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CHAPTER VII
Agatha was at this time in her seventeenth year. She had a lively
perception of the foibles of others, and no reverence for her
seniors, whom she thought dull, cautious, and ridiculously
amenable by commonplaces. But she was subject to the illusion
which disables youth in spite of its superiority to age. She
thought herself an exception. Crediting Mr. Jansenius and the
general mob of mankind with nothing but a grovelling
consciousness of some few material facts, she felt in herself an
exquisite sense and all-embracing conception of nature, shared
only by her favorite poets and heroes of romance and history.
Hence she was in the common youthful case of being a much better
judge of other people's affairs than of her own. At the
fellow-student who adored some Henry or Augustus, not from the
drivelling sentimentality which the world calls love, but because
this particular Henry or Augustus was a phoenix to whom the laws
that govern the relations of ordinary lads and lasses did not
apply, Agatha laughed in her sleeve. The more she saw of this
weakness in her fellows, the more satisfied she was that, being
forewarned, she was also forearmed against an attack of it on
herself, much as if a doctor were to conclude that he could not
catch smallpox because he had seen many cases of it; or as if a
master mariner, knowing that many ships are wrecked in the
British channel, should venture there without a pilot, thinking
that he knew its perils too well to run any risk of them. Yet, as
the doctor might hold such an opinion if he believed himself to
be constituted differently from ordinary men; or the shipmaster
adopt such a course under the impression that his vessel was a
star, Agatha found false security in the subjective difference
between her fellows seen from without and herself known from
within. When, for instance, she fell in love with Mr. Jefferson
Smilash (a step upon which she resolved the day after the storm),
her imagination invested the pleasing emotion with a sacredness
which, to her, set it far apart and distinct from the frivolous
fancies of which Henry and Augustus had been the subject, and she
the confidant.
"I can look at him quite coolly and dispassionately," she said to
herself. "Though his face has a strange influence that must, I
know, correspond to some unexplained power within me, yet it is
not a perfect face. I have seen many men who are, strictly
speaking, far handsomer. If the light that never was on sea or
land is in his eyes, yet they are not pretty eyes--not half so
clear as mine. Though he wears his common clothes with a nameless
grace that betrays his true breeding at every step, yet he is not
tall, dark, and melancholy, as my ideal hero would be if I were
as great a fool as girls of my age usually are. If I am in love,
I have sense enough not to let my love blind my judgment."
She did not tell anyone of her new interest in life. Strongest in
that student community, she had used her power with good-nature
enough to win the popularity of a school leader, and occasionally
with unscrupulousness enough to secure the privileges of a school
bully. Popularity and privilege, however, only satisfied her when
she was in the mood for them. Girls, like men, want to be petted,
pitied, and made much of, when they are diffident, in low
spirits, or in unrequited love. These are services which the weak
cannot render to the strong and which the strong will not render
to the weak, except when there is also a difference of sex.
Agatha knew by experience that though a weak woman cannot
understand why her stronger sister should wish to lean upon her,
she may triumph in the fact without understanding it, and give
chaff instead of consolation. Agatha wanted to be understood and
not to be chaffed. Finding herself unable to satisfy both these
conditions, she resolved to do without sympathy and to hold her
tongue. She had often had to do so before, and she was helped on
this occasion by a sense of the ridiculous appearance her passion
might wear in the vulgar eye. Her secret kept itself, as she was
supposed in the college to be insensible to the softer emotions.
Love wrought no external change upon her. It made her believe
that she had left her girlhood behind her and was now a woman
with a newly-developed heart capacity at which she would
childishly have scoffed a little while before. She felt ashamed
of the bee on the window pane, although it somehow buzzed as
frequently as before in spite of her. Her calendar, formerly a
monotonous cycle of class times, meal times, play times, and bed
time, was now irregularly divided by walks past the chalet and
accidental glimpses of its tenant.
Early in December came a black frost, and navigation on the canal
was suspended. Wickens's boy was sent to the college with news
that Wickens's pond would bear, and that the young ladies should
be welcome at any time. The pond was only four feet deep, and as
Miss Wilson set much store by the physical education of her
pupils, leave was given for skating. Agatha, who was expert on
the ice, immediately proposed that a select party should go out
before breakfast next morning. Actions not in themselves virtuous
often appear so when performed at hours that compel early rising,
and some of the candidates for the Cambridge Local, who would not
have sacrificed the afternoon to amusement, at once fell in with
her suggestion. But for them it might never have been carried
out; for when they summoned Agatha, at half-past six next
morning, to leave her warm bed and brave the biting air, she
would have refused without hesitation had she not been shamed
into compliance by these laborious ones who stood by her bedside,
blue-nosed and hungry, but ready for the ice. When she had
dressed herself with much shuddering and chattering, they allayed
their internal discomfort by a slender meal of biscuits, got
their skates, and went out across the rimy meadows, past patient
cows breathing clouds of steam, to Wickens's pond. Here, to their
surprise, was Smilash, on electro-plated acme skates, practicing
complicated figures with intense diligence. It soon appeared that
his skill came short of his ambition; for, after several narrow
escapes and some frantic staggering, his calves, elbows, and
occiput smote the ice almost simultaneously. On rising ruefully
to a sitting posture he became aware that eight young ladies were
watching his proceedings with interest.
"This comes of a common man putting himself above his station by
getting into gentlemen's skates," he said. "Had I been content
with a humble slide, as my fathers was, I should ha' been a
happier man at the present moment." He sighed, rose, touched his
hat to Miss Ward, and took off his skates, adding: "Good-morning,
Miss. Miss Wilson sent me word to be here sharp at six to put on
the young ladies' skates, and I took the liberty of trying a
figure or two to keep out the cold."
"Miss Wilson did not tell me that she ordered you to come," said
Miss Ward.
"Just like her to be thoughtful and yet not let on to be! She is
a kind lady, and a learned--like yourself, Miss. Sit yourself
down on the camp-stool. and give me your heel, if I may be so
bold as to stick a gimlet into it."
His assistance was welcome, and Miss Ward allowed him to put on
her skates. She was a Canadian, and could skate well. Jane, the
first to follow her, was anxious as to the strength of the ice;
but when reassured, she acquitted herself admirably, for she was
proficient in outdoor exercises, and had the satisfaction of
laughing in the field at those who laughed at her in the study.
Agatha, contrary to her custom, gave way to her companions, and
her boots were the last upon which Smilash operated.
"How d'you do, Miss Wylie?" he said, dropping the Smilash manner
now that the rest were out of earshot.
"I am very well, thank you," said Agatha, shy and constrained.
This phase of her being new to him, he paused with her heel in
his hand and looked up at her curiously. She collected herself,
returned his gaze steadily, and said: "How did Miss Wilson send
you word to come? She only knew of our party at half-past nine
last night."
"Miss Wilson did not send for me."
"But you have just told Miss Ward that she did."
"Yes. I find it necessary to tell almost as many lies now that I
am a simple laborer as I did when I was a gentleman. More, in
fact."
"I shall know how much to believe of what you say in the future."
"The truth is this. I am perhaps the worst skater in the world,
and therefore, according to a natural law, I covet the faintest
distinction on the ice more than immortal fame for the things in
which nature has given me aptitude to excel. I envy that large
friend of yours--Jane is her name, I think--more than I envy
Plato. I came down here this morning, thinking that the skating
world was all a-bed, to practice in secret."
"I am glad we caught you at it," said Agatha maliciously, for he
was disappointing her. She wanted him to be heroic in his
conversation; and he would not.
"I suppose so," he replied. "I have observed that Woman's dearest
delight is to wound Man's self-conceit, though Man's dearest
delight is to gratify hers. There is at least one creature lower
than Man. Now, off with you. Shall I hold you until your ankles
get firm?"
"Thank you," she said, disgusted: "_I_ can skate pretty well, and
I don't think you could give me any useful assistance." And she
went off cautiously, feeling that a mishap would be very
disgraceful after such a speech.
He stood on the shore, listening to the grinding, swaying sound
of the skates, and watching the growing complexity of the curves
they were engraving on the ice. As the girls grew warm and
accustomed to the exercise they laughed, jested, screamed
recklessly when they came into collision, and sailed before the
wind down the whole length of the pond at perilous speed. The
more animated they became, the gloomier looked Smilash. "Not
two-penn'orth of choice between them and a parcel of puppies," he
said; "except that some of them are conscious that there is a man
looking at them, although he is only a blackguard laborer. They
remind me of Henrietta in a hundred ways. Would I laugh, now, if
the whole sheet of ice were to burst into little bits under
them?"
Just then the ice cracked with a startling report, and the
skaters, except Jane, skimmed away in all directions.
"You are breaking the ice to pieces, Jane," said Agatha, calling
from a safe distance. "How can you expect it to bear your
weight?"
"Pack of fools!" retorted Jane indignantly. "The noise only shows
how strong it is."
The shock which the report had given Smilash answered him his
question. "Make a note that wishes for the destruction of the
human race, however rational and sincere, are contrary to
nature," he said, recovering his spirits. "Besides, what a
precious fool I should be if I were working at an international
association of creatures only fit for destruction! Hi, lady! One
word, Miss!" This was to Miss Ward, who had skated into his
neighborhood. "It bein' a cold morning, and me havin' a poor and
common circulation, would it be looked on as a liberty if I was
to cut a slide here or take a turn in the corner all to myself?"
"You may skate over there if you wish," she said, after a pause
for consideration, pointing to a deserted spot at the leeward end
of the pond, where the ice was too rough for comfortable skating.
"Nobly spoke!" he cried, with a grin, hurrying to the place
indicated, where, skating being out of the question, he made a
pair of slides, and gravely exercised himself upon them until his
face glowed and his fingers tingled in the frosty air. The time
passed quickly; when Miss Ward sent for him to take off her
skates there was a general groan and declaration that it could
not possibly be half-past eight o'clock yet. Smilash knelt before
the camp-stool, and was presently busy unbuckling and unscrewing.
When Jane's turn came, the camp-stool creaked beneath her weight.
Agatha again remonstrated with her, but immediately reproached
herself with flippancy before Smilash, to whom she wished to
convey an impression of deep seriousness of character.
"Smallest foot of the lot," he said critically, holding Jane's
foot between his finger and thumb as if it were an art treasure
which he had been invited to examine. "And belonging to the
finest built lady."
Jane snatched away her foot, blushed, and said:
"Indeed! What next, I wonder?"
"T'other 'un next," he said, setting to work on the remaining
skate. When it was off, he looked up at her, and she darted a
glance at him as she rose which showed that his compliment (her
feet were, in fact, small and pretty) was appreciated.
"Allow me, Miss," he said to Gertrude, who was standing on one
leg, leaning on Agatha, and taking off her own skates.
"No, thank you," she said coldly. "I don't need your assistance."
"I am well aware that the offer was overbold," he replied, with a
self-complacency that made his profession of humility
exasperating. "If all the skates is off, I will, by Miss Wilson's
order, carry them and the camp-stool back to the college."
Miss Ward handed him her skates and turned away. Gertrude placed
hers on the stool and went with Miss Ward. The rest followed,
leaving him to stare at the heap of skates and consider how he
should carry them. He could think of no better plan than to
interlace the straps and hang them in a chain over his shoulder.
By the time he had done this the young ladies were out of sight,
and his intention of enjoying their society during the return to
the college was defeated. They had entered the building long
before he came in sight of it.
Somewhat out of conceit with his folly, he went to the servants'
entrance and rang the bell there. When the door was opened, he
saw Miss Ward standing behind the maid who admitted him.
"Oh," she said, looking at the string of skates as if she had
hardly expected to see them again, "so you have brought our
things back?"
"Such were my instructions," he said, taken aback by her manner.
"You had no instructions. What do you mean by getting our skates
into your charge under false pretences? I was about to send the
police to take them from you. How dare you tell me that you were
sent to wait on me, when you know very well that you were nothing
of the sort?"
"I couldn't help it, Miss," he replied submissively. "I am a
natural born liar--always was. I know that it must appear
dreadful to you that never told a lie, and don't hardly know what
a lie is, belonging as you do to a class where none is ever told.
But common people like me tells lies just as a duck swims. I ask
your pardon, Miss, most humble, and I hope the young ladies'll be
able to tell one set of skates from t'other; for I'm blest if I
can."
"Put them down. Miss Wilson wishes to speak to you before you go.
Susan, show him the way."
"Hope you ain't been and got a poor cove into trouble, Miss?"
"Miss Wilson knows how you have behaved."
He smiled at her benevolently and followed Susan upstairs. On
their way they met Jane, who stole a glance at him, and was about
to pass by, when he said:
"Won't you say a word to Miss Wilson for a poor common fellow,
honored young lady? I have got into dreadful trouble for having
made bold to assist you this morning."
"You needn't give yourself the pains to talk like that," replied
Jane in an impetuous whisper. "We all know that you're only
pretending."
"Well, you can guess my motive," he whispered, looking tenderly
at her.
"Such stuff and nonsense! I never heard of such a thing in my
life," said Jane, and ran away, plainly understanding that he had
disguised himself in order to obtain admission to the college and
enjoy the happiness of looking at her.
"Cursed fool that I am!" he said to himself; "I cannot act like a
rational creature for five consecutive minutes."
The servant led him to the study and announced, "The man, if you
please, ma'am."
"Jeff Smilash," he added in explanation.
"Come in," said Miss Wilson sternly.
He went in, and met the determined frown which she cast on him
from her seat behind the writing table, by saying courteously:
"Good-morning, Miss Wilson."
She bent forward involuntarily, as if to receive a gentleman.
Then she checked herself and looked implacable.
"I have to apologize," he said, "for making use of your name
unwarrantably this morning--telling a lie, in fact. I happened to
be skating when the young ladies came down, and as they needed
some assistance which they would hardly have accepted from a
common man--excuse my borrowing that tiresome expression from our
acquaintance Smilash--I set their minds at ease by saying that
you had sent for me. Otherwise, as you have given me a bad
character--though not worse than I deserve--they would probably
have refused to employ me, or at least I should have been
compelled to accept payment, which I, of course, do not need."
Miss Wilson affected surprise. "I do not understand you," she
said.
"Not altogether," he said smiling. "But you understand that I am
what is called a gentleman."
"No. The gentlemen with whom I am conversant do not dress as you
dress, nor speak as you speak, nor act as you act."
He looked at her, and her countenance confirmed the hostility of
her tone. He instantly relapsed into an aggravated phase of
Smilash.
"I will no longer attempt to set myself up as a gentleman," he
said. "I am a common man, and your ladyship's hi recognizes me as
such and is not to be deceived. But don't go for to say that I am
not candid when I am as candid as ever you will let me be. What
fault, if any, do you find with my putting the skates on the
young ladies, and carryin' the campstool for them?"
"If you are a gentleman," said Miss Wilson, reddening, "your
conduct in persisting in these antics in my presence is insulting
to me. Extremely so."
"Miss Wilson," he replied, unruffled, "if you insist on Smilash,
you shall have Smilash; I take an insane pleasure in personating
him. If you want Sidney--my real Christian name--you can command
him. But allow me to say that you must have either one or the
other. If you become frank with me, I will understand that you
are addressing Sidney. If distant and severe, Smilash."
"No matter what your name may be," said Miss Wilson, much
annoyed, "I forbid you to come here or to hold any communication
whatever with the young ladies in my charge."
"Why?"
"Because I choose."
"There is much force in that reason, Miss Wilson; but it is not
moral force in the sense conveyed by your college prospectus,
which I have read with great interest."
Miss Wilson, since her quarrel with Agatha, had been sore on the
subject of moral force. "No one is admitted here," she said,
"without a trustworthy introduction or recommendation. A disguise
is not a satisfactory substitute for either."
"Disguises are generally assumed for the purpose of concealing
crime," he remarked sententiously.
"Precisely so," she said emphatically.
"Therefore, I bear, to say the least, a doubtful character.
Nevertheless, I have formed with some of the students here a
slight acquaintance, of which, it seems, you disapprove. You have
given me no good reason why I should discontinue that
acquaintance, and you cannot control me except by your wish--a
sort of influence not usually effective with doubtful characters.
Suppose I disregard your wish, and that one or two of your pupils
come to you and say: 'Miss Wilson, in our opinion Smilash is an
excellent fellow; we find his conversation most improving. As it
is your principle to allow us to exercise our own judgment, we
intend to cultivate the acquaintance of Smilash.' How will you
act in that case?"
"Send them home to their parents at once."
"I see that your principles are those of the Church of England.
You allow the students the right of private judgment on condition
that they arrive at the same conclusions as you. Excuse my saying
that the principles of the Church of England, however excellent,
are not those your prospectus led me to hope for. Your plan is
coercion, stark and simple."
"I do not admit it," said Miss Wilson, ready to argue, even with
Smilash, in defence of her system. "The girls are quite at
liberty to act as they please, but I reserve my equal liberty to
exclude them from my college if I do not approve of their
behavior."
"Just so. In most schools children are perfectly at liberty to
learn their lessons or not, just as they please; but the
principal reserves an equal liberty to whip them if they cannot
repeat their tasks."
"I do not whip my pupils," said Miss Wilson indignantly. "The
comparison is an outrage."
"But you expel them; and, as they are devoted to you and to the
place, expulsion is a dreaded punishment. Yours is the old system
of making laws and enforcing them by penalties, and the
superiority of Alton College to other colleges is due, not to any
difference of system, but to the comparative reasonableness of
its laws and the mildness and judgment with which they are
enforced."
"My system is radically different from the old one. However, I
will not discuss the matter with you. A mind occupied with the
prejudices of the old coercive despotism can naturally only see
in the new a modification of the old, instead of, as my system
is, an entire reversal or abandonment of it."
He shook his head sadly and said: "You seek to impose your ideas
on others, ostracizing those who reject them. Believe me, mankind
has been doing nothing else ever since it began to pay some
attention to ideas. It has been said that a benevolent despotism
is the best possible form of government. I do not believe that
saying, because I believe another one to the effect that hell is
paved with benevolence, which most people, the proverb being too
deep for them, misinterpret as unfulfilled intentions. As if a
benevolent despot might not by any error of judgment destroy his
kingdom, and then say, like Romeo when he got his friend killed,
'I thought all for the best!' Excuse my rambling. I meant to say,
in short, that though you are benevolent and judicious you are
none the less a despot."
Miss Wilson, at a loss for a reply, regretted that she had not,
before letting him gain so far on her, dismissed him summarily
instead of tolerating a discussion which she did not know how to
end with dignity. He relieved her by adding unexpectedly:
"Your system was the cause of my absurd marriage. My wife
acquired a degree of culture and reasonableness from her training
here which made her seem a superior being among the chatterers
who form the female seasoning in ordinary society. I admired her
dark eyes, and was only too glad to seize the excuse her
education offered me for believing her a match for me in mind as
well as in body."
Miss Wilson, astonished, determined to tell him coldly that her
time was valuable. But curiosity took possession of her in the
act of utterance, and the words that came were, "Who was she?"
"Henrietta Jansenius. She is Henrietta Trefusis, and I am Sidney
Trefusis, at your mercy. I see I have aroused your compassion at
last."
"Nonsense!" said Miss Wilson hastily; for her surprise was indeed
tinged by a feeling that he was thrown away on Henrietta.
"I ran away from her and adopted this retreat and this disguise
in order to avoid her. The usual rebuke to human forethought
followed. I ran straight into her arms--or rather she ran into
mine. You remember the scene, and were probably puzzled by it."
"You seem to think your marriage contract a very light matter,
Mr. Trefusis. May I ask whose fault was the separation? Hers, of
course."
"I have nothing to reproach her with. I expected to find her
temper hasty, but it was not so--her behavior was
unexceptionable. So was mine. Our bliss was perfect, but
unfortunately, I was not made for domestic bliss--at all events I
could not endure it--so I fled, and when she caught me again I
could give no excuse for my flight, though I made it clear to her
that I would not resume our connubial relations just yet. We
parted on bad terms. I fully intended to write her a sweet letter
to make her forgive me in spite of herself, but somehow the weeks
have slipped away and I am still fully intending. She has never
written, and I have never written. This is a pretty state of
things, isn't it, Miss Wilson, after all her advantages under the
influence of moral force and the movement for the higher
education of women?"
"By your own admission, the fault seems to lie upon your moral
training and not upon hers."
"The fault was in the conditions of our association. Why they
should have attracted me so strongly at first, and repelled me so
horribly afterwards, is one of those devil's riddles which will
not be answered until we shall have traced all the yet
unsuspected reactions of our inveterate dishonesty. But I am
wasting your time, I fear. You sent for Smilash, and I have
responded by practically annihilating him. In public, however,
you must still bear with his antics. One moment more. I had
forgotten to ask you whether you are interested in the shepherd
whose wife you sheltered on the night of the storm?"
"He assured me, before he took his wife away, that he was
comfortably settled in a lodging in Lyvern."
"Yes. Very comfortably settled indeed. For half-a-crown a week he
obtained permission to share a spacious drawing-room with two
other families in a ten-roomed house in not much better repair
than his blown-down hovel. This house yields to its landlord over
two hundred a year, or rather more than the rent of a commodious
mansion in South Kensington. It is a troublesome rent to collect,
but on the other hand there is no expenditure for repairs or
sanitation, which are not considered necessary in tenement
houses. Our friend has to walk three miles to his work and three
miles back. Exercise is a capital thing for a student or a city
clerk, but to a shepherd who has been in the fields all day, a
long walk at the end of his work is somewhat too much of a good
thing. He begged for an increase of wages to compensate him for
the loss of the hut, but Sir John pointed out to him that if he
was not satisfied his place could be easily filled by less
exorbitant shepherds. Sir John even condescended to explain that
the laws of political economy bind employers to buy labor in the
cheapest market, and our poor friend, just as ignorant of
economics as Sir John, of course did not know that this was
untrue. However, as labor is actually so purchased everywhere
except in Downing Street and a few other privileged spots, I
suggested that our friend should go to some place where his
market price would be higher than in merry England. He was
willing enough to do so, but unable from want of means. So I lent
him a trifle, and now he is on his way to Australia. Workmen are
the geese that lay the golden eggs, but they fly away sometimes.
I hear a gong sounding, to remind me of the fight of time and the
value of your share of it. Good-morning!"
Miss Wilson was suddenly moved not to let him go without an
appeal to his better nature. "Mr. Trefusis," she said, "excuse
me, but are you not, in your generosity to others a little
forgetful of your duty to yourself; and--"
"The first and hardest of all duties!" he exclaimed. "I beg your
pardon for interrupting you. It was only to plead guilty."
"I cannot admit that it is the first of all duties, but it is
sometimes perhaps the hardest, as you say. Still, you could
surely do yourself more justice without any great effort. If you
wish to live humbly, you can do so without pretending to be an
uneducated man and without taking an irritating and absurd name.
Why on earth do you call yourself Smilash?"
"I confess that the name has been a failure. I took great pains,
in constructing it, to secure a pleasant impression. It is not a
mere invention, but a compound of the words smile and eyelash. A
smile suggests good humor; eyelashes soften the expression and
are the only features that never blemish a face. Hence Smilash is
a sound that should cheer and propitiate. Yet it exasperates. It
is really very odd that it should have that effect, unless it is
that it raises expectations which I am unable to satisfy."
Miss Wilson looked at him doubtfully. He remained perfectly
grave. There was a pause. Then, as if she had made up her mind to
be offended, she said, "Good-morning," shortly.
"Good-morning, Miss Wilson. The son of a millionaire, like the
son of a king, is seldom free from mental disease. I am just mad
enough to be a mountebank. If I were a little madder, I should
perhaps really believe myself Smilash instead of merely acting
him. Whether you ask me to forget myself for a moment, or to
remember myself for a moment, I reply that I am the son of my
father, and cannot. With my egotism, my charlatanry, my tongue,
and my habit of having my own way, I am fit for no calling but
that of saviour of mankind--just of the sort they like." After an
impressive pause he turned slowly and left the room.
"I wonder," he said, as he crossed the landing, "whether, by
judiciously losing my way, I can catch a glimpse of that girl who
is like a golden idol?"
Downstairs, on his way to the door, he saw Agatha coming towards
him, occupied with a book which she was tossing up to the ceiling
and catching. Her melancholy expression, habitual in her lonely
moments, showed that she was not amusing herself, but giving vent
to her restlessness. As her gaze travelled upward, following the
flight of the volume, it was arrested by Smilash. The book fell
to the floor. He picked it up and handed it to her, saying:
"And, in good time, here is the golden idol!"
"What?" said Agatha, confused.
"I call you the golden idol," he said. "When we are apart I
always imagine your face as a face of gold, with eyes and teeth
of bdellium, or chalcedony, or agate, or any wonderful unknown
stones of appropriate colors."
Agatha, witless and dumb, could only look down deprecatingly.
"You think you ought to be angry with me, and you do not know
exactly how to make me feel that you are so. Is that it?"
"No. Quite the contrary. At least--I mean that you are wrong. I
am the most commonplace person you can imagine--if you only knew.
No matter what I may look, I mean."
"How do you know that you are commonplace?"
"Of course I know," said Agatha, her eyes wandering uneasily.
"Of course you do not know; you cannot see yourself as others see
you. For instance, you have never thought of yourself as a golden
idol."
"But that is absurd. You are quite mistaken about me."
"Perhaps so. I know, however, that your face is not really made
of gold and that it has not the same charm for you that it has
for others--for me."
"I must go," said Agatha, suddenly in haste.
"When shall we meet again?"
"I don't know," she said, with a growing sense of alarm. "I
really must go."
"Believe me, your hurry is only imaginary. Do you fancy that you
are behaving in a manner quite ubdued ardor that affected Agatha
strangely. "But first tell me whether it is new to you or not."
"It is not an emotion at all. I did not say that it was."
"Do not be afraid of it. It is only being alone with a man whom
you have bewitched. You would be mistress of the situation if you
only knew how to manage a lover. It is far easier than managing a
horse, or skating, or playing the piano, or half a dozen other
feats of which you think nothing."
Agatha colored and raised her head.
"Forgive me," he said, interrupting the action. "I am trying to
offend you in order to save myself from falling in love with you,
and I have not the heart to let myself succeed. On your life, do
not listen to me or believe me. I have no right to say these
things to you. Some fiend enters into me when I am at your side.
You should wear a veil, Agatha."
She blushed, and stood burning and tingling, her presence of mind
gone, and her chief sensation one of relief to hear--for she did
not dare to see--that he was departing. Her consciousness was in
a delicious confusion, with the one definite thought in it that
she had won her lover at last. The tone of Trefusis's voice, rich
with truth and earnestness, his quick insight, and his passionate
warning to her not to heed him, convinced her that she had
entered into a relation destined to influence her whole life.
"And yet," she said remorsefully, "I cannot love him as he loves
me. I am selfish, cold, calculating, worldly, and have doubted
until now whether such a thing as love really existed. If I could
only love him recklessly and wholly, as he loves me!"
Smilash was also soliloquizing as he went on his way.
"Now I have made the poor child--who was so anxious that I should
not mistake her for a supernaturally gifted and lovely woman as
happy as an angel; and so is that fine girl whom they call Jane
Carpenter. I hope they won't exchange confidences on the
subject."
Content of CHAPTER VII [George Bernard Shaw's novel: An Unsocial Socialist]
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