The Tinted Venus: A Farcical Romance, F. Anstey [best novels in english txt] 📗

"I mean no offence," he represented, having felt his way to a stroke of supreme cunning, "but when I feel there's a goddess inside of this statue, I don't know how it is exactly, but it puts me off. I can't fix my thoughts; the—the passion don't ferment as it ought. If, supposing now, you was to withdraw yourself and leave me the statue? I could gaze on it, and think of thee, and Cyprus, and all the rest of it, more comfortable, so to speak, than what I can when you're animating of it, and making me that nervous, words can't describe it!"

He hardly dared to hope that so lame and transparent a device would succeed with her; but, as he had previously found, there was a certain spice of credulity and simplicity in her nature, which made it possible to impose upon her occasionally.

"It may be so," she said. "I overawe thee, perchance?"

"Very much so," said he, promptly. "You don't intend it, I know; but it's a fact."

"I will leave you to meditate upon the charms so[Pg 172] faintly shadowed in this image, remembering that whatever of loveliness you find herein will be multiplied ten thousand-fold in the actual Aphrodite! Remain, then; ponder and gaze—and love!"

He waited for a little while after the statue was silent, and then took up the sacking left for him by Braddle; twice he attempted to throw it over the marble, and twice he recoiled. "It's no use," he said, "I can't do it; they must do it themselves!"

He carefully unfastened the window at the back of his saloon, and, placing the statue in the centre of the floor, turned out the gas, and with a beating heart stole upstairs to his bedroom, where (with his door bolted) he waited anxiously for the arrival of his dreaded deliverers.

He scarcely knew how long he had been there, for a kind of waking dream had come upon him, in which he was providing the statue with light refreshment in the shape of fancy pebbles and liquid cement, when the long, low whistle, faintly heard from the back of the house, brought him back to his full senses.

The burglars had come! He unbolted the door and stole out to the top of the crazy staircase, intending to rush back and bolt himself in if he heard steps ascending; and for some minutes he strained his ears, without being able to catch a sound.

At last he heard the muffled creak of the window, as it was thrown up. They were coming in! Would they, or would they not, be inhuman enough to force him to assist them in the removal?

They were still in the saloon; he heard them trampling about, moving the furniture with unnecessary violence, and addressing one another in tones that were not caressing. Now they were carrying the statue to the[Pg 173] window; he heard their labouring breath and groans of exertion under the burden.

Another pause. He stole lower down the staircase, until he was outside his sitting-room, and could hear better. There! that was the thud as they leapt out on the flagged yard. A second and heavier thud—the goddess! How would they get her over the wall? Had they brought steps, ropes, or what? No matter; they knew their own business, and were not likely to have forgotten anything. But how long they were about it! Suppose a constable were to come by and see the cart!

There were sounds at last; they were scaling the wall—floundering, apparently; and no wonder, with such a weight to hoist after them! More thuds; and then the steps of men staggering slowly, painfully away. The steps echoed louder from under the archway, and then died away in silence.

Could they be really gone? He dared not hope so, and remained shivering in his sitting-room for some minutes; until, gaining courage, he determined to go down and shut the window, to avoid any suspicion. Although now that the burglars were safely off with their prize, even their capture could not implicate him. He rather hoped they would be caught!

He took a lighted candle, and descended. As he entered the saloon, a gust from the open window blew out the light. He stood there in the dark and an icy draught; and, beginning to grope about in the dark for the matches, he brushed against something which was soft and had a cloth-like texture. "It's Braddle!" he thought, and his blood ran cold; "or else the Count!" And he called them both respectfully. There was no reply; no sound of breathing, even.

Ha! here was a box of matches at last! He struck[Pg 174] a light in feverish haste, and lit the nearest gas-bracket. For an instant he could see nothing, in the sudden glare; but the next moment he fell back against the wall with a cry of horror and despair.

For there, in the centre of the disordered room, stood—not the Count, not Braddle—but the statue, the mantle thrown back from her arms, and those arms, and the folds of the marble drapery, spotted here and there with stains of dark crimson![Pg 176][Pg 175]

[Pg 177]

[Pg 178]

"To feed were best at home."—Macbeth.

As soon as Leander had recovered from the first shock of horror and disappointment, he set himself to efface the stains with which the statue and the oilcloth were liberally bespattered; he was burning to find out what had happened to make such desperadoes abandon their design at the point of completion.

They both seemed to have bled freely. Had they quarrelled, or what? He went out into the yard with a hand-lamp, trembling lest he should come upon one or more corpses; but the place was bare, and he then remembered having heard them stumble and flounder over the wall.

He came back in utter bewilderment; the statue, standing calm and lifeless as he had himself placed it, could tell him nothing, and he went back to his bedroom full of the vaguest fears.

The next day was a Saturday, and he passed it in the state of continual apprehension which was becoming his normal condition. He expected every moment to see or hear from the baffled ruffians, who would, no doubt, consider him responsible for their failure; but no word nor sign came from them, and the uncertainty drove him very near distraction.[Pg 179]

As the night approached, he almost welcomed it, as a time when the goddess herself would enlighten part of his ignorance; and he waited more impatiently than ever for her return.

He was made to wait long that evening, until he almost began to think that the marble was deserted altogether; but at length, as he watched, the statue gave a long, shuddering sigh, and seemed to gaze round the saloon with vacant eyes.

"Where am I?" she murmured. "Ah! I remember. Leander, while you slumbered, impious hands were laid upon this image!"

"Dear me, mum; you don't say so!" exclaimed Leander.

"It is the truth! From afar I felt the indignity that was purposed, and hastened to protect my image, to find it in the coarse grasp of godless outlaws. Leander, they were about to drag me away by force—away from thee!"

"I'm very sorry you should have been disturbed," said Leander; and he certainly was. "So you came back and caught them at it, did you? And wh—what did you do to 'em, if I may inquire?"

"I know not," she said simply. "I caused them to be filled with mad fury, and they fell upon one another blindly, and fought like wild beasts around my image until strength failed them, and they sank to the ground; and when they were able, they fled from my presence, and I saw them no more."

"You—you didn't kill them outright, then?" said Leander, not feeling quite sure whether he would be glad or not to hear that they had forfeited their lives.

"They were unworthy of such a death," she said; "so I let them crawl away. Henceforth they will respect our images."[Pg 180]

"I should say they would, most likely, madam," agreed Leander. "I do assure you, I'm almost glad of it myself—I am; it served them both right."

"Almost glad! And do you not rejoice from your heart that I yet remain to you?"

"Why," said Leander, "it is, in course, a most satisfactory and agreeable termination, I'm sure."

"Who knows whether, if this my image had once been removed from you, I could have found it in my power to return?" she said; "for, I ween, the power that is left me has limits. I might never have appeared to you again. Think of it, Leander."

"I was thinking of it," he replied. "It quite upsets me to think how near it was."

"You are moved. You love me well, do you not, Leander?"

"Oh! I suppose I do," he said—"well enough."

"Well enough to abandon this gross existence, and fly with me where none can separate us?"

"I never said nothing about that," he answered.

"But yesternight and you confessed that you were yielding—that ere long I should prevail."

"So I am," he said; "but it will take me some time to yield thoroughly. You wouldn't believe how slow I yield; why, I haven't hardly begun yet!"

"And how long a time will pass before you are fully prepared?"

"I'm afraid I can't say, not exactly; it may be a month, or it might only be a week, or again, it may be a year. I'm so dependent upon the weather. So, if you're in any kind of a hurry, I couldn't advise you, as a honest man, to wait for me."

"I will not wait a year!" she said fiercely. "You mock me with such words. I tell you again that my[Pg 181] forbearance will last but little longer. More of this laggard love, and I will shame you before your fellow-men as an ingrate and a dastard! I will; by my zone, I will!"

"Now, mum, you're allowing yourself to get excited," said Leander, soothingly. "I wouldn't talk about it no more this evening; we shall do no good. I can't arrange to go with you just yet, and there's an end of it."

"You will find that that is not the end of it, clod-witted slave that you are!"

"Now, don't call names; it's beneath you."

"Ay, indeed! for are not you beneath me? But for very shame I will not abandon what is justly mine; nor shall you, wily and persuasive hairdresser though you be, withstand my sovereign will with impunity!"

"So you say, mum!" said Leander, with a touch of his native impertinence.

"As I say, I shall act; but no more of this, or you will anger me before the time. Let me depart."

"I'm not hindering you," he said; but she did not remain long enough to resent his words. He sat down with a groan. "Whatever will become of me?" he soliloquized dismally. "She gets more pressing every evening, and she's been taking to threatening dreadful of late.... If the Count and that Braddle ever come back now, it won't be to take her off my hands; it'll more likely be to have my life for letting them into such a trap. They'll think it was some trick of mine, I shouldn't wonder.... And to-morrow's Sunday, and I've got to dine with aunt, and meet Matilda and her ma. A pretty state of mind I'm in for going out to dinner, after the awful week I've had of it! But there'll be some comfort in seeing my darling Tillie again; she ain't a statue, bless her!"[Pg 182]

"As for you, mum," he said to the unconscious statue, "I'm going to lock you up in your old quarters, where you can't get out and do mischief. I do think I'm entitled to have my Sunday quiet."

After which he contrived to toil upstairs with the image, not without considerable labour and frequent halts to recover his breath; for although, as we have already noted, the marble, after being infused with life, seemed to lose something of its normal weight, it was no light burden, even then, to be undertaken single-handed.

He slept long and late that Sunday morning; for he had been too preoccupied for the last few days to make any arrangements for attending chapel with his Matilda, and he was in sore need of repose besides. So he rose just in time to swallow his coffee and array himself carefully for his aunt's early dinner, leaving his two Sunday papers—the theatrical and the general organs—unread on his table.

It was a foggy, dull day, and Millman Street, never a cheerful thoroughfare, looked gloomier than ever as he turned