The Blind Bow-boy/Chapter 10
On an afternoon in September, Campaspe woke up feeling a little ill, and decided not to go out. She did not, however, send for a physician. Campaspe cherished a peculiar superstition in regard to ill-health. She considered it as a visitation in the nature of a warning, a warning to take arest. Any interference with the course of the complaint she held to be artificial and even vicious. The miraculously prolonged youthful appearance of her mother, who had never permitted a doctor to visit her since the days when she bore her children, confirmed Campaspe in this esoteric belief.
If I had a broken leg, she assured herself, I would call in a surgeon to set it, but a headache or a hemorrhage is natural. Decayed cells are breaking down and need to be replaced, or I am being punished by nature for some misdemeanour. When it is over, and the cells have renewed themselves, I shall be stronger than ever.
She glanced over her mail. A letter from Laura, which she did not open. . . . A postcard from the Duke, with a lithograph in colours of a cottage smothered in rambler roses, and a Nantucket postmark. Inside quotation marks the Duke had written the following on the reverse side of the card: "Tu te prives de viandes, de vin, d'étuves, d'esclaves et d'honneurs; mais comme tu laisses ton imagination t'offrir des banquets, des parfums, des femmes nues et des foules applaudissantes! Ta chasteté n'est qu'une corruption plus subtile, et ce mépris du monde l'impuissance de ta haine contre lui!" Ronald was amusing. . . . And so he had gone away again. She sighed, as she tore open an orange envelope with a Danish stamp. The contents were printed, but in such delightfully large type, in reds and greens and blacks and blues, that she was moved to examine the sheet more particularly. It was a prospectus, the preliminary announcement, of the Danish Colonial Lottery. A whole ticket, five drawings, was available at $37.50. One might win 100,000 francs on each of the first four drawings and as much as 1,000,000 francs on the fifth drawing. The lucky number suggested by the agents was 38653. Mentally, Campaspe rapidly added these digits to see if the result conformed with certain figures on a chart that an adept in Kabbalism had recently made out for her. She was a trifle disappointed to find that it did not. . . . Pushing aside the remainder of her correspondence, a mass of invitations and bills, her mind wandered to an article she had read in some magazine, picked up in a dentist's waiting-room, an article concerning the extermination of rats. The plan proposed was to catch the rats alive, kill all the females, and set the males free again. In time, as a consequence, the males would outnumber the females by such a high percentage that their persecution of the latter would eventually end in sterility and death for the whole race. In the same magazine there was a paper on hierba mate, the South American beverage, bitter and unpalatable until a taste for it is acquired, draughted from the leaves of the Ilex Paraguayensis. Genaro Romero, the Paraguayan, had rhapsodized regarding it: When we taste maté our energies are renewed, our nerves are comforted by the effect of the green sap, the juice of hope of the Paraguayan flora; and we experience strange impressions, we are nourished by an infusion of energy, and gilded dreams, possibly of good fortune, caress us. Campaspe wondered, at this juncture, if Esperanto had any irregular verbs. . . . She made an attempt to define her impression of the work of Gertrude Stein. She uses words, thought Campaspe, for their detonations and their connotations. . . . In the New York Times she discovered an account of a man who had devoted years to the engraving of the Lord's Prayer on the head of a pin. Once this task was accomplished, he went first blind and then insane. . . . Out of the back of her mind she picked another detail: girls working in cordite factories use the explosive for chewing-gum. It acts as a heart stimulant.
Campaspe began to feel restless and energetic. She was not, she now believed, ill enough to keep to her room; nor did she deny herself to callers, although she was expecting no one in particular. Her mood was capricious, volatile, vibratory. She welcomed, therefore, the announcement of the arrival of the expressman with two large crates from Paris, and she ordered them deposited in the drawing-room, sending Frederika for the butler and hammer and screw-driver. The crates were not entirely a surprise. Fannie had written that she was shipping some pictures.
They proved to be unusually interesting pictures by Henri Rousseau and Marc Chagall, artists whose work Campaspe admired vastly. The Chagall was a portrait of a girl with bangs across her forehead, long hair down her back, melancholy eyes (eyes which were uncertain, Campaspe noted), a sensual mouth, and an intellectual nose. She wore a tightfitting yellow bodice with a frill, clasped by a brooch, around the throat, and deep indigo gloves. The background, too, was a rich blue. Campaspe considered the picture: fantasy, fable, colour. She would think about it a good deal more in the future, she was certain. She realized that Laura's first question would be, What does it mean? That was, perhaps, its chief charm, that it did not mean anything; it was as meaningless as Mozart's E flat major symphony or life itself. The Rousseau was a splendid and definite jungle, with curiously exotic trees with long green fronds, plants with startling scarlet blossoms, monkeys, and a royal tiger. She recalled that Rousseau had been a working-man, painting on Sunday, his only free day, how he had never left Paris, creating his jungles after visits to the Jardin d'Acclimatation and the Jardin des Plantes. What a genius! This was not imitation but creation. And yet there were those who asserted that he painted in this sure way through naïvete. Looking at the picture, Campaspe realized that the artist had been entirely aware of what he was doing, that he must have been certain even on his darkest days that eventual recognition would come to him. Work such as this—Campaspe was irresistibly reminded of Lucas Cranach—was assuredly no accident. She pondered over this idea. She was sitting on the floor in the centre of the drawing-room, still regarding the pictures, set up against the wall, when Bunny was announced.
Hello, Bunny, she called out, without rising, when he was shown in.
Hello, 'paspe. His manner was solemn. What have you got here?
Oh! some pictures Fannie sent me. Aren't they divine? I could eat that tiger of Rousseau's.
They are good. There's something about that jungle which suggests to me what I have been trying to do in my rotten music.
Your music is as good as the picture, she retorted.
I can't compose any longer, 'paspe.
He had been standing, but now she rose to her feet and led him to the divan.
Poor Bunny.
I wish I'd never seen her!
Bunny! Don't forget the music she made you write!
I don't give a damn about that! I can't do it any more. I'm no good at all now. It's all gone . . . with her. If I only had her back!
Campaspe changed the subject abruptly: What's Paul doing? He hasn't been near me.
Harold's father sent him another cheque; so he's happy. All he needs, for happiness, Bunny added bitterly, is money. Drains received a cheque, too, and he's gone off with the Duke.
Back to Ronald.
Everybody goes back to Ronald, Bunny remarked with some resentment. He bought a bulldog before he left town, he continued inconsequentially.
Whatever will he do with it?
Campaspe's mind reverted to the dog-fight in the garden. There was a moment's silence, during which she gazed intently at the Rousseau. Bunny's expression was most lugubrious.
A perfectly divine tiger! she repeated at last, as if speaking to herself.
'paspe, I don't believe you've been listening!
. . . heard every word.
Do you know what Zimbule is doing?
She rose slowly, still scrutinizing the painting which held her fancy.
No. What? Her manner was preoccupied.
Moving pictures. Angel. Apartment. Riverside Drive.
My dear Bunny, I believe you are a detective. Do you know who he is?
Yes, I do. His tone was hard and there was a challenge to interrogation in it. Nevertheless, Campaspe did not ask the question Bunny expected to hear.
Where is she living? she queried, lightly.
The Lombardy.
Campaspe smiled. I think I'll send her a picture.
She won't like it. She wouldn't understand these. He swept his arm around in a vague gesture. It was characteristic of Bunny's movements that they were never definite and forceful.
Oh! I wouldn't send her one of these. I like them too well myself. I'll send her the pictures I take down when I hang these.
I'm sure she has plenty of pictures. The boy was actually malicious.
No doubt, but one can always use a few more. Possibly she cares for change as much as I do.
Campaspe did not carry out her threat. Instead, she made a resolution to call on Zimbule in a day or so. She had heard the story of Harold's disappearance, or as much of it as she needed to hear, from Alice. Her father, too, had been voluble. Where was Harold? She must know; of that these two obtuse members of her family were firmly convinced. As a matter of fact she did not, and she was making no effort to find out. When he was ready he would come to her, and, subsequently, she determined, her family should hear nothing whatever about the visit. Her father and Alice had almost put her through three degrees in their effort to drag the information out of her which they were certain that she possessed. It required very little of this kind of thing to satisfy Campaspe. Her manner assumed a crisp frigidity which her family had encountered on occasion in the past. They knew the meaning of it, and, for the moment, they withdrew their brisk importunities.
She had considered the possibility of taking Paul with her when she called on Zimbule. After a little reflection, she decided to go alone. She dressed very carefully for the adventure, wearing a smart, grey tailored costume which had just arrived from Redfern, and a black hat adorned with white wings. From her wrist dangled a cluster of crystal grapes, an inspiration of Marie El Khoury.
As her motor bore her into the unfamiliar neighbourhood, already she began to smile. She was in her best humour as she stood before the telephone operator in the elaborate hallway, which reminded her, somehow, of a scene in a Theodore Dreiser novel. She had, she was convinced, never before seen so much onyx all at once, such highly polished onyx, too. The electroliers of burnished gold, the tall gothic seats, with their rich, red velvet cushions, the purple uniforms and brass buttons of the black attendants, all played their parts in creating an effect in which she could perceive no single flaw. She recalled a happy Spanish proverb, If you want to go to the devil, at least go in a carriage!
Once she had been admitted to Zimbule's apartment, she resumed her inquisitive appraisement, with some stupefaction at first, until she remembered that there was a trade called interior decorating. The room was Viennese (or Minchen) in style—an amazingly acute originality for New York in 1922, Campaspe thought. The walls were brown, the furniture heavy but extremely picturesque, in the fascinatingly tortured shapes affected by modern Austrian or Bavarian cabinet-makers. Campaspe cried out with delight when she descried a porcelain stove in one corner. Over a particularly ornately constructed sofa hung a horizontal row of framed samplers, all the Scandinavian goddesses, Freya, Iduna, and the rest, done in red yarn. There were other pictures, bright amazing dancers by Schnackenberg, portraits of Maria Hagen, Peter Pathé, Anne Ehmans, and Lo Hesse, more remote conceits in black and white by Alastair, a poster for a baroque ballet by Mela Koehler, and nude, graceful pretties with cats by Raphael Kirchner. A great green and red and blue box of Baumgarten bonbons stood on a table covered with a square scarf which resembled an Italian futurist painting. Over the mantelpiece, on which two heavy vases of garnet and gold Bohemian glass seemed very much at home, hung a large picture in pure design by Jean Metzinger.
I wonder, Campaspe was thinking, if Zimbule lives up to this incongruous environment.
Zimbule, at last, came in. Her blond hair, turning at the roots, back to its natural colour, still framed her face in a nervous shock. She was wearing a neglige of coral sequins over Turkish trousers fashioned of gold cloth, and she plied a fan of ostrich plumes, unnaturally joined to prolong their length, of the colour of green jade. She was, Campaspe observed at once, as much at her ease as ever.
Campaspe! I'm so glad to see you.
You never come to me; so I had to come to you. You haven't been near me since . . .
Out! The girl flung her fan across the room. I'm trying to forget him. Love! Nothing in it.
But . . . Campaspe looked around.
Yes, Zimbule rematked blandly, crossing her legs as she seated herself on a great stuffed ottoman, I've capitalized my talents. Why not? They all do. Probably you did it yourself when you married—Campaspe did not even trouble to shake her head in denial of this. There was a sudden and complete metamorphosis. Do you know where Harold is?
No, Zimbule, I wish I did.
I hear she's left him! Zimbule was eager.
You hear . . . Campaspe permitted an expression of light surprise to play over her features, an expression not unnoted by Zimbule.
Yes. I met Cupid in the Park. He told me.
It is true. They are separated, but he left her.
Zimbule ignored this echo of an event she had every desire to forget, and begged: Where is he, Campaspe? Help me find him.
I wish I could. . . . But tell me about yourself. You're doing pictures?
Zimbule was frankly bored. She pulled great tufts of down out of a quilt of colibri feathers which she had drawn over her knee. Yes, she assented, I'm in the movies.
What company?
Zimbule O'Grady Incorporated. Capital $200,000. Zimbule yawned.
When do you start work?
Commenced a week ago. I'm not in the scenes today.
What is the picture called?
A Long Island Phryne. . . . Campaspe, please help me to find Harold.
I haven't an idea where to look. She paused. That's an interesting picture you have. She pointed to the Metzinger.
Yes, I got it because it has significant form. He's sure to come to see you.
Campaspe adopted a more sympathetic tone. When he turns up, she said, I'll let you know.
Promise? Zimbule, with an instinctive gesture, thrust her hands forwards, and on one of her fingers Campaspe caught a glimpse of a familiar ring, a sapphire intaglio, set most curiously, and engraved with a banyan-tree, an ape, a cobra, and the motto, Fronti nulla fides.
I promise. As soon as he comes to me I shall let you know.
She kissed the child.
Campaspe went out smiling, through the polished onyx hallway, past the black attendants, to her car, standing in the warm autumn sun. She consulted her watch. She would have time to get Han Ryner's Les Paraboles cyniques, Jean de Tinan's Penses-tu réussir, and P. J. Toulet's La Jeune fille verte.
Go to Dorbon's, she commanded her chauffeur, 561 Madison Avenue.
She settled herself comfortably back against the puce-colour cloth cushions as the car drove away from Riverside Drive.