying a mandolin.

Dalla lontana e lentamente oscurantesi sala della musica, la canzone di Enid Wimpole giungeva tenue e chiara:

«Meno della polvere sotto la ruota del tuo carro,

Meno della ruggine che mai macchiò la tua spada–»

«Sai cosa siamo?» domandò Joan Brett, di nuovo. «Siamo un Harem.»

«Diamine, cosa vuoi dire?» esclamò la fanciulla più giovane, in grande agitazione. «Ma se Lord Ivywood non ha mai–»

«So che non l’ha mai fatto. Non sono nemmeno sicura,» disse Joan, «che lo farebbe mai. Non capirò mai quell’uomo, né lo capirà nessun altro. Ma ti dico che quello è lo spirito. Ecco cosa siamo. E questa stanza puzza di poligamia con la stessa certezza con cui odora di tuberose.»

«Ma, Joan,» esclamò Lady Enid, entrando nella stanza come un fantasma ben educato, «cosa diamine ti prende. Siete tutte bianche come lenzuola.»

Joan non le badò affatto ma proseguì col proprio ostinato ragionamento.

«E, per giunta,» disse, «se c’è una cosa che sappiamo di lui, è che crede per principio nel fare le cose lentamente. La chiama evoluzione e relatività e l’espansione di un’idea in idee più vaste. Come facciamo a sapere che non lo stia facendo lentamente; abituandoci a vivere così, sicché lo shock sia minore quando andrà oltre – impregnandoci dell’atmosfera prima di introdurre davvero,» e rabbrividì, «l’istituzione. È forse un disegno più pacatamente scandaloso di qualsiasi altro dei disegni di Ivywood; di un comandante in capo sepoy, o di Misysra che predica nell’Abbazia di Westminster, o della distruzione di tutte le locande d’Inghilterra? Non aspetterò e non mi espanderò. Non mi lascerò evolvere. Non mi svilupperò in qualcosa che non sono io. I miei piedi saranno fuori da queste mura anche se poi dovrò battere le strade; o strillerò come strillerei intrappolata in una qualsiasi tana giù ai Docks.»

Attraversò a grandi passi le stanze verso la torretta, con un’improvvisa passione per la solitudine; ma mentre passava accanto all’intaglio astronomico che aveva chiuso l’estremità della vecchia ala, Enid la vide colpirlo con la mano serrata a pugno.

Fu nella torretta che ella ebbe una strana esperienza. Stava di nuovo, più tardi, sfruttando quell’isolamento per arrovellarsi sul modo migliore di chiarire la faccenda con Philip, quando fosse tornato dalla sua visita a Londra; poiché confidare alla vecchia Lady Ivywood ciò che aveva in mente sarebbe stato press’a poco tanto gentile e utile quanto descrivere le torture cinesi a un neonato. La sera era assai quieta, di quella specie grigio pallida, e tutto quel lato di Ivywood le giaceva davanti agli occhi, indisturbato. Fu tanto più sorpresa quando il suo fantasticare colse una sorta di brulichio nel grigio-purpureo crepuscolo dei cespugli; di bisbigli; e di molti passi. Poi il silenzio tornò a posarsi; e poi fu trasalentemente rotto da una gran voce che cantava nella buia lontananza. Era accompagnata da deboli suoni che potevano venire dal pizzicare di un liuto o di una viola:

«Signora, la luce sta morendo nei cieli,

Signora, e lasciateci morire quando muore l’Onore,

Il vostro caro guanto caduto era come un guanto di sfida gettato,

quando voi e io eravamo giovani.

Poiché qualcosa più dello splendore resse; e l’agio non era l’unico bene

attorno ai boschi di Ivywood quando voi e io eravamo giovani.

«Signora, le stelle cadono pallide e piccole,

Signora, non vivremo se la vita è tutto qui,

dimenticando quelle buone stelle appese in cielo

quando tutto il mondo era giovane,

poiché più dell’oro c’era in un anello, e l’amore non era cosa da poco

tra gli alberi di Ivywood quando tutto il mondo era giovane.»

Il canto cessò; e il trambusto nei cespugli non poteva dirsi più che un sussurro. Ma suoni della stessa specie e un po’ più forti parevano sospinti dietro gli angoli da altri lati della casa; e l’intera notte pareva colma di qualcosa che era vivo, ma era più di un singolo uomo.

Udì un grido dietro di sé, ed Enid si precipitò nella stanza bianca come uno dei gigli.

«Che cosa terribile sta accadendo?» gridò. «Il cortile è pieno di uomini che urlano, e ci sono torce dappertutto e–»

Joan udì un calpestio di uomini in marcia e udì, lontano, un’altra canzone, cantata su una nota più beffarda, qualcosa come–

«Ma Ivywood, Lord Ivywood,

marcisce l’albero come farebbe l’edera.»

«Credo,» disse Joan, pensosamente, «che sia la Fine del Mondo.»

«Ma dov’è la polizia?» si lamentò la cugina. «Non pare che siano più da nessuna parte da quando portano quei fez. Saremo assassinate o–»

Tre colpi tonanti e cadenzati scossero la decorativa boiserie all’estremità dell’ala; come se si esigesse d’entrare con la clava di un gigante. Enid ricordò d’aver giudicato energico il piccolo colpo di Joan, e rabbrividì. Entrambe le fanciulle fissarono le stelle e le lune e i soli blasonati su quella sacra parete che sobbalzava e rabbrividiva sotto i colpi del destino.

Poi il sole cadde dal Cielo, e la Luna e le stelle precipitarono giù e si sparsero sul tappeto persiano; e per l’apertura della fine del mondo, Patrick Dalroy entrò, portando un mandolino.

CHAPTER XXV: THE FINDING OF THE SUPERMAN

“I’VE brought you a little dog,” said Mr. Dalroy, introducing the rampant Quoodle. “I had him brought down here in a large hamper labelled ‘Explosives,’ a title which appears to have been well selected.”

He had bowed to Lady Enid on entering and taken Joan’s hand with the least suggestion that he wanted to do something else with it; but he resolutely resumed his conversation, which was on the subject of dogs.

“People who bring back dogs,” he said, “are always under a cloud of suspicion. Sometimes it is hideously hinted that the citizen who brings the dog back with him is identical with the citizen who took the dog away with him. In my case, of course, such conduct is inconceivable. But the returners of dogs, that prosperous and increasing class, are also accused,” he went on, looking straight at Joan, with blank blue eyes, “of coming back for a Reward. There is more truth in this charge.”

Then, with a change of manner more extraordinary than any revolution, even the revolution that was roaring round the house, he took her hand again and kissed it, saying, with a confounding seriousness,

“I know at least that you will pray for my soul.”

“You had better pray for mine, if I have one,” answered Joan, “but why now?”

“Because,” said Patrick, “you will hear from outside, you may even see from that turret window something which in brute fact has never been seen in England since Poor Monmouth’s army went down. In spirit and in truth it has not happened since Saladin and Coeur de Lion crashed together. I only add one thing, and that you know already. I have lived loving you and I shall die loving you. It is the only dimension of the Universe in which I have not wandered and gone astray. I leave the dog to guard you;” and he disappeared down the old broken staircase.

Lady Enid was much mystified that no popular pursuit assailed this stair or invaded the house. But Lady Joan knew better. She had gone, on the suggestion she most cared about, into the turret room and looked out of its many windows on to the abandoned copse and tunnel, which were now fenced off with high walls, the boundary of the mysterious property next door. Across that high barrier she could not even see the tunnel, and barely the tops of the tallest trees which hid its entrance from sight. But in an instant she knew that Dalroy was not hurling his forces on Ivywood at all, but on the house and estate beyond it.

And then followed a sight that was not an experience but rather a revolving vision. She could never describe it afterward, nor could any of those involved in so violent and mystical a wheel. She had seen a huge wall of a breaker wash all over the parade at Pebblewick; and wondered that so huge a hammer could be made merely of water. She had never had a notion of what it is like when it is made of men.

The palisade, put up by the new landlord in front of the old tangled ground by the tunnel, she had long regarded as something as settled and ordinary as one of the walls of the drawing room. It swung and split and sprang into a thousand pieces under the mere blow of human bodies bursting with rage; and the great wave crested the obstacle more clearly than she had ever seen any great wave crest the parade. Only, when the fence was broken, she saw behind it something that robbed her of reason; so that she seemed to be living in all ages and all lands at once. She never could describe the vision afterward; but she always denied it was a dream. She said it was worse; it was something more real than reality. It was a line of real soldiers, which is always a magnificent sight. But they might have been the soldiers of Hannibal or of Attila, they might have been dug up from the cemeteries of Sidon and Babylon, for all Joan had to do with them. There, encamped in English meadows, with a hawthorn-tree in front of them and three beeches behind, was something that has never been in camp nearer than some leagues south of Paris, since that Carolus called The Hammer broke it backward at Tours.

There flew the green standard of that great faith and strong civilization which has so often almost entered the great cities of the West; which long encircled Vienna, which was barely barred from Paris; but which had never before been seen in arms on the soil of England. At one end of the line stood Philip Ivywood, in a uniform of his own special creation, a compromise between the Sepoy and the Turkish uniform. The compromise worked more and more wildly in Joan’s mind. If any impression remained it was merely that England had conquered India and Turkey had conquered England. Then she saw that Ivywood, for all his uniform, was not the Commander of these forces, for an old man, with a great scar on his face, which was not a European face, set himself in the front of the battle, as if it had been a battle in the old epics, and crossed swords with Patrick Dalroy. He had come to return the scar upon his forehead; and he returned it with many wounds, though at last it was he who sank under the sword thrust. He fell on his face; and Dalroy looked at him with something that is much more great than pity. Blood was flowing from Patrick’s wrist and forehead, but he made a salute with his sword. As he was doing so, the corpse, as it appeared, laboriously lifted a face, with feeble eyelids. And, seeming to understand the quarters of the sky by instinct, Oman Pasha dragged himself a foot or so to the left; and fell with his face toward Mecca.

After that the turret turned round and round about Joan and she knew not whether the things she saw were history or prophecy. Something in that last fact of being crushed by the weapons of brown men and yellow, secretly entrenched in English meadows, had made the English what they had not been for centuries. The hawthorn-tree was twisted and broken, as it was at the Battle of Ashdown, when Alfred led his first charge against the Danes. The beech-trees were splashed up to their lowest branches with the mingling of brave heathen and brave Christian blood. She knew no more than that when a column of the Christian rebels, led by Humphrey of the Sign of the Ship, burst through the choked and forgotten tunnel and took the Turkish regiment in the rear, it was the end.

That violent and revolving vision became something beyond the human voice or human ear. She could not intelligently hear even the shots and shouts round the last magnificent rally of the Turks. It was natural, therefore, that she should not hear the words Lord Ivywood addressed to his next-door neighbour, a Turkish officer, or rather to himself. But his words were:

“I have gone where God has never dared to go. I am above the silly supermen as they are above mere men. Where I walk in the Heavens, no man has walked before me; and I am alone in a garden. All this passing about me is like the lonely plucking of garden flowers. I will have this blossom, I will have that.”

The sentence ended so suddenly that the officer looked at him, as if expecting him to speak. But he did not speak.

But Patrick and Joan, wandering together in a world made warm and fresh again, as it can be for few in a world that calls courage frenzy and love superstition, feeling every branching tree as a friend with arms open for the man, or every sweeping slope as a great train trailing behind the woman, did one day climb up to the little white cottage that was now the home of the Superman.

He sat playing with a pale, reposeful face, with scraps of flower and weed put before him on a wooden table. He did not notice them, nor anything else around him; scarcely even Enid Wimpole, who attended to all his wants.

“He is perfectly happy,” she said quietly.

Joan, with the glow on her dark face, could not prevent herself from replying, “And we are so happy.”

“Yes,” said Enid, “but his happiness will last,” and she wept.

“I understand,” said Joan, and kissed her cousin, not without tears of her own.

CAPITOLO XXV: IL RITROVAMENTO DEL SUPERUOMO

«Vi ho portato un cagnolino», disse il signor Dalroy, presentando lo scalpitante Quoodle. «L’ho fatto trasportare fin qui dentro un grosso cesto con l’etichetta “Esplosivi”, titolo che pare essere stato ben scelto.»

Entrando aveva fatto un inchino a Lady Enid e aveva preso la mano di Joan con il minimo accenno di voler farne qualcos’altro; ma riprese risolutamente la sua conversazione, che verteva sul tema dei cani.

«Le persone che riportano indietro i cani», disse, «sono sempre avvolte da una nube di sospetto. Talvolta si insinua orribilmente che il cittadino che riporta il cane sia identico al cittadino che il cane l’ha portato via. Nel mio caso, naturalmente, una condotta simile è inconcepibile. Ma coloro che restituiscono i cani, quella classe prospera e crescente, sono anche accusati», proseguì, guardando dritto Joan, con vacui occhi azzurri, «di tornare per una Ricompensa. In questa accusa c’è più verità.»

Poi, con un mutamento di modi più straordinario di qualsiasi rivoluzione, perfino della rivoluzione che ruggiva intorno alla casa, le riprese la mano e la baciò, dicendo, con sconcertante serietà:

«So almeno che pregherete per la mia anima.»

«Fareste meglio a pregare per la mia, se ne ho una», rispose Joan, «ma perché ora?»

«Perché», disse Patrick, «udrete dall’esterno, potrete perfino vedere da quella finestra della torretta qualcosa che, nella brutale realtà dei fatti, non si è mai visto in Inghilterra dai tempi in cui l’esercito del Povero Monmouth cadde. In spirito e in verità non accade dai tempi in cui Saladino e Cuor di Leone si scontrarono. Aggiungo solo una cosa, e quella già la sapete. Ho vissuto amandovi e morirò amandovi. È l’unica dimensione dell’Universo in cui non ho vagato smarrendomi. Vi lascio il cane a guardia;» e scomparve giù per la vecchia scala sconnessa.

Lady Enid era assai sconcertata che nessun inseguimento popolare assalisse quella scala o invadesse la casa. Ma Lady Joan la sapeva più lunga. Era andata, seguendo il suggerimento che più le stava a cuore, nella stanza della torretta e aveva guardato dalle sue molte finestre sul boschetto e sul tunnel abbandonati, ora recintati da alte mura, il confine della misteriosa proprietà accanto. Al di là di quell’alta barriera non riusciva nemmeno a vedere il tunnel, e a malapena le cime degli alberi più alti che ne nascondevano l’ingresso alla vista. Ma in un istante comprese che Dalroy non stava affatto scagliando le sue forze su Ivywood, bensì sulla casa e sulla tenuta al di là di essa.

E poi seguì uno spettacolo che non fu un’esperienza ma piuttosto una visione roteante. Non riuscì mai a descriverlo in seguito, né poté farlo alcuno di coloro che furono coinvolti in una ruota tanto violenta e mistica. Aveva visto un’enorme muraglia di frangente inondare tutto il lungomare di Pebblewick; e si era stupita che un martello così immane potesse essere fatto di sola acqua. Non aveva mai avuto idea di cosa sia quando è fatto di uomini.

La palizzata, eretta dal nuovo proprietario davanti al vecchio terreno ingarbugliato presso il tunnel, l’aveva a lungo considerata qualcosa di stabile e ordinario come una delle pareti del salotto. Oscillò, si spaccò e balzò in mille pezzi sotto il semplice urto di corpi umani scoppianti di rabbia; e la grande onda superò l’ostacolo con più nettezza di quanto avesse mai visto alcuna grande onda superare il lungomare. Solo che, quando lo steccato fu infranto, vide dietro di esso qualcosa che le tolse la ragione; sicché le parve di vivere in tutte le epoche e in tutte le terre insieme. Non riuscì mai a descrivere la visione in seguito; ma negò sempre che fosse un sogno. Disse che era peggio; era qualcosa di più reale della realtà. Era una fila di veri soldati, che è sempre uno spettacolo magnifico. Ma avrebbero potuto essere i soldati di Annibale o di Attila, avrebbero potuto essere dissepolti dai cimiteri di Sidone e di Babilonia, per quanto riguardava Joan. Là, accampato nei prati inglesi, con un biancospino davanti e tre faggi dietro, c’era qualcosa che non si era mai accampato più vicino di qualche lega a sud di Parigi, da quando quel Carolus detto Il Martello lo respinse indietro a Tours.

Là sventolava il verde stendardo di quella grande fede e forte civiltà che tante volte è quasi entrata nelle grandi città d’Occidente; che a lungo cinse Vienna, che a stento fu sbarrata da Parigi; ma che mai prima era stata vista in armi sul suolo d’Inghilterra. A un capo della fila stava Philip Ivywood, in un’uniforme di sua speciale invenzione, un compromesso tra la divisa del Sepoy e quella turca. Il compromesso operava sempre più follemente nella mente di Joan. Se un’impressione rimaneva, era semplicemente che l’Inghilterra aveva conquistato l’India e la Turchia aveva conquistato l’Inghilterra. Poi vide che Ivywood, malgrado la sua uniforme, non era il Comandante di quelle forze, poiché un vecchio, con una grande cicatrice sul volto, che non era un volto europeo, si pose in prima fila nella battaglia, come se fosse stata una battaglia delle antiche epopee, e incrociò le spade con Patrick Dalroy. Era venuto a restituire la cicatrice sulla sua fronte; e la restituì con molte ferite, benché alla fine fosse lui a soccombere sotto il colpo di spada. Cadde bocconi; e Dalroy lo guardò con qualcosa di assai più grande della pietà. Il sangue sgorgava dal polso e dalla fronte di Patrick, ma egli fece un saluto con la sua spada. Mentre lo faceva, il cadavere, come pareva, sollevò faticosamente un volto, con palpebre deboli. E, sembrando comprendere i punti cardinali per istinto, Oman Pasha si trascinò di un piede circa verso sinistra; e cadde con il volto rivolto verso La Mecca.

Dopo di ciò la torretta girò e rigirò intorno a Joan, ed ella non sapeva se le cose che vedeva fossero storia o profezia. Qualcosa in quell’ultimo fatto di essere schiacciati dalle armi di uomini bruni e gialli, segretamente trincerati nei prati inglesi, aveva reso gli Inglesi ciò che non erano stati per secoli. Il biancospino era contorto e spezzato, come lo fu alla Battaglia di Ashdown, quando Alfredo guidò la sua prima carica contro i Danesi. I faggi erano schizzati fino ai rami più bassi con il mescolarsi del sangue prode pagano e prode cristiano. Non seppe più nulla, salvo che, quando una colonna dei ribelli cristiani, guidata da Humphrey dell’Insegna della Nave, irruppe attraverso il tunnel ostruito e dimenticato e prese alle spalle il reggimento turco, fu la fine.

Quella visione violenta e roteante divenne qualcosa al di là della voce umana o dell’orecchio umano. Non riusciva a udire distintamente nemmeno gli spari e le grida attorno all’ultima magnifica riscossa dei Turchi. Era naturale, dunque, che non udisse le parole che Lord Ivywood rivolse al suo vicino, un ufficiale turco, o piuttosto a se stesso. Ma le sue parole furono:

«Sono andato dove Dio non ha mai osato andare. Sono al di sopra degli sciocchi superuomini come essi sono al di sopra dei semplici uomini. Là dove cammino nei Cieli, nessun uomo ha camminato prima di me; e sono solo in un giardino. Tutto questo che mi passa accanto è come cogliere solitario, in un giardino, i fiori a uno a uno. Avrò questo fiore, avrò quello.»

La frase si concluse così bruscamente che l’ufficiale lo guardò, come aspettando che parlasse. Ma egli non parlò.

Ma Patrick e Joan, vagando insieme in un mondo reso di nuovo caldo e fresco, come può esserlo per pochi in un mondo che chiama frenesia il coraggio e superstizione l’amore, sentendo ogni albero ramificato come un amico con le braccia aperte per l’uomo, e ogni pendio digradante come un gran strascico che si trascina dietro la donna, salirono un giorno fino al piccolo cottage bianco che era ora la dimora del Superuomo.

Sedeva giocando, con un volto pallido e riposato, con frammenti di fiori ed erba posti davanti a lui su un tavolo di legno. Non li notava, né alcun’altra cosa intorno a sé; a stento perfino Enid Wimpole, che badava a ogni suo bisogno.

«È perfettamente felice», disse ella con calma.

Joan, con l’ardore sul suo volto scuro, non poté trattenersi dal replicare: «E noi siamo così felici.»

«Sì», disse Enid, «ma la sua felicità durerà», e pianse.

«Capisco», disse Joan, e baciò la cugina, non senza lacrime sue proprie.