  It was probable that Mrs. Venables came to Naples in order to absorb impressions. This was the business of her life; she made of herself a sponge, and let the waters of her experiences fill her. Later, she squeezed them out. It is admitted, of course, that any sponge will a little colour with its own individualities of hue the water which passes through it. She had really a fine power of discerning and appraising significance in matters the most ordinary. When all is said, to be easily 'struck' (her own word) must be accounted a gift, like any other of the manifold gifts of receptiveness. Mrs. Venables was struck—immensely struck—by the picturesque (her own word again) gaiety of the Toledo in the late November evening. Her walk through it was a veritable orgie to her. Her intelligent profile wore at moments a strained look; it was as if the impressions pressed in with almost too great a rapidity and force for capture. Capture was all she attempted; digestion might come later. The same anxious strain may be observed in the face of the gourmand confronted, he half fears, with more than his match. This anxiety perhaps takes the edge from entire enjoyment; but Mrs. Venables had not entered into life to receive pleasure, but impressions. It was all copy to her: the pedlars' stalls with their lights and groups of loafers, the unkempt men and women gutter-picking ('the mozzonari, Warren,' said Mrs. Venables, impressed), the people eating macaroni under the awnings of travelling cooks, the rag-sellers and the bone-buyers, and the general noisy sociability. It was all absorbed; it would all be squeezed forth in due time; nothing would be kept back, for the atmosphere of Southern Italy, so unique, depended on these details. 'Be truthful, and you will certainly be interesting,' was Mrs. Venables' theory of art; not at all 'Be interesting, and you may possibly be truthful incidentally.' For which she deserved credit, as the holder of a commendable ideal. Her son Warren knew that this walk was of the nature of an orgie. The curve of his mother's fine lips would alone have conveyed that to him. The set of his own evinced a little amusement; the scene to him was ordinary enough, and there seemed to him to be a good many rather obnoxious people about. People, obnoxious or agreeable, were not to him copy, unless he wanted to paint them. His dark, clever face missed the ideality of his mother's; his speculative eyes saw a good deal more. Outside a cafÉ a noisy group lounged. One of them was reading something aloud from a paper; it seemed to be amusing. An explosion of laughter interrupted the stuttering voice of the reader, as the Venables passed. The reader, glancing up, looked Warren Venables full in the face. Then the stuttering voice went on. More laughter exploded. 'What are they reading?' Mrs. Venables wondered, as they left the group behind them. 'Oh, some rotten thing....' Warren Venables looked abstracted for a moment or two. Then he jerked back his head, in sudden enlightenment. 'That was it—he was in my house in my last year at school. An infant with a horrid stutter; I used to lick him for it; never knew whether it was meant for cheek or not.... What was his name, now?' He pondered it. 'What are you talking about, Warren? Look at that girl. What a striking face! The features of the Moor and the spirit of the Greek.... Did you see some one you know, dear boy?' 'Yes—the man reading; I was at school with him in my last year, but I can't think of his name.... Crevequer, that's it.... Now, that's funny, rather,' he mused. 'The young man reading, Warren?' 'That's the one. I knew him by his stutter, chiefly—and the blazer. He knew me, too, or half thought he did. Seems to be amusing himself pretty well. Do you remember, mother, you said something about my seeing after him, more or less, when he went to school? You'd met his father, or knew about him in some way. I suppose that was why I felt I had to lick him for his stutter; I don't remember that I ever had much other intercourse with him.' 'Crevequer?... Oh, Maddan Crevequer's boy, do you mean? Yes, I met Maddan Crevequer once or twice, and I used to hear a good deal about him. He was an eccentric—a genius, too, I think, only he didn't turn it in the right directions. Shut himself up in a little place in the North of Italy, and no one ever knew what he did there. Very striking. Then he came to England to send his boy to school, and it killed him. He required Italy for his existence, physically, intellectually, and spiritually. Quite a pagan, but his wife was a Roman Catholic, and I heard that the children were brought up to her faith, though she died quite young.... One feels always about his books that they should be intensely interesting, but it is an interest somehow run off the lines.... And so that is Maddan Crevequer's boy!' The thought suddenly brought her up. The flare of a street lamp had shown Tommy Crevequer rather plainly—his bare head, his frayed blazer, his friends, girls and men, who laughed. It was, perhaps, his friends who chiefly put the ring of surprise into Mrs. Venables' tone. Interest followed close on its heels. The thing struck her. 'Curious. We must find him out, Warren; get to know him.' 'Must we, mother? Good copy, do you think? But one knows the sort'—he made a downward movement with his hand—'when it's sober it borrows, and that's such a bore. Besides, we shan't be able to find him—and he won't, probably, want to be found.' 'You might go back now....' 'Interrupt the reading? No, I think not. He mightn't be pleased.' 'He looked,' said Mrs. Venables, 'as if he was entering into the life of the quite poor. That would be an enterprise of immense interest if one could really accomplish it, really break down the barriers. We must find the boy, Warren.' 'All right, we'll try. But I expect he's just scum, you know. There are lots like him in every big town; it drifts about the bottom, that sort, and personally I don't think it's anything in its favour that it's by way of being—or having been—a gentleman. But I've no doubt you'd like it, mother, so we'll look for Crevequer. Only its not an easy sort to find, I warn you. Nomadic, you know.... Oh, of course Crevequer may be just on the spree for to-night; he may dress better as a rule.' The impression of Mr. Crevequer seemed to remain with Mrs. Venables, standing out above the other dishes of her orgie. She returned to her hotel replete. Tommy Crevequer met his sister at the door of the Fondo Theatre, and walked home with her. He mentioned Venables. 'Head of my house in my first year at school. He was decent to me, rather. I don't suppose he knew me to-night; he had some one with him, so I didn't stop him; but I wouldn't mind meeting him again.' It was quite clear that he would not mind in the least. The Crevequers never minded meeting people; they were very sociable. Betty said that Morello had asked her to sit to him. 'I suppose I'd better—had I? It will bore me quite awfully, but it would be extravagant not to, of course. And he's asked Gina and me to supper to-morrow. You'd better come too; it may be fun.' Tommy hummed an air. 'He's a silly ass, Morello is. But we'll have supper with him by all means, particularly with him and Gina; Gina's great sport.... It's struck me, Betty, that perhaps Venables did know me, and was feeling proud or something. If he's proud I should love to meet him again, and introduce him to—to Luli and every one. It would be our duty, don't you think? But Venables used to be an awfully good sort—I don't believe he's really proud—and if we do run into him again, we'll take him about with us.... I'm awfully hard up just now.' The Crevequers did not suffer from pride. Three weeks later, Venables walked into the Crevequers' room. It was about six o'clock; the Crevequers had guests, who smoked and drank wine and conversed. Tommy Crevequer sat astride on the table; Betty was on the arm of a chair, leaning back against Gina Lunelli's broad shoulder. It was confusing to come into such an intimate party. Tommy looked round, and broke off in the middle of what he was saying, and got off the table. He was glad Venables had come. Venables apologized. 'How are you, Crevequer?... But I'm interrupting you; I'll come in another time.' But Tommy drew him in, and introduced him to Betty, and to Luli and Gina and all the rest, and offered him wine. It was a convivial gathering; Venables, being a stranger, and wearing a rather clean collar, perhaps threw a shade of restraint over it, but mirth broke out again before long. At last, with common accord, the company took its leave—all but Venables. 'Well, how are you Crevequer? I've been looking for you, you know, all over the place.' Tommy had almost forgotten how much he had admired Venables once; it returned to him now as they talked. He would have liked to see a good deal of Venables. Venables painted, he learnt—painted successfully, Tommy presumed, looking at the clean collar and the well-cut coat. It was perhaps a pity, Tommy reflected, his melancholy eyes, under their quick, amused brows, turning from Venables to his sister, that he and Betty were not better dressed to-day. Venables was probably a person of prejudices, and his collar was very clean. Venables learned that Crevequer was a journalist. 'What's your paper?' 'That.' Tommy indicated Marchese Peppino on the table; it came out that day. 'Oh.' Venables just glanced at it; he showed no desire to inspect it more closely; possibly he knew enough about it already. His clever face was scrupulously devoid of expression. 'I chiefly do sketches,' Tommy elaborated. 'You know the sort of thing? They aren't funny, not a bit; but they sell. Oh, I write for it, too, of course; and that's funnier, rather. Novelle in corto, you know; we have the news in, as much as if we were anybody; combine instruction with amusement, don't you know.' Venables knew quite well. 'I wonder,' he thought afterwards, 'why he shoved it down my throat like that. Mere cheek, perhaps, or to show he didn't mind, or to warn me off at once in case I didn't like his style. Or doesn't he really, perhaps, realize....' Not really to realize, Crevequer must have pushed very far from the shores of decency. Venables let the topic of Marchese Peppino lie where Tommy had dropped it. He delivered his mother's message, not stiffly, but with voice and face a little vacant of expression, lacking interest. He asked the Crevequers to come to lunch to-morrow at Parker's Hotel. Mrs. Venables had not been aware of Betty, but Warren supposed that her existence would add a further element of picturesque interest to the 'impression.' The invitation was accepted. Venables stayed a little longer, and examined the ceiling, and discovered incidentally that the Crevequers—probably by the sheer insane futility of their stammering flow—had the power of pricking him at all points to sudden laughter. He considered it walking home. In his search for Tommy Crevequer he had happened upon a man—he kept a billiard saloon—who knew him rather well. His remarks, entirely friendly (he was really fond of Tommy), conveyed to Venables several items of information about him; among others, that Venables would at no time have any difficulty in finding him, as a good many people thought it prudent to keep him under view. At the same time, Tommy's acquaintances seemed to assume as a matter of course that he might find an occasional plunge into obscurity a convenience. These casually conveyed impressions Venables had assimilated without surprise. As he would have said, one knew the sort. And Venables liked people who amused him. But Marchese Peppino stuck in his throat. Betty observed to Tommy: 'What fun. We shall probably forget to go. But if we don't, we shall have to eat so much that we shan't need any more for a week. How economical! Lunch in England—do you remember, Tommy?' Tommy was thinking. 'Betty, we don't dress well enough. I want a new hat; so do you. Venables is better dressed than we are. We must be tidy, and cut a dash at lunch. It's a mistake not to be well dressed; people are so prejudiced. I shall wear a collar to-morrow—a quite clean one, like Venables. And we won't have any supper to-night, because we shall have to eat too much at lunch. And I suppose Mrs. Venables will talk about father's books, as she's so interested; so let's read them.' 'Perhaps,' said Betty, 'we'd better read her own works too; only I don't feel sure they'd be quite nice, so I think we'll wait till we're older—thirty-two and thirty-three. We can tell her if she asks that we read so little that we have to be very careful about what we read. It would be so disappointing to read a book we didn't like; she'll understand that.' |
|
