The Ruling Passion [48]
BRAC, you will see the art of to-day--the works of painters who are
precisely in the focus of advertisement, and whose names call out an
instant round of applause in the auction-room. On the floors above,
in degrees of obscurity deepening toward the attic, you will find
the art of yesterday--the pictures which have passed out of the
glare of popularity without yet arriving at the mellow radiance of
old masters. In the basement, concealed in huge packing-cases, and
marked "PARIS--FRAGILE,"--you will find the art of to-morrow; the
paintings of the men in regard to whose names, styles, and personal
traits, the foreign correspondents and prophetic critics in the
newspapers, are now diffusing in the public mind that twilight of
familiarity and ignorance which precedes the sunrise of marketable
fame.
The affable and sagacious Morgenstern was already well acquainted
with the waywardness of Pierrepont's admiration, and with my own
persistent disregard of current quotations in the valuation of works
of art. He regarded us, I suppose, very much as Robin Hood would
have looked upon a pair of plain yeomen who had strayed into his
lair. The knights of capital, and coal barons, and rich merchants
were his natural prey, but toward this poor but honest couple it
would be worthy only of a Gentile robber to show anything but
courteous and fair dealing.
He expressed no surprise when he heard what we wanted to see, but
smiled tolerantly and led the way, not into the well-defined realm
of the past, the present, or the future, but into a region of
uncertain fortunes, a limbo of acknowledged but unrewarded merits, a
large back room devoted to the works of American painters. Here we
found Falconer's picture; and the dealer, with that instinctive tact
which is the best part of his business capital, left us alone to
look at it.
It showed the mouth of a little river: a secluded lagoon, where the
shallow tides rose and fell with vague lassitude, following the
impulse of prevailing winds more than the strong attraction of the
moon. But now the unsailed harbour was quite still, in the pause of
the evening; and the smooth undulations were caressed by a hundred
opalescent hues, growing deeper toward the west, where the river
came in. Converging lines of trees stood dark against the sky; a
cleft in the woods marked the course of the stream, above which the
reluctant splendours of an autumnal day were dying in ashes of
roses, while three tiny clouds, poised high in air, burned red with
the last glimpse of the departed sun.
On the right was a reedy point running out into the bay, and behind
it, on a slight rise of ground, an antique house with tall white
pillars. It was but dimly outlined in the gathering shadows; yet
one could imagine its stately, formal aspect, its precise garden
with beds of old-fashioned flowers and straight paths bordered with
box, and a little arbour overgrown with honeysuckle. I know not by
what subtlety of delicate and indescribable touches--a slight
inclination in one of the pillars, a broken line which might
indicate an unhinged gate, a drooping resignation in the foliage of
the yellowing trees, a tone of sadness in the blending of subdued
colours--the painter had suggested that the place was deserted. But
the truth was unmistakable. An air of loneliness and pensive sorrow
breathed from the picture; a sigh of longing and regret. It was
haunted by sad, sweet memories of some untold story of human life.
In the corner Falconer had put his signature, T. F., "LARMONE," 189-,
and on the border of the picture he had faintly traced some words,
which we made out at last--
"A spirit haunts the year's last hours."
Pierrepont took up the quotation and completed it--
"A spirit haunts the year's last hours,
Dwelling amid these yellowing bowers: