Sketches in Lavender, Blue and Green [69]
it had passed into the next room and so out through the open window, and its strangely still green eyes no longer drawing mine towards them, I felt my common sense returning to me.
"You have not lived with it for six months," answered Dick quietly, "and felt its eyes for ever on you as I have. And I am not the only one. You know Canon Whycherly, the great preacher?"
"My knowledge of modern church history is not extensive," I replied. "I know him by name, of course. What about him?"
"He was a curate in the East End," continued Dick, and for ten years he laboured, poor and unknown, leading one of those noble, heroic lives that here and there men do yet live, even in this age. Now he is the prophet of the fashionable up-to-date Christianity of South Kensington, drives to his pulpit behind a pair of thorough- bred Arabs, and his waistcoat is taking to itself the curved line of prosperity. He was in here the other morning on behalf of Princess --. They are giving a performance of one of my plays in aid of the Destitute Vicars' Fund."
"And did Pyramids discourage him?" I asked, with perhaps the suggestion of a sneer.
"No," answered Dick, "so far as I could judge, it approved the scheme. The point of the matter is that the moment Whycherly came into the room the cat walked over to him and rubbed itself affectionately against his legs. He stood and stroked it."
"'Oh, so it's come to you, has it?' he said, with a curious smile.
"There was no need for any further explanation between us. I understood what lay behind those few words."
I lost sight of Dick for some time, though I heard a good deal of him, for he was rapidly climbing into the position of the most successful dramatist of the day, and Pyramids I had forgotten all about, until one afternoon calling on an artist friend who had lately emerged from the shadows of starving struggle into the sunshine of popularity, I saw a pair of green eyes that seemed familiar to me gleaming at me from a dark corner of the studio.
"Why, surely," I exclaimed, crossing over to examine the animal more closely, "why, yes, you've got Dick Dunkerman's cat."
He raised his face from the easel and glanced across at me.
"Yes," he said, "we can't live on ideals," and I, remembering, hastened to change the conversation.
Since then I have met Pyramids in the rooms of many friends of mine. They give him different names, but I am sure it is the same cat, I know those green eyes. He always brings them luck, but they are never quite the same men again afterwards.
Sometimes I sit wondering if I hear his scratching at the door.
THE MINOR POET'S STORY
"It doesn't suit you at all," I answered.
"You're very disagreeable," said she, "I shan't ever ask your advice again."
"Nobody," I hastened to add, "would look well in it. You, of course, look less awful in it than any other woman would, but it's not your style."
"He means," exclaimed the Minor Poet, "that the thing itself not being pre-eminently beautiful, it does not suit, is not in agreement with you. The contrast between you and anything approaching the ugly or the commonplace, is too glaring to be aught else than displeasing."
"He didn't say it," replied the Woman of the World; "and besides it isn't ugly. It's the very latest fashion."
"Why is it," asked the Philosopher, "that women are such slaves to fashion? They think clothes, they talk clothes, they read clothes, yet they have never understood clothes. The purpose of dress, after the primary object of warmth has been secured, is to adorn, to beautify the particular wearer. Yet not one woman in a thousand stops to consider what colours will go best with her complexion, what cut will best hide the defects or display the advantages of her figure. If it be the fashion, she must wear it. And so we have pale-faced girls looking ghastly in shades suitable to dairy- maids, and dots waddling about in costumes fit and proper to six- footers. It is as if crows insisted on wearing cockatoo's feathers on their heads, and rabbits ran
"You have not lived with it for six months," answered Dick quietly, "and felt its eyes for ever on you as I have. And I am not the only one. You know Canon Whycherly, the great preacher?"
"My knowledge of modern church history is not extensive," I replied. "I know him by name, of course. What about him?"
"He was a curate in the East End," continued Dick, and for ten years he laboured, poor and unknown, leading one of those noble, heroic lives that here and there men do yet live, even in this age. Now he is the prophet of the fashionable up-to-date Christianity of South Kensington, drives to his pulpit behind a pair of thorough- bred Arabs, and his waistcoat is taking to itself the curved line of prosperity. He was in here the other morning on behalf of Princess --. They are giving a performance of one of my plays in aid of the Destitute Vicars' Fund."
"And did Pyramids discourage him?" I asked, with perhaps the suggestion of a sneer.
"No," answered Dick, "so far as I could judge, it approved the scheme. The point of the matter is that the moment Whycherly came into the room the cat walked over to him and rubbed itself affectionately against his legs. He stood and stroked it."
"'Oh, so it's come to you, has it?' he said, with a curious smile.
"There was no need for any further explanation between us. I understood what lay behind those few words."
I lost sight of Dick for some time, though I heard a good deal of him, for he was rapidly climbing into the position of the most successful dramatist of the day, and Pyramids I had forgotten all about, until one afternoon calling on an artist friend who had lately emerged from the shadows of starving struggle into the sunshine of popularity, I saw a pair of green eyes that seemed familiar to me gleaming at me from a dark corner of the studio.
"Why, surely," I exclaimed, crossing over to examine the animal more closely, "why, yes, you've got Dick Dunkerman's cat."
He raised his face from the easel and glanced across at me.
"Yes," he said, "we can't live on ideals," and I, remembering, hastened to change the conversation.
Since then I have met Pyramids in the rooms of many friends of mine. They give him different names, but I am sure it is the same cat, I know those green eyes. He always brings them luck, but they are never quite the same men again afterwards.
Sometimes I sit wondering if I hear his scratching at the door.
THE MINOR POET'S STORY
"It doesn't suit you at all," I answered.
"You're very disagreeable," said she, "I shan't ever ask your advice again."
"Nobody," I hastened to add, "would look well in it. You, of course, look less awful in it than any other woman would, but it's not your style."
"He means," exclaimed the Minor Poet, "that the thing itself not being pre-eminently beautiful, it does not suit, is not in agreement with you. The contrast between you and anything approaching the ugly or the commonplace, is too glaring to be aught else than displeasing."
"He didn't say it," replied the Woman of the World; "and besides it isn't ugly. It's the very latest fashion."
"Why is it," asked the Philosopher, "that women are such slaves to fashion? They think clothes, they talk clothes, they read clothes, yet they have never understood clothes. The purpose of dress, after the primary object of warmth has been secured, is to adorn, to beautify the particular wearer. Yet not one woman in a thousand stops to consider what colours will go best with her complexion, what cut will best hide the defects or display the advantages of her figure. If it be the fashion, she must wear it. And so we have pale-faced girls looking ghastly in shades suitable to dairy- maids, and dots waddling about in costumes fit and proper to six- footers. It is as if crows insisted on wearing cockatoo's feathers on their heads, and rabbits ran