Mrs. Oliphant

“ While they were driving along in the luxurious smoothly-rolling brougham, the child crept close to her mother, clasping Helen's arm with both her hands. 'Oh, mamma,' she said, 'how strange it is that we should have lost everything and Dr Maurice nothing, that he should have that great house and this nice carriage, and us be driven away from St Mary's Road! What can God be thinking of, mamma?'
'Oh, Norah, my dear child, we have each other, and he has nobody,' said Helen; and in her heart there was a frenzy of triumph over this man who was so much better off than she was. ”

“ Helen looked out at them, and big tears fell softly out of her eyes. Oh, face of Dives looking up! Oh, true and kind and just and gentle soul! Must she not even think of him as in heaven, as hidden in God with the dead who depart in faith and peace, but gone elsewhere, banished for ever? The thought crossed her like an awful shadow, but did not sting. There are some depths of misery to which healthy nature refuses to descend, and this was one. Had she felt as many good people feel on this subject, and as she herself believed theoretically that she felt, I know what Helen would have done. ”

“ She was very indignant at the idea that a painter's wife might serve her husband as a model. 'Why should a painter's profession, which ought to be one of the noblest in the world, be obtruded upon the outer world at every step?' she said. But yet as he was a painter, every inch of him, his eye caught the pose of her head as she moved, and made a mental note of it. And yet she was not, strictly speaking, a beautiful woman. She was not the large Juno, who is our present type of beauty; she was not blazing with colour—red, and white, and golden—like the Rubens-heroines of the studio ”

“ Miss Jane had left a little stew, a savoury dish such as Stephen's fanciful appetite required to tempt it, by the fire, slowly coming to perfection. 'The girl' had removed it to the fender, where it was standing, growing cold, just at the critical moment when all its juices should have been blending under the gentle, genial influence of the fire. Common cooks cannot stew. They can boil, or they can burn; but they never catch the delicious medium between. Only such persons as cook for love, or such as possess genius, can hit this more than golden mean. ”

“ Helen sighed over her Titian-dream, but to a great extent she gave it up. Greatness was not to be; but comfort and even luxury were probable. Her old conditions of life seemed to be coming back to her. It was not what she had dreamed of; but yet it was better to have mediocrity with ease and modest riches, and pleasant surroundings, than mediocrity without those alleviations. To do her justice, had her husband been a great unsuccessful genius, in whom she had thoroughly believed, she would have borne privation proudly and with a certain triumph. ”

“ The waking of the new day stole upon the watcher before she was aware; those sounds which are so awful in their power, which show how long it is since last night, how life has gone on, casting aside old burdens, taking on new ones. It was just about ten o'clock, when the morning was at its busiest outside, and Helen, refusing to acknowledge the needs of the new day, still sat at the window watching, with eyes that were dry and hot and bloodshot, with the room all in mournful disorder round her, when Dr Maurice's brougham drew up to the door. ”

“ Drummond went away with more bewilderment still, with many new thoughts buzzing in his head, thoughts which troubled the composure of his life. He himself being but an artist, and not a merchant, was afraid of money. He touched it warily, trafficked in it with a certain awe. He knew how much labour it required to earn it, and how hard it was to be without it. He could not understand the levity with which Burton and Golden treated that potent thing. To them it was like common merchandise, sugar or salt. ”

“ He felt that he himself could never be in such despair, could never take 'a step so rash'—the only step a man could take which left no room for repentance. It had been providential, no doubt, for some things. But Helen had been in his mind since ever he had time to think. There was a little glitter in his eye, a little complacent curl about the corners of his mouth, as he thought of her, and her destitute condition, and her helplessness. What a mistake she had made! She had chosen a wretched painter, without a penny, instead of himself. ”

“ God help the solitary, the helpless, the wronged, those who can see no compensation for their sufferings, no possible alchemy that can bring good out of them! Helen crept to bed at last, and slept. It was the only thing in which there remained any consolation; to be unconscious, to shut out life and light and all that accompanies them; to be for an hour, for a moment, as good as dead. ”

“ The painter is a better companion even than the poet—just as seeing is better than saying that you see. Robert was not a genius in art; but he had the artist's animated, all-perceiving eye. Nothing escaped him—he saw a hundred beautiful things which would have been imperceptible to ordinary men—a dew-drop on a blade of grass at his feet charmed him as much as a rainbow—his 'Look, Helen!' was more than volumes of descriptive poetry. ”

“ It is never dark in June. Through the open window there came the sound of voices, people walking about the streets after their work was over. There are so many who have only the streets to walk in, so many to whom St Mary's Road, with its lilacs and laburnums and pretty houses, was pleasant and fresh as if it had been in the depths of the country. Helen saw them from the window, coming and going, so often two, arm in arm, two who loitered and looked up at the lighted house, and spoke softly to each other, making their cheerful comments. ”

“ But already, even in this one hour, she had learned the first hard lesson of grief, which is that it must not fatigue others with its eternal presence—that they who suffer most must be content often to suffer silently, and put on such smiles as are possible—the ghost must not appear at life's commonest board any more than at the banquet. It seemed like a dream when five minutes later she found herself seated in an easy-chair in Dr Maurice's dining-room, painfully swallowing some wine, while Norah sat at the table by him and shared his dinner. ”

“ The poor so often have that consolation; and sometimes it is not much of a consolation after all. But Helen felt it to the bottom of her heart as she drew her child to her, and felt the warm, soft clasp of hands, the round cheek against her own. Two desolate, lonely creatures in their black dresses—but two, and together; whereas Dr Maurice, in his wealth, in his strength, in what the world would have called his happiness, was but one. ”

“ Robert's good name! She sat quite silent for hours thinking it over while Norah slept. Sometimes for a moment it went nigh to make her mad. Of all frantic things in the world, there is nothing like that sense of impotence—to feel the wrong and to be unable to move against it. It woke a feverish irritation in her, a sourd resentment, a rage which she could not overcome, nor satisfy by any exertion. What could she do, a feeble woman, against the men who had cast this stigma on her husband? She did not even know who they were, except Golden. ”

“ Sometimes she felt as if she herself was Andrea—not Robert, for Robert had none of that heart-rending sense of failure. Was she Lucrezia rather, the wife that goaded him into misery? No, no! she could not so condemn herself. When her thoughts reached this point she forsook the studio and the conservatory, and rushed back to the drawing-room, where little Norah, with her head pressed close against the window to take advantage of the last glimmer of light, was reading a book of fairy tales. Great painters had not wives. ”

“ When the night was deeper, when the walkers outside had gone, when all was quiet, except now and then the hurried step of a late passer-by, Helen went to the window once more, and looked out upon that world. What a little bit of a world it is that a woman can see from her window!—a few silent roofs and closed windows, one or two figures going and coming, not a soul whom she knew or could influence ”

“ I can't be a governess, and needlework does not pay; neither does teaching, for that matter, even if I could do it. I am a good housekeeper, though I say it. I can keep accounts with anybody. I am not a bad cook even. And I'm past forty, and never was pretty in my life, so that I don't see it matters whether I am a woman or a man. I don't care what I do or where I go, so long as I can earn some money. Can you help me to that? Don't groan, Stephen; do you think I mind it? and don't you smile, Mr Burton. I am in earnest for my part.'
Stephen had groaned in his helplessness. ”

“ It was Francesca and Paolo, in the story, reading together at the crisis of their fate. The glow and ardour of suppressed passion had somehow toned down in Drummond's hands to a gentle light. There was a sunset warmth of colour about the pair, which stood in place of that fiercer illumination; and all the maze of love and madness, all the passion and misery and delight, all the terror of fate involved, and shadow of the dark, awful world beyond, had sunk into a tender picture of a pair of lovers, innocent and sweet. ”

“ There were people in these days who felt even that the painter had fallen into bad ways. They saw his eyes bloodshot and his hand trembling. He was never seen with his wife now when she drove her ponies through the park—even in society Helen went sometimes out alone. And they had been so united, so happy a pair. 'Drummond will have nothing ready in April,' the painters said to each other—'even his diploma picture has never been finished—prosperity has not agreed with him.' When he was visible at all, his vacant air, his tremulous look, the deep lines under his eyes, frightened all his friends. ”

“ Villains themselves are not very clever, they always let themselves be found out.'
'But, my dear, we are not talking of villains,' said Helen.
'No, mamma, only of that Mr Golden. I hate him! If you and I were awfully clever, and could see into him, what he means—'
'You silly little girl! You have read too many novels,' said Helen. 'In the world people are often selfish, and think of their own advantage first; but they don't try to ruin others out of pure malice, as they do in stories. Even Norah Drummond sometimes thinks of herself first. ”

“ If I lived I could do no good, only harm; but they will be sorry for her if I die. I have written to her, poor darling, to tell her; but I want you to go and stand by her. She'll want some one; and kiss the child for me. If they find me, bury me anywhere. I hope they will never find me, though, for Helen's sake. And poor Haldane. Tell him I knew nothing of it; nothing, nothing! I would have died sooner than let them risk his money. God help us, and God forgive me! Maurice, you are a good fellow ”

“ Burton could not have been more at a loss in Drummond's studio than he would have felt in his friend's counting-house. Mr Burton was 'a merchant;' a vague term which nevertheless satisfied the painter's mind. He was understood to be one of the partners in Rivers's bank, but his own business was quite independent of that. Money was the material he dealt in—his stock-in-trade. He understood the Funds as a doctor understands a patient whose pulse he feels every day. He could divine when they were going to rise and when they were going to fall. ”

“ It would perhaps be rash to say that this was the happy time of Drummond's married life, for they had always been happy, with only that one drawback of Helen's dissatisfaction with her husband's work. They had loved each other always, and their union had been most true and full. But the effect of wealth was mollifying, as it so often is. Prosperity has been railed at much, as dangerous and deadening to the higher being; but prosperity increases amiability and smooths down asperities as nothing else can. ”

“ But poor Robert, though he was not a great artist, was the most tender-hearted, amiable, affectionate of men; and this mode of criticism stole the very heart out of him. There is no such want in the world as that want of backing up. It is the secret of weakness and failure, just as strong moral support and sympathy is the very secret of strength. He stood steady and robust to the external eye, painting many pictures every year, getting very tolerable prices, keeping his household very comfortable, a man still under forty, healthy, cheerful, and vigorous ”

“ His carriage had waited for him for two hours together at the railway, while he was busy in town, toiling over the arrears of work at Rivers's. 'We have a jewel of a manager,' he said, 'or we never could get on at all. You know Golden, Drummond? There never was such a fellow for work—and a head as clear as steel; never forgets anything; never lets an opportunity slip him. But for him, we never could have got on so long in this way. But every man's strength has its limits. And we must have "new blood."'
Thus Helen gradually came to an understanding of the whole, or at least thought she did. ”