Читать книгу The Island of Fantasy - Fergus Hume - Страница 6

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The pride of the human

Does nature diminish,

With spiteful acumen,

She roughly will finish

A man or a woman,

He stout and she thinnish,

Till one is not fair, nor the other a true man.

But Nature’s conception

May not be pernicious,

For know her perception

At times is capricious;

Her work bears inspection,

In manner judicious,

For sometimes she turns out a man near perfection.

The above jingle of verses may sound somewhat abstruse, but he who has the patience to search until he discovers the kernel of this rhyming nut, will certainly find it to be a truism. Nature does finish the mass of humanity in a somewhat rough and ready fashion; true, she may equip them with all the necessary limbs and organs necessary to the enjoyment of life, but she does not trouble herself to put in those delicate touches which go to the making of a perfectly handsome man, or a faultlessly beautiful woman. At times, however, just to show what she can do in the way of creative beauty, she gives her whole mind to the task, and lo! Achilles, and Helen of Troy. But such perfect specimens of humanity are few and far between; therefore when Maurice, who had an artistic eye, met Count Constantine Caliphronas for the first time, he recognized with delight that he saw before him one of Nature’s masterpieces.

There is nothing more detestable than that society horror, “a beauty man,” who resembles a wax figure in his unnatural perfectibility of face and form. Flawless he may be in every part, but the ensemble is nevertheless unpleasing both to eye and mind, for, in aiding Nature to show herself at her best, he soon becomes a mere artificial figure, which ought to be placed in a glass case for the edification of school misses and gushing society ladies. This man, however, did not belong to that over-civilized class, as at a glance one could see he was a child of Nature, a nursling of the winds and waves, whose physical perfections were kept in their pristine beauty by the constant care of the great mother herself. Caliphronas had all the grace and untamed beauty of a wild animal, looking as if he claimed kinship with the salt sea, the fresh woods, the strong sunlight, and the bracing air of snow-clad mountain-tops. His physical beauty was truly wonderful, and was as much the outcome of perfect health, as of perfect creation. He lacked that self-restrained air which is stamped on the face of every civilized man, and in the modest little dining-room of the Rectory looked like some graceful panther caged against its will. Nature’s child was only in his right place with Nature herself, and in our dull respectable England he seemed an exile from the healthful solitudes which had given him birth.

“It is impossible to describe Caliphronas,” said Maurice many years afterwards, in speaking of this man. “I can tell you that his figure was as perfect as the Apollo Belvedere, and say that his face was as flawless in its virile beauty as the Antinous of the Vatican, but this will give you no idea of his physical perfection. His body seemed to be instinct with the lawless fierceness of wind and wave; he moved with the stately grace of a nude savage unaccustomed to the restraint of clothing. I never understood the phrase ‘child of Nature’ until I saw Caliphronas, and it is the only way in which he can be explained. I believe his mother was a Nereid and his father a hunter, for he was the offspring of earth and ocean—the consummate flower of both. Yet I do not think he had what we call brains—true, he possessed the cunning and instinct of a wild animal, but that was all. I think, myself, brains and culture would have spoiled him; he was born to be a wild, free thing, happy only on the hills, a type, a visible incarnation of Nature in a male form. If you ask me whom he resembled in real life, I cannot tell you, as I never saw any one in the least like him. But in fiction—well, study the character of Margrave in ‘A Strange Story,’ and Donatello in Hawthorne’s ‘Marble Faun,’ and by blending the two you may arrive at some conception of Count Caliphronas.”

Such was the man who now sat at the table of the Rector, chatting gayly with his host and Maurice Roylands. Being a hot day, the Rector had wisely provided a cold luncheon, and himself presided over a noble piece of beef, which looked as though it had been taken from one of Apollo’s oxen. There was also a capital salad,—the Rector was famous for his salads,—fruit, wine, cheese, and bread. A simple repast, truly, but then the Rector was simple in his tastes, and detested those highly-spiced dishes, which but create thirst, and whose chief merit seems to be that the diner cannot tell of what they are composed. An artificial life creates artificial tastes, and the principal mission of cookery now seems to lie in the direction of tickling the palate, not of satisfying the stomach, with the result that gout and dyspepsia have it all their own way. If half, nay, if the whole of the French cooks now engaged in ruining the healths of Englishmen and Englishwomen were bundled back to their beloved Paris, the income of every doctor in London would decrease with the rapidity of lightning. As before mentioned, the Rector liked the good things of this life, but he thought the simplest food the most enjoyable, in which he was right, though epicures may doubt the truth of such an opinion. Yet, after all, do not epicures hold the simplicity of a well-roasted leg of mutton to be a dish fit for a king.

If the Rector was simple in his eating, however, Count Constantine was still simpler, for he hardly touched his meat, and confined his attention to bread, cheese, salad, and wine—the latter being some excellent claret, on which the Rector prided himself.

“My dear sir,” he said in agony, as he saw Caliphronas about to mingle water with his wine, “you will spoil the flavor of the claret.”

“Pardon me, sir,” replied the Count, who spoke English admirably, “but we Greeks are partial to such mingling. We worship the Naiad with her urn as well as Bacchus with his flask, and the union of both produces a drink fit for Father Zeus.”

“You don’t seem to care much for meat,” said the Rector, relinquishing the point about the wine, though it went to his soul to see such a spoiling of the finest qualities of his claret.

“No,” answered Caliphronas carelessly; “oddly enough, I do not care much for flesh. I live so much in the open air that, like Nature, I live on the simplest things. Bread, cheese, and wine I love; add honey, and I want nothing better to satisfy my appetite. Country fare for a country man, you know.”

“You are a shepherd of Theocritus,” said Maurice, with a smile.

“No; save in such tastes perhaps; otherwise I am no Sicilian of the Idylles.”

“You speak English wonderfully well, Count,” remarked the Rector politely.

“Thank you for the compliment, sir; yet it is the first time I have been in England.”

“What! do they teach English in the schools of Athens?”

“Alas, no. The schools of modern Athens are not those of the old Greek days. Socrates, Plato, Pythagoras, have gone to the blessed isles in company with the heroes of Salamis, and our Greek culture of to-day is primitive in the extreme. No; I learned EnglishEnglish from a roving Englishman—a scholar and a gentleman who grew weary of this respectable England of yours, and came back to the freer life of the Greek islands.”

“He taught you admirably,” said Roylands, wondering why the Greek eyed him so keenly while making this speech. “Do you come from Athens?”

“I have been there,” answered Caliphronas, pushing away his plate, “but I am an islander. Yes, I was born in Ithaca, therefore am I a countryman of Ulysses.”

“Achilles, perhaps,” observed the Rector, fascinated by the clear-cut features of the young man,—“the godlike Achilles.”

“Ah no,” replied the Greek, with a shade of melancholy in his tone; “I am like no hero of those times. Our ancestors have transmitted to us their physical forms, but not their brains, not their heroism.”

“Come now,” remonstrated Maurice. “I am sure your countrymen behaved bravely in the War of Independence.”

“Yes, I agree with you there. Canaris, Mavrocordato, Botzaris, were all brave men. I accept the rebuke, for I have no right to run down my own countrymen. Perhaps in England I may learn the meaning of the word patriotism.”

“Or Jingoism.”

“Your pardon?” queried the Count, a trifled puzzled.

“Jingoism,” explained Maurice gravely, “is a spurious patriotism, composed of music-hall songs, the Union Jack, and gallons of beer—it begins with a chorus and ends with a riot. Tom, Dick, and Harry are very fond of it, as it expands their lungs and quenches their thirst. But there, I am only jesting. Do you stay long in England?”

Again the Greek eyed Maurice keenly, and hesitated a moment before replying.

“I can hardly tell yet,” he said, with emphasis. “Mr. Carriston, will you show me your garden?” he added, turning to the Rector.

“I will be delighted,” said Carriston eagerly; “we will stroll round it. Do you smoke?”

“No, thank you,” returned the count, waving away with a gesture of repugnance the cigarette Maurice held out to him. “I never smoke.”

“That is strange.”

Caliphronas shrugged his shoulders.

“Perhaps so, sir. For myself, I do not care about it.”

“Curious creature,” murmured Maurice reflectively, as he followed the Rector and his guest into the garden. “I wonder why he looks at me so keenly, and what he is doing down here. Humph! I would like to find out your little game, my friend.”

Ten years of fighting with the world had turned Maurice from a frank, open-hearted fellow into a cold, suspicious man, and he always doubted the motives of every one. This is a disagreeable way of looking at things, but in many cases it is a very necessary one, owing to the double lives which most people seem nowadays to live. Social intercourse, whether for pleasure or business, is no longer as simple as it used to be in the old days, and our complex civilization has introduced into every action we perform that element of distrust which is at once disagreeable and necessary. Maurice knew nothing about Caliphronas, and had he met him in London would doubtless have accepted him for what he appeared to be—a foreign nobleman on his travels; but for this man to visit a quiet village like Roylands was peculiar, and there must be some motive for his doing so.

“I’ll ask him how he likes England, and lead up to his unexpected arrival here,” thought Maurice, as he walked along smoking his cigarette. “He seems sharp, but I think I’m able to distinguish between the real and the false.”

Caliphronas was loud in his expressions of admiration for the Rector’s roses, and his delight seemed genuine enough even to Maurice, who stood listening to his raptures with a grim smile, as if he would like to cast over this bright being the shadow of his own melancholy nature.

“I have a perfect passion for flowers,” said the Count, with a gay smile, as he placed a red bud in his coat, “and roses are my favorites. Were they not the flowers of pleasure in classical times? did they not wreathe the brows of revellers at festivals?—the flowers of love and of silence!”

“I am pleased you like flowers,” observed the Rector, looking at the joyous figure before him, which was bathed in sunshine; “’tis an innocent pleasure.”

“I love all that is of Nature,” cried Caliphronas, throwing himself on the smooth sward; “Nature is my mother—my true mother. Yes, I am a man born of woman, but such maternity does not appeal to me. Nature is at once my mother, my nurse, my goddess.”

“You were born in Ithaca,” said Maurice quietly.

“Was I born at all?” replied Caliphronas, throwing himself back with a joyous laugh and letting the sun blaze on his uncovered head. “I do not know! I cannot tell. Perchance some nymph bore me to one of the old gods, who Heine says yet walk the earth in other forms.”

“What do you know of Heine?” asked the Rector in some surprise.

“Nothing!—absolutely nothing. I never heard his name till the other day, when some one told me a story of the Gods in Exile, and said one Heine had written it.”

“Are you fond of reading?”

“I never read. I care not for books—all my knowledge comes from the mouth of my fellow-men and from Nature. Such culture is enough for me.”

“You will get a sunstroke if you don’t cover your head,” said Maurice, somewhat tired of this pseudo-classicism.

“No! I am a friend of Apollo’s. He will hurl no darts at me, and your pale sun in England is but a shadow of the glorious Helios of our Greek skies.”

And, lying on his back, he began to sing a strange, wandering melody, of which the words (roughly translated) were as follows:—

“The sun is my father:

He kissed my mother the sea,

And of their wooing the fruit am I.”

Both the Englishmen were strangely fascinated by this stranger. He conducted himself in quite an unconventional fashion, and seemed to follow the last thought that suggested itself to his capricious brain.

“Come!” he cried, springing to his feet with a bound like a deer. “Come, Mr. Maurice—are you a runner? I will race you round this garden.”

“Really, Count,” said the Rector, somewhat startled.

“Eh! Am I wrong, sir?” replied Caliphronas apologetically. “I ask your pardon! I do not know your English ways; you must teach me. I act as I feel. Is it wrong to do so?”

“Well, we English like to see a little more self-restraint,” said Maurice, looking at the graceful figure of the young man. “By the way, are you going to stay here long?”

The smile faded from the bright face of the Count, and he turned half away with an abrupt movement.

“Who can tell?” he said lightly. “I am a bird of passage. I alight here and there, but fly when I am weary of the bough. You wonder at my coming down here, do you not, Mr. Maurice?”

Thus addressed directly, Roylands was rather taken aback, and reddened perceptibly through the tan of his skin.

“Well, for a gay young man like you, Count, I thought London would have pleased you better.”

Caliphronas burst out laughing, and, putting his hands behind his head, leant back against the trunk of the elm.

“Do you hear your friend, sir?” he said to the Rector. “He thinks that I prefer that dull, smoky town to the country. Why, Athens is too narrow for me! I love the open lands, the plains, the mountains, the seas. Up in that city of yours I was weary, and I spoke to the priest of my friend. ‘Oh,’ I cried, ‘I will die of want of air in this place. Take me to the woods, where I can breathe and see the sun.’ So he gave me that letter to you,” addressing the Rector, “and I came here at once.”

So this was the explanation of his presence in the little village—a very natural one surely, and Maurice felt somewhat ashamed of his late suspicions; but a new thought had entered his head, suggested by the statuesque pose of the Greek leaning against the tree, and he came forward eagerly.

“Count Caliphronas,” he said quickly, “I am a sculptor, and I have the idea for a statue of Endymion—would you—would you”—

“Ah, you want me to be a model, sir?” said the Count, laughing. “Eh, well, I do not mind in the least—you may command me.”

“Thank you very much, if I”—

“If you could only introduce me to a Diana, that would indeed be perfect.”

“I suppose you are a kind of general lover, Count,” said the rector, turning round from a rose-tree with a smile.

“I am not as bad as that, sir. No! I love! I love!” He stopped abruptly, and a shade came over his face. “Yes, I love,” he resumed quickly; “but my love is unfortunate.”

“What! is any woman cold-hearted enough to refuse you?” observed Maurice, looking at him in amazement; for indeed a woman would be hard to please were she not satisfied with this splendid-looking youth.

“There are women and women,” said Caliphronas enigmatically. “This one does not love me yet, but she will.”

“When?”

The Greek shot a keen glance at Maurice, and then observed, in an indifferent voice,—

“When I do what I am requested to do.”

Both men looked steadily at one another, and it seemed to Maurice as though there were a certain amount of menace visible on the face of Caliphronas, but such look speedily passed away, and he bounded lightly across the turf to where the cat was sitting.

To the surprise of both the Rector and Maurice, she let this stranger take her up in his arms and smooth her fur.

“Dear, dear!” said the Rector in an astonished tone; “what power do you possess over the animal world, Count? That cat will not let any one touch her as a rule.”

“Oh, all animals take to me,” replied Caliphronas lightly, letting the cat down gently on the ground. “I can do anything with horses and dogs.”

“Donatello!” whispered Maurice to himself. “He looks innocent enough, and yet that look—I must speak to Crispin, and ask his opinion of this man.”

Meanwhile the Count was giving Carriston a description of his miseries at the Royland Arms.

“Such a small room to sleep in,” he said in a disgusted tone. “I know I will be smothered if I stay in it. No; I shall wrap myself up in a blanket and sleep under the moon like Endymion, which will be training for your friend’s statue.”

“That will be dangerous,” objected the Rector.

“Not at all! In Greece—I mean my native islands—I sleep out very often. Oh, there is nothing more beautiful than slumber in the open air. I cannot bear houses; they stifle me; they crush me. I love no roof lower than the sky. And then to wake at dawn, to see the east glow with rosy tints, to watch the dew moisten every blade of grass, the awakening of the animals, the first songs of the birds, and the rising of the sun. Oh, I worship the sun! I worship him!”

The Rector was a trifle shocked at this peroration, as he was not quite sure whether this fantastic being was not a sun-worshipper in downright earnest; the more so as in a sudden freak he flung himself down on his knees and held out his arms to the glorious luminary.

“You are joking,” he said gravely.

“Not I,” replied Caliphronas, springing to his feet. “You are not angry, are you, sir? Eh! I forgot myself you were a priest in this country. I must explain. I am of the Greek Church—yes! oh, I have been baptized.”

The Rector smiled, and said no more, for it was impossible to talk seriously with a man who possessed so childish a soul. Meanwhile, Maurice, who had been thinking over matters, came to the conclusion that he would ask Caliphronas to stay at the Grange for a few days. At first sight this seemed rather injudicious, but when he remembered the high character of the man who vouched for the respectability of the Greek, all his scruples vanished. Besides, Caliphronas was such a peculiar character that he desired a closer acquaintance with him; and, above all, he could not hope anywhere to find such a perfect model for his Endymion. Taking, then, all these facts into consideration, he speedily made up his mind to ask the Count to be his guest, and did so without delay.

“Count,” he said politely, “I am afraid you will find that inn very uncomfortable, so I would be glad to see you at the Grange for a week or so, where I think you will find yourself in more civilized quarters.”

The Count’s eyes flashed with what looked uncommonly like triumph, but he dropped the lids over them rapidly for the moment, so as to prevent this look being seen, and shook Maurice heartily by the hand.

“Thank you very much! oh, very much indeed!” he said effusively. “I hope I will not trouble you. I will be glad to come—yes, that place in the village would kill me.”

“That’s all right,” replied Maurice, who had an Englishman’s horror of a scene. “I will send over for your traps, and you can come to the Grange in time for dinner. We dine at seven o’clock.”

“Thank you, sir. I will be at your home to-night.”

The Rector, who had fully intended to ask Caliphronas to be his guest, was rather startled by Maurice’s precipitancy, but, on the whole, was not ill-pleased, for two reasons: the first being that he did not much care about burdening himself with this eccentric foreigner; and the second, that he was delighted that, during the stay of the Count at the Grange, Maurice would take to his modelling again.

“By the way,” said Maurice, turning suddenly to the Count, “do you know any one called Crispin?”

“Creespeen!” repeated Caliphronas, with his foreign accent; “no, I do not know that name.”

“He is a gentleman who is staying with me,” replied Roylands carelessly; “and, as he is pretty well acquainted with your part of the world, I thought you might have met him.”

The Greek smilingly denied that he had the honor of Crispin’s acquaintance, but it seemed to Maurice as though there was a shade of apprehension on his face which somewhat puzzled the young man.

“Can’t make this fellow out,” was his mental comment. “Hope I’m not making a mistake in asking him to the Grange. Still, the Archdeacon’s letter to Carriston is a sufficient guarantee that he is not a swindler, so I will chance it.”

“I must now say good-by,” said Caliphronas to the Rector, “and thank you for your kindness. Of course I will see you soon again.”

“Oh yes. You must come here as often as you can.”

“That will not be much if I am to sit for this artist,” laughed Caliphronas, turning to Maurice. “Good-by, sir; I will see you to-night at six o’clock.”

He turned away gayly and left the garden, followed by the admiring eyes of the two men, especially of Maurice, who congratulated himself on his good fortune in obtaining such a perfect model.

Meanwhile Caliphronas was walking swiftly in the direction of the Royland Arms.

“Good!” he muttered to himself in Greek. “The first step is taken, so I have no fear now.”