The Blind Bow-boy/Chapter 14
One morning, late in December, Campaspe was awakened by a revolutionary assault on her privacy. A lady wrapped in a long sable mantle, with a shako of monkey-fur standing erect on her head and fitting so closely that it gave the curious effect of being her own hair, exploded into the room.
Campaspe, my darling!
Rudely awakened, Campaspe found herself in her mother's arms.
Fannie! My precious Fannie!
My own!
My beloved!
My favourite daughter!
Did you have a good crossing?
Awful! I feel nine years older.
Campaspe contemplated this woman who had the indecency to be her mother: an exquisite oval face without a single line; narrow eyebrows that arched like some architectural masterpiece; eyes as blue as velvet pansies; a straight, slender nose; and a mouth that invited kisses. The open mantle revealed a figure as pimpant as Mary Garden's, and the anklelength skirt exposed a foot like Cinderella's. An inciting scent, perhaps Bichara's Ambre, evaporated from the furs. It was obscene of this woman, Campaspe reflected, to have the effrontery to look five years younger than her eldest daughter.
Do you mind, Fannie, if I drink my coffee while we talk? Without waiting for a reply, Campaspe pressed the jewelled head of her bed-table tortoise. Fannie was seated in a comfortable chair before the grate in which the hot coals glowed.
You still know, dearest Fannie, what belongs to a frippery!
Lanvin and Vionnet tell me, Mrs. Blake demurred. Then: How's Cupid?
Just the same. He's keeping a snake-charmer.
Fannie laughed. A snake-charmer!
Well, just at present she is a moving picture star. I am a little sorry for her. She deserves something better than Cupid.
How can you let him, 'paspe?
Let him, Fannie! I encourage him.
Mrs. Blake was powdering her face. We are so different, she said, you and I, and yet you are the only member of my family with whom I can get along. I don't understand you, but I adore you. As for me, in such a case, I would be jealous. A man must belong to me.
I know, Fannie dearest. We want different things, but in the end it is the same. Our bond is simple. We both get what we want and we admire each other for it.
Frederika was laying a small table with the breakfast-paraphernalia.
Will you have some coffee, Fannie? Campaspe queried.
Thanks, no. I shall never eat again. How's your father? Not that I care.
Campaspe smiled. I don't know, Fannie. You know I never see him.
Alice? Mrs. Blake made a wry face.
Oh! Alice married.
I heard something. . . . Mrs. Blake's face assumed a vague expression. . . . I think she wrote me.
Campaspe sipped her coffee. He left her a month later, she announced.
Mrs. Blake looked annoyed. Why didn't you let me know? I would have cabled Bravo to the boy. What a dreadfully priggish little snob Alice is! Where is the boy now? I'd like to meet him.
I don't know where he is, said Campaspe.
Mrs. Blake shook out her monkey-fur muff. Well, I shan't see Alice or your father. I doubt if I see anybody but you, dear 'paspe. I only came over to consult my lawyer. I expect to sail Saturday. The present rate of exchange makes it more convenient for me to live in Paris. Besides, you know, I don't like New York. . . . She paused for a moment. . . . I'm going to be married, 'paspe dearest.
Fannie!
Yes, 'paspe, your old mother is to be married again!
Fannie, my baby!
I met him in London last summer and was immediately seized with the most unbelievable beguin. His name is Cohen, Manfred Cohen.
A Jew!
Yes, darling.
Laura will not receive you! Campaspe shouted with laughter.
That moron! Do you still see her?
Sometimes . . . enough to keep in touch with . . . Campaspe waved her hand in a vague gesture. . . . Oh! you know, WITH.
But how can you tolerate her? Cette femme est ridicule.
Chere Fannie, she's here so little. She summers in the Berkshires. She winters at Palm Beach. She opens the Horse Show and the Opera and then she goes away. Tell me more about Mr. Cohen.
I have no intention of being so simple, her mother responded. When you come over you can examine him for yourself. Tell me about your boys.
They are coming home from school today.
You like them?
Campaspe reflected. I may. I am waiting.
All life is a gamble.
Not, dearest Fannie, if you put your money both on the red and black and never take it out. . . . Keep on putting it in. There will always be plenty in that case. I never lose and I never break the bank. Sometimes, I think I own the bank.
I draw my winnings.
Clever Fannie! Where will you and Mr. Cohen live?
Cadenabbia: Lago di Como.
You always go there.
I'm always happy there. I even enjoyed my honeymoon there with your father.
My angel!
They embraced again. Mrs. Blake rose, gathered her sable mantle about her figure, smoothed out her muff, and stooped to pick up her ebony cane, with a head sparkling with emeralds, which had fallen to the floor.
It's wonderful to have such a mother! Campaspe cried. It gives me courage! I hope I can do it too!
Do what, 'paspe?
Learn to be as beautiful as you.
It was noon when Fannie departed. Campaspe rose and, after her bath, arrayed herself carefully in a neglige of lilac velvet, filmy with a rich Spanish gold lace. She glanced over the envelopes on a tray, but was not tempted to open one. Presently Frederika brought in a great box, bursting with calla lilies and tube-roses with a card from Paul.
I am marrying Mrs. Whittaker, the card read. Il faut tant d'argent pour être bohême aujourd'hui.
Nice old Paulet! However you toss him, Campaspe reflected, he lands on his feet.
She walked over to the window, and looked down upon the pavement covered with a thin film of ice, the heaps of white snow in the street. It had begun to snow again. The warm room now seemed more comfortable to her. Her mood was idle, listless, and she sat for some time before the fire, thinking about her mother.
At one o'clock a strange thing happened. Cupid returned for lunch. She could not remember that this had ever happened before.
The boys are coming home, he explained, sheepishly.
But not until late this afternoon, she countered, not unsympathetically, however. The poor man looked troubled, worried, harassed. Was it, she wondered, money?
Cupid, is anything the matter? If it's money, I could help you. . . .
Her words threw the gates open. Money! he flared up. Money! It's you. Can't you . . . Won't you . . . Campaspe, do you hate me?
Looking at him, she noted tears in the poor creature's eyes. No, she didn't hate him, she reflected, but he was very tiresome, and more than a little ridiculous.
Don't be romantic, Cupid, was what she said. It seemed to her that she had thus adjured him several thousand times.
He faced her. Is it, he asked, because of . . . Zimbule?
What nonsense, Cupid. Go ahead enjoying yourself.
I'm not enjoying myself, he muttered morosely. I hate her.
Well, Cupid, she rejoined, smiling, and with as much kindliness as she could assume, taking into account her slight interest in the matter, I don't hate her at all. I like her.
He stood before her, perplexed. I don't understand you, Campaspe. What do you want? A divorce?
No, Cupid, I don't want a divorce. Do you?
Campaspe!
Well, there we are. Neither of us wants a divorce. We are a happily married couple like . . . Laura and her husband. Suddenly, she began to laugh. Cupid, she said, Fannie is getting married again.
I don't give a damn about Fannie! His face was red. It's you that I want to talk about. You're like a cake of ice! I don't believe you even have a lover!
Immediately this affront had passed his lips, he was apparently aghast that he had let it slip out, but Campaspe's manner was not indicative that anything untoward had been said.
You are quite right, Cupid, she remarked quietly. I haven't.
Forgive me, Campaspe!
And now Cupid made another unusual move. He invaded her sacred bathroom. More curious—had he, she wondered, succumbed to emotion?—than annoyed, Campaspe slowly crossed the room and peered through the crack left at the hinges by the door slightly ajar. Cupid stood before the mirror combing his hair. Life, she assured herself, grew more amusing all the time. She was certain that she would remain young as her mother had. Getting bored was what aged people, and she was never bored.
The boys arrived about five, quiet, well-behaved, handsome lads. Esme, with his great dark eyes and his curly brown hair, had charm. He might turn into something. They were nice, both of them. Campaspe discovered that she was really fond of them and she was so kind to them that they stood before her transfixed with delight. They adored this mother of theirs and they saw so little of her.
A little later, Basil, alone with her, became confidential, sought advice. A Spanish boy, who shared his bedroom, had made a curious request. . . . Should I, mama? Must I?
Do you want to?
No, mama.
Then you don't have to.
On the stairs she re-encountered Cupid.
I forgot to tell you, Cupid, she said, that I'm sailing on the twenty-third.
But that's two days before Christmas. You won't be here with the boys on Christmas day.
No, Cupid. I no longer believe in Santa Claus, and you can amuse the boys. There is too much mothering going on in the world. What our boys need—what all boys need—is independence. As she spoke she realized that it was curiously ironic that Esmé and Basil should prefer her to Cupid, who worried about them constantly.
Cupid did not argue. He took her tone: When are you coming back?
I don't know.
The little man groaned. Campaspe, he pleaded, we can't go on living like this. Will it always be like this?
Yes, Cupid if you wish. Always. I am, content. You are free, of course, to do what you like. . . . . Yes, it will always be like this, unless you change it. . . . She passed him and continued on her way upstairs.
Before dinner they all met again under the lamps in the drawing-room. Cupid was reading This Freedom. The boys were playing a game of halma. Campaspe felt a certain amount of pride in contemplating this scene. The American home, she mused, as she sat before the fire, smoking a cigarette. I have achieved it . . . along with something else. . . . But presently her thoughts drifted to her garden, her dear garden, which she must bid good-bye; Eros, blindfold, his bow hanging with icicles, the nymph below buried in the snowdrift. . . .
A week later, Campaspe, wrapped in a heavy moleskin cloak, walked the ship's deck. It was Christmas morning, bright, clear, and cold. The ship sped on through the frigid, green waves. Presently, Frederika appeared with the rugs, and a pile of books. Well tucked in and protected from the crisp December ocean wind, Campaspe sat idly in the bright sunlight, watching sky and sea. She knew, she fancied, nobody aboard. There were, indeed, few passengers. . . . She examined the books she had selected for this journey: Marmaduke Pickthall's Oriental Encounters, Le Livre de Goha le Simple. . . . She had some faint intention of visiting the Orient. . . . Stendhal's Armance: she could not read these now. She had no desire, she found, to read at all. Then, immediately, she regretted that she had brought no book by Huysmans, Huysmans who had said: There are two ways of ridding ourselves of a thing which burdens us, casting it away or letting it fall. To cast away requires an effort of which we may not be capable, to let fall imposes no labour, is simpler, within the reach of all. To cast away, again, implies a certain interest, a certain animation, even a certain fear; to let fall is absolute indifference, absolute contempt. . . . Some time or other, she said to herself, we all drift into the Sargasso Sea, where the wrecks of all the past thought in the world are caught in the rotting sea-weed. I have escaped from this sea. . . . The only triumphs in this life are negative. I get what I want by wanting something I can give myself. That is my ultimate security. . . . She recalled Gabrielle Dalzant's wise remark to Vernon Lee: We must be prepared to begin life many times afresh. How true! Perhaps, for this new beginning, she would see no more people. Some lines of La Fontaine impinged on her consciousness.
L'innocente beauté des jardins et des jours
Allait faire à jamais le charme de ma vie.
She had a snug, comfortable feeling that all was well. The past was the past and the future was the future. Only the present occupied her, and it delighted her to remember that the present was as blank as a white sheet of paper. She could write on it what she wished. For the moment she was content to contemplate the white sheet. . . . Later . . . later, she might seek a new pen . . . fresh ink. . . . Campaspe drew her scarf around her face and dozed.
When she awoke the great disk of the fiery sun was sinking into the cold sea. The ship was plowing its way through furrows of foam. She felt a little chill and numb. Where, she wondered, was Frederika? Presently she became aware that two men in heavy coats stood just in front of her, their backs towards her, leaning over the rail. There was something familiar to her in the contours of these backs; there was nothing strange about the timbre of the men's voices. At this moment the two men, who had not yet seen Campaspe, turned, and stood facing each other, their faces clearly silhouetted against the sky. They were the faces of Harold Prewett and Ronald, Duke of Middlebottom.
New York
October 28, 1922