CHAPTER XIX.
THE CLEOPATRA.
My stay at La Terrasse was prolonged a fortnight beyond the close of the vacation. Mrs. Bretton’s kind management procured1 me this respite2. Her son having one day delivered the dictum that “Lucy was not yet strong enough to go back to that den3 of a pensionnat,” she at once drove over to the Rue4 Fossette, had an interview with the directress, and procured the indulgence, on the plea of prolonged rest and change being necessary to perfect recovery. Hereupon, however, followed an attention I could very well have dispensed5 with, viz.—a polite call from Madame Beck.
That lady—one fine day—actually came out in a fiacre as far as the château7. I suppose she had resolved within herself to see what manner of place Dr. John inhabited. Apparently8, the pleasant site and neat interior surpassed her expectations; she eulogized all she saw, pronounced the blue salon9 “une pièce magnifique,” profusely10 congratulated me on the acquisition of friends, “tellement dignes, aimables, et respectables,” turned also a neat compliment in my favour, and, upon Dr. John coming in, ran up to him with the utmost buoyancy, opening at the same time such a fire of rapid language, all sparkling with felicitations and protestations about his “château,”—“madame sa mère11, la digne châtelaine:” also his looks; which, indeed, were very flourishing, and at the moment additionally embellished12 by the good-natured but amused smile with which he always listened to Madame’s fluent and florid French. In short, Madame shone in her very best phase that day, and came in and went out quite a living catherine-wheel of compliments, delight, and affability. Half purposely, and half to ask some question about school-business, I followed her to the carriage, and looked in after she was seated and the door closed. In that brief fraction of time what a change had been wrought13! An instant ago, all sparkles and jests, she now sat sterner than a judge and graver than a sage14. Strange little woman!
I went back and teased Dr. John about Madame’s devotion to him. How he laughed! What fun shone in his eyes as he recalled some of her fine speeches, and repeated them, imitating her voluble delivery! He had an acute sense of humour, and was the finest company in the world—when he could forget Miss Fanshawe.
To “sit in sunshine calm and sweet” is said to be excellent for weak people; it gives them vital force. When little Georgette Beck was recovering from her illness, I used to take her in my arms and walk with her in the garden by the hour together, beneath a certain wall hung with grapes, which the Southern sun was ripening15: that sun cherished her little pale frame quite as effectually as it mellowed16 and swelled17 the clustering fruit.
There are human tempers, bland18, glowing, and genial19, within whose influence it is as good for the poor in spirit to live, as it is for the feeble in frame to bask20 in the glow of noon. Of the number of these choice natures were certainly both Dr. Bretton’s and his mother’s. They liked to communicate happiness, as some like to occasion misery21: they did it instinctively22; without fuss, and apparently with little consciousness; the means to give pleasure rose spontaneously in their minds. Every day while I stayed with them, some little plan was proposed which resulted in beneficial enjoyment. Fully occupied as was Dr. John’s time, he still made it in his way to accompany us in each brief excursion. I can hardly tell how he managed his engagements; they were numerous, yet by dint23 of system, he classed them in an order which left him a daily period of liberty. I often saw him hard-worked, yet seldom over-driven, and never irritated, confused, or oppressed. What he did was accomplished24 with the ease and grace of all-sufficing strength; with the bountiful cheerfulness of high and unbroken energies. Under his guidance I saw, in that one happy fortnight, more of Villette, its environs, and its inhabitants, than I had seen in the whole eight months of my previous residence. He took me to places of interest in the town, of whose names I had not before so much as heard; with willingness and spirit he communicated much noteworthy information. He never seemed to think it a trouble to talk to me, and, I am sure, it was never a task to me to listen. It was not his way to treat subjects coldly and vaguely26; he rarely generalized, never prosed. He seemed to like nice details almost as much as I liked them myself: he seemed observant of character: and not superficially observant, either. These points gave the quality of interest to his discourse27; and the fact of his speaking direct from his own resources, and not borrowing or stealing from books—here a dry fact, and there a trite28 phrase, and elsewhere a hackneyed opinion—ensured a freshness, as welcome as it was rare. Before my eyes, too, his disposition29 seemed to unfold another phase; to pass to a fresh day: to rise in new and nobler dawn.
His mother possessed30 a good development of benevolence31, but he owned a better and larger. I found, on accompanying him to the Basse-Ville—the poor and crowded quarter of the city—that his errands there were as much those of the philanthropist as the physician. I understood presently that cheerfully, habitually32, and in single-minded unconsciousness of any special merit distinguishing his deeds—he was achieving, amongst a very wretched population, a world of active good. The lower orders liked him well; his poor patients in the hospitals welcomed him with a sort of enthusiasm.
But stop—I must not, from the faithful narrator, degenerate33 into the partial eulogist. Well, full well, do I know that Dr. John was not perfect, any more than I am perfect. Human fallibility leavened34 him throughout: there was no hour, and scarcely a moment of the time I spent with him that in act or speech, or look, he did not betray something that was not of a god. A god could not have the cruel vanity of Dr. John, nor his sometime levity35. No immortal36 could have resembled him in his occasional temporary oblivion of all but the present—in his passing passion for that present; shown not coarsely, by devoting it to material indulgence, but selfishly, by extracting from it whatever it could yield of nutriment to his masculine self-love: his delight was to feed that ravenous37 sentiment, without thought of the price of provender39, or care for the cost of keeping it sleek40 and high-pampered.
The reader is requested to note a seeming contradiction in the two views which have been given of Graham Bretton—the public and private—the out-door and the in-door view. In the first, the public, he is shown oblivious41 of self; as modest in the display of his energies, as earnest in their exercise. In the second, the fireside picture, there is expressed consciousness of what he has and what he is; pleasure in homage42, some recklessness in exciting, some vanity in receiving the same. Both portraits are correct.
It was hardly possible to oblige Dr. John quietly and in secret. When you thought that the fabrication of some trifle dedicated43 to his use had been achieved unnoticed, and that, like other men, he would use it when placed ready for his use, and never ask whence it came, he amazed you by a smilingly-uttered observation or two, proving that his eye had been on the work from commencement to close: that he had noted44 the design, traced its progress, and marked its completion. It pleased him to be thus served, and he let his pleasure beam in his eye and play about his mouth.
This would have been all very well, if he had not added to such kindly45 and unobtrusive evidence a certain wilfulness46 in discharging what he called debts. When his mother worked for him, he paid her by showering about her his bright animal spirits, with even more affluence47 than his gay, taunting48, teasing, loving wont49. If Lucy Snowe were discovered to have put her hand to such work, he planned, in recompence, some pleasant recreation.
I often felt amazed at his perfect knowledge of Villette; a knowledge not merely confined to its open streets, but penetrating50 to all its galleries, salles, and cabinets: of every door which shut in an object worth seeing, of every museum, of every hall, sacred to art or science, he seemed to possess the “Open! Sesame.” I never had a head for science, but an ignorant, blind, fond instinct inclined me to art. I liked to visit the picture-galleries, and I dearly liked to be left there alone. In company, a wretched idiosyncracy forbade me to see much or to feel anything. In unfamiliar51 company, where it was necessary to maintain a flow of talk on the subjects in presence, half an hour would knock me up, with a combined pressure of physical lassitude and entire mental incapacity. I never yet saw the well-reared child, much less the educated adult, who could not put me to shame, by the sustained intelligence of its demeanour under the ordeal52 of a conversable, sociable53 visitation of pictures, historical sights or buildings, or any lions of public interest. Dr. Bretton was a cicerone after my own heart; he would take me betimes, ere the galleries were filled, leave me there for two or three hours, and call for me when his own engagements were discharged. Meantime, I was happy; happy, not always in admiring, but in examining, questioning, and forming conclusions. In the commencement of these visits, there was some misunderstanding and consequent struggle between Will and Power. The former faculty55 exacted approbation56 of that which it was considered orthodox to admire; the latter groaned57 forth58 its utter inability to pay the tax; it was then self-sneered at, spurred up, goaded59 on to refine its taste, and whet60 its zest61. The more it was chidden, however, the more it wouldn’t praise. Discovering gradually that a wonderful sense of fatigue62 resulted from these conscientious63 efforts, I began to reflect whether I might not dispense6 with that great labour, and concluded eventually that I might, and so sank supine into a luxury of calm before ninety-nine out of a hundred of the exhibited frames.
It seemed to me that an original and good picture was just as scarce as an original and good book; nor did I, in the end, tremble to say to myself, standing54 before certain chef-d’œuvres bearing great names, “These are not a whit64 like nature. Nature’s daylight never had that colour: never was made so turbid65, either by storm or cloud, as it is laid out there, under a sky of indigo66: and that indigo is not ether; and those dark weeds plastered upon it are not trees.” Several very well executed and complacent-looking fat women struck me as by no means the goddesses they appeared to consider themselves. Many scores of marvellously-finished little Flemish pictures, and also of sketches67, excellent for fashion-books displaying varied68 costumes in the handsomest materials, gave evidence of laudable industry whimsically applied69. And yet there were fragments of truth here and there which satisfied the conscience, and gleams of light that cheered the vision. Nature’s power here broke through in a mountain snow-storm; and there her glory in a sunny southern day. An expression in this portrait proved clear insight into character; a face in that historical painting, by its vivid filial likeness70, startlingly reminded you that genius gave it birth. These exceptions I loved: they grew dear as friends.
One day, at a quiet early hour, I found myself nearly alone in a certain gallery, wherein one particular picture of portentous71 size, set up in the best light, having a cordon72 of protection stretched before it, and a cushioned bench duly set in front for the accommodation73 of worshipping connoisseurs74, who, having gazed themselves off their feet, might be fain to complete the business sitting: this picture, I say, seemed to consider itself the queen of the collection.
It represented a woman, considerably76 larger, I thought, than the life. I calculated that this lady, put into a scale of magnitude, suitable for the reception of a commodity of bulk77, would infallibly turn from fourteen to sixteen stone. She was, indeed, extremely well fed: very much butcher’s meat—to say nothing of bread, vegetables, and liquids—must she have consumed to attain78 that breadth and height, that wealth of muscle, that affluence of flesh. She lay half-reclined on a couch: why, it would be difficult to say; broad daylight blazed round her; she appeared in hearty79 health, strong enough to
