Harold Frederic - Mrs Albert Grundy—Observations in Philistia

In the vestibule of the small theatre that evening there paced up and down a tall, middle-aged, weasel-backed citizen, his hands plunged deep in his pockets, doubt and irresolution written all over his face. As others paid their money and passed in he would watch them with obvious longing; then he would go and study once more the attractive coloured bill of the Company, with its bevy of pretty girls in skirts just short enough to disclose most enticing little ankles; then once more he would resume his perplexed walk to and fro. At last he made up his mind, and approached Salsbury with diffidence. “Mister,” he said, “air you the boss of this show?” “What can I do for you?” asked Nate. “Well – no offence meant – but – can I – that is to say – will it be all right to bring a lady to your show?” “That, sir, depends!” responded the manager firmly. “Well,” the citizen went on, “what I was gittin’ at is this – can I be perfectly safe in bringin’ my wife here?”

“Sir,” said Salsbury with dignity, and an eye trained to abstain from twinkling, “it is no portion of my business to inquire whether she is your wife or not, but if she comes in here she’s got to behave herself!”

A solitary note of laughter fell upon the air when I had told this story, and on the instant Uncle Dudley, perceiving that he had made a mistake, dropped his napkin, and came up from fishing for it on the floor red-faced and dumb. All else was deadly silence.

“I – I suppose they really weren’t married at all?” said the curate, after a chilling pause.

“Marriage, I regret to say, means next to nothing in most parts of America,” remarked Mr Hump, judicially. “The most sacred ties are there habitually made the subject of ribald jests. I have been assured by a person who spent nearly three weeks in the United States some years since that it is an extremely rare experience to meet an adult American who has not been divorced at least once. This fact made a vivid impression on my mind at the time, and I – ahem! – have written frequently upon it since.”

“I suppose the trouble arises from their all living in hotels – having no home life whatever,” said Mrs Albert, with a kindly air of coming to my rescue.

“Who on earth told you that?” I began, but was cut short.

“I confess,” broke in Miss Wallaby, with frosty distinctness of tone and enunciation, “that the assumption upon which the incident just related is based – the assumption that the la – woman referred to would probably misconduct herself in a place of public resort – seems to me startlingly characteristic of the country of which it is narrated. It has been truly said that the most valuable test of a country’s actual, as distinct from its assumed, worth, is the respect it pays to its women. Both at Cheltenham and at Newnham the idea is steadily inculcated – I might say insisted upon as of paramount importance – that the nation’s real civilisation rests upon the measure, not alone of chivalrous deference, but of esteem and confidence which my sex, by its devotion to duty, and its intellectual sympathy with broad aims and lofty purposes, is able to inspire and command.”

“But I assure you,” I protested feebly, “the story I told was a joke.”

“There are some subjects,” interposed Lady Willoughby Wallaby, the fixed smile lighting up with an angry, winter-sunset glow her inflamed countenance – “there are some subjects on which it is best not to joke.” As she spoke she wagged a mitted thumb at her hostess, and on the instant the ladies rose. Mr Hump hastened round to hold the door open as they filed out, their heads high in air, their skirts rustling indignantly over the threshold. Then he followed them, closing the door with decision behind him.

“Gad, Albert,” said Uncle Dudley, reaching over for the port, “I don’t wonder that the pick of our young fellows go in for marrying American girls.”

“Pass it along!” remarked the father of Mrs Albert’s three daughters, in a voice of confirmed dejection.

Scene. — Just inside the door of a studio.

Time. — Last Sunday in March, 5 p.m.

1st Citizeness. O, thank you so much!

2nd do. So good of you to come!

1st do. I so dote upon art!

2nd do. So kind of you to say so!

1st do. Thank you so much for asking us!

2nd do. Delighted, I’m sure! Thank you for coming!

1st Citizeness. Not at all! Thank you for – for thanking me for – Well — good-bye . ( Exit – with family group .)

Husband of 2nd Citizeness ( with gloom ). And who might those thankful bounders be?

2nd Citizeness ( wearily ). O, don’t ask me! I don’t know! From Addison Road way, I should think.

1st Citizeness ( outside ). Well! If that thing gets into the Academy!

Family Group. Did you notice the ridiculous way her hair was done? Did you ever taste such tea in your life? How yellow Mrs. General Wragg is getting to look in the daylight. Yes – there’s our four-wheeler. ( Exeunt omnes. )

The above is not intended for presentation upon any stage – not even that of the Independent Theatre. It has been cast into the dramatic mould merely for convenience’ sake. It embodies what I chiefly remember about Picture Sunday.

It has come to be my annual duty – a peculiarly hardy, not to say temerarious, annual – to convoy Mrs Albert Grundy and her party about sections of Chelsea and Brompton on the earlier of the two Show Sabbaths. I drifted into this function through having once shared an attic with a young painter, whose colleagues used to come to borrow florins of him whenever one of his pictures disappeared from any shop window, and so incidentally formed my acquaintance. My claim nowadays upon their recollection is really very slight. I just know them well enough to manage the last Sunday in March: even that might be awkward if they were not such good-natured fellows.

But it would be difficult to persuade Mrs Albert of this. That good lady is wont, when the playfully benignant mood is upon her, to describe me as her connecting link with Bohemia. She probably would be puzzled to explain her meaning; I certainly should. But if she were provided with affidavits setting forth the whole truth – viz., that my entire income is derived from an inherited part-interest in an artificial-ice machine; that there are two clergymen on the committee of my only club; that I am free from debt; and that I play duets on the piano with my sister – still would she cling to the belief that I am a young man with an extremely gay, rakish side, who could make thrilling revelations of Bohemia if I would. Of course, I am never questioned on the subject; but I can see that it is a point upon which the faith of Fernbank is firmly grounded. Often Mrs Albert’s conversation cuts figure-eights on very thin ice when we are alone, as if just to show me that she knows. More than once I have discovered Ermyntrude looking furtively at me, as the wistful shepherd-boy on the plains of Dura might have gazed at the distant haze overhanging bold, unspeakable Babylon. I rarely visit the house but Uncle Dudley winks at me. However, nothing is ever asked me about the dreadful things with which they suppose me to be upon intimate terms.

It seemed for a long time, on Sunday, as if an easy escape had been arranged for me by Providence. At two o’clock, the hour appointed for our crusade, a heavy fog overhung everything. Looking out from the drawing-room windows, only the very nearest of the neatly trimmed firs on the lawn were to be distinguished. The street beyond was utter blackness.