“I suppose it is, but unfortunately I have made the worst of it,” he answered, “and having made the worst I see no best. Who is that singing?”
He lifted his hand with a gesture of attention as a rich mezzo-soprano rang out towards them, —
“Per carita Mostrami il cielo; Tulto e un velo, E non si sa Dove e il cielo. Se si sta Cosi cola, Non si sa Se non si va Ahi me lontano! Tulto e in vano! Prendimi in mano Per carita!”
“It is Angela,” said the Cardinal, “She has a wonderfully sweet voice.”
“Prendimi in mano, Per carita!”
murmured Abbe Vergniaud, still listening, “It is like the cry of a lost soul!”
“Or a strayed one,” interposed the Cardinal gently, and rising, he took Vergniaud’s arm, and leaned upon it with a kindly and familiar grace, an action which implied much more than the mere outward expression of confidence,— “Nothing is utterly lost, my dear friend. ‘The very hairs of our head are numbered,’ — not a drop of dew escapes to waste, — how much more precious than a drop of dew is the spirit of a man!”
“It is not so unsullied,” declared Vergniaud, who loved controversy,— “Personally, I think the dew is more valuable than the soul, because so absolutely clean!”
“You must not bring every line of discussion to a pin’s point,” said Bonpre smiling, as he walked slowly across the room still leaning on the Abbe’s arm. “We can reduce our very selves to the bodiless condition of a dream if we take sufficient pains first to advance a theory, and then to wear it threadbare. Nothing is so deceptive as human reasoning, — nothing so slippery and reversible as what we have decided to call ‘logic.’ The truest compass of life is spiritual instinct.”
“And what of those who have no spiritual instinct?” demanded Vergniaud.
“I do not think there are any such. To us it certainly often seems as if there were masses of human beings whose sole idea of living is to gratify their bodily needs, — but I fancy it is only because we do not know them sufficiently that we judge them thus. Few, if any, are so utterly materialistic as never to have had some fleeting intuition of the Higher existence. They may lack the force to comprehend it, or to follow its teaching, — but in my opinion, the Divine is revealed to all men once at least in their lives.”
They had by this time passed out of the drawing-room, and now, ascending three steps, they went through a curtained recess into Angela Sovrani’s studio, — a large and lofty apartment made beautiful by the picturesque disorder and charm common to a great artist’s surroundings. Here, at a grand piano sat Angela herself, her song finished, her white hands straying idly over the keys, — and near her stood the gentleman whom the Abbe Vergniaud had called “a terrible reformer and Socialist” and who was generally admitted to be something of a remarkable character in Europe. Tall and fair, with very bright flashing eyes, and a wonderfully high bred air of concentrated pride and resolution, united to a grace and courtesy which exhaled from him, so to speak, with his every movement and gesture, he was not a man to pass by without comment, even in a crowd. A peculiar distinctiveness marked him, — out of a marching regiment one would have naturally selected him as the commanding officer, and in any crisis of particular social importance or interest his very appearance would have distinguished him as the leading spirit of the whole. On perceiving the Cardinal he advanced at once to be presented, and as Angela performed the ceremony of introduction he slightly bent one knee, and bowed over the venerable prelate’s extended hand with a reverence which had in it something of tenderness. His greeting of Abbe Vergniaud was, while perfectly courteous, not quite so marked by the grace of a strong man’s submission.
“Ah, Mr. Leigh! So you have not left Paris as soon as you determined?” queried the Abbe with a smile, “I thought you were bound for Florence in haste?”
“I go to Florence to-morrow,” answered Leigh briefly.
“So soon! I am indeed glad not to have missed you,” said Cardinal Bonpre cordially. “Angela, my child, let me see what you have been doing. All your canvases are covered, or turned with their faces to the wall; — are we not permitted to look at any of them?”
Angela immediately rose from the piano, and wheeled a large oaken chair with a carved and gilded canopy, into the centre of the studio.
“Well, if you want to see my sketches — and they are only sketches,” she said,— “you must come and sit here. Now,” as her uncle obeyed her, “you look enthroned in state, — that canopy is just fitted for you, and you are a picture in yourself! — Yes, you are, dearest uncle! And not all the artists in the world could ever do you justice I Monsieur l’Abbe, will you sit just where you please? — And Mr. Leigh, you have seen everything, so it does not matter.”
“It matters very much,” said Leigh with a smile, “For I want to see everything again. If I may, I will stand here.”
And he took up his position close to the Cardinal’s chair.
“But where is the boy?” asked Vergniaud, “Where is the foundling of the Cathedral?”
“He left us some minutes ago,” said Angela, “He went to your room, uncle.”
“Was he pleased with the music?” asked the Cardinal.
“I think he enjoyed every note of it,” said Leigh, “A thoughtful lad! He was very silent while I played, — but silence is often the most eloquent appreciation.”
“Are we to be silent then over the work of Donna Sovrani?” enquired the Abbe gaily. “Must we not express our admiration?”
“If you have any admiration to express,” said Angela carelessly, setting, as she spoke, an easel facing the Cardinal; “but I am afraid you will greatly disapprove of me and condemn all my work this year. I should explain to you first that I am composing a very large picture, — I began it in Rome some three years ago, and it is in my studio there, — but I require a few French types of countenance in order to quite complete it. The sketches I have made here are French types only. They will all be reproduced in the larger canvas — but they are roughly done just now. This is the first of them. I call it ‘A Servant of Christ, at the Madeleine, Paris.’”
And she placed the canvas she held on the easel and stood aside, while all three men looked at it with very different eyes, — one with poignant regret and pain, — the other with a sense of shame, — and the third with a thrill of strong delight in the power of the work, and of triumph in the lesson it gave.
IX.
Low beetling brows, — a sensual, cruel mouth with a loosely projecting under-lip, — eyes that appeared to be furtively watching each other across the thin bridge of nose, — a receding chin and a narrow cranium, combined with an expression which was hypocritically humble, yet sly, — this was the type Angela Sovrani had chosen to delineate, sparing nothing, softening no line, and introducing no redeeming point, — a type mercilessly true to the life; the face of a priest,— “A servant of Christ,” as she called him. The title, united with that wicked and repulsive countenance, was a terribly significant suggestion. For some minutes no one spoke, — and the Cardinal was the first to break the silence.
“Angela, — my dear child” — he said, in low, strained tones, “I am sorry you have done this! It is powerful — so powerful that it is painful as well. It cuts me to the heart that you should find it necessary to select such an example of the priesthood, though of course I am not in the secret of your aims — I do not understand your purpose . . .”
He broke off, — and Angela, who had stood silent, looking as though she were lost in a dream, took up his unfinished sentence.
“You do not understand my purpose? — Dearest uncle, I hardly understand it myself! Some force stronger than I am, is urging me to paint the picture I have begun, — some influence more ardent and eager than my own, burns like a fever in me, persuading me to complete the design. You blame me for choosing such an evil type of priest? But there is no question of choice! These faces are ordinary among our priests. At all the churches, Sunday after Sunday I have looked for a good, a n
oble face; — in vain! For an even commonly-honest face, — in vain! And my useless search has ended by impressing me with profound sorrow and disgust that so many low specimens of human intellect are selected as servants of our Lord. Do not judge me too severely! I feel that I have a work to do, — and a lesson to give in the work, when done. I may fail; — I may be told that as a woman I have no force, and no ability to make any powerful or lasting impression on this generation; — but at any rate I feel that I must try! If priests of the Church were like you, how different it would all be! But you always forget that you are an exception to the rule, — you do not realise how very exceptional you are! I told you before I showed you this sketch that you would probably disapprove of it and condemn me, — but I really cannot help it. In this matter nothing — not even the ban of the Church itself, can deter me from fulfilling what I have designed to do in my own soul!”
She spoke passionately and with ardour, — and the Cardinal looked at her with something of surprise and trouble. The fire of genius is as he knew, a consuming one, — and he had never entirely realized how completely it filled and dominated this slight feminine creature for whom he felt an almost paternal tenderness. Before he could answer her the Abbe Vergniaud spoke.
“Donna Sovrani is faithful to the truth in her sketch,” he said, “therefore, as a lover of truth I do not see, my dear Bonpre, why you should object! If she has, — as she says, — some great aim in view, she must fulfil it in her own way. I quite agree with her in her estimate of the French priests, — they are for the most part despicable-looking persons, — only just a grade higher than their brothers of Italy and Spain. But what would you have? The iron hand of Rome holds them back from progress, — they are speaking and acting lies; and like the stagemimes, have to put on paint and powder to make the lies go down. But when the paint and powder come off, the religious mime is often as ill-looking as the stage one! Donna Sovrani has caught this particular example, before he has had time to put on holy airs and turn up the footlights. What do you think about it, Mr. Leigh?”
“I think, as I have always thought,” said Leigh quietly, “that Donna Sovrani is an inspired artist, — and that being inspired it follows that she must carry out her own convictions whether they suit the taste of others or not. ‘A Servant of Christ’ is a painful truth, boldly declared.”
Angela was unmoved by the compliment implied. She only glanced wistfully at the Cardinal, who still sat silent. Then without a word she withdrew the offending sketch from the easel and set another in its place.
“This,” she said gently, “is the portrait of an Archbishop. I need not name his diocese. He is very wealthy, and excessively selfish. I call this, ‘LORD, I THANK THEE THAT I AM NOT AS OTHER MEN’.”
Vergniaud laughed as he looked, — he knew the pictured dignitary well. The smooth countenance, the little eyes comfortably sunken in small rolls of fat, the smug smiling lips, the gross neck and heavy jaw, — marks of high feeding and prosperous living, — and above all the perfectly self-satisfied and mock-pious air of the man, — these points were given with the firm touch of a master’s brush, and the Abbe, after studying the picture closely, turned to Angela with a light yet deferential bow.
“Chere Sovrani, you are stronger than ever! Surely you have improved much since you were last in Paris? Your strokes are firmer, your grasp is bolder. Have your French confreres seen your work this year?”
“No,” replied Angela, “I am resolved they shall see nothing till my picture is finished.”
“May one ask why?”
A flash of disdain passed over the girl’s face.
“For a very simple reason! They take my ideas and use them, — and then, when my work is produced they say it is I who have copied from THEM, and that women have no imagination! I have been cheated once or twice in that way, — this time no one has any idea what I am doing.”
“No one? Not even Signer Varillo?”
“No,” said Angela, smiling a little, “Not even Signor Varillo. I want to surprise him.”
“In what way?” asked the Cardinal, rousing himself from his pensive reverie.
Angela blushed.
“By proving that perhaps, after all, a woman can do a great thing in art, — a really great thing!” she said, “Designed greatly, and greatly executed.”
“Does he not admit that, knowing you?” asked Aubrey Leigh suggestively.
“Oh, he is most kind and sympathetic to me in my work,” explained Angela quickly, vexed to think that she had perhaps implied some little point that was not quite in her beloved one’s favour. “But he is like most men, — they have a preconceived idea of women, and of what their place should be in the world—”
“Unchanged since the early phases of civilization, when women were something less valuable than cattle?” said Leigh smiling.
“Oh, the cattle idea is not exploded, by any means!” put in Vergniaud. “In Germany and Switzerland, for example, look at the women who are ground down to toil and hardship there! The cows are infinitely prettier and more preferable, and lead much pleasanter lives. And the men for whom these poor wretched women work, lounge about in cafes all day, smoking and playing dominoes. The barbaric arrangement that a woman should be a man’s drudge and chattel is quite satisfactory, I think, to the majority of our sex. It is certainly an odd condition of things that the mothers of men should suffer most from man’s cruelty. But it is the work of an all-wise Providence, no doubt; and you, Mr. Leigh, will swear that it is all right!”
“It is all right,” said Leigh quietly, “or rather I should say, it WILL be all right, — and it would have been all right long ago, if we had, as Emerson puts it, ‘accepted the hint of each new experience.’ But that is precisely what we will not do. Woman is the true helpmate of man, and takes a natural joy in being so whenever we will allow it, — whenever we will give her scope for her actions, freedom for her intelligence, and trust for her instincts. But for the present many of us still prefer to play savage, — the complete savage in low life, — the civilized savage in high. The complete savage is found in the dockyard labourer, who makes a woman bear his children and then kicks her to death, — the savage in high life is the man who equally kills the mother of his children, but in another way, namely, by neglect and infidelity, while he treats his numerous mistresses just as the Turk treats the creatures of his harem — merely as so many pretty soft animals, requiring to be fed with sweets and ornamented with jewels, and then to be cast aside when done with. All pure savagery! But we are slowly evolving from it into something better. A few of us there are, who honour womanhood, — a few of us believe in women as guiding stars in our troubled sky, — a few of us would work and climb to greatness for love of the one woman we adore, — would conquer all obstacles, — ay, would die for her if need be, of what is far more difficult, would live for her the life of a hero and martyr! Yes — such things are done, — and men can be found who will do such things — all for a woman’s sake.”
There was a wonderful passion in his voice, — a deep thrill of earnestness which carried conviction with sweetness. Cardinal Bonpre looked at him with a smile.
“You are perhaps one of those men, Mr. Leigh?” he said.
“I do not know, — I may be,” responded Leigh, a flush rising to his cheeks;— “but, — so far, no woman has ever truly loved me, save my mother. But apart from all personalities, I am a great believer in women. The love of a good woman is a most powerful lever to raise man to greatness, — I do not mean by ‘good’ the goody-goody creature, — no, for that is a sort of woman who does more mischief in her so-called ‘blameless’ life than a very Delilah. I mean by ‘good’, a strong, pure, great soul in woman, — sincere, faithful, patient, full of courage and calm, — and with this I maintain she must prove a truly God-given helpmate to man. For we are rough creatures at best, — irritable creatures too! — you see,” and here a slight smile lighted up his delicate features, “we really do try more or less to reach heights
that are beyond us — we are always fighting for a heaven of some sort, whether we make it of gold, or politics, or art; — it is a ‘heaven’ or a ‘happiness’ that we want; — we would be as gods, — we would scale Olympus, — and sometimes Olympus refuses to be scaled! And then we tumble down, very cross, very sore, very much ruffled; — and it is only a woman who can comfort us then, and by her love and tenderness mend our broken limbs and put salve on our wounded pride.”
“Well, then, surely the Church is in a very bad way,” said Vergniaud smiling, “Think of the vow of perpetual celibacy!”
“Celibacy cannot do away with woman’s help or influence,” said Leigh, “There are always mothers and sisters, instead of sweethearts and wives. I am in favour of celibacy for the clergy. I think a minister of Christ should be free to work for and serve Christ only.”
“You are quite right, Mr. Leigh;” said the Cardinal, “There is more than enough to do in every day of our lives if we desire to truly follow His commands. But in this present time, alas! — religion is becoming a question of form — not of heart.”
“Dearest uncle, if you think that, you will not judge me too severely for my pictures,” said Angela quickly, throwing herself on her knees beside him. “Do you not see? It is just because the ministers of Christ are so lax that I have taken to studying them in my way, — which is, I know, not your way; — still, I think we both mean one and the same thing!”
“You are a woman, Angela,” said the Cardinal gently, “and as a woman you must be careful of offences—”
“Oh, a woman!” exclaimed Angela, her beautiful eyes flashing with mingled tenderness and scorn, and her whole face lighting up with animation, “Only a woman! SHE must not give a grand lesson to the world! SHE must not, by means of brush or pen, point out to a corrupt generation the way it is going! Why? Because God has created her to be the helpmate of man! Excellent reason! Man is taking a direct straight road to destruction, and she must not stop him by so much as lifting a warning finger! Again, why? Only because she is a woman! But I — were I twenty times a woman, twenty times weaker than I am, and hampered by every sort of convention and usage, — I would express my thoughts somehow, or die in the attempt!”
Delphi Collected Works of Marie Corelli Page 468