Barty

“ The only event of any importance in Barty's life that year was his first communion, which he took with several others of about his own age. An event that did not seem to make much impression on him—nothing seemed to make much impression on Barty Josselin when he was very young. He was just a lively, irresponsible, irrepressible human animal—always in perfect health and exuberant spirits, with an immense appetite for food and fun and frolic; like a squirrel, a collie pup, or a kitten. ”

“ I'm glad I'm successful because of Barty, although success, which brings the world to our feet, does not always endear us to the friend of our bosom. If I had been a failure Barty would have stuck to me like a brick, I feel sure, instead of my sticking to him like a leech! ”

“ Barty, charmed with his new acquaintance, gave the signore his card, and Carlo Veronese invited him graciously to take a seat in the wagonette, as if it were his own private carriage. Barty, who was the most easily impressed person that ever lived, accepted with as much sincere gratitude as if he hadn't already paid for his place, and they started on their sunny drive of eight miles along the dusty straight Belgian chaussée, bordered with poplars on either side, and paved with flagstones all the way to Blankenberghe. ”

“ And after dinner we talked of Barty—she with that delightful frankness that always characterized her through life, I am told:
"Dear Barty Josselin! how desperately in love I was with that man, to be sure! Everybody was—he might have thrown the handkerchief as he pleased in Riffrath, I can tell you, Sir Robert! He was the handsomest man I ever saw, and wore a black pork‐pie hat and a little yellow Vandyck beard and mustache; just the color of Turkish tobacco, like his hair! All that sounds odd now, doesn't it? Fashions have changed—but not for the better! ”

“ Gibson, whose fondness for Barty soon grew into absolute worship!
And Leah, so reserved and self‐contained in general company, would laugh till the tears ran down her cheeks; and the music of her laughter, which was deep and low, rang more agreeably to Barty's ear than even the ravishing strains of Adelina Patti—the last of the great prime donne of our time, I think—whose voice still stirs me to the depths, with vague remembrance of fresh girlish innocence turned into sound.
Long life to her and to her voice! Lovely voices should never fade, nor pretty faces either! ”

“ It is really not too much to say that I would have given up to him everything I possessed in the world—every blessed thing! except Leah—and Leah was not mine to give!
Now and again Barty's face would take on a look so ineffably, pathetically, angelically simple and childlike that it moved one to the very depths, and made one feel like father and mother to him in one! It was the true revelation of his innermost soul, which in many ways remained that of a child even in his middle age and till he died. All his life he never quite put away childish things! ”

“ Barty, I will never doubt you again, and we will do great things together. They will not be quite what I used to hope, but they will be worth doing, and all the doing will be yours. All I can do is to set your brains in motion—those innocent brains that don't know their own strength any more than a herd of bullocks which any little butcher boy can drive to the slaughter-house. ”

“ An extraordinary susceptibility to musical sound was growing in Barty since his trouble had overtaken him, and with it an extraordinary sensitiveness to the troubles of other people, their partings and bereavements and wants, and aches and pains, even those of people he didn't know; and especially the woes of children, and dogs and cats and horses, and aged folk—and all the live things that have to be driven to market and killed for our eating—or shot at for our fun! ”

“ And Barty became the intimate friend of these good people, who made Blankenberghe a different place to him—and conceived for him a violent liking, and introduced him to all their smart Belgian friends; they were quite a set—bathing together, making music and dancing, taking excursions, and so forth. And before a fortnight was over Barty had become the most popular young man in the town, the gayest of the gay, the young guardsman once more, throwing dull care to the winds ”

“ She simply spoke in a quiet, reasonable way of all that he owed Stafford.
“And when it means so much,” she said, “to both of us—when it affects your whole future—”
“Well,” said Barty deliberately, “I dare say you’re right.” She glanced up hopefully. “But I don’t care,” he went on. “I love you, and I won’t go on like this any longer! I’ve tried, and I can’t—that’s all. I can’t stand seeing you thin and miserable and shabby—”
“I’m not shabby, Barty!”
“You are—for you,” he said. “You ought to have everything in the world! You’re so beautiful and wonderful! ”

“ Je regarde la comète!"
"Voulez‐vous bien vous en aller bien vite?"
"Une autre fois!" says Barty.
"Allez‐vous en, je vous dis!"
"Après‐demain!"
"Vous ... ne ... voulez ... pas ... vous ... en ... aller?" says the soldier, on tiptoe, his chest against Barty's stomach, his nose almost up to Barty's chin, glaring up like a fiend and poising his coupe‐choux for a death‐stroke.
"Non, sacré petit pousse‐cailloux du diable!" roars Barty. ”

“ And as each book, English or French, was more beautiful than the last; so was each little Barty, male or female. All over Kensington and Campden Hill—for they took Gretna Lodge, next door to Cornelys, the sculptor's—the splendor of these little Bartys, their size, their beauty, their health and high spirits, became almost a joke, and their mother became almost a comic character in consequence—like the old lady who lived in a shoe. ”

“ Why, one day at the Marathonæum, the first and foremost of them all, the champion smiter of the Philistines, the apostle of culture and sweetness and light, told me that, putting Barty's books out of the question, [Pg 378] he always got more profit and pleasure out of Barty's society than that of any man he knew.
"It does me good to be in the same room with him; the freshness of the man, his voice, his aspect, his splendid vitality and mother‐wit, his boyish spirit, and the towering genius behind it all. ”

“ Barty was a man's man par excellence, and loved to forgather with men. The only men he couldn't stand were those we have agreed to call in modern English the Philistines and the prigs—or both combined, as they can sometimes be; and this objection of his would have considerably narrowed his circle of male acquaintances but that the Philistines and the prigs, who so detest each other, were so dotingly fond of Barty, and ran him to earth in Marsfield. ”

“ At first it seemed to Barty preposterous, and even a little annoying, that the alert and self-reliant Jacko should have got herself lost in this fashion. The trail up from the landing was perfectly clear and easy to follow, and Stafford had given her his flash light.
Barty went all the way down to the lake again, calling her name. Then, as he stood on the shore of the black water, the note in his voice changed. A fitful wind had sprung up, driving clouds across the face of the moon. The trees stirred and sighed. ”

“ Julia had eaten them all up, except one or two that had been unconsciously nibbled by little Daphne.
Barty did not join in these aristocratic revels; he had become a pupil of Herr Duffenthaler, and worked hard in his master's studio with two brothers of the brush—one English, the other American; delightful men who remained his friends for life.
Indeed, he lived among the painters, who all got to love "der schöne Barty Josselin" like a brother. ”

“ Indeed, it was quite impossible to know Barty at all intimately and not do whatever he wanted you to do. Whatever he wanted, he wanted so intensely, and at once; [Pg 65] and he had such a droll and engaging way of expressing that hurry and intensity, and especially of expressing his gratitude and delight when what he wanted was what he got—that you could not for the life of you hold your own! Tout vient à qui ne sait pas attendre! ”

“ In the direful gloom of the hall, with the rain and wind threshing on the half-shuttered windows, and the inconstant light of the burning logs the sole illuminant, his pale face, with the wing of black hair on his forehead, looked like the face of a strayed occupant of another sphere who had resumed such an aspect as he had worn in his coffin.
"Ireland's a queer old place just now, Miss Christian," Barty hurried on. "Everything's changing hands, and everyone's changing sides. ”

“ And when it was all over, all his amiable carelessness came back, and with it his genius, his school-boy high [Pg 363] spirits, his tomfooling, his romps with his children, and his utter irresponsibility, and absolute disdain for all the ordinary business of life; and the happy, genial temper that never seemed to know a moment's depression or nourish an unkind thought.
Poor Barty! what would he have done without us all, and what should we have done without Barty? As Scatcherd said of him, "He's having his portion in this life." ”

“ Had he not escaped assassination himself that night only by the skin of his teeth?
"Could any man living throw light upon this matter?" he asked. "The leech from Edgeware, or any other?"
"I misdoubt me if any could, save wall-eyed Peter, Mr. Barty's man; and I trow his master makes it worth while for him to hold his tongue and know nothing."
"Gold will sometimes unloose a miscreant's tongue."
"Ay, ay, maybe; but Mr. Barty's purse is longer than yours, Sir Grey, and his mind is crookeder and his ways more artful. Don't you go for to anger him yet: hurt might come to you an you did. ”

“ The intellect has not energy enough for reconstruction; it accepts too readily, and, once saturated, the stain is indelible, because there is no power of growth.
Behold, then, Barty, gentle and obstinate, timid and an enthusiast, loving, yet implacable, seated in Larry's studio, regarding with submissive adoration the being compact of the antithesis of his qualities, and ready, for that being's sake, to make any sacrifice save that of renouncing him. ”

“ Barty dreamt of this adventure, and woke up laughing at it in the small hours of that night. Then, suddenly, in the dark, he remembered the horror of what had happened. It overwhelmed him. He realized, as in a sudden illuminating flash, what life meant for him hence‐forward—life that might last for so many years.
Vitality is at its lowest ebb at that time of night; though the brain is quick to perceive, and so clear that its logic seems inexorable. ”

“ And a horror of his life in London came over him like a revelation—a blast—a horrible surprise! Mere sin is ugly when it's no more; and so beastly to remember, unless the sinner be thoroughly acclimatized; and Barty was only twenty‐two, and hated deceit and cruelty in any form. ”

“ Certainly he gave a great deal, but it had always seemed to Jacqueline that Stafford got the best of the bargain.
He was one of the foremost architects in the city. It was an honor for the obscure young Barty to be singled out by such a man, to be taken into his office, and, just recently, to be asked to share a studio apartment with the great man; but in return he got all Barty's honest enthusiasm, his fidelity and gratitude. He had Barty's companionship, Barty's sympathy for the many affronts this rough world offers to sensitive men. ”

“ And, "Mon Dieu, comme il a bonne mine, ce cher Barty—n'est‐ce pas, mon amour, que tu as bonne mine? regarde‐toi dans la glace."
And, "Si nous allions à l'Hippodrôme cette après‐midi voir la belle écuyère Madame Richard? Barty adore les jolies femmes, comme son oncle! n'est‐ce pas, méchant [Pg 89] petit Barty, que tu adores les jolies femmes? et tu n'as jamais vu Madame Richard? Tu m'en diras des nouvelles! et vous, mon ami [this to me] , est‐ce que vous adorez aussi les jolies femmes?"
"Ô oui," says Daphne, "allons voir M'ame Richard; it'll be such fun! ”

“ He's one of the best fellows I've ever met,' said Barty.
"'He's to be so rich, and so am I,' I said.
"No answer.
"'It would be right for me to marry a poor man—man with brains and no money, you know, and help him to make his way.'
"'Reece has plenty of brains too,' said Barty.
"'Oh, Mr. Josselin—don't misunderstand me'—and then I began to stammer and look foolish.
"'Miss Royce—I've only got £15 in the world, and with that I mean to go to London and be an artist ”

“ They went up to their suite again, and Barty put into his bag the few things he had unpacked so short a time before. Jacqueline helped him. She brushed his hair with his military brushes, she straightened his tie. She kissed him and sent him off with a smile.
“Oh, Barty! Oh, Barty!” she cried, after he had gone.
V
“Stopping here?” cried a delighted voice.
Odd, how people keep on existing, completely unaware how superfluous they are! Jacqueline turned from her contemplation of the moonlit sea to the vastly inferior spectacle of Mr. Terrill, and answered him as civilly as she could just then. ”

“ And so no more of le Grand Bonzig.
Nor did Barty ever again meet Lirieux, in whose [Pg 181] existence a change had also been wrought by fortune; but whether for good or evil I can't say. He was taken to Italy and Greece by a wealthy relative. What happened to him there—whether he ever came back, or succeeded or failed—Barty never heard! He dropped out of Barty's life as completely as if he had been drowned like his old friend. ”