贵妇人画像The Portrait of a Lady-8

the questions involved over very attentively he declared that she was only another example of whathe had often been struck with--the fact that, of all the people in the world, the Americans were the第 51 页 共 391 页原版英语阅读网most grossly superstitious. They were rank Tories and bigots, every one of them; there were noconservatives like American conservatives. Her uncle and her cousin were there to prove it;nothing could be more medieval than many of their views; they had ideas that people in Englandnowadays were ashamed to confess to; and they had the impudence moreover, said his lordship,laughing, to pretend they knew more about the needs and dangers of this poor dear stupid oldEngland than he who was born in it and owned a considerable slice of it--the more shame to him!From all of which Isabel gathered that Lord Warburton was a nobleman of the newest pattern, areformer, a radical, a contemner of ancient ways. His other brother, who was in the army in India,was rather wild and pig-headed and had not been of much use as yet but to make debts forWarburton to pay--one of the most precious privileges of an elder brother. "I don't think I shall payany more," said her friend; "he lives a monstrous deal better than I do, enjoys unheard-of luxuriesand thinks himself a much finer gentleman than I. As I'm a consistent radical I go in only forequality; I don't go in for the superiority of the younger brothers." Two of his four sisters, thesecond and fourth, were married, one of them having done very well, as they said, the other onlyso-so. The husband of the elder, Lord Haycock, was a very good fellow, but unfortunately a horridTory; and his wife, like all good English wives, was worse than her husband. The other hadespoused a smallish squire in Norfolk and, though married but the other day, had already fivechildren. This information and much more Lord Warburton imparted to his young Americanlistener, taking pains to make many things clear and to lay bare to her apprehension thepeculiarities of English life. Isabel was often amused at his explicitness and at the small allowancehe seemed to make either for her own experience or for her imagination. "He thinks I'm abarbarian," she said, "and that I've never seen forks and spoons;" and she used to ask him artlessquestions for the pleasure of hearing him answer seriously. Then when he had fallen into the trap,"It's a pity you can't see me in my war-paint and feathers," she remarked; "if I had known how kindyou are to the poor savages I would have brought over my native costume!" Lord Warburton hadtravelled through the United States and knew much more about them than Isabel; he was so goodas to say that America was the most charming country in the world, but his recollections of itappeared to encourage the idea that Americans in England would need to have a great many thingsexplained to them. "If I had only had you to explain things to me in America!" he said. "I wasrather puzzled in your country; in fact I was quite bewildered, and the trouble was that theexplanations only puzzled me more. You know I think they often gave me the wrong ones onpurpose; they're rather clever about that over there. But when I explain you can trust me; aboutwhat I tell you there's no mistake." There was no mistake at least about his being very intelligentand cultivated and knowing almost everything in the world. Although he gave the most interestingand thrilling glimpses Isabel felt he never did it to exhibit himself, and though he had had rarechances and had tumbled in, as she put it, for high prizes, he was as far as possible from making amerit of it. He had enjoyed the best things of life, but they had not spoiled his sense of proportion.His quality was a mixture of the effect of rich experience--oh, so easily come by!--with a modestyat times almost boyish; the sweet and wholesome savour of which--it was as agreeable assomething tasted--lost nothing from the addition of a tone of responsible kindness."I like your specimen English gentleman very much," Isabel said to Ralph after Lord Warburtonhad gone.第 52 页 共 391 页原版英语阅读网"I like him too--I love him well," Ralph returned. "But I pity him more."Isabel looked at him askance. "Why, that seems to me his only fault--that one can't pity him a little.He appears to have everything, to know everything, to be everything.""Oh, he's in a bad way!" Ralph insisted."I suppose you don't mean in health?""No, as to that he's detestably sound. What I mean is that he's a man with a great position who'splaying all sorts of tricks with it. He doesn't take himself seriously.""Does he regard himself as a joke?""Much worse; he regards himself as an imposition--as an abuse.""Well, perhaps he is," said Isabel."Perhaps he is--though on the whole I don't think so. But in that case what's more pitiable than asentient, self-conscious abuse planted by other hands, deeply rooted but aching with a sense of itsinjustice? For me, in his place, I could be as solemn as a statue of Buddha. He occupies a positionthat appeals to my imagination. Great responsibilities, great opportunities, great consideration,great wealth, great power, a natural share in the public affairs of a great country. But he's all in amuddle about himself, his position, his power, and indeed about everything in the world. He's thevictim of a critical age; he has ceased to believe in himself and he doesn't know what to believe in.When I attempt to tell him (because if I were he I know very well what I should believe in) he callsme a pampered bigot. I believe he seriously thinks me an awful Philistine; he says I don'tunderstand my time. I understand it certainly better than he, who can neither abolish himself as anuisance nor maintain himself as an institution.""He doesn't look very wretched," Isabel observed."Possibly not; though, being a man of a good deal of charming taste, I think he often hasuncomfortable hours. But what is it to say of a being of his opportunities that he's not miserable?Besides, I believe he is.""I don't," said Isabel."Well," her cousin rejoined, "if he isn't he ought to be!"In the afternoon she spent an hour with her uncle on the lawn, where the old man sat, as usual, withhis shawl over his legs and his large cup of diluted tea in his hands. In the course of conversationhe asked her what she thought of their late visitor.Isabel was prompt. "I think he's charming.""He's a nice person," said Mr. Touchett, "but I don't recommend you to fall in love with him.""I shall not do it then; I shall never fall in love but on your recommendation. Moreover," Isabeladded, "my cousin gives me rather a sad account of Lord Warburton.""Oh, indeed? I don't know what there may be to say, but you must remember that Ralph must talk.""He thinks your friend's too subversive--or not subversive enough! I don't quite understand which,"said Isabel.第 53 页 共 391 页原版英语阅读网The old man shook his head slowly, smiled and put down his cup. "I don't know which either. Hegoes very far, but it's quite possible he doesn't go far enough. He seems to want to do away with agood many things, but he seems to want to remain himself. I suppose that's natural, but it's ratherinconsistent.""Oh, I hope he'll remain himself," said Isabel. "If he were to be done away with his friends wouldmiss him sadly.""Well," said the old man, "I guess he'll stay and amuse his friends. I should certainly miss him verymuch here at Gardencourt. He always amuses me when he comes over, and I think he amuseshimself as well. There's a considerable number like him, round in society; they're very fashionablejust now. I don't know what they're trying to do--whether they're trying to get up a revolution. Ihope at any rate they'll put it off till after I'm gone. You see they want to disestablish everything;but I'm a pretty big landowner here, and I don't want to be disestablished. I wouldn't have comeover if I had thought they were going to behave like that," Mr. Touchett went on with expandinghilarity. "I came over because I thought England was a safe country. I call it a regular fraud if theyare going to introduce any considerable changes; there'll be a large number disappointed in thatcase.""Oh, I do hope they'll make a revolution!" Isabel exclaimed. "I should delight in seeing arevolution.""Let me see," said her uncle, with a humorous intention; "I forget whether you're on the side of theold or on the side of the new. I've heard you take such opposite views.""I'm on the side of both. I guess I'm a little on the side of everything. In a revolution--after it waswell begun--I think I should be a high, proud loyalist. One sympathises more with them, andthey've a chance to behave so exquisitely. I mean so picturesquely.""I don't know that I understand what you mean by behaving picturesquely, but it seems to me thatyou do that always, my dear.""Oh, you lovely man, if I could believe that!" the girl interrupted."I'm afraid, after all, you won't have the pleasure of going gracefully to the guillotine here justnow," Mr. Touchett went on. "If you want to see a big outbreak you must pay us a long visit. Yousee, when you come to the point it wouldn't suit them to be taken at their word.""Of whom are you speaking?""Well, I mean Lord Warburton and his friends--the radicals of the upper class. Of course I onlyknow the way it strikes me. They talk about the changes, but I don't think they quite realise. Youand I, you know, we know what it is to have lived under democratic institutions: I always thoughtthem very comfortable, but I was used to them from the first. And then I ain't a lord; you're a lady,my dear, but I ain't a lord. Now over here I don't think it quite comes home to them. It's a matter ofevery day and every hour, and I don't think many of them would find it as pleasant as what they'vegot. Of course if they want to try, it's their own business; but I expect they won't try very hard.""Don't you think they're sincere?" Isabel asked."Well, they want to FEEL earnest," Mr. Touchett allowed; "but it seems as if they took it out intheories mostly. Their radical views are a kind of amusement; they've got to have some第 54 页 共 391 页原版英语阅读网amusement, and they might have coarser tastes than that. You see they're very luxurious, and theseprogressive ideas are about their biggest luxury. They make them feel moral and yet don't damagetheir position. They think a great deal of their position; don't let one of them ever persuade you hedoesn't, for if you were to proceed on that basis you'd be pulled up very short."Isabel followed her uncle's argument, which he unfolded with his quaint distinctness, mostattentively, and though she was unacquainted with the British aristocracy she found it in harmonywith her general impressions of human nature. But she felt moved to put in a protest on LordWarburton's behalf. "I don't believe Lord Warburton's a humbug; I don't care what the others are. Ishould like to see Lord Warburton put to the test.""Heaven deliver me from my friends!" Mr. Touchett answered. "Lord Warburton's a very amiableyoung man--a very fine young man. He has a hundred thousand a year. He owns fifty thousandacres of the soil of this little island and ever so many other things besides. He has half a dozenhouses to live in. He has a seat in Parliament as I have one at my own dinner-table. He has eleganttastes--cares for literature, for art, for science, for charming young ladies. The most elegant is histaste for the new views. It affords him a great deal of pleasure--more perhaps than anything else,except the young ladies. His old house over there--what does he call it, Lockleigh?--is veryattractive; but I don't think it's as pleasant as this. That doesn't matter, however--he has so manyothers. His views don't hurt any one as far as I can see; they certainly don't hurt himself. And ifthere were to be a revolution he would come off very easily. They wouldn't touch him, they'd leavehim as he is: he's too much liked.""Ah, he couldn't be a martyr even if he wished!" Isabel sighed. "That's a very poor position.""He'll never be a martyr unless you make him one," said the old man.Isabel shook her head; there might have been something laughable in the fact that she did it with atouch of melancholy. "I shall never make any one a martyr.""You'll never be one, I hope.""I hope not. But you don't pity Lord Warburton then as Ralph does?"Her uncle looked at her a while with genial acuteness. "Yes, I do, after all!"CHAPTER IXThe two Misses Molyneux, this nobleman's sisters, came presently to call upon her, and Isabeltook a fancy to the young ladies, who appeared to her to show a most original stamp. It is true thatwhen she described them to her cousin by that term he declared that no epithet could be lessapplicable than this to the two Misses Molyneux, since there were fifty thousand young women inEngland who exactly resembled them. Deprived of this advantage, however, Isabel's visitorsretained that of an extreme sweetness and shyness of demeanour, and of having, as she thought,eyes like the balanced basins, the circles of "ornamental water," set, in parterres, among thegeraniums."They're not morbid, at any rate, whatever they are," our heroine said to herself; and she deemedthis a great charm, for two or three of the friends of her girlhood had been regrettably open to thecharge (they would have been so nice without it), to say nothing of Isabel's having occasionally第 55 页 共 391 页原版英语阅读网suspected it as a tendency of her own. The Misses Molyneux were not in their first youth, but theyhad bright, fresh complexions and something of the smile of childhood. Yes, their eyes, whichIsabel admired, were round, quiet and contented, and their figures, also of a generous roundness,were encased in sealskin jackets. Their friendliness was great, so great that they were almostembarrassed to show it; they seemed somewhat afraid of the young lady from the other side of theworld and rather looked than spoke their good wishes. But they made it clear to her that they hopedshe would come to luncheon at Lockleigh, where they lived with their brother, and then they mightsee her very, very often. They wondered if she wouldn't come over some day, and sleep: they wereexpecting some people on the twenty-ninth, so perhaps she would come while the people werethere."I'm afraid it isn't any one very remarkable," said the elder sister; "but I dare say you'll take us asyou find us.""I shall find you delightful; I think you're enchanting just as you are," replied Isabel, who oftenpraised profusely.Her visitors flushed, and her cousin told her, after they were gone, that if she said such things tothose poor girls they would think she was in some wild, free manner practising on them: he wassure it was the first time they had been called enchanting."I can't help it," Isabel answered. "I think it's lovely to be so quiet and reasonable and satisfied. Ishould like to be like that.""Heaven forbid!" cried Ralph with ardour."I mean to try and imitate them," said Isabel. "I want very much to see them at home."She had this pleasure a few days later, when, with Ralph and his mother, she drove over toLockleigh. She found the Misses Molyneux sitting in a vast drawing-room (she perceivedafterwards it was one of several) in a wilderness of faded chintz; they were dressed on thisoccasion in black velveteen. Isabel liked them even better at home than she had done atGardencourt, and was more than ever struck with the fact that they were not morbid. It had seemedto her before that if they had a fault it was a want of play of mind; but she presently saw they werecapable of deep emotion. Before luncheon she was alone with them for some time, on one side ofthe room, while Lord Warburton, at a distance, talked to Mrs. Touchett."Is it true your brother's such a great radical?" Isabel asked. She knew it was true, but we have seenthat her interest in human nature was keen, and she had a desire to draw the Misses Molyneux out."Oh dear, yes; he's immensely advanced," said Mildred, the younger sister."At the same time Warburton's very reasonable," Miss Molyneux observed.Isabel watched him a moment at the other side of the room; he was clearly trying hard to makehimself agreeable to Mrs. Touchett. Ralph had met the frank advances of one of the dogs beforethe fire that the temperature of an English August, in the ancient expanses, had not made animpertinence. "Do you suppose your brother's sincere?" Isabel enquired with a smile."Oh, he must be, you know!" Mildred exclaimed quickly, while the elder sister gazed at ourheroine in silence."Do you think he would stand the test?"第 56 页 共 391 页原版英语阅读网"The test?""I mean for instance having to give up all this.""Having to give up Lockleigh?" said Miss Molyneux, finding her voice."Yes, and the other places; what are they called?"The two sisters exchanged an almost frightened glance. "Do you mean--do you mean on account ofthe expense?" the younger one asked."I dare say he might let one or two of his houses," said the other."Let them for nothing?" Isabel demanded."I can't fancy his giving up his property," said Miss Molyneux."Ah, I'm afraid he is an impostor!" Isabel returned. "Don't you think it's a false position?"Her companions, evidently, had lost themselves. "My brother's position?" Miss Molyneuxenquired."It's thought a very good position," said the younger sister. "It's the first position in this part of thecounty.""I dare say you think me very irreverent," Isabel took occasion to remark. "I suppose you revereyour brother and are rather afraid of him.""Of course one looks up to one's brother," said Miss Molyneux simply."If you do that he must be very good--because you, evidently, are beautifully good.""He's most kind. It will never be known, the good he does.""His ability is known," Mildred added; "every one thinks it's immense.""Oh, I can see that," said Isabel. "But if I were he I should wish to fight to the death: I mean for theheritage of the past. I should hold it tight.""I think one ought to be liberal," Mildred argued gently. "We've always been so, even from theearliest times.""Ah well," said Isabel, "you've made a great success of it; I don't wonder you like it. I see you'revery fond of crewels."When Lord Warburton showed her the house, after luncheon, it seemed to her a matter of coursethat it should be a noble picture. Within, it had been a good deal modernised--some of its bestpoints had lost their purity; but as they saw it from the gardens, a stout grey pile, of the softest,deepest, most weather-fretted hue, rising from a broad, still moat, it affected the young visitor as acastle in a legend. The day was cool and rather lustreless; the first note of autumn had been struck,and the watery sunshine rested on the walls in blurred and desultory gleams, washing them, as itwere, in places tenderly chosen, where the ache of antiquity was keenest. Her host's brother, theVicar, had come to luncheon, and Isabel had had five minutes' talk with him--time enough toinstitute a search for a rich ecclesiasticism and give it up as vain. The marks of the Vicar ofLockleigh were a big, athletic figure, a candid, natural countenance, a capacious appetite and atendency to indiscriminate laughter. Isabel learned afterwards from her cousin that before takingorders he had been a mighty wrestler and that he was still, on occasion--in the privacy of the第 57 页 共 391 页原版英语阅读网family circle as it were--quite capable of flooring his man. Isabel liked him--she was in the moodfor liking everything; but her imagination was a good deal taxed to think of him as a source ofspiritual aid. The whole party, on leaving lunch, went to walk in the grounds; but Lord Warburtonexercised some ingenuity in engaging his least familiar guest in a stroll apart from the others."I wish you to see the place properly, seriously," he said. "You can't do so if your attention isdistracted by irrelevant gossip." His own conversation (though he told Isabel a good deal about thehouse, which had a very curious history) was not purely archaeological; he reverted at intervals tomatters more personal --matters personal to the young lady as well as to himself. But at last, after apause of some duration, returning for a moment to their ostensible theme, "Ah, well," he said, "I'mvery glad indeed you like the old barrack. I wish you could see more of it --that you could stayhere a while. My sisters have taken an immense fancy to you--if that would be any inducement.""There's no want of inducements," Isabel answered; "but I'm afraid I can't make engagements. I'mquite in my aunt's hands.""Ah, pardon me if I say I don't exactly believe that. I'm pretty sure you can do whatever you want.""I'm sorry if I make that impression on you; I don't think it's a nice impression to make.""It has the merit of permitting me to hope." And Lord Warburton paused a moment."To hope what?""That in future I may see you often.""Ah," said Isabel, "to enjoy that pleasure I needn't be so terribly emancipated.""Doubtless not; and yet, at the same time, I don't think your uncle likes me.""You're very much mistaken. I've heard him speak very highly of you.""I'm glad you have talked about me," said Lord Warburton. "But, I nevertheless don't think he'dlike me to keep coming to Gardencourt.""I can't answer for my uncle's tastes," the girl rejoined, "though I ought as far as possible to takethem into account. But for myself I shall be very glad to see you.""Now that's what I like to hear you say. I'm charmed when you say that.""You're easily charmed, my lord," said Isabel."No, I'm not easily charmed!" And then he stopped a moment. "But you've charmed me, Miss