Ethel Churchill/Chapter 44
CHAPTER IX.
A FIRST NIGHT.
It is a fearful stake the poet casts,
When he comes forth from his sweet solitude
Of hopes, and songs, and visionary things,
To ask the iron verdict of the world.
Till then his home has been in fairyland,
Sheltered in the sweet depths of his own heart;
But the strong need of praise impels him forth;
For never was there poet but he craved
The golden sunshine of secure renown.
That sympathy which is the life of fame,
It is full dearly bought: henceforth he lives
Feverish and anxious, in an unkind world,
That only gives the laurel to the grave.
Norbourne was glad when he found himself in the open air, and with an object before him in which he was keenly interested. It is the mind ill at ease that seeks for excitement, and Courtenaye found in himself a craving for any amusement that, even for a short time, carried him away from the bitter and busy world within. But now he had a better motive than the mere desire of amusement—he was most anxious for Maynard's success. One of the first things he had done in London, was to find Walter—not a very easy task. Walter shrank from his society with the sensitiveness that belongs to pride and poverty. But Courtenaye would not allow his advances to be rejected; he interested himself in the other's pursuits, and foresaw their future fame. No poet could reject a friend who was also a prophet, and of his own success.
Norbourne was punctual to his appointment; but Maynard was there before him. He found him pacing the little sanded parlour of the tavern appointed for the place of meeting, with irregular and hasty steps: his slight frame quivered with uncontrollable emotion, and his face was absolutely white with agitation. He took Norbourne's hand in silence, and they had walked the length of several streets before he found voice to thank him for coming. When he arrived at the door of the theatre he made a pause, and then, reminding his companion of his promise to join him, he ran in as if life and death were on his speed. Norbourne went round to the front of the house, where every thing promised well. There was a brilliant audience—rank, beauty, and wit—while he went from box to box, doing his utmost to predispose the listeners in the author's favour. As he looked round the house, he could not but feel that the triumph was well worth the risk: the mastery over human emotion had never before appeared to him so glorious. In another hour the hopes and the recollections, the thoughts and the feelings, the most generous aspirations and the tenderest sympathies of our nature, would be stirred, and by what? The noble creation of one gifted and inspired mind!
The overture was almost at a close; and silence being now more effective than any thing that he could urge in favour of the play, Courtenaye went behind the scenes: never had the contrast struck him so forcibly. Before the curtain all was light and brilliancy; beautiful faces appeared with every advantage of dress and situation; placed at their side was the graceful and perfumed cavalier, with flatteries as light as the wave of the fan, that half chided, half encouraged them. Scattered amid the glittering crowd were men whose empire was that at which the youthful author aimed—the empire of the mind. All before the curtain was poetry in its most brilliant, and yet most tangible shape; but behind came the reality—cold, dark, and forbidding. Norbourne felt his enthusiasm suddenly extinguished; he looked with absolute loathing on the scene around him; so gloomy, and yet so common. Actors and actresses appeared alike exaggerated and tawdry, and he marvelled what could be the attraction of an existence which seemed divested as much of comfort as of dignity.
Just as these thoughts were passing before him, his attention was drawn to Booth, who, to solve a trifling disagreement between him and the author as to the effect which was to be given to a particular passage, began to declaim the speech in question. Courtenaye was at once carried out of himself; he caught the fire of the actor; the splendid voice, the noble gesture, and the exalted sentiment, aided by the pomp of the verse, mastered his inmost soul. He was again under the influence of genius,—that influence so subtle and so intense, conquering alike time, place, and circumstance.
He was next struck by the alteration in Walter. His cheek was flushed crimson, his eyes flashed, and he seemed in the wildest spirits; for every actor he had his jest, and for every actress his compliment. He scarcely appeared to heed what was doing on the stage; perhaps Norboume was the only one who noticed the convulsive movement of the bitten lip, or the slight shudder which shook him at any unexpected sound. As to Norbourne himself, he tried in vain to speak; leant against one of the side-scenes; all he could do was to watch intently the progress, till he almost felt inclined to spring forward and implore the audience to admire. To him it seemed the most dreadful ordeal to which the human mind could be subjected: all its most precious thoughts brought forward for public scrutiny, perhaps to be misjudged and ridiculed; the labour of months, the hope of a life, to be the sacrifice of a single night; and even he knew not the extent of to-night's importance to the author.
Walter Maynard's fortunes wholly depended on the success of his play. Lintot refused to bring out his poems till the fate of the tragedy was decided; and he well knew that if it failed, the cautious bookseller would decline the publication altogether. A few shillings were all he possessed in the world: and yet there he stood, the light word on his lip, and seemingly far less anxious than his friend. The subject of his play was the fate of Agis, the young and heroic King of Sparta: it gave the ideal of patriotism, relieved by the tenderness of sorrow, and the fidelity of love. It is curious to note how much an author throws himself into his creations: there are his passions, his feelings, and his thoughts. He only models his hero by imagining what himself would do in a similar situation. Agis was Walter Maynard; brave, high-minded, devoted, and full of the noblest plans for his country and his kind; and yet with a certain vein of irresolution growing out of theories too fine for reducing into practice. But, in considering an author and his works as one, a sufficient distinction is not drawn between the ideal and the real: the last is only given by being past through the crucible of the first. He does not give the events of his life; but the deductions that have been drawn from those events. It is not that he has been placed in the circumstances that he paints; but a quick intuition born of quick feeling, and that power of observation, which is the first requisite in a poet, enable him to bestow actual life to his breathing pictures: while this life is necessarily coloured by the sentiments and the emotions of the giver.
Every thing now depended on the death of Agis, whether it would take due hold on the sympathies of the audience. Courtenaye augured well from the profound silence; suddenly a burst of applause shook the house, the curtain had fallen, and Booth sprang to Walter's side, who was still engaged in an animated flirtation with an actress who was to play in the afterpiece.
"We have carried every thing before us!" exclaimed he: "I died in splendid style. And now, for supper; I will drink to the liberties of Sparta in nothing less than champagne to-night! I have done wonders for you: I am sure that no one who saw Agis to-night could say that 'Sparta has many a worthier son than he!' I was first-rate!"
"I congratulate you!" was what Courtenaye, as he shook hands with the successful author, tried to say; but he felt that his words were inaudible. At first he could only look his joy; but he was singularly struck with Walter's appearance: the flush of forced spirits had sunk in the presence of his great emotion, and his face was as the face of death.
A dark presentiment sprang up in Norbourne's mind, and a sad pity mingled with his rejoicing. He seemed fascinated by the large lustrous eyes, whose light was not of this world—so unearthly, so wild, was at that moment the expression of Walter's countenance. "He is dying!" sounded like a voice in Norbourne's ears: he tried to shake off what he termed a vain and foolish fear, but it clung to him like an omen. He looked again, and the colour had returned to Maynard's lips, the shadow of the grave had passed away; but Courtenaye still seemed to hear within him self a solemn and fated voice repeat, "He is dying!"