"My friend Ladislaw thinks you will pardon me, sir, if I say that asketch of your head would be invaluable to me for the St. ThomasAquinas in my picture there. It is too much to ask; but I so seldom seejust what I want—the idealistic in the real."
"You astonish me greatly, sir," said Mr. Casaubon, his looksimproved with a glow of delight; "but if my poor physiognomy, which Ihave been accustomed to regard as of the commonest order, can be ofany use to you in furnishing some traits for the angelical doctor, I shallfeel honored. That is to say, if the operation will not be a lengthy one;and if Mrs. Casaubon will not object to the delay."
As for Dorothea, nothing could have pleased her more, unless it hadbeen a miraculous voice pronouncing Mr. Casaubon the wisest andworthiest among the sons of men. In that case her tottering faith wouldhave become firm again.
Naumann's apparatus was at hand in wonderful completeness, andthe sketch went on at once as well as the conversation. Dorothea satdown and subsided into calm silence, feeling happier than she had donefor a long while before. Every one about her seemed good, and she saidto herself that Rome, if she had only been less ignorant, would have beenfull of beauty its sadness would have been winged with hope. No naturecould be less suspicious than hers: when she was a child she believed inthe gratitude of wasps and the honorable susceptibility of sparrows, andwas proportionately indignant when their baseness was made manifest.
The adroit artist was asking Mr. Casaubon questions about Englishpolities, which brought long answers, and, Will meanwhile had perchedhimself on some steps in the background overlooking all.
Presently Naumann said—"Now if I could lay this by for half an hourand take it up again—come and look, Ladislaw—I think it is perfect sofar."
Will vented those adjuring interjections which imply that admirationis too strong for syntax; and Naumann said in a tone of piteous regret—
"Ah—now—if I could but have had more—but you have otherengagements—I could not ask it—or even to come again to-morrow."
"Oh, let us stay!" said Dorothea. "We have nothing to do to-dayexcept go about, have we?" she added, looking entreatingly at Mr.Casaubon. "It would be a pity not to make the head as good as possible."
"I am at your service, sir, in the matter," said Mr. Casaubon, withpolite condescension. "Having given up the interior of my head toidleness, it is as well that the exterior should work in this way."
"You are unspeakably good—now I am happy!" said Naumann, andthen went on in German to Will, pointing here and there to the sketch asif he were considering that. Putting it aside for a moment, he lookedround vaguely, as if seeking some occupation for his visitors, andafterwards turning to Mr. Casaubon, said—
"Perhaps the beautiful bride, the gracious lady, would not beunwilling to let me fill up the time by trying to make a slight sketch ofher—not, of course, as you see, for that picture—only as a single study."
Mr. Casaubon, bowing, doubted not that Mrs. Casaubon wouldoblige him, and Dorothea said, at once, "Where shall I put myself?"
Naumann was all apologies in asking her to stand, and allow him toadjust her attitude, to which she submitted without any of the affectedairs and laughs frequently thought necessary on such occasions, whenthe painter said, "It is as Santa Clara that I want you to stand—leaningso, with your cheek against your hand—so—looking at that stool, please,so!"
Will was divided between the inclination to fall at the Saint's feet andkiss her robe, and the temptation to knock Naumann down while he wasadjusting her arm. All this was impudence and desecration, and herepented that he had brought her.
The artist was diligent, and Will recovering himself moved about andoccupied Mr. Casaubon as ingeniously as he could; but he did not in theend prevent the time from seeming long to that gentleman, as was clearfrom his expressing a fear that Mrs. Casaubon would be tired. Naumanntook the hint and said—
"Now, sir, if you can oblige me again; I will release the lady-wife."
So Mr. Casaubon's patience held out further, and when after all itturned out that the head of Saint Thomas Aquinas would be more perfectif another sitting could be had, it was granted for the morrow. On themorrow Santa Clara too was retouched more than once. The result of allwas so far from displeasing to Mr. Casaubon, that he arranged for thepurchase of the picture in which Saint Thomas Aquinas sat among thedoctors of the Church in a disputation too abstract to be represented, butlistened to with more or less attention by an audience above. The SantaClara, which was spoken of in the second place, Naumann declaredhimself to be dissatisfied with—he could not, in conscience, engage tomake a worthy picture of it; so about the Santa Clara the arrangementwas conditional.
I will not dwell on Naumann's jokes at the expense of Mr. Casaubonthat evening, or on his dithyrambs about Dorothea's charm, in all whichWill joined, but with a difference. No sooner did Naumann mention anydetail of Dorothea's beauty, than Will got exasperated at hispresumption: there was grossness in his choice of the most ordinarywords, and what business had he to talk of her lips? She was not awoman to be spoken of as other women were. Will could not say justwhat he thought, but he became irritable. And yet, when after someresistance he had consented to take the Casaubons to his friend's studio,he had been allured by the gratification of his pride in being the personwho could grant Naumann such an opportunity of studying herloveliness—or rather her divineness, for the ordinary phrases whichmight apply to mere bodily prettiness were not applicable to her.(Certainly all Tipton and its neighborhood, as well as Dorothea herself,would have been surprised at her beauty being made so much of. In thatpart of the world Miss Brooke had been only a "fine young woman.")
"Oblige me by letting the subject drop, Naumann. Mrs. Casaubon isnot to be talked of as if she were a model," said Will. Naumann stared athim.
"Schon! I will talk of my Aquinas. The head is not a bad type, afterall. I dare say the great scholastic himself would have been flattered tohave his portrait asked for. Nothing like these starchy doctors for vanity!It was as I thought: he cared much less for her portrait than his own." "He's a cursed white-blooded pedantic coxcomb," said Will, withgnashing impetuosity. His obligations to Mr. Casaubon were not knownto his hearer, but Will himself was thinking of them, and wishing that hecould discharge them all by a check.
Naumann gave a shrug and said, "It is good they go away soon, mydear. They are spoiling your fine temper."
All Will's hope and contrivance were now concentrated on seeingDorothea when she was alone. He only wanted her to take moreemphatic notice of him; he only wanted to be something more special inher remembrance than he could yet believe himself likely to be. He wasrather impatient under that open ardent good-will, reach he saw was herusual state of feeling. The remote worship of a woman throned out oftheir reach plays a great part in men's lives, but in most cases theworshipper longs for some queenly recognition, some approving sign bywhich his soul's sovereign may cheer him without descending from herhigh place. That was precisely what Will wanted. But there were plentyof contradictions in his imaginative demands. It was beautiful to see howDorothea's eyes turned with wifely anxiety and beseeching to Mr.Casaubon: she would have lost some of her halo if she had been withoutthat duteous preoccupation; and yet at the next moment the husband'ssandy absorption of such nectar was too intolerable; and Will's longing tosay damaging things about him was perhaps not the less tormentingbecause he felt the strongest reasons for restraining it.
Will had not been invited to dine the next day. Hence he persuadedhimself that he was bound to call, and that the only eligible time was themiddle of the day, when Mr. Casaubon would not be at home.
Dorothea, who had not been made aware that her former receptionof Will had displeased her husband, had no hesitation about seeing him,especially as he might be come to pay a farewell visit. When he enteredshe was looking at some cameos which she had been buying for Celia.She greeted Will as if his visit were quite a matter of course, and said atonce, having a cameo bracelet in her hand—
"I am so glad you are come. Perhaps you understand all aboutcameos, and can tell me if these are really good. I wished to have youwith us in choosing them, but Mr. Casaubon objected: he thought therewas not time. He will finish his work to-morrow, and we shall go away inthree days. I have been uneasy about these cameos. Pray sit down andlook at them."
"I am not particularly knowing, but there can be no great mistakeabout these little Homeric bits: they are exquisitely neat. And the color isfine: it will just suit you."
"Oh, they are for my sister, who has quite a different complexion.You saw her with me at Lowick: she is light-haired and very pretty—atleast I think so. We were never so long away from each other in our livesbefore. She is a great pet and never was naughty in her life. I found outbefore I came away that she wanted me to buy her some cameos, and Ishould be sorry for them not to be good—after their kind." Dorotheaadded the last words with a smile.
"You seem not to care about cameos," said Will, seating himself atsome distance from her, and observing her while she closed the cases.
"No, frankly, I don't think them a great object in life," said Dorothea
"I fear you are a heretic about art generally. How is that? I shouldhave expected you to be very sensitive to the beautiful everywhere."
"I suppose I am dull about many things," said Dorothea, simply. "Ishould like to make life beautiful—I mean everybody's life. And then allthis immense expense of art, that seems somehow to lie outside life andmake it no better for the world, pains one. It spoils my enjoyment ofanything when I am made to think that most people are shut out fromit."
"I call that the fanaticism of sympathy," said Will, impetuously. "Youmight say the same of landscape, of poetry, of all refinement. If youcarried it out you ought to be miserable in your own goodness, and turnevil that you might have no advantage over others. The best piety is toenjoy—when you can. You are doing the most then to save the earth'scharacter as an agreeable planet. And enjoyment radiates. It is of no useto try and take care of all the world; that is being taken care of when youfeel delight—in art or in anything else. Would you turn all the youth ofthe world into a tragic chorus, wailing and moralizing over misery? Isuspect that you have some false belief in the virtues of misery, andwant to make your life a martyrdom." Will had gone further than heintended, and checked himself. But Dorothea's thought was not takingjust the same direction as his own, and she answered without any specialemotion—
"Indeed you mistake me. I am not a sad, melancholy creature. I amnever unhappy long together. I am angry and naughty—not like Celia: Ihave a great outburst, and then all seems glorious again. I cannot helpbelieving in glorious things in a blind sort of way. I should be quitewilling to enjoy the art here, but there is so much that I don't know thereason of—so much that seems to me a consecration of ugliness ratherthan beauty. The painting and sculpture may be wonderful, but thefeeling is often low and brutal, and sometimes even ridiculous. Here andthere I see what takes me at once as noble—something that I mightcompare with the Alban Mountains or the sunset from the Pincian Hill;but that makes it the greater pity that there is so little of the best kindamong all that mass of things over which men have toiled so."
"Of course there is always a great deal of poor work: the rarer thingswant that soil to grow in."
"Oh dear," said Dorothea, taking up that thought into the chiefcurrent of her anxiety; "I see it must be very difficult to do anythinggood. I have often felt since I have been in Rome that most of our liveswould look much uglier and more bungling than the pictures, if theycould be put on the wall."
Dorothea parted her lips again as if she were going to say more, butchanged her mind and paused.
"You are too young—it is an anachronism for you to have suchthoughts," said Will, energetically, with a quick shake of the headhabitual to him. "You talk as if you had never known any youth. It ismonstrous—as if you had had a vision of Hades in your childhood, likethe boy in the legend. You have been brought up in some of thosehorrible notions that choose the sweetest women to devour—likeMinotaurs And now you will go and be shut up in that stone prison atLowick: you will be buried alive. It makes me savage to think of it! Iwould rather never have seen you than think of you with such aprospect."
Will again feared that he had gone too far; but the meaning weattach to words depends on our feeling, and his tone of angry regret hadso much kindness in it for Dorothea's heart, which had always beengiving out ardor and had never been fed with much from the livingbeings around her, that she felt a new sense of gratitude and answeredwith a gentle smile—
"It is very good of you to be anxious about me. It is because you didnot like Lowick yourself: you had set your heart on another kind of life.But Lowick is my chosen home."
The last sentence was spoken with an almost solemn cadence, andWill did not know what to say, since it would not be useful for him toembrace her slippers, and tell her that he would die for her: it was clearthat she required nothing of the sort; and they were both silent for amoment or two, when Dorothea began again with an air of saying at lastwhat had been in her mind beforehand.
"I wanted to ask you again about something you said the other day.Perhaps it was half of it your lively way of speaking: I notice that youlike to put things strongly; I myself often exaggerate when I speakhastily."
"What was it?" said Will, observing that she spoke with a timidityquite new in her. "I have a hyperbolical tongue: it catches fire as it goes.I dare say I shall have to retract."
"I mean what you said about the necessity of knowing German—Imean, for the subjects that Mr. Casaubon is engaged in. I have beenthinking about it; and it seems to me that with Mr. Casaubon's learninghe must have before him the same materials as German scholars—has henot?" Dorothea's timidity was due to an indistinct consciousness that shewas in the strange situation of consulting a third person about theadequacy of Mr. Casaubon's learning.
