"Oh, I have it!" he cried, bringing his arms in contact with a small Venetian vase, which Esther, with great presence of mind, just managed to catch ere it reached the ground.
"No, I have it!" she said, laughing. "Do sit down, else n.o.body can answer for the consequences."
She half pushed him into his chair, where he fell to warming his hands contemplatively.
"Well?" she said after a pause. "I thought you had an idea."
"Yes, yes," he said, rousing himself. "The subject we were just discussing--art."
"But there is nothing Jewish about art."
"All n.o.ble work has its religious aspects. Then there are Jewish artists."
"Oh yes. Your contemporaries do notice their exhibits, and there seem to be more of them than the world ever hears of. But if I went to a gathering for you, how should I know which were Jews?"
"By their names, of course."
"By no means of course. Some artistic Jews have forgotten their own names."
"That"s a dig at Sidney."
"Really, I wasn"t thinking of him for the moment," she said a little sharply. "However, in any case there"s nothing worth doing till May, and that"s some months ahead. I"ll do the Academy for you, if you like."
"Thank you. Won"t Sidney stare if you pulverise him in the _Flag of Judah_? Some of the pictures have also Jewish subjects, you know."
"Yes, but if I mistake not, they"re invariably done by Christian artists."
"Nearly always," he admitted pensively. "I wish we had a Jewish allegorical painter to express the high conceptions of our sages."
"As he would probably not know what they are----" she murmured. Then, seeing him rise as if to go, she said: "Won"t you have a cup of tea?"
"No, don"t trouble," he answered.
"Oh yes! do," she pleaded. "Or else I shall think you"re angry with me for not asking you before." And she rang the bell.
She discovered, to her amus.e.m.e.nt, that Raphael took two pieces of sugar per cup, but that, if they were not inserted, he did not notice their absence. Over tea, too, Raphael had a new idea, this time fraught with peril to the Sevres teapot.
"Why couldn"t you write us a Jewish serial story?" he said suddenly.
"That would be a novelty in communal journalism."
Esther looked startled by the proposition.
"How do you know I could?" she said after a silence.
"I don"t know," he replied. "Only I fancy you could. Why not?" he said encouragingly. "You don"t know what you can do till you try. Besides, you write poetry."
"The Jewish public doesn"t like the looking-gla.s.s," she answered him, shaking her head.
"Oh, you can"t say that! They"ve only objected as yet to the distorting-mirror. You"re thinking of the row over that man Armitage"s book. Now, why not write an antidote to that book? There now, there"s an idea for you!"
"It _is_ an idea," said Esther, with overt sarcasm. "You think art can be degraded into an antidote."
"Art is not a fetish," he urged. "What degradation is there in art teaching a n.o.ble lesson?"
"Ah, that is what you religious people will never understand," she said scathingly. "You want everything to preach."
"Everything does preach something," he retorted. "Why not have the sermon good?"
"I consider the original sermon _was_ good," she said defiantly. "It doesn"t need an antidote."
"How can you say that? Surely, merely as one who was born a Jewess, you wouldn"t care for the sombre picture drawn by this Armitage to stand as a portrait of your people."
She shrugged her shoulders--the ungraceful shrug of the Ghetto.
"Why not? It is one-sided, but it is true."
"I don"t deny that; probably the man was sincerely indignant at certain aspects. I am ready to allow he did not even see he was one-sided. But if _you_ see it, why not show the world the other side of the shield?"
She put her hand wearily to her brow.
"Do not ask me," she said. "To have my work appreciated merely because the moral tickled the reader"s vanity would be a mockery. The suffrages of the Jewish public--I might have valued them once; now I despise them."
She sank further back on the chair, pale and silent.
"Why, what harm have they done you?" he asked.
"They are so stupid," she said, with a gesture of distaste.
"That is a new charge against the Jews."
"Look at the way they have denounced this Armitage, saying his book is vulgar and wretched and written for gain, and all because it does not flatter them."
"Can you wonder at it? To say "you"re another" may not be criticism, but it is human nature."
Esther smiled sadly.
"I cannot make you out at all," she said.
"Why? What is there strange about me?"
"You say such shrewd, humorous things sometimes--I wonder how you can remain orthodox."
"Now I can"t understand _you_," he said, puzzled.
"Oh, well! Perhaps if you could, you wouldn"t be orthodox. Let us remain mutual enigmas. And will you do me a favour?"
"With pleasure," he said, his face lighting up.
"Don"t mention Mr. Armitage"s book to me again. I am sick of hearing about it."