Our Own Set. Ossip Schubin

Чтение книги онлайн.

CHAPTER IV.

       Table of Contents

      A few days after the evening when Sempaly had given such brilliant proof of his talent as a caricaturist, General von Klinger was sitting in his studio on a divan covered with a picturesque Persian rug and endeavoring--having for the moment nothing better to do--to teach his parrot to sing the Austrian anthem--a loyal task which the bird, perched on the top of its cage, persistently refused to learn. It was a gorgeous studio, with a coved ceiling painted in fresco and a rococo plaster cornice, the walls hung with old tapestry, eastern stuffs and other "properties." It was so large that men looked like dwarfs in it, and the general's works of art like illustrations cut out of a picture book. The scirocco brooded in the atmosphere and the general was out of sorts; he could not get on with his painting, and though it was now a quarter to five not a visitor had he seen. Usually by this hour he had a number--nay sometimes too many. The general often grumbled--to himself of course--at the interruption; but he always enjoyed the little dissipation; it made him melancholy to be left to himself.

      He was thinking just now how difficult it was to get on as a painter; his coloring was capital--so all his artist friends assured him; but that his drawing left much to be desired he himself confessed. His two strong points were a harmonious effect of grey tone and horses seen from behind. All his pictures returned to him from the exhibitions unsold, excepting one which was purchased by the emperor in consideration of the general's former merits as a soldier rather than of his talents as an artist. The painters who came to smoke his cigarettes accounted for this by saying that his artistic aims were too independent, that he made no concessions to public taste and so could not hope for popularity.

      He was in the very act of whistling the national anthem for the sixteenth time to the recalcitrant bird, when he heard a knock at the door; he rose to open it and Sempaly came in. He had called to inform the general that he had discovered a very fine though much damaged piece of tapestry in a convent, and had bought it for a mere song; he had in fact purchased it for the general because he knew that it was just such a specimen as he had long wished for. "But if you do not care to take it I shall be very glad to keep it," he added. No one had the art of doing an obliging thing with a better grace than he; it was one of his little accomplishments.

      When they had settled their business Sempaly broke into loud lamentations that he was obliged to dine that day at the British embassy, and then to dance at the French ambassador's, and raved about the ideal life led by his friend--he only wished he could lead such a life--in which there were no evening parties, routs, balls or dinners. Next he wandered round the room looking at all the studies that hid their faces against the wall. "Charming!" "Superb!" he kept exclaiming in French, with his Austrian accent, from a sheer impulse to say something pleasant--he always tried to make himself pleasant. "Why do not you work that thing up?" he said at length, pointing to a sketch on canvas of a group of bashibazouks.

      "It might sell," replied the artist whose great difficulty always lay in the 'working up,' "but you know I am independent in my aims, I set my face against making concessions to the vulgar; I must work on my own principles and not to pander to the public."

      Sempaly smiled at this profession of faith.

      "As it is a mere whim with you ever to sell at all," he answered, "my advice is that you should never attempt it, but leave all your works to the nation, so that we may have a Musée Wierz at Vienna."

      The general assured him that he was quite in earnest in his desire to sell his pictures, but Sempaly smiled knowingly.

      "There was once upon a time," he began, "a cobbler who was a man of genius, but he prided himself on his sense of beauty and his artistic convictions, and he heeded not the requirements of his customers--he would make nothing but Greek sandals. He died a beggar, but happy in the consciousness of never having made a concession to the vulgar."

      The general was on the point of making an indignant reply to this malicious anecdote, when the loud rap was again heard which seems to be traditional at a studio door; it is supposed to be necessary to arouse the artist from his absorption in his work. The general went to admit his visitor.

      There was a small ante-room between the studio and the stairs. The door was no sooner opened than in flitted a slender creature, fair and blooming, tall, slim, and bewitchingly pretty, in a dark dress and a sealskin jacket.

      "What, you Zinka!" cried the old general delightedly. "This is a surprise! How long have you been in Rome?"

      "Only since this morning," answered a gay voice.

      "And are you alone?" asked the artist in astonishment, as Zinka shut the door and went forward into the atelier.

      "Yes, quite alone," she said calmly. "I left the maid at home; she and mamma are fast asleep, resting after their journey. I came alone in a carriage--it was very nice of me do not you think?--Why, what a face to make! … And why have you not given me a kiss. Uncle Klinger?" She stood before him bright and confident, her head a little thrown back, her hands in a tiny muff, gazing at him with surprise in her frank grey eyes.

      "My dear Zinka. … " the general began--for, like all conscientious old gentlemen with romantic memories, he was desperately punctilious as to the proprieties when any lady in whom he took an interest was implicated, "I am charmed, delighted to see you. … But in a strange place, where you know no one, and in a strange house where. … "

      "Oh, now I understand," cried the girl. "It is not proper! … I shall live to be a hundred before I know exactly what is proper; it is very odd, but Uncle Sterzl used always to say that it was of no use to worry about it; that if people were ladies and gentlemen everything was proper, and if they were not why it was all the same. But he did not know what he was talking about, it would seem!" and she turned sharply on her heel and made for the door.

      "But, СКАЧАТЬ