The Tattooed Countess/Chapter 13
At breakfast the next morning the Countess plied her sister with a hundred suavities, displaying a lively and unexpected curiosity in regard to the euchre-party of the evening before, awakening thereby an entirely unprecedented degree of descriptive enthusiasm in Lou, who recalled the dresses worn by the female contestants, retold, not very successfully, some of the humorous stories which the men had related, and furnished outlines of the more brilliant plays which had been made at the card-tables. Quite suddenly, in the midst of this sprightly account, she interrupted herself to interpolate: I'm so sorry, Ella, that you couldn't go with me. How is your head this morning?
The Countess laughed aloud. Quite well, thank you, she replied. Do you know, after you left last night, before I had time to go to bed, Gareth Johns happened in. When we had talked a little while my headache disappeared. We made lemonade and had a very good time.
O! Lou stiffened at once.
Lou dear, the Countess went on, employing her most casual manner, he has promised to show me something of the country round here today, and so I won't be back for dinner. I wonder could you ask Anna to pack me a box of sandwiches or devilled eggs?
But we've driven everywhere . . . on all the roads. There's nothing you haven't seen, Lou protested.
It's some new place that he's showing me, the Countess went on lightly. I'm not sure exactly what it is. Anyway we're going to walk. It's quite different walking: you see so much more.
Lou's stiffness increased. Very well, she responded coldly. I'll tell Anna.
I hate to be the cause of so much trouble, the Countess continued smoothly. If you'd rather, I'll make the sandwiches.
The cook is baking today and it will make trouble, Lou replied, but I'm sure she would rather have Anna make the sandwiches than have some one else fussing in the kitchen. What kind do you want?
It doesn't really matter at all, the Countess cheerfully explained. Anything will do, but don't ask her to make very many: it's too hot to eat much.
Lou pushed the swinging baize door into the kitchen and followed it through, while Ella went up to her room singing. The Countess did not see her sister again that morning. It was Anna who brought the little hamper, neatly packed and covered with a napkin, to her room. When, precisely at eleven, Gareth was announced, the Countess was ready to go out. She handed the basket to the boy. I hope it isn't too heavy, she said.
In a little while their walk led them beyond the bounds of Ella's ordinary rounds. Soon, indeed, they were passing through a purlieu of the town which she had never seen, the quarter devoted to the Bohemian residents, where the streets were unpaved and where they walked on a wooden side-walk. They passed rows of cottages, painted in gay colours, small stores, flaunting signs in the Czech language, which seemed, Ella thought, to contain a great many V's and Z's. The women, picturesque with bright handkerchiefs bound about their heads or worn as scarfs around their shoulders, sat on their low doorsteps. Geese, chickens, and dogs owned the yards. Here and there a bitch or a sow flat in the dust suckled her young. Straggling gardens exhibited the vegetables of the season; cucumbers, gourds, green and yellow and striated, squash, and pumpkins bulged from vines trailing over the ground. Against the houses hollyhocks reared their stalks, thick with pink and white and yellow pompons or morning-glories waved their pretty, purple bells.
I had no idea, Ella exclaimed, that Maple Valley boasted anything as curious as this. It's like a corner of old Europe. Why aren't the residents proud of this quarter instead of those stupid water-works?
Nobody ever mentions it except in depreciation, Gareth responded. When they say Bohemytown they mean the worst.
The sun's direct rays beat down mercilessly. It was as hot a day as Ella could remember, the kind of day, indeed, which she would ordinarily have spent in bed with the blinds drawn, reading a novel, with a pitcher of some refreshing beverage on the table beside her pillow. But today she did not mind the heat.
There would be a fine opportunity for a painter here, Gareth went on.
Helas, there are no American painters, the Countess objected.
Who are the great painters now?
For portraits, Chartran and Carolus-Duran. Duran has painted me. For landscapes, Harpignies and Corot. For animals, Rosa Bonheur. For beautiful pictures, Bastien-Lepage, Jean-Paul Laurens, Henner, and, above all, Bouguereau, whom I prefer even to Ingres and Cabanel. The pictures of these men and a few more, Gérôme, Meissonier, and Jules Breton, will always live. They are the last of the giants.
What about the impressionists?
O, the impressionists! The Countess made a gesture indicating disgust. A side issue! A freak side issue! They amounted to nothing and now that they are finished they will soon be forgotten. Painting will go back to what it was before. For my part, I recognize neither drawing, nor colouring, nor feeling in the pictures of Monet, Renoir, and Degas. They stop where the difficulty really begins. They cannot draw and so they pass off their inability as a novel method of painting. But the world will soon return to the true art.
Have you heard, she went on with some intensity, what a dreadful thing the French government has done? It has accepted the Caillebotte collection for the Luxembourg, a collection which contains that dreadful Olympia by Manet, a cold, ugly picture. Flesh was never that colour. Bouguereau was the last painter to understand the painting of flesh, and with him the secret will die. When you come to Paris I will show you my beautiful Bouguereau.
When I come to Paris!
O, you will come! She spoke with conviction.
Their walk led them over a brow of a hill into one of the older residence quarters of the town, where stately, old-fashioned houses raised themselves at the head of broad lawns, adorned with cast-iron effigies of dogs and deer or with fountains in which Cupids held duck spouting water from their beaks; other dwellings were set deep in rich, tangled gardens of flowers and spreading trees, enclosed behind white picket-fences.
Gareth pointed to one of these. That's the old Moore house, he said.
Mabel Moore! I remember her. What has become of her?
She married and went east many years ago. I've heard mother speak of her. Sometimes she comes back here to visit her father. He is a very old man now.
A sigh escaped the Countess.
A little farther on, enclosed in an iron-fence, painted white, the cemetery began.
Do you mind, Gareth asked, walking through the cemetery? It's a short cut to where we're going.
Not at all. The Countess smiled. In Paris all tourists visit Père-Lachaise. Why shouldn't I visit the Maple Valley graveyard?
In silence, they entered the gateway and strolled down a winding path. The place, like so many village cemeteries, was not lacking in a certain disturbing, melancholy loveliness. The dark green of the cedars and cypresses, severe and solemn trees, supplied a significant contrast to the aging marble of the tombs. Weeping willows spread their drooping fronds over the urns and obelisks. The mounds were buried under myrtle coverlets. Occasionally some visitor had placed cut-flowers in a vase of water sunk in the turf near a head-stone. Here and there they observed a neglected grave, the head-stone leaning like the tower of Pisa, but the general atmosphere of the place was serene and peaceful. Ella began to wonder, indeed, why she had not heard more about it.
Presently, on a little knoll ahead of them, they came upon a splendid granite mausoleum with grated windows, surmounted by a draped urn set on the cupola. Gazing upon it, Ella descried, in heavy letters carved over the portal, the word Poore.
Why, that's ours! she exclaimed.
Yes, Gareth assented.
Father is there. . . . It was built for him . . . and mother now, I believe.
She paused before the tomb.
Dear old father! How strange this is. I've hardly thought about him at all since I've been back here, that is I've hardly thought about him as a real person, but this resurrects him, brings him before me. A tear appeared in the corner of the Countess's eye and rolled down her cheek. She wiped her face with her handkerchief.
It's queer, she went on, what death does to us. I believe it brings us closer to the living.
I don't kndw anything about death, Gareth said. Nobody I've loved has ever died.
The Countess was in a revery. I loved my father, she continued, I loved him very much, but when I married Nattatorrini I went to live in Europe, and somehow I never returned . . . not until now, that is . . . too late. I never saw my father again. He was a kind man, noble in his way, a remarkable man for Iowa of that period, strong . . . and yet I've really never thought of him since I've been here. O, Lou and I have talked about him, of course. His name is mentioned nearly every day, but I haven't thought about him. I haven't been conscious of him . . . until today. Do you know what I mean?
Yes, Gareth assented, I know what you mean.
This tomb that I've never seen before brings him very clearly before my mind. Isn't that queer? And now that he is in my mind I feel I want to live more than ever. . . . Death frightens me, she went on, whenever I think of it. I did not love my husband . . . she was speaking in a very low tone . . . and I was glad when he died, yes, glad, but his death terrified me. Hewasso young! Might that not happen to me also, I could not help asking myself, or to some one I did love? Then, quite suddenly, I began to feel more alive than ever, closer to life. Ella pressed her hand against her heart, permitting her parasol to drop to the ground. There was a moment's silence, as Gareth stooped to pick it up. Then she said, Let us go on.
They did not speak again until they had left the cemetery by a further gate, passing at once into a great field of tall grasses, spattered thickly with black-eyed Susans, waving their orange heads about the knees of the strollers. They stood high on a hill; a quarter of a mile below, the river wound in and out through a curving valley. On the opposite side of the river the bluffs were wooded, dotted here and there with white farmhouses. All was still save for the soft lowing of invisible cattle, the buzzing of insects, and the fife-like, whistled scale of the meadowlark. Grasshoppers leaped, yellow and tawny butterflies fluttered, and iridescent dragon-flies sailed over the expanse of flowers. Black and buff bobolinks, flashing white as they flew, yellow-breasted meadowlarks, blue-birds, and cardinal grosbeaks rose from earth to sky, chittering in their passage.
How beautiful! the Countess exclaimed. How very beautiful! I've seen nothing at all like this before since I've been here. I had no idea Iowa was so lovely.
I suppose you've always driven, Gareth explained. There's no road to this hill. You have to walk to get here.
If I lived in Maple Valley I should build my house on this spot, the Countess said.
For a short time they stood silent and happy, enjoying the natural picture, but, in spite of a light breeze, the heat was oppressive, while the sun and the Countess's watch indicated that it was past midday.
Let's get out of the sun, Gareth suggested. There's an ideal spot yonder where we can sit in the shade.
He pointed to a little copse of trees and bushes to the left of their present position. Bordered by sumach, spread with maroon bloom, and mountainash-trees, with their glaucous foliage and vermilion berries, the copse, on entrance, proved to be a small grove of great oaks, which provided a thick and grateful shade. In the centre of the grove there was a small clearing, where some practical picnickers of bygone days had constructed a rough table and bench.
But this is splendid! the Countess exclaimed again, simply splendid!
Rapidly, she began to unpack the hamper, discovering therein a bottle of Queen Olives, four hard-boiled eggs, sandwiches fashioned from the white meat of chicken laid on slices of tomato, forks and knives, plates and glasses.
There is nothing to drink, the Countess complained. I forgot to ask Anna to include a bottle of cold tea.
There's water here, Gareth consoled her. Just back of those trees there is a spring. He disappeared behind a screen of hazel-brush, the twigs crepitating under his feet, soon returning, the two glasses in his hands full to the brim with cool, spring water.
Gareth, the Countess ejaculated, this makes me feel like a child again. We must come here every day!
There are other wonderful places . . .
O, I don't care where we go . . . but every day!
Until you tire of seeing me . . .
That will never happen.
Smiling, she began to munch a sandwich. What are those things on your legs? she demanded.
Burdock-burrs. He stooped to pluck them off.
I did not know, she went on, that I could be so contented.
Gareth was salting his egg. He regarded the Countess closely. He was bursting with questions. There was so'much that he wanted to know.
Tell me, he selected as a beginning, what was the most wonderful night you ever spent in the theatre?
She pondered. Let me see . . . I haven't thought about the theatre for such a long time . . . I've been so much. Perhaps the premiere of Sibyl Sanderson in Esclarmonde. That was in '89 during the Paris exposition. I love the music of Massenet. He is, I believe, my favourite composer. What graceful and refined melodies he creates! How they lift one, too! He is a master of sentiment; he has the keys to the heart of any woman who loves music. Do you know the Meditation from Thaïs?
Gareth shook his head.
She began to hum it. That was a night: she reverted to Esclarmonde. Sanderson was new to Paris; the opera was a novelty. What a brilliant house! She ran over some of the names. . . . Or perhaps one night when Marie Van Zandt sang Lakmé. You see, in 1894, she broke down on the stage during a performance of The Barber of Seville. The audience, believing her to be intoxicated, hissed her. The next season she returned to the Opera-Comique to sing Lakmé, a rôle she had created in 1883. When she first stepped on the stage, the hissing was so violent that you could not hear a note, but she conquered that unsympathetic public by sheer magnetism, personality, determination. By the time she began the Bell-song, the audience was ready to listen, and when she had concluded this air there was a demonstration.
But, the Countess reflected as she lighted a cigarette, that could not have been the most wonderful night. She paused for a moment. Only recently, she went on, one evening at the Scala, which is a music hall, the Princess Chimay and her . . . well, the gipsy musician Rigo for whom she left her husband . . . sat in a box to witness the skit upon their romance which was a scene in the revue. The spectators demanded that Rigo go on the stage to play his own part. When he refused there was a riot. The police were called in. I shall never know how I managed to reach my carriage. I was separated from my friends, dragged with the mob . . . She stopped suddenly. Ah! I had entirely forgotten, it was so long ago. I do know the most wonderful night of all. On the evening after Christmas one year, ever so long ago, the Duchesse de Portefin and I, on our way to join a late party, dropped into the Théâtre de la Porte St. Martin to see Sarah Bernhardt in Nana Sahib. Just as we were settled in our seats, it was announced that Marais, who played the title part, was indisposed, and that Jean Richepin, the author of the piece, and besides . . . the Countess braced herself and went through with it this time . . . Sarah's lover in private life, would take his place. The house was immediately plunged into an uproar of astonishment, curiosity, and amused comment. You may well believe that no one left the theatre to demand his money at the contrôle.
In the first scene Nana Sahib does not appear; so you can imagine with what impatience we followed its course. When the curtain rose on the second tableau, exposing Jean Richepin reclining on a nest of cushions, the audience shouted its admiration and approval. You see the young poet—he was young then—was an ideal realization of the half-savage type he had created and which, on this occasion, he was interpreting. Tall, dark, with black, curly hair, and piercing eyes the colour of ripe figs, a sardonic smile playing over his lips, he had only to appear to conquer the public. Then, of course, there was Sarah, heaven-defying in her passion; goddess-like in her tragic scenes. Richepin, the magnificent barbarian, did not attempt to act: he merely was Nana Sahib while Sarah was Djelma. They were being indiscreet in public, that was all. They had invited the world to witness one manifestation of their frank passion. . . .
I never heard anything so wonderful before in my life, Gareth exclaimed, enthusiastically.
The springtime of their romance was much talked about in Paris, the Countess continued in a kind of ecstasy. It began long before the scene in the theatre that I have been describing. Richepin had encountered Sarah, accompanied by her maid, in the street one night. Closing her in his arms, he had embraced her; she struck him . . . and so their love began.
And what happened after . . . after Nana Sahib? Gareth demanded eagerly.
After? The Countess sighed. Richepin tired of her, naturally. He sailed for Newfoundland, or was it Madagascar? Sarah's heart was broken . . . for a few months.
What a woman! Will I never see her? Gareth mused.
You must bear in mind, the Countess went on, that all this happened a long time ago. At the period of which I am speaking Sarah was more discussed than any one else in Paris. With what chic she wore her clothes! Her slimness was a myth! And what a voice! Now she is old. Paris is tired of her. Only this spring I saw her in La Samaritaine, Rostand's new play. She is no longer the same. Her voice has lost its golden quality. She will, no doubt, soon retire, and in the twentieth century new idols will arise.
Who is there, Gareth demanded, to take her place?
The Countess considered. Frankly, she said, nobody. Her place was unique, but there are many interesting actresses. There is Réjane, of course, but she is not much younger than Sarah. I saw her only last year in Porto-Riche's comedy, Amoureuse. Cécile Sorel, perhaps . . . Jane Hading . . . No, she is too cold. Eve Lavallière is delightful in comedy; Armande Cassive very funny in farce. But there is no one to take Sarah's place. The twentieth century will have to stagger along without a Bernhardt.
Gareth did not appear to be listening. After the Countess had finished speaking, he was silent for a moment before he said: I was thinking how different life is in Paris. People there seem to be able to be themselves, to do what they want to do, to live for love or whatever it is they want to live for.
It is quite true, the Countess replied, and I know what you are thinking about. Life is inverted here in Maple Valley. At first I couldn't understand it: everything seemed so queer. Everybody is' busy trying to conceal his vices or his amiable faults, or what others consider vices or amiable faults; one only tells the public how good one is, how intelligent, how charitable. These people . . . I feel I can speak frankly to you, Gareth . . . have their love affairs, you must be aware, just as we . . . just as people in Paris do . . . but they have them behind closed doors and make clothes for the orphan out in the open. It is quite the opposite where I come from. People there are generally kind, good at heart. They do wonderful things for one another, but secretly . . . while what here would be called their private life is all on the surface. Everybody knows about it, yet nobody cares. It is, the Countess added, the existence I prefer.
So would I! Gareth asserted fervently, but how will I ever be able to break away from this place?
That will come, the Countess assured him, laying her hand on his arm. In the meantime. . . . she withdrew her hand . . . let us enjoy ourselves here. Something will happen; you'll see. Something always does if you want it badly enough. We all get what we live for.
I've wanted, Gareth said, all my life to meet some one like you.
You see, the Countess responded, you wanted it, and you got your wish.
The sun was a flaming globe of fire descending behind the hills on the far bank of the river when they started back home. Again they paused at the top of the hill, which, in the late afternoon light seemed to be carpeted with orange and black. Suddenly, and at the same instant, they both became aware that they were not alone: reclining, their faces, just emerging from the tall grass, half-way down the hill, pressed together in the warmth of an embrace, the Countess and Gareth recognized Dr. Sinclair and Sarah Wiltbank.