"You mean that I am too self-willed and domineering?" laughed Elisabeth.
"I mean that it is beside the mark to expect a reigning queen to understand how to canva.s.s for votes at a general election."
"But you do think me too autocratic, don"t you? You must, because everybody does," Elisabeth persisted, with engaging candour.
"I think you are the most charming woman I ever met in my life," replied Cecil; and at the moment, and for at least five minutes afterward, he really believed what he said.
"Thank you; but you think me too fond of dominating other people, all the same."
"Don"t say that; I could not think any evil of you, and it hurts me to hear you even suggest that I could. But perhaps it surprises me that so large-hearted a woman as yourself should invariably look at things from the subjective point of view, as I am sure you do."
"Right again, Mr. Farquhar; you really are very clever at reading people."
Cecil corrected her. "At reading you, you mean; you are not "people," if you please. But tell me the truth: when you look at yourself from the outside (which I know you are fond of doing, as I am fond of doing), doesn"t it surprise you to see as gifted a woman as you must know you are, so much more p.r.o.ne to measure your influence upon your surroundings than their influence upon you; and, measuring, to allow for it?"
"Nothing that a woman does ever surprises me; and that the woman happens to be one"s self is a mere matter of detail."
"That is a quibble, dear lady. Please answer my question."
Elisabeth drew her eyebrows together with a puzzled expression. "I don"t think it does surprise me, because my influence on my surroundings is greater than their influence on me. You, too, are a creator; and you must know the almost G.o.d-like joy of making something out of nothing, and seeing that it is good. It seems to me that when once you have tasted that joy, you can never again doubt that you yourself are stronger than anything outside you; and that, as the Apostle said, "all things are yours.""
"Yes; I understand that. But there is still a step further--namely, when you become conscious that, strong as you are, there is something stronger than yourself; and that is another person"s influence upon you."
"I have never felt that," said Elisabeth simply.
"Have you never known what it is to find your own individuality swallowed up in other persons" individuality, and your own personality merged in theirs, until--without the slightest conscious unselfishness on your part--you cease to have a will of your own?"
"No; and I don"t want to know it. I can understand wishing to share one"s own princ.i.p.alities and powers with another person; but I can"t understand being willing to share another person"s princ.i.p.alities and powers."
"In short," said Cecil, "you feel that you could love sufficiently to give, but not sufficiently to receive; you would stamp your image and superscription with pleasure upon another person"s heart; but you would allow no man to stamp his image and superscription upon yours."
"I suppose that is so," replied Elisabeth gravely; "but I never put it as clearly to myself as that before. Yes," she went on after a moment"s pause; "I could never care enough for any man to give up my own will to his; I should always want to bend his to mine, and the more I liked him the more I should want it. He could have all my powers and possessions, and be welcome to them; but my will must always be my own; that is a kingdom I would share with no one."
"Ah! you are treating the question subjectively, as usual. Did it never occur to you that you might have no say in the matter; that a man might compel you, by force of his own charm or power or love for you, to give up your will to his, whether you would or no?"
Elisabeth looked him full in the face with clear, grave eyes. "No; and I hope I may never meet such a man as long as I live. I have always been so strong, and so proud of my strength, and so sure of myself, that I could never forgive any one for being stronger than I, and wresting my dominion from me."
"Dear lady, you are a genius, and you have climbed to the summit of the giddy pinnacle which men call success; but for all that, you are still "an unlesson"d girl." Believe me, the strong man armed will come some day, and you will lower your flag and rejoice in the lowering."
"You don"t understand me, after all," said Elisabeth reproachfully.
Cecil"s smile was very pleasant. "Don"t I? Yet it was I who painted The Daughters of Philip."
There was a moment"s constrained silence; and then Elisabeth broke the tension by saying lightly--
"Look! there"s Lady Silverhampton coming back again. Isn"t it a pity she is so stout? I do hope I shall never be stout, for flesh is a most difficult thing to live down."
"You are right; there are few things in the world worse than stoutness."
"I only know two: sin and boiled cabbage."
"And crochet-antimaca.s.sars," added Cecil; "you"re forgetting crochet-antimaca.s.sars. I speak feelingly, because my present lodgings are white with them; and they stick to my coat like leeches, and follow me whithersoever I go. I am never alone from them."
"If I were as stout as Lady Silverhampton," said Elisabeth thoughtfully, "I should either cut myself up into building lots, or else let myself out into market gardens: I should never go about whole; should you?"
"Certainly not; I would rather publish myself in sections, as dictionaries and encyclopaedias do!"
"Lady Silverhampton presented me," remarked Elisabeth, "so I always feel a sort of G.o.d-daughterly respect for her, which enhances the pleasure of abusing her."
"What does it feel like to go to Court? Does it frighten you?"
"Oh, dear! no. It would do, I daresay, if you were in plain clothes; but trains and feathers make fine birds--with all the manners and habits of fine birds. Peac.o.c.ks couldn"t hop about in gutters, and London sparrows couldn"t strut across Kensington Gardens, however much they both desired it. So when a woman, in addition to her ordinary best clothes, is attended by twenty-four yards of good satin which ought to be feeding the poor, nothing really abashes her."
"I suppose she feels like a queen."
"Well, to tell the truth, with her train over her arm and her tulle lappets hanging down her back, she feels like a widow carrying a waterproof; but she thinks she looks like a d.u.c.h.ess, and that is a very supporting thought."
"Tell me, who is that beautiful woman with the tall soldierly man, coming in now?" said Farquhar.
"Oh! those are the Le Mesuriers of Greystone; isn"t she divine? And she has the two loveliest little boys you ever saw or imagined. I"m longing to paint them."
"She is strikingly handsome."
"There is a very strange story about her and her twin sister, which I"ll tell you some day."
"You shall; but you must tell me all about yourself first, and how you have come to know so much and learn so little."
Elisabeth looked round at him quickly. "What do you mean?"
"I mean that the depth of your intuition is only surpa.s.sed by the shallowness of your experience."
"You are very rude!" And Elisabeth drew up her head rather haughtily.
"Forgive me; I didn"t mean to be; but I was overcome by the wonder of how complex you are--how wise on the one side, and how foolish upon the other; but experience is merely human and very attainable, while intuition is divine and given to few. And I was overcome by another thought; may I tell you what that was?"
"Yes; of course you may."
"You won"t be angry?"
"No."
"You will remember how we played together as children round the temple of Philae, and let my prehistoric memories of you be my excuse?"
"Yes."
"I was overcome by the thought of how glorious it would be to teach you all the things you don"t know, and how delightful it would be to see you learn them."
"Let us go into the next room," said Elisabeth, rising from her seat; "I see Lady Silverhampton nodding to me, and I must go and speak to her."