Kitabı oku: «Stolen Souls», sayfa 3
A little clock chiming on its silver bells caused me to spring to my feet.
“Nine o’clock!” I exclaimed. “You must excuse me, otherwise I really shall not catch my train.”
“Must you go?” asked Doroteita, in a tone of regret, closing her fan with a snap and rising also.
“Yes,” I said. “This is my last train. I must wish you au revoir, in the hope that we may meet again at a date not far distant.”
“Aren’t you going to exchange tokens of friendship?” Luis suggested, laughing in his careless, good-humoured way. “Give my future brother-in-law your flower, Doroteita.”
She laughed and blushed, then taking the crimson blossom from her hair, handed it to me. I was about to inhale its fragrance when the strange, fixed look in her eyes fascinated me, and as I placed it in the lapel of my coat with a murmured word of thanks, I confess I was startled by the sudden transformation of her countenance.
“Good-bye,” I said, taking her hand.
It was cold, limp, and trembling.
“Adieu,” she answered huskily.
I turned to shake hands with her brother, but before I could do so, he had pounced upon me from behind, holding my arms powerless, crying —
“No, no, my friend, you will not escape so easily!”
“What – what do you mean?” I gasped in abject amazement.
“I mean that you do not leave this place alive,” he hissed in my ear. Though I could not see him, I could feel his hot breath upon my cheek, and struggled violently to free myself, but in his iron grip I seemed powerless as a child.
“Now, quick, Doroteita!” he commanded. “Remember, we have no time to lose. Don’t stand staring there!”
“Do you mean to kill me?” I cried, clenching my teeth and struggling with all my might to free my arms.
“Curse you, woman! Don’t you hear me?” he yelled at Doroteita, who stood transfixed, with face ashen pale and hands clenched in desperation. “Remember what we have at stake! You have trapped him – finish your work, or – or I’ll kill you!”
In a second she sprang forward, and, snatching from my buttonhole the flower she had given me, held her handkerchief over my mouth with one hand, while with the other she pressed the flower against my nostrils. It seemed damp with some evil-smelling fluid, and though I struggled, she held my face with such determined force, that the leaves of the blossom were forced into my nose, and I was compelled to inhale the disagreeable perfume they emitted.
The odour was strange, and in a few seconds produced a curious giddiness such as I had never before experienced. My brain became paralysed and my limbs assumed an unaccountable rigidness. I tried to speak, but was unable. My jaws seemed to have become suddenly fixed, as if attacked by tetanus. A thrill of horror ran through me, for I could not breathe, and the pang of pain that shot through my eyes was excruciating.
Feeling myself utterly helpless in the hands of those who had so cunningly plotted my murder, I wondered in that brief instant whether Luis was Doroteita’s lover, and whether on discovering our friendship, he had planned this terrible and merciless revenge. My enchantress’s handsome face, now hideously distorted by mingled fear and passion, was close to me, her eyes riveted to mine, and as she pressed the strange flower against my face, her white lips moved as if speaking to me. But I was deaf. My senses had been destroyed.
Next second, though I fought against the sudden faintness that crept over me, my head swam, and my surroundings grew indistinct. I felt myself falling. Then, by a sudden darkness that fell upon me, the present became blotted out.
On opening my aching eyes, they became dazzled by a bar of golden sunlight that strayed in between the closed curtains.
Amazed, I gazed around from where I lay stretched upon the floor. Then, in a few moments, the recollection of the strange events of the previous night returned to me in all their grim reality. The woman I had adored had, from some motive utterly incomprehensible, enticed me there to murder me! Feeling terribly weak and ill, I managed to struggle to my feet. I looked for the fatal flower, but could not find it. Then my eyes fell upon the clock, and I was amazed to discover it was past three in the afternoon.
I had remained unconscious nearly eighteen hours!
Half fearful lest another attempt should be made upon me, I searched the rooms on the ground floor and shouted. No one stirred. The house was tenantless!
Walking with difficulty down the hill towards the Ezcurra, I suddenly remembered my dispatch, and placing my hand in the inner pocket of my coat, I found it gone! It had evidently been stolen; but for what object was an enigma.
As I passed onward under the trees of the Calle del Pozzo, boys were crying La Voz, and from their strident shouts, and the eagerness of purchasers, I knew that the new Ministry had been officially announced. My intellect seemed too disordered to think, so I merely returned to the hotel, and, casting myself on the bed, slept till next morning.
I refrained from lodging a complaint with the police, believing that my extraordinary story would be discredited; nevertheless, I remained three days longer, endeavouring to discover some facts regarding the Countess d’Avendaño and her daughter. All I could glean was, that, a month before, they had taken the Villa Guipuzcoa for the season, and that a number of tradespeople, including two jewellers, were now exceedingly anxious to ascertain their whereabouts. Therefore, after much futile effort to ascertain the truth about Doroteita, I at length returned to London, being compelled to invent an absurdly lame excuse for not telegraphing the information of the new Cabinet.
Last July I again found myself in Spain. Another serious crisis had occurred. The Carlists were known to be carrying on an active propaganda, and I had been despatched to Madrid, so as to be on the spot if serious trouble arose. Only one London newspaper keeps a resident correspondent in the Spanish capital, the remainder of the news from that city being supplied through a well-known agency. A few days after my arrival at the Hôtel de Rome, in the Caballero de Gracia, I called upon Señor Navarro Reverter, Minister of Finance, and was granted an interview. I desired to ascertain his views on the situation, and as he had been very communicative during those stormy times at San Sebastian a year before, I had no doubt that he would give me a few opinions worth telegraphing.
As I entered his cosy private room in the Calle de Alcala, and he rose to greet me, my gaze became fixed upon the mantelshelf behind him, for upon it stood two cabinet photographs of a man and a woman.
The one was a counterfeit presentment of Luis d’Avendaño; the other a portrait of Doroteita!
When I had formally “interviewed” him upon the financial reforms and other matters regarding which I desired his opinion, I asked to be allowed to see the photographs, and he handed them to me with a smile.
“Doroteita d’Avendaño!” I ejaculated. The features were unmistakable, though the dress was different.
“Are they – er – friends of yours?” the Minister asked, regarding me keenly from beneath his shaggy brows.
“They were – once,” I answered. “Ever since we were at San Sebastian last year I have been endeavouring to trace them.”
“What? Did she add you to her list of victims?” he asked, laughing.
“Well, the plot was scarcely successful, otherwise I should not be here now,” I replied. Then I told him briefly how, after luring me to their villa, the interesting pair had attempted to murder me.
“Extraordinary!” he ejaculated, when I had finished. “Curiously enough, however, your story supplies just the link in the chain of evidence that was missing at their trial.”
“Their trial?” I exclaimed. “Tell me about them.”
“Well, in the first place, the enchantress you knew as Doroteita d’Avendaño was none other than the notorious Liseta Gonzalez, known to the police as ‘The Golden Hand.’”
”‘The Golden Hand’?” I echoed in amazement. I had heard much of the extraordinary career of an adventuress bearing that sobriquet; how she had moved in the best society in Paris and Vienna, and how in the latter city, in a single year, in her character as queen of the demi-monde, she had spent 50,000 pounds, the money of her dupes. Indeed, her adventures had been the talk of Europe.
“Yes,” he continued, smiling at my astonishment. “No doubt you have read in your English newspapers all about the many ingenious frauds she has perpetrated. For the past five years she has been well-known in various characters in Pau, Rome, Paris, and Vienna; her schemes have invariably been successful, and her escape from the police has been accomplished just at the right moment, in a manner almost incredible. But the audacious boldness of a coup she effected a year ago caused her downfall.”
“A year ago?” I said. “Was it during the time I knew her?”
“Yes. While spending the summer at San Sebastian with Mateo Sanchez, – a Bourse adventurer of Madrid, who, under the name of Luis d’Avendaño, passed as her brother, – she conceived, during the Cabinet crisis, a very ingenious scheme for gigantic operations on the Bourse with certain success. The circumstances were remarkable, and your story supplies the facts which have remained until now a mystery. Unaware of the true character of Sanchez, I had employed him as agent in various transactions shortly before the crisis, and he had thus become aware of my intentions to institute certain financial reforms that would affect the Bourse to a considerable extent. ‘The Golden Hand,’ it appears, with her usual shrewdness, pointed out how the knowledge thus acquired would enable him to operate with success, if only he could be certain of my reappointment as Finance Minister, and the pair forthwith carried into effect an ingeniously arranged plan. Apparently you were watched, and, it having been ascertained that, as correspondent of an influential journal, you were a likely person to obtain the very earliest intimation of the formation of the Cabinet, they laid their plans to entrap you.”
“I confess I little dreamed of foul play when I entered the Villa Guipuzcoa,” I observed.
“At the trial it was a mystery how they obtained knowledge of the State secret,” he continued. “But it is now quite plain that on the evening when the portfolios were arranged, they, being aware of the devices to which you would probably resort in order to obtain accurate information, enticed you to their house, and then, having ascertained from your own lips that the Ministry had been formed, resolved to carry out their cunningly-devised scheme. They saw that you were the only member of the public who knew the secret, and if they prevented you from despatching it to London, – whence it was certain to be re-telegraphed here, – it would give them time to get to Madrid on the following morning and operate on the Bourse some hours before the announcement of the new Ministry.”
“She seemed so ingenuous and charming, that I suspected nothing – until – ”
“Until she attempted to murder you – eh?” he said, taking up her portrait, and gazing upon it with a smile. “To say the least, the plot was a most extraordinary one. By your admission that the crisis was at an end, they knew you held a list of the new Ministers, and as you persisted in your endeavour to catch the train to the frontier, it became necessary for them to possess themselves of the list, and silence you, in order to escape to Madrid, and on the opening of the Bourse next day purchase the stock which they knew would rise immediately the official announcement was published. ‘The Golden Hand’ gave you as a souvenir the flower she wore, in the expectation that you would inhale its fatal perfume, as other victims had done.”
“It was very similar to a camellia,” I said. “Has anything been ascertained regarding it?”
“Oh yes. The flower she sometimes wore in her hair, and which appeared rather like a camellia, was at the trial proved to be the Kali Mujah, or death-rose of Sumatra, which is so deadly that its perfume is sufficient to cause unconsciousness, and sometimes even death. It was found that she actually cultivated these flowers, and that on more than one occasion she had used them upon her victims with fatal result. She gave one to you, but you merely placed it in your buttonhole; therefore, just as you were about to depart, her lover gripped you, while she pressed the fatal blossom into your nostrils. Then you lapsed into unconsciousness, and half an hour afterwards the enterprising pair were on their way to Madrid, where, on the following morning, they purchased a quantity of stock, with money secured by your idol Doroteita from one of her dupes, the Comte de Ségonnaux, whose death had been caused by the poisonous blossom in a similar manner to the attempt upon yourself.”
“Were their operations on the Bourse successful?” I asked.
“Entirely so. Unaware of these events, I put forward my financial scheme in the Chamber a month afterwards, with the result that the stock they had secured rose to unparalleled prices, and then they effected a gigantic coup, gaining nearly a million pesetas. But the boldness of the scheme caused their downfall, for the colossal extent of their transactions attracted the attention of the police, the result being that eventually the murder of the Comte de Ségonnaux at Toledo was conclusively proved, and your divinity’s identity with ‘The Golden Hand’ fully established.”
“Were they both tried?” I asked, amazed at his extraordinary story.
“Yes. Mateo Sanchez was found guilty of being an accessory in the assassination of the Comte, and sentenced at the last sitting of the Assize Court to fifteen years’ imprisonment; while the bewitching Liseta, condemned for the murder, is at present serving a life sentence at the convict prison at Barcelona.”
A quarter of an hour later I had wished my genial friend the Minister adieu, and, full of grave reflections, crossed the sunlit Puerta del Sol, carrying in my pocket, as a souvenir of a foolish infatuation, the portrait of “The Golden Hand.”
Chapter Three.
The Masked Circe
The success of “The Masked Circe” in last year’s Royal Academy was incontestable, not only for the intrinsic beauty of the picture, but from the fact that the personal charms of a handsome woman were perpetuated without compromising her features. Woman’s vanity often outruns her natural diffidence, and the consciousness of her great beauty stifles the conscience of modesty.
Visitors to the Academy know the picture. Circe, seated on a throne, with her back to a great circular mirror, presents a half-draped figure of marvellous delicate colouring and beauty of outline. One hand holds aloft a golden wine-goblet, and the other a tapering wand, while upon the tesselated pavement before the daïs purple grapes and yellow roses have been strewn. The black hair of the daughter of Perseis falls in profusion about her bare shoulders, and strays over her breast, but her features are hidden by a half-mask of black silk. The lips, with their arc de cupidon, are slightly parted, disclosing an even row of pearly teeth, and giving an expression of reckless diablerie.
Of the thousands who have gazed upon it in admiration, none knows the somewhat remarkable story connected with it. As I have been closely associated with it, from the day it was outlined in charcoal, until the evening it was packed in a crate and sent for the inspection of the hanging committee, it is perhaps àpropos that I should relate the narrative.
The studio of my old friend, Dick Carruthers, the man who painted it, is on Campden Hill, Kensington, within a few hundred yards of where I reside, and in the centre of an aesthetic artistic colony. We have been chums for years, for on many occasions he has displayed his talent as a black and white artist in illustrating my articles and stories in various magazines. He is a popular painter, and as handsome a man as ever had a picture “on the line.”
Three years ago, when the prologue of this secret drama was enacted, he was in the habit of coming over when the light had faded, to smoke a cigarette and discuss art and literature with me. I was glad of a chat after a hard day’s work at my writing-table, but his companionship had one drawback. He drivelled over a girl he loved, and was forever suggesting that I might take her as a character and drag her into the novel upon which I was engaged.
One day he drew a cabinet photograph carefully from his pocket, and placed it upon the blotting-pad before me.
The girl he loved! Bah! I knew her, though I did not tell him so. She was a dark-haired, pink-and-white beauty that flitted through artistic Bohemia like a butterfly in a hothouse. The sight of the pictured face brought back to me the memory of days long past – of a closed chapter in my life’s history. I remembered the first time I saw Ethel Broughton, fully five years before. She wore a soiled pink wrapper, her satin slippers were trodden down at heel, and she had a bottle of champagne at her elbow. At that time her lover, grandiloquent and impecunious Mr Harry Oranmore, a bad but handsome actor, had been untrue to her, and she, a third-rate actress, who had an ingénue part at a Strand theatre, was reviling him. I had been taken to her house and introduced by a mutual friend, but she scarcely heeded me. Probably she was thinking of Oranmore, for she clasped her slim fingers round her suffering throat, and offered up an occasional sob, following it with a silent but protracted draught from her glass.
The result of this interview was but natural. Dazzled by her beauty, I sympathised with her, endeavoured to cheer her, and concluded by falling violently in love with her. At that time I was writing numbers of dramatic criticisms, and I confess I used what weight my opinions possessed for the purpose of her advancement. It is needless to refer to the smooth and uninterrupted course of our love. Suffice it to say that we were both Bohemians, and that within a year I had the satisfaction of sitting before the footlights, watching her make her début as “leading lady” at a West End theatre, and a few days later of observing her photograph exhibited in shop windows among those of other stage beauties.
But, alas! those halcyon days were all too brief. Suddenly the scales fell from my eyes. A scene occurred between us – and we parted.
To think that sin should lie for years in the blood, just as arsenic does in a corpse!
When I discovered that Dick Carruthers was wasting the very honest and ardent emotions of his heart at this feverish fairy’s shrine, I resolved to take him aside, and, without admitting that I knew her, give him a verbal drubbing. I did so, but he bit his moustache fiercely, and turned upon me.
“She is charming,” he said, “and I love her.”
“Ah! I know the type – ”
“You know nothing, old fellow!” he exclaimed, flushing angrily. “But” – he shrugged his shoulders – “the prejudices of the world count for – what? Nothing at all. The curse of the Philistine is his Philistinism.”
“Very well, Dick, old chap, forget my words,” I said. “I approach your idol in the properly reverential spirit.”
“You shall see her before long.” His gaze grew bright, soft, and vague, as one who catches glimpses of the floating garments of supernatural mysteries. “Ah, she is lovely! Only an artist can appreciate her beauty.”
I saw that words were of no avail. Like Ulysses, he was living in the paradise of Aeaea, heedless of everything under the spell she had cast about him.
One night, not long after I had expressed my sentiments to him regarding his infatuation, I entered his studio, and found his goddess seated by the fire, with her shapely feet upon the fender, sipping kümmel from a tiny glass, and holding a lighted cigarette between her dainty fingers.
Dick flung down his palette, and came forward to introduce me. Her dark eyes met mine, and we tacitly agreed not to recognise each other, therefore we bowed as perfect strangers. As I seated myself, and she poured me out a liqueur, I caught her glancing furtively at me under her long lashes. She had grown even handsomer than when last I had seen her, and was the picture of the romantic Bohemienne. Her dress was of black gauze, through which the milky whiteness of her figure seemed to shine. Yet, as she turned her beautiful face towards me, I was struck by the complete effect of physical and moral frailty that she presented.
She expressed pleasure at meeting me, remarking that she had read my last novel, and had been keenly interested in it.
When I had briefly acknowledged the compliment she paid me, she said —
“One thing always strikes me in reading your stories. Your women are inevitably false and fickle. Perhaps, however, you write from personal experience of the failings of my sex,” she laughed.
Glancing sharply at her, I saw that her eyes did not waver.
“It is true I once knew a woman who proved false and infamous,” I replied, with some emphasis.
“And you avenge yourself by reviling all of us. It is really too bad!” she said, pouting like a spoiled child.
“By Jove, old fellow,” Dick chimed in, “do tell us about your romance! It would be interesting to know the reason you set your face against all the fair ones.”
But I succeeded in turning the conversation into another channel. I saw I had intruded upon them, so, making an excuse, I bade them au revoir, and returned to my own book-lined den.
Unlocking a drawer in my writing-table, I took out a packet of letters that still emitted a stale odour of violets. Then I lit my pipe, and one by one read them through, pausing and pondering over the declarations of passionate love they contained. Far into the night I sat reviewing the romance of bygone days, until I came to the last letter. It was a cold, formal note, merely a few lines of hurried scrawl, and read: “You are right. I have been false to you. Think no more of me. By the time you receive this I shall be on my way to New York; nevertheless, you will be always remembered by yours unworthily – Ethel.” Bitter memories of the past overwhelmed me; but at last, growing impatient, and tossing the letters back into the drawer, I strove to forget. The clock had struck two, and my reading-lamp was burning low and sputtering when I rose to retire for the night. I confess that my frame of mind surprised me, inasmuch as I actually found myself still loving her.
“Good afternoon. I hope I don’t disturb you.”
Looking up from my work, I saw Ethel.
“Not at all. Pray sit down,” I said coldly, motioning her to an armchair. “To what do I owe the honour of this visit?”
She pulled off her long gloves, and let her sealskin cape fall at her feet, while I put down my pen, and, rising, stood with my back to the fire.
With her she had brought the odour of violets, the same that I remembered years ago; the same perfume that always stirred sad memories within me.
“You don’t welcome me very warmly,” she said in a disappointed tone, as she grasped my hand, and looked steadily into my eyes.
“No,” I said sternly. “Last night I told you that a woman had embittered my life. The woman I referred to was yourself.”
“Ah,” she said, striving to suppress a sob, “Forgive me! I – I was mad then. I loved you; but I did not apprehend the consequence.”
“Love? What nonsense to speak of it, when through your baseness I have been almost ruined. Think of your actions on the day before you left me; how you took from that drawer a signed blank cheque, with which you drew six hundred pounds, – nearly all the money I possessed, – and then fled with your lover. Is that the way a woman shows her affection?”
Her head was bowed in humiliation.
“Forgive me, Harold,” she said, with intense earnestness. “I admit that I wronged you cruelly, that I discarded the honest love you gave me; but you – you do not know how weak we women are when temptation is in our path. Cannot I now make amends?”
I shook my head sadly.
“Don’t say that you will not forgive,” she implored tearfully. “At least I am honest. My object in coming this afternoon was to repay the money I – I borrowed.” And she drew forth an envelope from her pocket and handed it to me.
“There are notes for six hundred pounds,” she added, as I took it and felt the crisp paper inside.
“How did you obtain it?” I asked, hesitating to receive it.
“I have earned it honestly, every penny,” she replied. “Since we parted, I have become popular in America, and played ‘lead’ in nearly all the great cities. During the years that have gone I have many, many times wondered what had become of you, for in your writings I read plainly how soured and embittered you had become.”
“And where is Oranmore?”
“Dead. He contracted typhoid while we were playing in San Francisco, and it terminated fatally.”
“Ethel,” I said gravely, taking her hand in mine, “you have fascinated Dick Carruthers, my friend; and you will treat him as you treated me.”
“No, no. I love him,” she said in a fierce half-whisper, adding, “Keep secret the fact that we loved one another, and I swear before Heaven I will be true to him. If he marries me, he shall never have cause for regret – never!”
“Suppose I told him? What would he think of you?”
“You will not!” she cried, clinging to me. “You are too honourable for that. Promise to keep my secret!”
“For the present I will preserve silence,” I answered, my heart softening towards her. “But I cannot promise that I will never tell him.”
“I am going to sit to him as model,” she said, after a brief silence. “What character do you think would best suit me?”
“Well, I should suggest that of Circe – the woman who broke men’s hearts,” I replied, mischievously.
“Excellent! I shall be able to assume that character well,” she said, with a grim smile. “I will tell him.”
Spring came and went, but I saw very little of Dick. He had received a commission from one of the illustrated papers to make a series of sketches of scenery in Scotland, and consequently he was away a good deal. Whenever he paid flying visits to London, however, he always looked me up, but, strangely enough, never mentioned Ethel. Nevertheless, I ascertained that they frequently met.
At the close of a blue summer’s day, when the dreamy, golden haze wrapped the city in a mystic charm, I called at the studio, having heard that he had returned, and was settling down to work.
When I entered, Dick was standing before his easel, pipe in mouth and crayon in hand, busily sketching; while on the raised “throne” before him sat Ethel, radiant and beautiful. A tender smile played about her lips. It seemed as though a happiness – full, complete, perfectly satisfying – had taken possession of her, and lifted her out of herself – out of the world even.
“Welcome, old fellow!” Dick cried, turning to shake hands with me. “Behold my Circe!” and he waved his hand in the direction of his model. “Ethel will not sit for any other subject. It hardly does her justice – does it?”
“It is a strange fancy of mine,” she explained, when I had greeted her. “I’m sure the dress is very becoming – isn’t it?” And she waved the goblet she was holding above her head.
“Your pose is perfect, dear. Please don’t alter it,” urged the artist; who, advancing to his easel again, continued the free, rapid outline.
We chatted and laughed together for nearly an hour, until the tints of pearl and rose had melted imperceptibly into the deep night sky; then Dick lit the lamps, while Ethel retired into the model’s sanctum to resume her nineteenth century attire.
Presently she reappeared, and we went to dine together at a restaurant in Piccadilly, afterwards visiting a theatre, and spending a very pleasant evening.
Poor Dick! I was sorry that he was so infatuated. He was such a large-hearted, honest fellow, that I felt quite pained when I anticipated the awakening that must inevitably come sooner or later. He knew absolutely nothing of her past, and was quite ignorant that she had been a popular actress.
In the months that followed, I visited the studio almost daily, and watched the growth of the picture. Dick was putting his whole soul into the composition, and my knowledge of art – acquired by years of idling in the ateliers of the Quartier Latin, and dabbling with the colours a little myself – told me that he was engaged upon what promised to be his finest work.
The face was a lifelike portrait. The delicate tints of the neck and arms were reproduced with a skill that betrayed the master hand, and the reflection in the mirror behind had a wonderfully natural appearance, while the bright colours enhanced the general effect of gay, reckless abandon.
The fair model herself was charmed with it. Woman’s vanity always betrays itself over her picture.
One evening, at the time the canvas was receiving its finishing touches, I returned home from a stroll across Kensington Gardens, and, on going in, heard some one playing upon my piano, and a sweet soprano voice singing Trotere’s “In Old Madrid.” I recognised the clear tones as those of Ethel.
“Ah, Harold!” she cried, jumping up as I entered the room. “I was amusing myself until your return. I – I have something to tell you.”
“Well, what is it?” I asked, rather surprised.
“Cannot you guess? Dick has asked me to become his wife,” she said in a low tone.
“The thing’s impossible!” I cried warmly. “I will not allow it. You may be friends, but he shall never marry you.”
“How cruel you are!” she said, with a touch of sadness. “But, after all, your apprehensions are groundless. I have refused.”
“Refused? Why?”
“For reasons of my own,” she replied in a harsh, strained voice. “If – if he speaks to you, urge him to abandon thoughts of love, and regard me as a friend only.”
“You are at least sensible, Ethel,” I said. “It is gratifying to know that you recognise the impossibility of such an union.”
Tears welled in her eyes. She nodded, but did not reply.
A dry, grey day in March. It was “Show Sunday,” that institution in the art world, when the painter opens his studio to his friends and the public, to show them the picture he is about to send to the Academy. The exhibition is in many instances but the showing beforehand of the garlands of victory in a battle which is doomed to be lost, for when the opening day comes, many of the anxious artists do not have the luck to see their pictures hung at all. Then insincere admirers smile in their sleeves at the painter’s chagrin. I have always been thankful that the happy writer of books has no such ordeal to face. He never reads his new romance to his friends, nor do his well-wishers applaud in advance. Reviewers have first tilt at “advance copies,” and very properly.
