Zuleika Dobson Or, An Oxford Love Story Read online

  II

  The sun streamed through the bay-window of a "best" bedroom in theWarden's house, and glorified the pale crayon-portraits on the wall,the dimity curtains, the old fresh chintz. He invaded the many trunkswhich--all painted Z. D.--gaped, in various stages of excavation, aroundthe room. The doors of the huge wardrobe stood, like the doors ofJanus' temple in time of war, majestically open; and the sun seized thisopportunity of exploring the mahogany recesses. But the carpet, whichhad faded under his immemorial visitations, was now almost ENTIRELYhidden from him, hidden under layers of fair fine linen, layers ofsilk, brocade, satin, chiffon, muslin. All the colours of the rainbow,materialised by modistes, were there. Stacked on chairs were I know notwhat of sachets, glove-cases, fan-cases. There were innumerable packagesin silver-paper and pink ribands. There was a pyramid of bandboxes.There was a virgin forest of boot-trees. And rustling quickly hither andthither, in and out of this profusion, with armfuls of finery, was anobviously French maid. Alert, unerring, like a swallow she dipped anddarted. Nothing escaped her, and she never rested. She had the air ofthe born unpacker--swift and firm, yet withal tender. Scarce had herarms been laden but their loads were lying lightly between shelves ortightly in drawers. To calculate, catch, distribute, seemed in her but asingle process. She was one of those who are born to make chaos cosmic.

  Insomuch that ere the loud chapel-clock tolled another hour all thetrunks had been sent empty away. The carpet was unflecked by any scrapof silver-paper. From the mantelpiece, photographs of Zuleika surveyedthe room with a possessive air. Zuleika's pincushion, a-bristle withnew pins, lay on the dimity-flounced toilet-table, and round it stooda multitude of multiform glass vessels, domed, all of them, with dullgold, on which Z. D., in zianites and diamonds, was encrusted. Ona small table stood a great casket of malachite, initialled in likefashion. On another small table stood Zuleika's library. Both books werein covers of dull gold. On the back of one cover BRADSHAW, in beryls,was encrusted; on the back of the other, A.B.C. GUIDE, in amethysts,beryls, chrysoprases, and garnets. And Zuleika's great cheval-glassstood ready to reflect her. Always it travelled with her, in a greatcase specially made for it. It was framed in ivory, and of fluted ivorywere the slim columns it swung between. Of gold were its twin sconces,and four tall tapers stood in each of them.

  The door opened, and the Warden, with hospitable words, left hisgrand-daughter at the threshold.

  Zuleika wandered to her mirror. "Undress me, Melisande," she said. Likeall who are wont to appear by night before the public, she had the habitof resting towards sunset.

  Presently Melisande withdrew. Her mistress, in a white peignoir tiedwith a blue sash, lay in a great chintz chair, gazing out of thebay-window. The quadrangle below was very beautiful, with its walls ofrugged grey, its cloisters, its grass carpet. But to her it was of nomore interest than if it had been the rattling court-yard to one ofthose hotels in which she spent her life. She saw it, but heeded it not.She seemed to be thinking of herself, or of something she desired, or ofsome one she had never met. There was ennui, and there was wistfulness,in her gaze. Yet one would have guessed these things to be transient--tobe no more than the little shadows that sometimes pass between a brightmirror and the brightness it reflects.

  Zuleika was not strictly beautiful. Her eyes were a trifle large, andtheir lashes longer than they need have been. An anarchy of small curlswas her chevelure, a dark upland of misrule, every hair asserting itsrights over a not discreditable brow. For the rest, her features werenot at all original. They seemed to have been derived rather from agallimaufry of familiar models. From Madame la Marquise de Saint-Ouencame the shapely tilt of the nose. The mouth was a mere replica ofCupid's bow, lacquered scarlet and strung with the littlest pearls.No apple-tree, no wall of peaches, had not been robbed, nor any Tyrianrose-garden, for the glory of Miss Dobson's cheeks. Her neck wasimitation-marble. Her hands and feet were of very mean proportions. Shehad no waist to speak of.

  Yet, though a Greek would have railed at her asymmetry, and anElizabethan have called her "gipsy," Miss Dobson now, in the midst ofthe Edwardian Era, was the toast of two hemispheres. Late in her 'teensshe had become an orphan and a governess. Her grandfather had refusedher appeal for a home or an allowance, on the ground that he would notbe burdened with the upshot of a marriage which he had once forbiddenand not yet forgiven. Lately, however, prompted by curiosity or byremorse, he had asked her to spend a week or so of his decliningyears with him. And she, "resting" between two engagements--one atHammerstein's Victoria, N.Y.C., the other at the Folies Bergeres,Paris--and having never been in Oxford, had so far let bygones bebygones as to come and gratify the old man's whim.

  It may be that she still resented his indifference to those earlystruggles which, even now, she shuddered to recall. For a governess'life she had been, indeed, notably unfit. Hard she had thought it, thatpenury should force her back into the school-room she was scarce out of,there to champion the sums and maps and conjugations she had nevertried to master. Hating her work, she had failed signally to pick upany learning from her little pupils, and had been driven from houseto house, a sullen and most ineffectual maiden. The sequence of hersituations was the swifter by reason of her pretty face. Was there agrown-up son, always he fell in love with her, and she would let hiseyes trifle boldly with hers across the dinner-table. When he offeredher his hand, she would refuse it--not because she "knew her place,"but because she did not love him. Even had she been a good teacher, herpresence could not have been tolerated thereafter. Her corded trunk,heavier by another packet of billets-doux and a month's salary inadvance, was soon carried up the stairs of some other house.

  It chanced that she came, at length, to be governess in a large familythat had Gibbs for its name and Notting Hill for its background. Edward,the eldest son, was a clerk in the city, who spent his evenings in thepractice of amateur conjuring. He was a freckled youth, with hair thatbristled in places where it should have lain smooth, and he fell in lovewith Zuleika duly, at first sight, during high-tea. In the course of theevening, he sought to win her admiration by a display of all his tricks.These were familiar to this household, and the children had been sentto bed, the mother was dozing, long before the seance was at an end. ButMiss Dobson, unaccustomed to any gaieties, sat fascinated by the youngman's sleight of hand, marvelling that a top-hat could hold so manygoldfish, and a handkerchief turn so swiftly into a silver florin. Allthat night, she lay wide awake, haunted by the miracles he had wrought.Next evening, when she asked him to repeat them, "Nay," he whispered,"I cannot bear to deceive the girl I love. Permit me to explain thetricks." So he explained them. His eyes sought hers across the bowl ofgold-fish, his fingers trembled as he taught her to manipulate the magiccanister. One by one, she mastered the paltry secrets. Her respect forhim waned with every revelation. He complimented her on her skill. "Icould not do it more neatly myself!" he said. "Oh, dear Miss Dobson,will you but accept my hand, all these things shall be yours--the cards,the canister, the goldfish, the demon egg-cup--all yours!" Zuleika,with ravishing coyness, answered that if he would give her them now, shewould "think it over." The swain consented, and at bed-time sheretired with the gift under her arm. In the light of her bedroom candleMarguerite hung not in greater ecstasy over the jewel-casket thanhung Zuleika over the box of tricks. She clasped her hands over thetremendous possibilities it held for her--manumission from her bondage,wealth, fame, power. Stealthily, so soon as the house slumbered,she packed her small outfit, embedding therein the precious gift.Noiselessly, she shut the lid of her trunk, corded it, shouldered it,stole down the stairs with it. Outside--how that chain had grated!and her shoulder, how it was aching!--she soon found a cab. She tooka night's sanctuary in some railway-hotel. Next day, she moved intoa small room in a lodging-house off the Edgware Road, and there fora whole week she was sedulous in the practice of her tricks. Then sheinscribed her name on the books of a "Juvenile Party EntertainmentsAgency."

  The Christmas holidays were at hand, and before l
ong she got anengagement. It was a great evening for her. Her repertory was, it mustbe confessed, old and obvious; but the children, in deference to theirhostess, pretended not to know how the tricks were done, and assumedtheir prettiest airs of wonder and delight. One of them even pretendedto be frightened, and was led howling from the room. In fact, the wholething went off splendidly. The hostess was charmed, and told Zuleikathat a glass of lemonade would be served to her in the hall. Otherengagements soon followed. Zuleika was very, very happy. I cannot claimfor her that she had a genuine passion for her art. The true conjurerfinds his guerdon in the consciousness of work done perfectly and forits own sake. Lucre and applause are not necessary to him. If he wereset down, with the materials of his art, on a desert island, he wouldyet be quite happy. He would not cease to produce the barber's-pole fromhis mouth. To the indifferent winds he would still speak his patter, andeven in the last throes of starvation would not eat his live rabbit orhis gold-fish. Zuleika, on a desert island, would have spent most of hertime in looking for a man's foot-print. She was, indeed, far too humana creature to care much for art. I do not say that she took her worklightly. She thought she had genius, and she liked to be told that thiswas so. But mainly she loved her work as a means of mere self-display.The frank admiration which, into whatsoever house she entered, thegrown-up sons flashed on her; their eagerness to see her to the door;their impressive way of putting her into her omnibus--these were thethings she revelled in. She was a nymph to whom men's admiration was thegreater part of life. By day, whenever she went into the streets,she was conscious that no man passed her without a stare; and thisconsciousness gave a sharp zest to her outings. Sometimes she wasfollowed to her door--crude flattery which she was too innocent to fear.Even when she went into the haberdasher's to make some little purchaseof tape or riband, or into the grocer's--for she was an epicure in herhumble way--to buy a tin of potted meat for her supper, the homage ofthe young men behind the counter did flatter and exhilarate her. As thehomage of men became for her, more and more, a matter of course, themore subtly necessary was it to her happiness. The more she won of it,the more she treasured it. She was alone in the world, and it saved herfrom any moment of regret that she had neither home nor friends. Forher the streets that lay around her had no squalor, since she paced themalways in the gold nimbus of her fascinations. Her bedroom seemed notmean nor lonely to her, since the little square of glass, nailed abovethe wash-stand, was ever there to reflect her face. Thereinto, indeed,she was ever peering. She would droop her head from side to side, shewould bend it forward and see herself from beneath her eyelashes, thentilt it back and watch herself over her supercilious chin. And she wouldsmile, frown, pout, languish--let all the emotions hover upon her face;and always she seemed to herself lovelier than she had ever been.

  Yet was there nothing Narcissine in her spirit. Her love for her ownimage was not cold aestheticism. She valued that image not for its ownsake, but for sake of the glory it always won for her. In the littleremote music-hall, where she was soon appearing nightly as an "earlyturn," she reaped glory in a nightly harvest. She could feel that allthe gallery-boys, because of her, were scornful of the sweetheartswedged between them, and she knew that she had but to say "Will anygentleman in the audience be so good as to lend me his hat?" for thestalls to rise as one man and rush towards the platform. But greaterthings were in store for her. She was engaged at two halls in the WestEnd. Her horizon was fast receding and expanding. Homage became nightlytangible in bouquets, rings, brooches--things acceptable and (luckierthan their donors) accepted. Even Sunday was not barren for Zuleika:modish hostesses gave her postprandially to their guests. Came thatSunday night, notanda candidissimo calculo! when she received certainguttural compliments which made absolute her vogue and enabled her tocommand, thenceforth, whatever terms she asked for.

  Already, indeed, she was rich. She was living at the most exorbitanthotel in all Mayfair. She had innumerable gowns and no necessity to buyjewels; and she also had, which pleased her most, the fine cheval-glassI have described. At the close of the Season, Paris claimed her fora month's engagement. Paris saw her and was prostrate. Boldini did aportrait of her. Jules Bloch wrote a song about her; and this, for awhole month, was howled up and down the cobbled alleys of Montmartre.And all the little dandies were mad for "la Zuleika." The jewellersof the Rue de la Paix soon had nothing left to put in theirwindows--everything had been bought for "la Zuleika." For a whole month,baccarat was not played at the Jockey Club--every member had succumbedto a nobler passion. For a whole month, the whole demi-monde wasforgotten for one English virgin. Never, even in Paris, had a womantriumphed so. When the day came for her departure, the city wore such anair of sullen mourning as it had not worn since the Prussians marched toits Elysee. Zuleika, quite untouched, would not linger in the conqueredcity. Agents had come to her from every capital in Europe, and, for ayear, she ranged, in triumphal nomady, from one capital to another. InBerlin, every night, the students escorted her home with torches. PrinceVierfuenfsechs-Siebenachtneun offered her his hand, and was condemnedby the Kaiser to six months' confinement in his little castle. In YildizKiosk, the tyrant who still throve there conferred on her the Order ofChastity, and offered her the central couch in his seraglio. Shegave her performance in the Quirinal, and, from the Vatican, the Popelaunched against her a Bull which fell utterly flat. In Petersburg, theGrand Duke Salamander Salamandrovitch fell enamoured of her. Of everyarticle in the apparatus of her conjuring-tricks he caused a replicato be made in finest gold. These treasures he presented to her in thatgreat malachite casket which now stood on the little table in her room;and thenceforth it was with these that she performed her wonders.They did not mark the limit of the Grand Duke's generosity. He was forbestowing on Zuleika the half of his immensurable estates. The GrandDuchess appealed to the Tzar. Zuleika was conducted across the frontier,by an escort of love-sick Cossacks. On the Sunday before she leftMadrid, a great bull-fight was held in her honour. Fifteen bullsreceived the coup-de-grace, and Alvarez, the matador of matadors, diedin the arena with her name on his lips. He had tried to kill thelast bull without taking his eyes off la divina senorita. A prettiercompliment had never been paid her, and she was immensely pleased withit. For that matter, she was immensely pleased with everything. Shemoved proudly to the incessant music of a paean, aye! of a paean thatwas always crescendo.

  Its echoes followed her when she crossed the Atlantic, till they werelost in the louder, deeper, more blatant paean that rose for her fromthe shores beyond. All the stops of that "mighty organ, many-piped," theNew York press, were pulled out simultaneously, as far as they could bepulled, in Zuleika's honour. She delighted in the din. She read everyline that was printed about her, tasting her triumph as she had nevertasted it before. And how she revelled in the Brobdingnagian drawings ofher, which, printed in nineteen colours, towered between the columns orsprawled across them! There she was, measuring herself back to back withthe Statue of Liberty; scudding through the firmament on a comet,whilst a crowd of tiny men in evening-dress stared up at her from theterrestrial globe; peering through a microscope held by Cupid over adiminutive Uncle Sam; teaching the American Eagle to stand on its head;and doing a hundred-and-one other things--whatever suggested itselfto the fancy of native art. And through all this iridescent maze ofsymbolism were scattered many little slabs of realism. At home, on thestreet, Zuleika was the smiling target of all snap-shooters, and all thesnap-shots were snapped up by the press and reproduced with annotations:Zuleika Dobson walking on Broadway in the sables gifted her by GrandDuke Salamander--she says "You can bounce blizzards in them"; ZuleikaDobson yawning over a love-letter from millionaire Edelweiss; relishinga cup of clam-broth--she says "They don't use clams out there"; orderingher maid to fix her a warm bath; finding a split in the gloves she hasjust drawn on before starting for the musicale given in her honour byMrs. Suetonius X. Meistersinger, the most exclusive woman in New York;chatting at the telephone to Miss Camille Van Spook, the best-born girlin New Yo
rk; laughing over the recollection of a compliment made her byGeorge Abimelech Post, the best-groomed man in New York; meditating anew trick; admonishing a waiter who has upset a cocktail over her skirt;having herself manicured; drinking tea in bed. Thus was Zuleika enableddaily to be, as one might say, a spectator of her own wonderful life.On her departure from New York, the papers spoke no more than thetruth when they said she had had "a lovely time." The further she wentWest--millionaire Edelweiss had loaned her his private car--the lovelierher time was. Chicago drowned the echoes of New York; final Friscodwarfed the headlines of Chicago. Like one of its own prairie-fires, sheswept the country from end to end. Then she swept back, and sailed forEngland. She was to return for a second season in the coming Fall. Atpresent, she was, as I have said, "resting."

  As she sat here in the bay-window of her room, she was not reviewingthe splendid pageant of her past. She was a young person whose reveriesnever were in retrospect. For her the past was no treasury of distinctmemories, all hoarded and classified, some brighter than others and morehighly valued. All memories were for her but as the motes in one fusedradiance that followed her and made more luminous the pathway ofher future. She was always looking forward. She was looking forwardnow--that shade of ennui had passed from her face--to the week she wasto spend in Oxford. A new city was a new toy to her, and--for it wasyouth's homage that she loved best--this city of youths was a toy afterher own heart.

  Aye, and it was youths who gave homage to her most freely. She wasof that high-stepping and flamboyant type that captivates youth mostsurely. Old men and men of middle age admired her, but she had not thatflower-like quality of shyness and helplessness, that look of innocence,so dear to men who carry life's secrets in their heads. Yet ZuleikaWAS very innocent, really. She was as pure as that young shepherdessMarcella, who, all unguarded, roved the mountains and was by all theshepherds adored. Like Marcella, she had given her heart to no man, hadpreferred none. Youths were reputed to have died for love of her,as Chrysostom died for love of the shepherdess; and she, like theshepherdess, had shed no tear. When Chrysostom was lying on his bier inthe valley, and Marcella looked down from the high rock, Ambrosio,the dead man's comrade, cried out on her, upbraiding her with bitterwords--"Oh basilisk of our mountains!" Nor do I think Ambrosio spoke toostrongly. Marcella cared nothing for men's admiration, and yet, insteadof retiring to one of those nunneries which are founded for her kind,she chose to rove the mountains, causing despair to all the shepherds.Zuleika, with her peculiar temperament, would have gone mad in anunnery. "But," you may argue, "ought not she to have taken the veil,even at the cost of her reason, rather than cause so much despair in theworld? If Marcella was a basilisk, as you seem to think, how about MissDobson?" Ah, but Marcella knew quite well, boasted even, that she neverwould or could love any man. Zuleika, on the other hand, was a woman ofreally passionate fibre. She may not have had that conscious, separate,and quite explicit desire to be a mother with which modern playwrightscredit every unmated member of her sex. But she did know that she couldlove. And, surely, no woman who knows that of herself can be rightlycensured for not recluding herself from the world: it is only womenwithout the power to love who have no right to provoke men's love.

  Though Zuleika had never given her heart, strong in her were the desireand the need that it should be given. Whithersoever she had fared, shehad seen nothing but youths fatuously prostrate to her--not one uprightfigure which she could respect. There were the middle-aged men, the oldmen, who did not bow down to her; but from middle-age, as from eld, shehad a sanguine aversion. She could love none but a youth. Nor--thoughshe herself, womanly, would utterly abase herself before herideal--could she love one who fell prone before her. And before her allyouths always did fall prone. She was an empress, and all youths wereher slaves. Their bondage delighted her, as I have said. But no empresswho has any pride can adore one of her slaves. Whom, then, could proudZuleika adore? It was a question which sometimes troubled her. Therewere even moments when, looking into her cheval-glass, she cried outagainst that arrangement in comely lines and tints which got for herthe dulia she delighted in. To be able to love once--would not that bebetter than all the homage in the world? But would she ever meet whom,looking up to him, she could love--she, the omnisubjugant? Would sheever, ever meet him?

  It was when she wondered thus, that the wistfulness came into her eyes.Even now, as she sat by the window, that shadow returned to them. Shewas wondering, shyly, had she met him at length? That young equestrianwho had not turned to look at her; whom she was to meet at dinnerto-night... was it he? The ends of her blue sash lay across her lap,and she was lazily unravelling their fringes. "Blue and white!" sheremembered. "They were the colours he wore round his hat." And she gavea little laugh of coquetry. She laughed, and, long after, her lips werestill parted in a smile.

  So did she sit, smiling, wondering, with the fringes of her sashbetween her fingers, while the sun sank behind the opposite wall of thequadrangle, and the shadows crept out across the grass, thirsty for thedew.