The Way of Ambition. Robert Hichens

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СКАЧАТЬ The fourth angel poured out his vial upon the sun, and power was given unto him to scorch men with fire. … The sixth angel poured out his vial upon the great River Euphrates, and the water thereof was dried up, that the way of the Kings of the East might be prepared.'"

      The last words which Heath had set were those in the fifteenth verse of the chapter—"Behold, I come as a thief. Blessed is he that watcheth and keepeth his garments lest he walk naked and they see his shame."

      When he had finished he got up from the piano with a flushed face and, again speaking in a boyish and almost naive manner, said quickly:

      "There, that gives you an idea of the sort of thing I do and care about doing. For, of course, I never will attempt any subject that doesn't thoroughly interest me."

      He stood for a moment, not looking toward Mrs. Mansfield; then, as if struggling against an inward reluctance, he again sat down on the settle.

      "Have you orchestrated it?" she asked.

      "Yes. I've just finished the orchestration."

      "Surely you want to hear it given with voices and the orchestra? Frankly, I won't believe you if you say you don't."

      "I do."

      The reluctance seemed to fade out of him.

      "The fact is I'm torn between the desire to hear my things and a mighty distaste for publicity."

      He sprang up.

      "If you'll allow me I'll just give you an idea of my Te Deum. And then I'll have done."

      He went once more to the piano.

      When he was sitting beside her again Mrs. Mansfield felt shy of him. After a moment she said:

      "You are sincere in your music?"

      "Yes."

      He did not seem specially anxious to get at her exact opinion of his work, and this fact, she scarcely knew why, pleased Mrs. Mansfield.

      "I had two or three things done at the College concerts," Heath continued. "I don't think they were much liked. They were considered very clever technically. But what's that? Of course, one must conquer one's means or one can't express oneself at all."

      "And now you work quite alone?"

      "Yes. I've got just a thousand a year of my own," he said abruptly.

      "You are independent, then."

      "Yes. It isn't a great deal. Of course, I quite realize that the sort of thing I do could never bring in a penny of money. So I've no money temptation to resist in keeping quiet. There isn't a penny in my compositions. I know that."

      Mrs. Mansfield thought, "If he were to get a mystical libretto and write an opera!" But she did not say it. She felt that she would not care to suggest anything to Heath which might indicate a desire on her part to see him "a success." In her ears were perpetually sounding the words, "and the water thereof was dried up, that the way of the Kings of the East might be prepared." They took her away from London. They set her in the midst of a great strangeness. They even awoke in her an almost riotous feeling of desire. What she desired she could not have said exactly. Some form of happiness, that was all she knew. But how the thought of happiness stung her soul at that moment! She looked at Heath and said:

      "I quite understand about Mrs. Shiffney now."

      "Yes?"

      "You have the dangerous gift of a very peculiar and very powerful imagination. I think your music might make you enemies."

      Heath looked pleased.

      "I'm glad you think that. I know exactly what you mean."

      They sat together on the settle and talked for more than an hour. Mrs. Mansfield's feeling of shyness speedily vanished, was replaced by something maternal with which she was much more at ease.

      Mrs. Searle let her out. She had said good-bye to Heath in the studio and asked him not to come to the front door.

      "Good-night, Mrs. Searle!" she said, with a smile. "I hope I haven't stayed too long?"

      "No, indeed, ma'am. I'm sure you'd ado him good. He do like them that's nat'ral. But he don't like to be bothered. And there's people that do keep on, ma'am, isn't there?"

      "I daresay there are."

      "Specially with a young gentleman, ma'am. I always do say it's the women runs after the men. More shame to us, ma'am."

      "Has Fan begun yet?"

      Mrs. Searle blushed.

      "Well, ma'am, really I don't know. But she's awfully put out if anyone interrupts her when she's with Mr. Heath."

      "I must take care what I'm about."

      "Oh, ma'am, I'm sure—"

      The motor moved away from the little old house. As Mrs. Mansfield looked out she saw a faint gleam in the studio. Involuntarily she listened, almost strained her ears. And she murmured, "And the water thereof was dried up, that the way of the Kings of the East might be prepared."

      The gleam was lost in the night. She leaned back and found herself wondering what Charmian would have thought of the music she had just heard.

CHAPTER V

       Table of Contents

      Mrs. Shiffney had more money than she knew how to spend, although she was recklessly extravagant. Her mother, who was dead, had been an Austrian Jewess, and from her had come the greater part of Mrs. Shiffney's large personal fortune. Her father, Sir Willy Manning, was still alive, and was a highly cultivated and intelligent Englishman of the cosmopolitan type; Mrs. Shiffney derived her peculiar and attractive look of high breeding and her completely natural manner from him. From her mother she had received the nomadic instinct which kept her perpetually restless, and which often drove her about the world in search of the change and diversion which never satisfied her. Lady Manning had been a feverish traveller and had written several careless and clever books of description. She had died of a fever in Hong-Kong while her husband was in Scotland. Although apparently of an unreserved nature, he had never bemoaned her loss.

      Mrs. Shiffney had a husband, a lenient man who loved comfort and who was fond of his wife in an altruistic way. She and he got on excellently when they were together and quite admirably when they were parted, as they very often were, for yachting made Mr. Shiffney feel "remarkably cheap." As he much preferred to feel expensive he had nothing to do with The Wanderer unless she lay snug in harbor. His hobby was racing. He was a good horseman, disliked golf, and seldom went out of the British Isles, though he never said that his own country was good enough for him. When he did cross the Channel he visited Paris, Monte Carlo, Homburg, Biarritz, or some place where he was certain to be in the midst of his "pals." The strain of wildness, which made his wife uncommon and interesting, did not exist in him, but he was rather proud of it in her, and had been heard to say more than once, "Addie's a regular gipsy," as if the statement were a high compliment. He СКАЧАТЬ