Canvasback

“ Long after Mlle. Hasparren lay breathing deep, her dark face relaxed in a selfless quiet that was not more selfless than her waking look, Marise lay looking out at the stars and the mountains, thinking, trembling, sometimes feeling hot bitter tears in her eyes, sometimes feeling her heart swell high with strange, unearthly aspiration.
Mile. Hasparren was right. She had always been right. To keep clear of all troubling, maddening, personal relations that were sure to end by poisoning you, not to want anything for yourself, to give all for music—how safe you would be, to live like that. ”

“ At the piano Mlle. Hasparren and Father Armandariz were talking together of the next evening's rehearsal, Mlle. Hasparren occasionally illustrating with one hand what she was saying. How deeply human was the look of intimate confidence they bent on each other, the ugly young priest and the ugly old school-teacher. They might well be thankful that they had found each other in the world.
Mlle. Hasparren turned around now and asked Marise if she would not play for them. "I would be so proud to show my friends what an old pupil of mine has come to be," she said fondly. ”

“ Out of the black, varnished box, like the mighty genii of the Arabian Nights, soared something beautiful and strong, something that filled the dreary, empty salon and her heavy heart with sonorous life, something which like the genii put its greatness at the service of the being who knew the charm to free it from imprisonment.
"Stronger there, as you come up from the bass," said Mlle. Hasparren, and Marise knew from her voice that she too was soaring up. And yet, although she sounded no longer dull and weary, but strong and joyful, she abated nothing of her exacting rigor. ”

“ Before she ran up to make sure that no guests were stranded in the library without being served with ices, Marise looked cautiously into the dark corner on the landing to make sure that Ambrogi was not there. Horrid—an old man like that who could not keep his hands off women thirty years younger than he! But as for that, the old Visconti himself could not keep his off women fifty years younger than he! ”

“ Below deck, you swab!" he roared, and, picking up one of the heavy cut-glass goblets, flung it between the butler's legs as he hurried from the hall. Lord Cannebrake laughed and made me fill up my glass, while he poured out for himself an extra strong allowance of rum.
"Master Springle thinks he can do as he likes because I give him a moderate amount of freedom, seeing that we were shipmates once."
"It is indeed a condescension on your side, my lord, for which the fellow shows himself monstrous ungrateful. I drink your lordship's very good health." ”

“ He may perceive that we are sailing into danger, and wish to warn us from approaching any closer before it be too late.”
“Zounds, boy!” shouted Cavendish, “’fore Heaven I believe that you may be right in your assumption!”
Then, turning to the crew: “All hands stand by to veer ship!” he cried.
But even as he spoke there was a sudden check to the vessel’s way, and almost instantly she stopped dead, the sudden shock throwing more than one man prostrate on the deck. At the same moment the leadsman in the chains gave his warning cry: “Three fathoms only, and shoaling fast!” ”

“ Brisk, we’ll go see Sapho, though my lord won’t.
CYNT. I’ll wait upon your ladyship.
BRISK. Pray, madam, how old is Lady Sapho?
LADY FROTH. Three-quarters, but I swear she has a world of wit, and can sing a tune already. My lord, won’t you go? Won’t you? What! not to see Saph? Pray, my lord, come see little Saph. I knew you could not stay.
SCENE XII. CYNTHIA alone.
CYNT. ’Tis not so hard to counterfeit joy in the depth of affliction, as to dissemble mirth in company of fools. Why should I call ’em fools? The world thinks better of ’em ”

“ Later on Marise fell into a real sleep, deep and unbroken, and when She woke up, much later than usual, to find Mlle. Hasparren all dressed, the folding-bed put away, the window open and the sunshine coming in, she found that she seemed to have grown stronger since yesterday, that the black pit was not so fathomless. She felt infinitely older and as though she would never laugh again. She lay in bed, looking up at the ceiling, thinking fixedly about what had happened, and found that she could endure it now without crying out or bursting into tears as she had done yesterday. ”

“ Mrs. Clifton and Miss Kavanagh?”
“Yes, Colonel Conyers, and I am as much pleased as surprised to find you here! How comes it that we are fellow travelers?” said the lady, placing her own in his offered hand.
“And how-do-you-do, Miss Kavanagh?—really, I am so overjoyed to find you here! Why, you must know, my dear Mrs. Clifton, that I have been due at White Cliffs for several days. I am, in fact, the laggard of a party—but in truth I could not tear myself from Richmond, while you and Miss Kavanagh remained. ”

“ It was the butter-maker's mother, a stolid, middle-aged woman, who looked at me out of the most uncanny quiet eyes ... all the people in that valley have extraordinary piercing and quiet eyes ... and asked, 'Is it about the picture? For if it is, I don't want you should let on about it to anybody but me. Nobody but the family knows he paints 'em!"
At this the doctor burst out, "Gracious powers! You don't mean to say that the man who painted that picture is alive now ... in 1915!"
The actress frowned at the interruption and turned with a lithe petulance on the big Briton. ”

“ There are two thousand men who will revenge me."
"You richly deserve death. You can expect no mercy. You have said that you would burn the English in their houses. You have boasted that you would not deliver up a single Wampanoag, nor the paring of a Wampanoag's nail."
"I desire to hear no more about it," replied Canonchet. "Others were as eager in the war as myself, and many will be found of the same mind. Have not the English burned my people in their houses? Did you ever deliver up to the Narragansetts any of the Narragansetts' enemies? ”

“ But any one of experience can feel them in the room, as you feel a snake. You are not cold, my darling. No one who can play The Tragica as you do, is cold. You are only a child. You Anglo-Saxons take so long to ripen. But all the better for your technique—that quaint prolongation of infancy. But now," she put down her cup and looked at Marise deeply and masterfully, "now your infancy has lasted long enough. In with you! Dive from the nearest rock! Head over heels! ”

“ Sundown rose and saddled a horse. He mounted and rode slowly toward the rim of the distant cañon. At the cañon's brink, he dismounted and led his horse down the trail, stopping frequently to gaze in wonderment at the painted cliffs and masses of red rock strewn along the slopes. High up on the perpendicular face of the cañon walls he saw many caves and wondered how they came to be there. "Makes a fella feel like sayin' his prayers," he muttered. ”

“ He did not disturb Bill Brennen or Nick Leary. He knew that they would be around at his house for orders by sun-up. The last cabin he visited was that of Pat Kavanagh. Kavanagh was a man of parts, and had been a close friend of the old skipper. He was a man of the world, having sailed deep-sea voyages in his youth. He was a grand fiddler, a grand singer, and had made more "Come-all-ye's" than you could count on your fingers and toes. He had a wooden leg; and his daughter was the finest girl in Chance Along. ”

“ Candida is in the easy chair with the poker, a light brass one, upright in her hand. She is leaning back and looking at the point of it curiously, with her feet stretched towards the blaze and her heels resting on the fender, profoundly unconscious of her appearance and surroundings. MARCHBANKS (breaking off in his recitation) : Every poet that ever lived has put that thought into a sonnet. He must: he can't help it. (He looks to her for assent, and notices her absorption in the poker.) Haven't you been listening? (No response.) Mrs. Morell! ”

“ But even while he threatened, shaking the pistol, Lord Cannebrake struck hard with his stick and Captain Swall fell forward among the glasses on the table.
“Springle,” his lordship gasped. “Springle, I’ve killed him, ha’n’t I?”
Then I saw that the butler was standing in the corner, a plate of beef in his hand. He came forward and, setting down the plate, shook the sprawling figure.
“Aye, aye, he’s dead as his beef,” said Springle.
“We’ll bury the body quick, Conrad. Wait. I’ll see he has no friends outside.” ”

“ Cornelius was asking if I did not look very pale. I had been rather poorly of late, and he was kindly anxious about me.
"To me she looks the same as usual," quietly answered Miriam: "she always is sallow, and being so plain makes her look ill."
"Why, that is true," replied Cornelius, seemingly comforted by this reasoning.
What more they said I heard not; my blood flowed like fire. I was plain, I knew it well enough, but was he, of all others, to be told of it daily, until at length I heard it, an acknowledged fact falling from his lips? ”

“ But old Madeleine, the flower seller must have passed by on her way home, after shutting up her flowerstand, for now he had a white rose bud in his hands, looking down at it fixedly, turning it about between his fingers, once in a while touching a petal delicately, or holding it up to draw in its fragrance.
Marise pulled the curtain shut, and hurried back to the improvement of the French army from 1680 on. She felt very miserable, as though she'd eaten something she ought not to.... was it a headache? She had heard ladies talk so much about headaches, and had never had one. ”

“ Maman so pretty and stylish, looking so sweet when she made mistakes in French that nobody minded, or thought of laughing at her.
Marise tipped the candle over carefully and let some melted tallow fall on the back of her hand. As she set it back and waited for the tallow to harden, she was thinking how very different from home Bayonne was; the Basque fishwomen, with the shiny fish in the round flat baskets on their heads; the white oxen with the sheep-skin on their horns, and their red-striped white canvas covering, pulling those two-wheeled carts ”

“ Swank was gradually covering his canvas by squeezing the paint directly from the tubes, a method which has since been copied by many others—the "Tubistes" so called. Every few moments he would lurch forward and press his nose against the canvas, once falling flat on his masterpiece, most of which was transferred to his chest. But he persevered.
Whinney by this time had retired to his darkroom; Baahaabaa and Hitoia-Upa snored; Swank worked and I, from a near-by knoll, watched the miracle of a tropical dawn. ”

“ It was even said that Candaules had not disdained to wield with his own royal hands—a thing hardly becoming a prince—the chisel of the sculptor and the sponge of the encaustic painter.
But why should we dwell upon Candaules? The reader undoubtedly feels like the people of Sardes: and it is of Nyssia that he desires to hear.
The daughter of Megabazus was mounted upon an elephant, with wrinkled skin and immense ears which seemed like flags, who advanced with a heavy but rapid gait, like a vessel in the midst of the waves. ”

“ And while I was there I went to see the unknown canvas. The dealer half apologized for taking my time—said he did not as a rule pay any attention to freak things brought in from country holes by amateurs, but—I remember his wording—this thing, some ways he looked at it, didn't seem bad somehow."
The collector paused, passed his tongue over his lips, and said briefly: "Then he showed it to me. It was the young girl and kitten in there."
"By Jove!" cried the doctor.
"You have too exciting a profession, my good old dear," said the actress. "Some day you will die of a heart failure." ”

“ None of the three sons of Peter Kavanagh had ever before been known to have absented himself from Sunday mass, and their absence on that most holy day was of course a subject of much wonder.
“I could not have thought it possible,” said James Kavanagh gravely, “that they could become so wicked all at once—God forgive them! God help them!”
“Oh, uncle!” cried Alice, as they came in view of the house of guilt once more, “they are not up yet! ”

“ It was a huge conger, such as I had never seen before, and which came very near being the last I might gaze upon, for suddenly it brought its tail up over the outrigger, and before I could counterbalance my craft, seemed to swamp the canoe by its dead weight and the power of its fins. I was in the water in a second, but never loosened my hold of the line. Letting go the loose coils I struck out for Rocher Rouge, only some fifty yards away, and, landing at the foot of the great granite throne, commenced to haul in my line. ”

“ The French cannoniers who handled them were brave fellows, for they killed several men on board the Success, nor were they silenced, and the beach swept of the inhabitants, till the commodore's ship, together with the Rose, Flamborough, and Diligence, opened their broadsides to the land, and filled the whole bay with smoke, making every rock and mountain echo to the reverberations of a cannonade that lasted till seven in the evening, for we had a dread of masked batteries among the shrubberies and hedgerows near the shore. ”