The Way of Ambition. Robert Hichens
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of slime. Men showered their gold out of blackness. They rose on strong pinions only to sink down below the level surely of even the average man. And angry passions attended them along the pilgrimage of their lives, seemed born and bred of their very being. Few books made Claude feel so sad as the books which chronicled the genius of men submitted to the conditions which prevail in the ardent struggle for life.
He closed them, and was happy with his own quiet fate, his apparently humdrum existence, which provided no material for any biographer, the fate of the unknown man who does not wish to be known.
But, of course, there was in him, as there is in almost every man of strong imagination and original talent, a restlessness like that of the physically strong man who has never tried and proved his strength in any combat.
Mrs. Shiffney had appealed to his restlessness, which had driven Claude forth into the darkness of evening and now companioned him along the London ways. He knew no woman of her type well, and something in him instinctively shrank from her type. As he had said to Mrs. Mansfield, he dreaded, yet he was aware that he might be fascinated by, the monster with teeth and claws always watchful and hungry for pleasure. And the voice that murmured, "To-morrow we die! To-morrow we die!" was like a groan in his ears. But now, as he walked, he was almost inclined to scold his imagination as a companion which led him into excesses, to rebel against his own instinct. Why should he refuse any pleasant temptation that came in his way? Why should he decline to go on the yacht? Was he not a prude, a timorous man to be so afraid for his own safety, not of body, but of mind and soul? Mrs. Shiffney's remarks about Continental artists stuck in his mind. Ought he not to fling off his armor, to descend boldly into the mid-stream of life, to let it take him on its current whither it would?
He was conscious that if once he abandoned his cautious existence he might respond to many calls which, as yet, had not appealed to him. He fancied that he was one of those natures which cannot be half-hearted, which cannot easily mingle, arrange, portion out, take just so much of this and so much of that. The recklessness that looked out of Mrs. Shiffney's eyes spoke to something in him that might be friendly to it, though something else in him disliked, despised, almost dreaded it.
He had answered. Yet on Sunday he must answer again. How he wished Mrs. Shiffney had not called upon him a second time! In her persistence he read her worldly cleverness. She divined the instability which he now felt within him. It must be so. It was so. The first time he had met her he had had a feeling as if to her almost impertinent eyes he were transparent. And she had evidently seen something he had supposed to be hidden, something he wished were not in existence.
Her remarks about English musicians, her banter about the provincial festivals had stung him. The word "provincial" rankled. If it applied to him, to his talent! If he were merely provincial and destined to remain so because of his way of life!
Abruptly he became solicitous of opinion. He thought of Mrs. Mansfield, and wondered what had been her opinion of his music. Almost mechanically he crossed the broad road by the Marble Arch, turned into the windings of Mayfair, and made his way to Berkeley Square.
"I'll ask her. I'll find out!" was his thought.
He rang Mrs. Mansfield's bell.
"Is Mrs. Mansfield at home?"
"Yes, sir."
"Is she alone?"
"Yes, sir."
Heath stepped in quickly. He still felt excited, uncertain of himself, even self-conscious under the eyes of the butler. There was no one in the drawing-room. As he waited he wondered whether Charmian was in the house, whether he would see her. And now, for the first time, he began to wonder also why Mrs. Shiffney had made so much of the fact that Charmian was to be on the yacht. He recalled her words, "Poor Charmian Mansfield! Whom can I get for her?" Had he been asked on Charmian's account? That seemed to him very absurd. She certainly disliked him. They were not en rapport. In the yacht they would be thrown together incessantly. He thought of the expression in Mrs. Shiffney's eyes and felt positive that she had pressed him to come for herself. But possibly she fancied he liked Charmian because he came so often to Berkeley Square. The cleverest woman, it seemed, made mistakes. But he could not quite understand Mrs. Shiffney's proceedings. If he did, after all, go on the yacht it would be rather amusing to study her. And Charmian? Heath said to himself that he did not want to study her. She was too uncertain, not without a certain fascination perhaps, but too ironic, too something. He scarcely knew what it was that he disliked, almost dreaded, in her. She was mischievous at wrong moments. The minx peeped up in her and repelled him. She watched him in surely a hostile way and did not understand him. So he was on the defensive with her, never quite at his ease.
The door opened and Mrs. Mansfield came in. Heath went toward her and took her hands eagerly. This evening he felt less independent than he usually did, and in need of a real friend.
"What is it?" she said, after a look at him.
"Why should it be anything special?"
"But it is!"
He laughed almost uneasily.
"I wish I hadn't a face that gives me away always!" he exclaimed. "Though to you I don't mind very much. Well, I wanted to ask you two or three things, if I may."
Mrs. Mansfield sat down on her favorite sofa, with her feet on a stool.
"Anything," she said.
"Do you mind telling me exactly what you thought of my music the other evening? Did you—did you think it feeble stuff? Did you, perhaps, think it"—he paused—"provincial?" he concluded, with an effort.
"Provincial!"
Heath was answered, but he persisted.
"What did you think?"
"I thought it alarming."
"Alarming?"
"Disturbing. It has disturbed me."
"Disturbed your mind?"
"Or my heart, perhaps."
"But why? How?"
"I'm not sure that I could tell you that."
Heath sat down. When he was not composing or playing he sometimes felt very uncertain of himself, lacking in self-confidence. He often had moments when he felt not merely doubtful as to his talent, but as if he were less in almost every way than the average man. He endeavored to conceal this disagreeable weakness, which he suffered under and despised, but could not rid himself of; and in consequence his manner was sometimes uneasy. It was rather uneasy now. He longed to be reassured. Mrs. Mansfield found him strangely different from the man who had played to her, who had scarcely seemed to care what she thought, what anyone thought of his music.
"I do wish you would try to tell me!" he said anxiously.
"Why should you care what I think?" she said, almost as if in rebuke.
"Perhaps my music is terrible rubbish!"
"It certainly is not, or it could not have made a strong impression upon me."
"It did really make a strong impression?"
"Very strong."
"Then you think I have something in me worth developing, worth taking care of?"
"I am sure you have."
"I wonder how I ought to live?" he exclaimed.
"Is that what you came to ask me?"
Her fiery eyes seemed to search him. She sat very still, looking intensely alive.
"To-night I feel as if I didn't know, didn't know at all! You see, I avoid so many things, so many experiences that I might have."
"Do you?"
"Yes. I think I've done that for years. I know I'm doing it now."
He moved restlessly.
"Mrs. Shiffney has asked me again to go yachting