Robert Bloomfield - "May Day With The Muses"

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Christopher Leadem - "Highland Ballad"

Sherwood Anderson - "Marching Men"

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PHILADELPHIA, Pa. -- The Philadelphia literary world will celebrate the launch of two new players today, April 10th: Kay Square Press, a new publishing company focused on Philadelphia-area artists, their stories, and their art; and Kay Square's first release, 'With the Rich and Mighty: Emlen Etting of Philadelphia' (ISBN: 978-0-9815129-0-7), a critical biography by Kenneth C. Kaleta.

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Books: The Fallen Leaves

W >> Wilkie Collins >> The Fallen Leaves




"So far as You were concerned, I suppose?" said Mr. Hethcote.

"So far as She was concerned also," Amelius answered.

"How did she take it, sir?" Rufus inquired.

"With a composure that astonished us all," said Amelius. "We had
anticipated tears and entreaties for mercy. She stood up perfectly
calm, far calmer than I was, with her head turned towards me, and her
eyes resting quietly on my face. If you can imagine a woman whose whole
being was absorbed in looking into the future; seeing what no mortal
creature about her saw; sustained by hopes that no mortal creature
about her could share--you may see her as I did, when she heard her
sentence pronounced. The members of the Community, accustomed to take
leave of an erring brother or sister with loving and merciful words,
were all more or less distressed as they bade her farewell. Most of the
women were in tears as they kissed her. They said the same kind words
to her over and over again. 'We are heartily sorry for you, dear; we
shall all be glad to welcome you back.' They sang our customary hymn at
parting--and broke down before they got to the end. It was _she_ who
consoled _them!_ Not once, through all that melancholy ceremony, did
she lose her strange composure, her rapt mysterious look. I was the
last to say farewell; and I own I couldn't trust myself to speak. She
held my hand in hers. For a moment, her face lighted up softly with a
radiant smile--then the strange preoccupied expression flowed over her
again, like shadow over a light. Her eyes, still looking into mine,
seemed to look beyond me. She spoke low, in sad steady tones. 'Be
comforted, Amelius; the end is not yet.' She put her hands on my head,
and drew it down to her. 'You will come back to me,' she whispered--and
kissed me on the forehead, before them all. When I looked up again, she
was gone. I have neither seen her nor heard from her since. It's all
told, gentlemen--and some of it has distressed me in the telling. Let
me go away for a minute by myself, and look at the sea."



BOOK THE SECOND

AMELIUS IN LONDON

CHAPTER 1

Oh, Rufus Dingwell, it is such a rainy day! And the London street which
I look out on from my hotel window presents such a dirty and such a
miserable view! Do you know, I hardly feel like the same Amelius who
promised to write to you when you left the steamer at Queenstown. My
spirits are sinking; I begin to feel old. Am I in the right state of
mind to tell you what are my first impressions of London? Perhaps I may
alter my opinion. At present (this is between ourselves), I don't like
London or London people--excepting two ladies, who, in very different
ways, have interested and charmed me.

Who are the ladies? I must tell you what I heard about them from Mr.
Hethcote, before I present them to you on my own responsibility.

After you left us, I found the last day of the voyage to Liverpool dull
enough. Mr. Hethcote did not seem to feel it in the same way: on the
contrary, he grew more familiar and confidential in his talk with me.
He has some of the English stiffness, you see, and your American pace
was a little too fast for him. On our last night on board, we had some
more conversation about the Farnabys. You were not interested enough in
the subject to attend to what he said about them while you were with
us; but if you are to be introduced to the ladies, you must be
interested now. Let me first inform you that Mr. and Mrs. Farnaby have
no children; and let me add that they have adopted the daughter and
orphan child of Mrs. Farnaby's sister. This sister, it seems, died many
years ago, surviving her husband for a few months only. To complete the
story of the past, death has also taken old Mr. Ronald, the founder of
the stationer's business, and his wife, Mrs. Farnaby's mother. Dry
facts these--I don't deny it; but there is something more interesting
to follow. I have next to tell you how Mr. Hethcote first became
acquainted with Mrs. Farnaby. Now, Rufus, we are coming to something
romantic at last!

It is some time since Mr. Hethcote ceased to perform his clerical
duties, owing to a malady in the throat, which made it painful for him
to take his place in the reading-desk or the pulpit. His last curacy
attached him to a church at the West-end of London; and here, one
Sunday evening, after he had preached the sermon, a lady in trouble
came to him in the vestry for spiritual advice and consolation. She was
a regular attendant at the church, and something which he had said in
that evening's sermon had deeply affected her. Mr. Hethcote spoke with
her afterwards on many occasions at home. He felt a sincere interest in
her, but he disliked her husband; and, when he gave up his curacy, he
ceased to pay visits to the house. As to what Mrs. Farnaby's troubles
were, I can tell you nothing. Mr. Hethcote spoke very gravely and sadly
when he told me that the subject of his conversations with her must be
kept a secret. "I doubt whether you and Mr. Farnaby will get on well
together," he said to me; "but I shall be astonished if you are not
favourably impressed by his wife and her niece."

This was all I knew when I presented my letter of introduction to Mr.
Farnaby at his place of business.

It was a grand stone building, with great plate-glass windows--all
renewed and improved, they told me, since old Mr. Ronald's time. My
letter and my card went into an office at the back, and I followed them
after a while. A lean, hard, middle-aged man, buttoned up tight in a
black frock-coat, received me, holding my written introduction open in
his hand. He had a ruddy complexion not commonly seen in Londoners, so
far as my experience goes. His iron-gray hair and whiskers (especially
the whiskers) were in wonderfully fine order--as carefully oiled and
combed as if he had just come out of a barber's shop. I had been in the
morning to the Zoological Gardens; his eyes, when he lifted them from
the letter to me, reminded me of the eyes of the eagles--glassy and
cruel. I have a fault that I can't cure myself of. I like people, or
dislike them, at first sight, without knowing, in either case, whether
they deserve it or not. In the one moment when our eyes met, I felt the
devil in me. In plain English, I hated Mr. Farnaby!

"Good morning, sir," he began, in a loud, harsh, rasping voice. "The
letter you bring me takes me by surprise."

"I thought the writer was an old friend of yours," I said.

"An old friend of mine," Mr. Farnaby answered, "whose errors I deplore.
When he joined your Community, I looked upon him as a lost man. I am
surprised at his writing to me."

It is quite likely I was wrong, knowing nothing of the usages of
society in England. I thought this reception of me downright rude. I
had laid my hat on a chair; I took it up in my hand again, and
delivered a parting shot at the brute with the oily whiskers.

"If I had known what you now tell me," I said, "I should not have
troubled you by presenting that letter. Good morning."

This didn't in the least offend him. A curious smile broke out on his
face; it widened his eyes, and it twitched up his mouth at one corner.
He held out his hand to stop me. I waited, in case he felt bound to
make an apology. He did nothing of the sort--he only made a remark.

"You are young and hasty," he said. "I may lament my friend's
extravagances, without failing on that account in what is due to an old
friendship. You are probably not aware that we have no sympathy in
England with Socialists."

I hit him back again. "In that case, sir, a little Socialism in England
would do you no harm. We consider it a part of our duty as Christians
to feel sympathy with all men who are honest in their convictions--no
matter how mistaken (in our opinion) the convictions may be." I rather
thought I had him there; and I took up my hat again, to get off with
the honours of victory while I had the chance.

I am sincerely ashamed of myself, Rufus, in telling you all this. I
ought to have given him back "the soft answer that turneth away
wrath"--my conduct was a disgrace to my Community. What evil influence
was at work in me? Was it the air of London? or was it a possession of
the devil?

He stopped me for the second time--not in the least disconcerted by
what I had said to him. His inbred conviction of his own superiority to
a young adventurer like me was really something magnificent to witness.
He did me justice--the Philistine-Pharisee did me justice! Will you
believe it? He made his remarks next on my good points, as if I had
been a young bull at a prize cattle show.

"Excuse me for noticing it," he said. "Your manners are perfectly
gentlemanlike, and you speak English without any accent. And yet you
have been brought up in America. What does it mean?"

I grew worse and worse--I got downright sulky now.

"I suppose it means," I answered, "that some of us, in America,
cultivate ourselves as well as our land. We have our books and music,
though you seem to think we only have our axes and spades. Englishmen
don't claim a monopoly of good manners at Tadmor. We see no difference
between an American gentleman and an English gentleman. And as for
speaking English with an accent, the Americans accuse _us_ of doing
that."

He smiled again. "How very absurd!" he said, with a superb compassion
for the benighted Americans. By this time, I suspect he began to feel
that he had had enough of me. He got rid of me with an invitation.

"I shall be glad to receive you at my private residence, and introduce
you to my wife and her niece--our adopted daughter. There is the
address. We have a few friends to dinner on Saturday next, at seven.
Will you give us the pleasure of your company?"

We are all aware that there is a distinction between civility and
cordiality; but I myself never knew how wide that distinction might be,
until Mr. Farnaby invited me to dinner. If I had not been curious
(after what Mr. Hethcote had told me) to see Mrs. Farnaby and her
niece, I should certainly have slipped out of the engagement. As it
was, I promised to dine with Oily-Whiskers.

He put his hand into mine at parting. It felt as moistly cold as a dead
fish. After getting out again into the street, I turned into the first
tavern I passed, and ordered a drink. Shall I tell you what else I did?
I went into the lavatory, and washed Mr. Farnaby off my hand. (N.B.--If
I had behaved in this way at Tadmor, I should have been punished with
the lighter penalty--taking my meals by myself, and being forbidden to
enter the Common Room for eight and forty hours.) I feel I am getting
wickeder and wickeder in London--I have half a mind to join you in
Ireland. What does Tom Moore say of his countrymen--he ought to know, I
suppose? "For though they love women and golden store: Sir Knight, they
love honour and virtue more!" They must have been all Socialists in Tom
Moore's time. Just the place for me.


I have been obliged to wait a little. A dense fog has descended on us
by way of variety. With a stinking coal fire, with the gas lit and the
curtains drawn at half-past eleven in the forenoon, I feel that I am in
my own country again at last. Patience, my friend--patience! I am
coming to the ladies.

Entering Mr. Farnaby's private residence on the appointed day, I became
acquainted with one more of the innumerable insincerities of modern
English life. When a man asks you to dine with him at seven o'clock, in
other countries, he means what he says. In England, he means half-past
seven, and sometimes a quarter to eight. At seven o'clock I was the
only person in Mr. Farnaby's drawing-room. At ten minutes past seven,
Mr. Farnaby made his appearance. I had a good mind to take his place in
the middle of the hearth-rug, and say, "Farnaby, I am glad to see you."
But I looked at his whiskers; and _they_ said to me, as plainly as
words could speak, "Better not!"

In five minutes more, Mrs. Farnaby joined us.

I wish I was a practised author--or, no, I would rather, for the
moment, be a competent portrait-painter, and send you Mrs. Farnaby's
likeness enclosed. How I am to describe her in words, I really don't
know. My dear fellow, she almost frightened me. I never before saw such
a woman; I never expect to see such a woman again. There was nothing in
her figure, or in her way of moving, that produced this impression on
me--she is little and fat, and walks with a firm, heavy step, like the
step of a man. Her face is what I want to make you see as plainly as I
saw it myself: it was her face that startled me.

So far as I can pretend to judge, she must have been pretty, in a
healthy way, when she was young. I declare I hardly know whether she is
not pretty now. She certainly has no marks or wrinkles; her hair either
has no gray in it, or is too light to show the gray. She has preserved
her fair complexion; perhaps with art to assist it--I can't say. As for
her lips--I am not speaking disrespectfully, I am only describing them
truly, when I say that they invite kisses in spite of her. In two
words, though she has been married (as I know from what one of the
guests told me after dinner) for sixteen years, she would be still an
irresistible little woman, but for the one startling drawback of her
eyes. Don't mistake me. In themselves, they are large, well-opened blue
eyes, and may at one time have been the chief attraction in her face.
But now there is an expression of suffering in them--long, unsolaced
suffering, as I believe--so despairing and so dreadful, that she really
made my heart ache when I looked at her. I will swear to it, that woman
lives in some secret hell of her own making, and longs for the release
of death; and is so inveterately full of bodily life and strength, that
she may carry her burden with her to the utmost verge of life. I am
digging the pen into the paper, I feel this so strongly, and I am so
wretchedly incompetent to express my feeling. Can you imagine a
diseased mind, imprisoned in a healthy body? I don't care what doctors
or books may say--it is that, and nothing else. Nothing else will solve
the mystery of the smooth face, the fleshy figure, the firm step, the
muscular grip of her hand when she gives it to you--and the soul in
torment that looks at you all the while out of her eyes. It is useless
to tell me that such a contradiction as this cannot exist. I have seen
the woman; and she does exist.

Oh yes! I can fancy you grinning over my letter--I can hear you saying
to yourself, "Where did he pick up his experience, I wonder?" I have no
experience--I only have something that serves me instead of it, and I
don't know what. The Elder Brother, at Tadmor, used to say it was
sympathy. But _he_ is a sentimentalist.

Well, Mr. Farnaby presented me to his wife--and then walked away as if
he was sick of us both, and looked out of the window.

For some reason or other, Mrs. Farnaby seemed to be surprised, for the
moment, by my personal appearance. Her husband had, very likely, not
told her how young I was. She got over her momentary astonishment, and,
signing to me to sit by her on the sofa, said the necessary words of
welcome--evidently thinking something else all the time. The strange
miserable eyes looked over my shoulder, instead of looking at me.

"Mr. Farnaby tells me you have been living in America."

The tone in which she spoke was curiously quiet and monotonous. I have
heard such tones, in the Far West, from lonely settlers without a
neighbouring soul to speak to. Has Mrs. Farnaby no neighbouring soul to
speak to, except at dinner parties?

"You are an Englishman, are you not?" she went on.

I said Yes, and cast about in my mind for something to say to her. She
saved me the trouble by making me the victim of a complete series of
questions. This, as I afterwards discovered, was _her_ way of finding
conversation for strangers. Have you ever met with absent-minded people
to whom it is a relief to ask questions mechanically, without feeling
the slightest interest in the answers?

She began. "Where did you live in America?"

"At Tadmor, in the State of Illinois."

"What sort of place is Tadmor?"

I described the place as well as I could, under the circumstances.

"What made you go to Tadmor?"

It was impossible to reply to this, without speaking of the Community.
Feeling that the subject was not in the least likely to interest her, I
spoke as briefly as I could. To my astonishment, I evidently began to
interest her from that moment. The series of questions went on--but now
she not only listened, she was eager for the answers.

"Are there any women among you?"

"Nearly as many women as men."

Another change! Over the weary misery of her eyes there flashed a
bright look of interest which completely transformed them. Her
articulation even quickened when she put her next question.

"Are any of the women friendless creatures, who came to you from
England?"

"Yes, some of them."

I thought of Mellicent as I spoke. Was this new interest that I had so
innocently aroused, an interest in Mellicent? Her next question only
added to my perplexity. Her next question proved that my guess had
completely failed to hit the mark.

"Are there any _young_ women among them?"

Mr. Farnaby, standing with his back to us thus far, suddenly turned and
looked at her, when she inquired if there were "young" women among us.

"Oh yes," I said. "Mere girls."

She pressed so near to me that her knees touched mine. "How old?" she
asked eagerly.

Mr. Farnaby left the window, walked close up to the sofa, and
deliberately interrupted us.

"Nasty muggy weather, isn't it?" he said. "I suppose the climate of
America--"

Mrs. Farnaby deliberately interrupted her husband. "How old?" she
repeated, in a louder tone.

I was bound, of course, to answer the lady of the house. "Some girls
from eighteen to twenty. And some younger."

"How much younger?"

"Oh, from sixteen to seventeen."

She grew more and more excited; she positively laid her hand on my arm
in her eagerness to secure my attention all to herself. "American girls
or English?" she resumed, her fat, firm fingers closing on me with a
tremulous grasp.

"Shall you be in town in November?" said Mr. Farnaby, purposely
interrupting us again. "If you would like to see the Lord Mayor's
Show--"

Mrs. Farnaby impatiently shook me by the arm. "American girls or
English?" she reiterated, more obstinately than ever.

Mr. Farnaby gave her one look. If he could have put her on the blazing
fire and have burnt her up in an instant by an effort of will, I
believe he would have made the effort. He saw that I was observing him,
and turned quickly from his wife to me. His ruddy face was pale with
suppressed rage. My early arrival had given Mrs. Farnaby an opportunity
of speaking to me, which he had not anticipated in inviting me to
dinner. "Come and see my pictures," he said.

His wife still held me fast. Whether he liked it or not, I had again no
choice but to answer her. "Some American girls, and some English," I
said.

Her eyes opened wider and wider in unutterable expectation. She
suddenly advanced her face so close to mine, that I felt her hot breath
on my cheeks as the next words burst their way through her lips.

"Born in England?"

"No. Born at Tadmor."

She dropped my arm. The light died out of her eyes in an instant. In
some inconceivable way, I had utterly destroyed some secret expectation
that she had fixed on me. She actually left me on the sofa, and took a
chair on the opposite side of the fireplace. Mr. Farnaby, turning paler
and paler, stepped up to her as she changed her place. I rose to look
at the pictures on the wall nearest to me. You remarked the
extraordinary keenness of my sense of hearing, while we were fellow
passengers on the steamship. When he stooped over her, and whispered in
her ear, I heard him--though nearly the whole breadth of the room was
between us. "You hell-cat!"--that was what Mr. Farnaby said to his
wife.

The clock on the mantelpiece struck the half-hour after seven. In quick
succession, the guests at the dinner now entered the room.

I was so staggered by the extraordinary scene of married life which I
had just witnessed, that the guests produced only a very faint
impression upon me. My mind was absorbed in trying to find the true
meaning of what I had seen and heard. Was Mrs. Farnaby a little mad? I
dismissed that idea as soon as it occurred to me; nothing that I had
observed in her justified it. The truer conclusion appeared to be, that
she was deeply interested in some absent (and possibly lost) young
creature; whose age, judging by actions and tones which had
sufficiently revealed that part of the secret to me, could not be more
than sixteen or seventeen years. How long had she cherished the hope of
seeing the girl, or hearing of her? It must have been, anyhow, a hope
very deeply rooted, for she had been perfectly incapable of controlling
herself when I had accidentally roused it. As for her husband, there
could be no doubt that the subject was not merely distasteful to him,
but so absolutely infuriating that he could not even keep his temper,
in the presence of a third person invited to his house. Had he injured
the girl in any way? Was he responsible for her disappearance? Did his
wife know it, or only suspect it? Who _was_ the girl? What was the
secret of Mrs. Farnaby's extraordinary interest in her--Mrs. Farnaby,
whose marriage was childless; whose interest one would have thought
should be naturally concentrated on her adopted daughter, her sister's
orphan child? In conjectures such as these, I completely lost myself.
Let me hear what your ingenuity can make of the puzzle; and let me
return to Mr. Farnaby's dinner, waiting on Mr. Farnaby's table.

The servant threw open the drawing-room door, and the most honoured
guest present led Mrs. Farnaby to the dining-room. I roused myself to
some observation of what was going on about me. No ladies had been
invited; and the men were all of a certain age. I looked in vain for
the charming niece. Was she not well enough to appear at the
dinner-party? I ventured on putting the question to Mr. Farnaby.

"You will find her at the tea-table, when we return to the
drawing-room. Girls are out of place at dinner-parties." So he answered
me--not very graciously.

As I stepped out on the landing, I looked up; I don't know why, unless
I was the unconscious object of magnetic attraction. Anyhow, I had my
reward. A bright young face peeped over the balusters of the upper
staircase, and modestly withdrew itself again in a violent hurry.
Everybody but Mr. Farnaby and myself had disappeared in the
dining-room. Was she having a peep at the young Socialist?


Another interruption to my letter, caused by another change in the
weather. The fog has vanished; the waiter is turning off the gas, and
letting in the drab-coloured daylight. I ask him if it is still
raining. He smiles, and rubs his hands, and says, "It looks like
clearing up soon, sir." This man's head is gray; he has been all his
life a waiter in London--and he can still see the cheerful side of
things. What native strength of mind cast away on a vocation that is
unworthy of it!

Well--and now about the Farnaby dinner. I feel a tightness in the lower
part of my waistcoat, Rufus, when I think of the dinner; there was such
a quantity of it, and Mr. Farnaby was so tyrannically resolute in
forcing his luxuries down the throats of his guests. His eye was on me,
if I let my plate go away before it was empty--his eye said "I have
paid for this magnificent dinner, and I mean to see you eat it." Our
printed list of the dishes, as they succeeded each other, also informed
us of the varieties of wine which it was imperatively necessary to
drink with each dish. I got into difficulties early in the proceedings.
The taste of sherry, for instance, is absolutely nauseous to me; and
Rhine wine turns into vinegar ten minutes after it has passed my lips.
I asked for the wine that I could drink, out of its turn. You should
have seen Mr. Farnaby's face, when I violated the rules of his
dinner-table! It was the one amusing incident of the feast--the one
thing that alleviated the dreary and mysterious spectacle of Mrs.
Farnaby. There she sat, with her mind hundreds of miles away from
everything that was going on about her, entangling the two guests, on
her right hand and on her left, in a network of vacant questions, just
as she had entangled me. I discovered that one of these gentlemen was a
barrister and the other a ship-owner, by the answers which Mrs. Farnaby
absently extracted from them on the subject of their respective
vocations in life. And while she questioned incessantly, she ate
incessantly. Her vigorous body insisted on being fed. She would have
emptied her wineglass (I suspect) as readily as she plied her knife and
fork--but I discovered that a certain system of restraint was
established in the matter of wine. At intervals, Mr. Farnaby just
looked at the butler--and the butler and his bottle, on those
occasions, deliberately passed her by. Not the slightest visible change
was produced in her by the eating and drinking; she was equal to any
demands that any dinner could make on her. There was no flush in her
face, no change in her spirits, when she rose, in obedience to English
custom, and retired to the drawing-room.