Читать книгу Madcap - George Gibbs - Страница 5

Of all her friends Olga Teherny was the one who amused and entertained Hermia the most. She was older than Hermia, much more experienced and to tell the truth quite as mad in her own way as Hermia was. There were times when even Hermia could not entirely approve of her, but she forgave her much because she was herself and because, no matter what depended upon it, she could not be different if she tried. Olga Egerton had been born in Russia, where her father had been called as a consulting engineer of the railway department of the Russian Government. Though American born, the girl had been educated according to the European fashion and at twenty had married and lost the young nobleman whose name she bore, and had buried him in his family crypt in Moscow with the simple fortitude of one who is well out of a bad bargain. But she had paid her toll to disillusion and the age of thirty found her a little more careless, a little more worldly-wise than was necessary, even in a cosmopolitan. Her comments spared neither friend nor foe and Hilda Ashhurst, whose mind grasped only the obvious facts of existence, came in for more than a share of the lady's invective.

Indeed, Markam, the painter, seemed this morning to be the only luminous spot on the Countess Olga's social horizon and by the time the car had reached lower Fifth Avenue she had related most of the known facts of his character and career including his struggle for recognition in Europe, his revolutionary attitude toward the Art of the Academies as well as toward modern society, and the consequent and self-sought isolation which deprived him of the intercourse of his fellows and seriously retarded his progress toward a success that his professional talents undoubtedly merited.

Hermia listened with an abstracted air. Artists she remembered were a race of beings quite apart from the rest of humanity and with the exception of a few money-seeking foreigners, one of whom had painted her portrait, and Teddy Vincent, a New Yorker socially prominent (who was unspeakable), her acquaintance with the cult had been limited and unfavorable. When, therefore, her car drew alongside the curb of the old-fashioned building to which Olga directed the chauffeur, Hermia was already prepared to dislike Mr. Markham cordially. She had not always cared for Olga's friends.

There was no elevator in the building before which they stopped, and the two women mounted the stairs, avoiding both the wall and the dusty baluster, contact with either of which promised to defile their white gloves, reaching, somewhat out of breath, a door with a Florentine knocker bearing the name "Markham."

Olga knocked. There was no response. She knocked again while Hermia waited, a question on her lips. There was a sound of heavy footsteps and the door was flung open wide and a big man with rumpled hair, a well-smeared painting-smock and wearing a huge pair of tortoise-shell goggles peered out into the dark hall-way, blurting out impatiently,

"I'm very busy. I don't need any models. Come another day—"

He was actually on the point of banging the door in their faces when the Countess interposed.

"Such hospitality!"

At the sound of her voice Markham paused, the huge palette and brushes suspended in the air.

"Oh," he murmured in some confusion. "It's you, Madame—"

"It is. Very cross and dusty after the climb up your filthy stairs—I suppose I ought to be used to this kind of welcome but I'm not, somehow. Besides, I'm bringing a visitor, and had hoped to find you in a pleasanter mood."

He showed his white teeth as he laughed.

"Oh, Lord! Pleasant!" And then as an afterthought, very frankly, "I don't suppose I am very pleasant!" He stood aside bowing as Hermia emerged from the shadows and Olga Tcherny presented him. It was a stiff bow, rather awkward and impatient and revealed quite plainly his disappointment at her presence, but Hermia followed Olga into the room with a slight inclination of her head, conscious that in the moment that his eyes passed over her they made a brief note which classified her among the unnecessary nuisances to which busy geniuses must be subjected.

Olga Tcherny, who had now taken full possession of the studio, fell into its easiest chair and looked up at the painter with her caressing smile.

"You've been working. You've got the fog of it on you. Are we de trop?"

"Er—no. It's in rather a mess here, that's all. I was working, but I'm quite willing to stop."

"I'm afraid you've no further wish for me now that I'm no longer

useful," she sighed. "You're not going to discard me so easily.

Besides, we're not going to stay long—only a minute. I was hoping

Miss Challoner could see the portrait."

He glanced at Hermia almost resentfully, and fidgeted with his brushes.

"Yes—of course. It's the least I can do—isn't it? The portrait isn't finished. It's dried in, too—but—"

He laid his palette slowly down and wiped his brushes carefully on a piece of cheese-cloth, put a canvas in a frame upon the easel and shoved it forward into a better light.

Hermia followed his movements curiously, sure that he was the most inhospitable human being upon whom two pretty women had ever condescended to call, and stood uncomfortably, realizing that he has not even offered her a chair. But when the portrait was turned toward the light, she forgot everything but the canvas before her.

It was not the Olga Tcherny that people knew best—the gay, satirical mondaine, who exacted from a world which had denied her happiness her pound of flesh and called it pleasure. The Olga Tcherny which looked at Hermia from the canvas was the one that Hermia had glimpsed in the brief moments between bitterness and frivolity, a woman with a soul which in spite of her still dreamed of the things it had been denied.

It was a startling portrait, bold almost to the point of brutality, and even Hermia recognized its individuality, wondering at the capacity for analysis which had made the painter's delineation of character so remarkable, and his brush so unerring. She stole another—a more curious—glance at him. The hideous goggles and the rumpled hair could not disguise the strong lines of his face which she saw in profile—the heavy brows, the straight nose, the thin, rather sensitive lips and the strong, cleanly cut chin. Properly dressed and valeted this queer creature might have been made presentable. But his manners! No valeting or grooming could ever make such a man a gentleman.

If he was aware of her scrutiny he gave no sign of it and leaned forward intently, his gaze on the portrait—alone, to all appearances, with the fires of his genius. Hermia's eyes followed his, the superficial and rather frivolous comment which had been on her lips stilled for the moment by the dignity of his mental attitude, into which it seemed Olga Tcherny had also unconsciously fallen. But the silence irritated Hermia—the wrapt, absorbed attitudes of the man and the woman and the air of sacro-sanctity which pervaded the place. It was like a ceremonial in which this queer animal was being deified. She, at least, couldn't deify him.

"It's like you Olga, of course," she said flippantly, "but it's not at all pretty."

The words fell sharply and Markham and the Countess turned toward the Philistine who stood with her head cocked on one side, her arms a-kimbo. Markham's eyes peered forward somberly for a moment and he spoke with slow gravity.

"I don't paint 'pretty' portraits," he said.

"Mr. Markham means, Hermia, that he doesn't believe in artistic lies," said Olga smoothly.

"And I contend," Hermia went on undaunted, "that it's an artistic lie not to paint you as pretty as you are."

"Perhaps Mr. Markham doesn't think me as pretty as you do—"

Markham bowed his head as though to absolve himself from the guilt suggested.

"I try not to think in terms of prettiness," he explained slowly. "Had you been merely pretty I don't think I should have attempted—"

"But isn't the mission of Art to beautify—to adorn—?" broke in

Hermia, mercilessly bromidic.

Markham turned and looked at her as though he had suddenly discovered the presence of an insect which needed extermination.

"My dear young lady, the mission of Art is to tell the truth," he growled. "When I find it impossible to do that, I shall take up another trade."

"Oh," said Hermia, enjoying herself immensely. "I didn't mean to discourage you."

"I don't really think that you have," put in Markham.

Olga Tcherny laughed from her chair in a bored amusement.

"Hermia, dear," she said dryly, "I hardly brought you here to deflect the orbit of genius. Poor Mr. Markham! I shudder to think of his disastrous career if it depended upon your approval."

Hermia opened her moth to speak, paused and then glanced at Markham. His thoughts were turned inward again and excluded her completely. Indeed it was difficult to believe that he remembered what she had been talking about. In addition to being unpardonably rude, he now simply ignored her. His manner enraged her. "Perhaps my opinion doesn't matter to Mr. Markham," she probed with icy distinctness. "Nevertheless, I represent the public which judges pictures and buys them. Which orders portraits and pays for them. It's my opinion that counts—my money upon which the fashionable portrait painter must depend for his success. He must please me or people like me and the way to please most easily is to paint me as I ought to be rather than as I am."

Markham slowly turned so that he faced her and eyed her with a puzzled expression as he caught the meaning of her remarks, more personal and arrogant than his brief acquaintance with her seemed in any way to warrant.

"I'm not a fashionable portrait painter, thank God." he said with some warmth. "Fortunately I'm not obliged to depend upon the whims or upon the money of the people whose judgment you consider so important to an artistic success. I have no interest in the people who compose fashionable society, not in their money nor their aims, ideals or the lack of them. I paint what interests me—and shall continue to do so."

He shrugged his shoulders and laughed toward Olga. "What's the use,

Madame? In a moment I shall be telling Miss—er—"

"Challoner," said Hermia.

"I shall be telling Miss Challoner what I think of New York society—and of the people who compose it. That would be unfortunate."

"Well, rather," said Olga wearily. "Don't, I beg. Life's too short.

Must you break our pretty faded butterfly on the wheel?"

He shrugged his shoulders and turned aside.

"Not if it jars upon your sensibilities. I have no quarrel with your society. One only quarrels with an enemy or with a friend. To me society is neither." He smiled at Hermia amusedly. "Society may have its opinion of my utility and may express it freely—unchallenged."

"I don't challenge your utility," replied Hermia tartly. "I merely question your point of view. You do not see couleur de rose, Mr. Markham?"

"No. Life is not that color."

"Oh, la la!" from Olga. "Life is any color one wishes, and sometimes the color one does not wish. Very pale at times, gray, yellow and at times red—oh, so red! The soul is the chameleon which absorbs and reflects it. Today," she signed, "my chameleon has taken a vacation." She rose abruptly and threw out her arms with a dramatic gesture.

"Oh, you two infants—with your wise talk of life—you have already depressed me to the point of dissolution. I've no patience with you—with either of you. You've spoiled my morning, and I'll not stay here another minute." She reached for her trinkets on the table and rattled them viciously. "It's too bad. With the best intentions in the world I bring two of my friends together and they fall instantly into verbal fisticuffs. Hermia, you deserve no better fate than to be locked in here with this bear of a man until you both learn civility."

But Hermia had already preceded the Countess to the door, whither

Markham followed them.

"I should be charmed," said Markham.

"To learn civility?" asked Hermia acidly.

"I might even learn that—"

"It is inconceivable," put in the Countess. "You know, Markham, I don't mind your being bearish with me. In fact, I've taken it as the greatest of compliments. I thought that humor of yours was my special prerogative of friendship. But now alas! When I see how uncivil you can be to others I have a sense of lost caste. And you—instead of being amusingly whimsical and entÂt—are in danger of becoming merely bourgeois. I warn you now that if you plan to be uncivil to everybody—I shall give you up."

Markham and Hermia laughed. They couldn't help it. She was too absurd.

"Oh, I hope you won't do that," pleaded Markham.

"I'm capable of unheard of cruelties to those who incur my displeasure. I may even bring Miss Challoner in to call again."

Markham, protesting, followed them to the door.

"Au revoir, Monsieur," said the Countess.

Markham bowed in the general direction of the shadow in the hallway into which Miss Challoner had vanished and then turned back and took up his palette and brushes.