The Nabob, Volume 2 | Page 4

the
threshold of the studio, suppressed his will and delivered him over, fast
bound and conquered, to the sentiment that he was firmly resolved to
combat.
* * * * *
It was evident that the dinner, a veritable gourmand's dinner,
superintended by the Austrian even in its least important details, had
been prepared for a guest of first-rate consequence. From the high
Berber chandeliers of carved wood, with seven branches, which shed a
flood of light upon the richly embroidered cloth, to the long-necked
wine-jugs of curious and exquisite shape, the sumptuous table
appointments and the delicacy of the dishes, which were highly
seasoned to an unusual degree, everything disclosed the importance of
the expected guest and the pains that had been taken to please him.
There was no mistaking the fact that it was an artist's establishment.
Little silverware, but superb china, perfect harmony without the
slightest attempt at arrangement. Old Rouen, pink Sèvres, Dutch glass
mounted in old finely-wrought pewter met on that table as on a stand of
rare objects collected by a connoisseur simply to gratify his taste. The
result was some slight confusion in the household, dependent as it was
upon the chance of a lucky find. The exquisite oil-cruet had no stopper.

The broken salt-cellar overflowed on the cloth, and every moment it
was: "What has become of the mustard-pot? What has happened to that
fork?" All of which troubled de Géry a little on account of the young
mistress of the house, who, for her part, was not in the least disturbed.
But something that made him even more ill at ease was his anxiety to
know who the privileged guest was whose place he had taken at that
table, whom they could entertain with such magnificence and at the
same time such utter lack of ceremony. In spite of everything he felt as
if that countermanded guest were present, a constant affront to his own
dignity. In vain did he try to forget him; everything reminded him of
him, even to the holiday attire of the kindly Fairy, who sat opposite him
and who still retained some of the grand manners which she had
assumed in anticipation of the solemn occasion. The thought disturbed
him, poisoned his joy in being there.
On the other hand, as is always the case in parties of two, where
harmony of mood is very rare, he had never seen Felicia so affectionate,
in such merry humor. She was in a state of effervescent, almost
childlike gayety, one of those fervent outbursts of emotion which one
experiences when some danger has passed, the reaction of a clear,
blazing fire after the excitement of a shipwreck. She laughed heartily,
teased Paul about his accent and what she called his bourgeois ideas.
"For you are shockingly bourgeois, you know. But that is just what I
like in you. It's on account of the contrast, I have no doubt, because I
was born under a bridge, in a gust of wind, that I have always been
fond of sedate, logical natures."
"Oh! my dear, what do you suppose Monsieur Paul will think, when
you say you were born under a bridge?" exclaimed the excellent
Crenmitz, who could not accustom herself to the exaggeration of
metaphors, and always took everything literally.
"Let him think what he pleases, my Fairy. We haven't our eye on him
for a husband. I am sure he would have none of that monster known as
an artist wife. He would think he had married the devil. You are quite
right, Minerva. Art is a despot. One must give oneself to it
unreservedly. You put into your work all the imagination, energy,

honesty, conscience that you possess, so that you have no more of any
of them as long as you live, and the completion of the work tosses you
adrift, helpless and without a compass, like a dismasted hulk, at the
mercy of every wave. Such a wife would be a melancholy acquisition."
"And yet," the young man ventured timidly to observe, "it seems to me
that art, however exacting it may be, cannot take entire possession of
the woman. What would she do with her affections, with the craving
for love, for self-sacrifice, which is in her, far more than in man, the
motive for every act?"
She mused a moment before replying.
"You may be right, O wise Minerva! It is the truth that there are days
when my life rings terribly hollow. I am conscious of holes in it,
unfathomable depths. Everything disappears that I throw in to fill them
up. My noblest artistic enthusiasms are swallowed up in them and die
every time in a sigh. At such times I think of marriage. A husband,
children, a lot of children, tumbling about the