s so swift and yet so
graceful, that for a moment or two people scarcely realized that she
was gone. It was wonderful what a difference her absence made to the
room. The little stretch of drugget looked mean and bare. To Paul de
Vaux it seemed as though some warm, beautiful light, omniscient and
richly coloured, had suddenly burnt out, and left a damp chilliness in
the air. The silence was gloomy enough after that wonderful music, but
the babble of tongues which presently arose was a hundred times
worse. He found himself chafing and angry at the commonplacisms which
everywhere greeted his ear. Lady Swindon's afternoon entertainment had
been a great success, and every one was telling her so, more or
less volubly. There were some there, a handful of artists and a few
thoughtful men, who were silent, or who spoke of it only amongst
themselves in subdued voices. They recognised, in what had happened
that afternoon, the dawn of a new art, or rather the regeneration of
an old one, and they discussed in whispers its possible significance
and influence. She was an artist, that woman. No one doubted it. But
the woman was there as well as the artist. Who was she? Would she
realize the sanctity of her mission, and keep herself fit and pure for
its accomplishment? Had she character to sustain her, and imagination
to idealize her calling? She was on a pinnacle now, but it was a
pinnacle as dangerous as the feet of woman could press. If only she
could keep herself unspotted from the world, which would do its best
to drag her down, they all felt, painter, poet, and musician, that her
influence with the age might rank with their own. But was it possible?
A certain Diana-like coldness had been apparent to those who had the
eyes to see it, even in her most voluptuous movements. They knew
that it was not assumed for the sake of adding piquancy to her
performance--it was there indeed. But side by side with it there
were unprobed depths of passion in her soft, deep eyes; a slumbering
passion even in the sinuous, graceful movements of every limb. Some
day the struggle would come, even if it had not already commenced.
The woman against the artist--the woman tempted and flattered by a
thousand tongues, and dazzled with visions of all those things so
naturally sweet to her, her own nature even, so keenly susceptible to
love and sympathy, siding with the enemy. This, all against what? Only
that inward worshipping of all things sweet and pure and