The Price of Things by Elinor Glyn
E >>
Elinor Glyn >> The Price of Things
Pages:
1 |
2 |
3 |
4 |
5 |
6 |
7 |
8 |
9 |
10 |
11 |
12 |
13 |
14 |
15 |
16 |
17 Produced by Suzanne Shell, Mary Meehan and PG Distributed Proofreaders
THE PRICE OF THINGS
BY ELINOR GLYN
1919
FOREWORD
I wrote this book in Paris in the winter of 1917-18--in the midst of
bombs, and raids, and death. Everyone was keyed up to a strange pitch,
and only primitive instincts seemed to stand out distinctly.
Life appeared brutal, and our very fashion of speaking, the words we
used, the way we looked at things, was more realistic--coarser--than in
times of peace, when civilization can re-assert itself again. This is why
the story shocks some readers. I quite understand that it might do so;
but I deem it the duty of writers to make a faithful picture of each
phase of the era they are living in, that posterity may be correctly
informed about things, and get the atmosphere of epochs.
The story is, so to speak, rough hewn. But it shows the danger of
breaking laws, and interfering with fate--whether the laws be of God
or of Man.
It is also a psychological study of the instincts of two women, which the
strenuous times brought to the surface. "Amaryllis," with all her
breeding and gentleness, reacting to nature's call in her fierce fidelity
to the father of her child--and "Harietta," becoming in herself the
epitome of the age-old prostitute.
I advise those who are rebuffed by plain words, and a ruthless analysis
of the result of actions, not to read a single page.
[Signature: Elinor Glyn]
THE PRICE OF THINGS
CHAPTER I
"If one consciously and deliberately desires happiness on this plane,"
said the Russian, "one must have sufficient strength of will to banish
all thought. The moment that one begins to probe the meaning of things,
one has opened Pandora's box and it may be many lives before one
discovers hope lying at the bottom of it."
"What do you mean by thought? How can one not think?" Amaryllis Ardayre's
large grey eyes opened in a puzzled way. She was on her honeymoon in
Paris at a party at the Russian Embassy, and until now had accepted
things and not speculated about them. She had lived in the country and
was as good as gold.
She was accepting her honeymoon with her accustomed calm, although it was
not causing her any of the thrills which Elsie Goldmore, her school
friend, had assured her she should discover therein.
Honeymoons! Heavens! But perhaps it was because Sir John was dull. He
looked dull, she thought, as he stood there talking to the Ambassador. A
fine figure of an Englishman but--yes--dull. The Russian, on the
contrary, was not dull. He was huge and ugly and rough-hewn--his eyes
were yellowish-green and slanted upwards and his face was frankly
Calmuck. But you knew that you were talking to a personality--to one who
had probably a number of unknown possibilities about him tucked away
somewhere.
John had none of these. One could be certain of exactly what he would do
on any given occasion--and it would always be his duty. The Russian was
observing this charming English bride critically; she was such a perfect
specimen of that estimable race--well-shaped, refined and healthy. Chock
full of temperament too, he reflected--when she should discover herself.
Temperament and romance and even passion, and there were shrewdness and
commonsense as well.
"An agreeable task for a man to undertake her education," and he wished
that he had time.
Amaryllis Ardayre asked again:
"How can one not think? I am always thinking."
He smiled indulgently.
"Oh! no, you are not--you only imagine that you are. You have questioned
nothing--you do right generally because you have a nice character and
have been well brought up, not from any conscious determination to uplift
the soul. Yes--is it not so?"
She was startled.
"Perhaps."
"Do you ever ask yourself what things mean? What we are--where we are
going? What is the end of it all? No--you are happy; you live from day
to day--and yet you cannot be a very young ego, your eyes are too
wise--you have had many incarnations. It is merely that in this one life
the note of awakening has not yet been struck. You certainly must have
needed sleep."
"Many lives? You believe in that theory?"
She was not accustomed to discuss unorthodox subjects. She was
interested.
"But of course--how else could there be justice? We draw the reflex of
every evil action and of every good one, but sometimes not until the next
incarnation, that is why the heedless ones cannot grasp the truth--they
see no visible result of either good or evil--evil, in fact, seems
generally to win if there is a balance either way."
"Why are we not allowed memory then, so that we might profit by
our lessons?"
"We should in that case improve from self-interest and not have our
faults eliminated by suffering. We are given no conscious memory of
our last life, so we go on fighting for whatever desire still holds
us until its achievement brings such overwhelming pain that the
desire is no more."
"Why do you say that for happiness we must banish thought--that seems
a paradox."
She was a little disturbed.
"I said if one _consciously_ and deliberately desired happiness, one must
banish thought to bring oneself back to the condition of hundreds of
people who are happy; many of them are even elementals without souls at
all. They are permitted happiness so that they may become so attached to
the earth plane that they willingly return and gradually obtain a soul.
But no one who is allowed to think is allowed any continued happiness;
there would be no progress. If so, we should remain as brutes."
"Then how cruel of you to suggest to me to think. I want to be
happy--perhaps I do not want to obtain a soul."
"That was born long ago--my words may have awakened it once more, but the
sleep was not deep."
Amaryllis Ardayre looked at the crowds passing and re-passing in those
stately rooms.
"Tell me, who is that woman over there?" she asked. "The very pretty one
with the fair hair in jade green--she looks radiantly happy."
"And is--she is frankly an animal--exquisitely preserved, damnably
selfish, completely devoid of intellect, sugar manners, the senses of a
harem houri--and the tenacity of a rat."
"You are severe."
"Not at all. Harietta Boleski is a product of that most astonishing
nation across the Atlantic--none other could produce her. It is the
hothouse of the world as regards remarkable types. Here for immediate
ancestry we have a mother, from heaven knows what European refuse heap,
arrived in an immigrant ship--father of the 'pore white trash' of the
south--result: Harietta, fine points, beautiful, quite a lady for
ordinary purposes. The absence of soul is strikingly apparent to any
ordinary observer, but one only discovers the vulgarity of spirit if one
is a student of evolution--or chances to catch her when irritated with
her modiste or her maid. Other nations cannot produce such beings. Women
with the attributes of Harietta, were they European, would have surface
vulgarity showing--and so be out of the running, or they would have real
passion which would be their undoing--passion is glorious--it is aroused
by something beyond the physical. Observe her nostril! There is simple,
delightful animal sensuality for you! Look also at the convex curve below
the underlip--she will bite off the cherry whether it is hers by right or
another's, and devour it without a backward thought."
"Boleski--that is a Russian name, is it not?"
"No, Polish--she secured our Stanislass, a great man in his
country--last year in Berlin, having divorced a no longer required,
but worthy German husband who had held some post in the American
Consulate there."
"Is that old man standing obediently beside her your Stanislass?--he
looks quite cowed."
"A sad sight, is it not? Stanislass, though, is not old, barely forty. He
had a _beguin_ for her. She put his intelligence to sleep and bamboozled
his judgment with a continuous appeal to the senses; she has vampired him
now. Cloying all his will with her sugared caprices, she makes him scenes
and so keeps him in subjection. He was one of the Council de l'Empire for
Poland; the aims of his country were his earnest work, but now ambition
is no more. He is tired, he has ceased to struggle; she rules and eats
his soul as she has eaten the souls of others. Shall I present her to
you? As a type, she is worthy of your attention."
"It sounds as if she had the evil eye, as the Italians say," Amaryllis
shuddered.
"Only for men. She is really an amiable creature--women like her. She
is so frankly simple, since for her there are never two issues--only to
be allowed her own desires--a riot of extravagance, the first
place--and some one to gratify certain instincts without too many
refinements when the mood takes her. For the rest, she is kind and
good-natured and 'jolly,' as you English say, and has no notion that
she is a road to hell. But they are mostly dead, her other spider
mates, and cannot tell of it."
"I am much interested. I should like to talk to her. You say that she
is happy?"
"Obviously--she is an elemental--she never thinks at all, except to plan
some further benefit for herself. I do not believe in this life that she
can obtain a soul--her only force is her tenacious will."
"Such force is good, though?"
"Certainly. Even bad force is better than negative Good. One must first
be strong before one can be serene."
"You are strong."
"Yes, but not good. Hardly a fit companion for sweet little English
brides with excellent husbands awaiting them."
"I shall judge of that."
"_Tiens!_ So emancipated!"
"If you are bad, how does your theory work that we pay for each action?
Since by that you must know that it cannot be worth while to be bad."
"It is not--I am aware of it, but when I am bad I am bad deliberately,
knowing that I must pay."
"That seems stupid of you."
He shrugged his shoulders.
"I take very severe exercise when I begin to think of things I should not
and I become savage when I require happiness--now is our chance for
making you acquainted with Harietta, she is moving our way."
Madame Boleski swept towards them on the arm of an Austrian Prince and
the Russian Verisschenzko said, with suave politeness:
"Madame, let me present you to Lady Ardayre. With me she has been
admiring you from afar."
The two women bowed, and with cheery, disarming simplicity, the American
made some gracious remarks in a voice which sounded as if she smoked too
much; it was not disagreeable in tone, nor had she a pronounced
American accent.
Amaryllis Ardayre found herself interested. She admired the superb
attention to detail shown in Madame Boleski's whole person. Her face was
touched up with the lightest art, not overdone in any way. Her hair, of
that very light tone bordering on gold, which sometimes goes with hazel
eyes, was quite natural and wonderfully done. Her dress was
perfection--so were her jewels. One saw that her corsetiere was an
artist, and that everything had cost a great deal of money. She had taken
off one glove and Amaryllis saw her bare hand--it was well-shaped, save
that the thumb turned back in a remarkable degree.
"So delighted to meet you," Madame Boleski said. "We are going over to
London next month and I am just crazy to know more of you delicious
English people."
They chatted for a few moments and then Madame Boleski swept onwards. She
was quite stately and graceful and had a well-poised head. Amaryllis
turned to the Russian and was startled by the expression of fierce,
sardonic amusement in his yellow-green eyes.
"But surely, she can see that you are laughing at her?" she exclaimed,
astonished.
"It would convey nothing to her if she did."
"But you looked positively wicked."
"Possibly--I feel it sometimes when I think of Stanislass; he was a very
good friend of mine."
Sir John Ardayre joined them at this moment and the three walked towards
the supper room and the Russian said good-night.
"It is not good-bye, Madame. I, too, shall be in your country soon and I
also hope that I may see you again before you leave Paris."
They arranged a dinner for the following night but one, and said
au revoir.
An hour later the Russian was seated in a huge English leather chair in
the little salon of his apartment in the rue Cambon, when Madame Boleski
very softly entered the room and sat down upon his knee.
"I had to come, darling Brute," she said. "I was jealous of the English
girl," and she fitted her delicately painted lips to his. "Stanislass
wanted to talk over his new scheme for Poland, too, and as you know that
always gets on my nerves."
But Verisschenzko threw his head back impatiently, while he
answered roughly.
"I am not in the mood for your chastisement to-night. Go back as you
came, I am thinking of something real, something which makes your
body of no use to me--it wearies me and I do not even desire your
presence. Begone!"
Then he kissed her neck insolently and pushed her off his knee.
She pouted resentfully. But suddenly her eyes caught a small case lying
on a table near--and an eager gleam came into their hazel depths.
"Oh, Stepan! Is it the ruby thing! Oh! You beloved angel, you are going
to give it to me after all! Oh! I'll rush off at once and leave you, if
you wish it! Good-night!"
And when she was gone Verisschenzko threw some incense into a silver
burner and as the clouds of perfume rose into the air:
"Wough!" he said.
CHAPTER II
"What are you doing in Paris, Denzil?"
"I came over for a bit of racing. Awfully glad to see you. Can't we dine
together? I go back to-morrow." Verisschenzko put his arm through Denzil
Ardayre's and drew him in to the Cafe de Paris, at the door of which they
had chanced to meet.
"I had another guest, but she can be consoled with some of Midas' food,
and I want to talk to you; were you going to eat alone?"
"A fellow threw me over; I meant to have just a snack and go on to a
theatre. It is good running across you--I thought you were miles away!"
Verisschenzko spoke to the head waiter, and gave him directions as to the
disposal of the lovely lady who would presently arrive, and then he went
on to his table, rather at the top, in a fairly secluded corner.
The few people who were already dining--it was early on this May
night--looked at Denzil Ardayre--he was such a refreshing sight of health
and youth, so tall and fit and English, with his brown smooth head and
fearless blue eyes, gay and debonnaire. One could see that he played
cricket and polo, and any other game that came along, and that not a
muscle of his frame was out of condition. He had "soldier" written upon
him--young, gallant, cavalry soldier. Verisschenzko appreciated him;
nothing complete, human or inanimate, left him unconscious of its
meaning. They knew one another very well--they had been at Oxford and
later had shot bears together in the Russian's far-off home.
They talked for a while of casual things, and then Verisschenzko said:
"Some relations of yours are here--Sir John Ardayre and his particularly
attractive bride. Shall we eat what I had ordered for Collette, or have
you other fancies after the soup?"
Denzil paid only attention to the first part of the speech--he looked
surprised and interested.
"John Ardayre here! Of course, he married about ten days ago--he is the
head of the family as you are aware, but I hardly even know him by sight.
He is quite ten years older than I am and does not trouble about us, the
poor younger branch--" and he smiled, showing such good teeth. "Besides,
as you know, I have been for such a long time in India, and the leaves
were for sport, not for hunting up relations."
Verisschenzko did not press the matter of his guest's fancies in food,
and they continued the menu ordered for Collette without further delay.
"I want to hear all that you know about them, the girl is an exquisite
thing with immense possibilities. Sir John looks--dull."
"He is really a splendid character though," Denzil hastened to assure
him. "Do you know the family history? But no, of course not, we were too
busy in the old days enjoying life to trouble to talk of such things!
Well, it is rather strange in the last generation--things very nearly
came to an end and John has built it all up again. You are interested in
heredity?"
"Naturally--what is the story?"
"Our mutual great-grandfather was a tremendous personage in North
Somerset--the place Ardayre is there. My father was the son of the
younger son, who had just enough to do him decently at Eton, and enable
him to scrape along in the old regiment with a pony or two to play with.
My mother was a Willowbrook, as you know, and a considerable heiress,
that is how I come out all right, but until John's father, Sir James,
squandered things, the head of the family was always very rich and full
of land--and awfully set on the dignity of his race. They had turned the
cult of it into regular religion."
"The father of this man made a _gaspillage_, then--well?"
"Yes, he was a rotter--a hark-back to his mother's relations; she was a
Cranmote--they ruin any blood they mix with. I am glad that I come from
the generation before."
Denzil helped himself to a Russian salad, and went on leisurely. "He
fortunately married Lady Mary de la Paule--who was a saint, and so John
seems to have righted, and takes after her. She died quite early, she had
had enough of Sir James, I expect, he had gambled away everything he
could lay hands upon. Poor John was brought up with a tutor at home, for
some reason--hard luck on a man. He was only about thirteen when she died
and at seventeen went straight into the city. He was determined to make a
fortune, it has always been said, and redeem the mortgages on
Ardayre--very splendid of him, wasn't it?"
"Yes--well all this is not out of the ordinary line--what comes next?"
Denzil laughed--he was not a good raconteur.
"The poor lady was no sooner dead than the old boy married a Bulgarian
snake charmer, whom he had picked up in Constantinople! You may well
smile"--for Verisschenzko had raised his eyebrows in a whimsical
way--this did sound such a highly coloured incident!
"It was an unusual sort of thing to do, I admit, but the tale grows more
lurid still, when I tell you that five months after the wedding she
produced a son by the Lord knows who, one of her own tribe probably, and
old Sir James was so infatuated with her that he never protested, and
presently when he and John quarrelled like hell he pretended the little
brute was his own child--just to spite John."
Verisschenzko's Calmuck eyes narrowed.
"And does this result of the fusion of snake charmers figure in the
family history? I believe I have met him--his name is Ferdinand, is it
not, and he is, or was, in some business in Constantinople?"
"That is the creature--he was brought up at Ardayre as though he were the
heir, and poor John turned out of things. He came to Eton three years
before I left, but even there they could not turn him into the outside
semblance of a gentleman. I loathed the little toad, and he loathed
me--and the sickening part of the thing is that if John does not have a
son, by the English law of entail Ferdinand comes into Ardayre, and will
be the head of the family. Old Sir James died about five years ago,
always protesting this bastard was his own child, though every one knew
it was a lie. However, by that time John had made enough in the city to
redeem Ardayre twice over. He had tremendous luck after the South African
War, so he came into possession and lives there now in great state--I do
really hope that he will have a son."
"You, too, have the instinct of the family, then--this pride in
it--since it cannot benefit you either way."
"I believe it is born in us, and though I have never seen Ardayre, I
should hate this mongrel to have it. I was brought up with a tremendous
reverence for it, even as a second cousin."
"Well, the new Lady Ardayre looks young enough and of a health to have
ten sons!"
"Y-es," Denzil acquiesced in a tentative tone.
"Not so?" Verisschenzko glanced up surprised, and then gave his attention
to the waiter who had brought some Burgundy and was pouring it out into
his glass.
"Not so you would say?"
"I don't know, I have never seen her--but in the family it is whispered
that John--poor devil--he had an accident hunting two or three years
ago. However, it may not any of it be true--here, let us drink to the
Ardayre son!"
"To the Ardayre son!" and Verisschenzko filled his friend's glass with
the decanted wine and they both drank together.
"Your cousin is like you," he said presently. "A fatiguing likeness, but
the same height and make--and voice--strange things these family
reproductions of an exact type. I have no family, as you know--we are of
the people, arisen by trade to riches. Could I go beyond my immediate
parents, could I know cousins and uncles and brothers, should I find this
same peculiar stamp of family among us all? Who knows? I think not."
"I suppose there is something in it. My father has told me that in
the picture gallery at Ardayre they are as like as two pins the whole
way down."
"The concentration upon the idea causes it. In people risen like my
father and myself, we only resemble a group--a nation; if I have children
they will resemble me. It is strength in the beginning when an individual
rises beyond the group, which produces a type. One says 'English' to look
at you, and then, if one knows, one says 'Ardayre' at once; one gets as
far as 'Calmuck' with me, that is all, but in years to come it will have
developed into 'Verisschenzko.'"
"How you study things, Stepan; you are always putting new ideas into my
head whenever I see you. Life would be just a routine, for all the joy of
sport, if one did not think. I am going to finish my soldiering this
autumn and stand for Parliament. It seems waste of time now, with no wars
in prospect, sticking to it; I want a vaster field."
"You think there can be no wars in prospect--no? Well, who can prophesy?
There are clouds in the Southeast, but for the moment we will not
speculate about them--and they may affect my country and not yours. And
so you will settle down and become a reputable member of Parliament?"
Then, as Denzil would have spoken perhaps upon the subject of war clouds,
Verisschenzko hastily continued:
"Will you dine to-morrow night at the Ritz to meet your cousin and his
wife? They are honouring me."
"I wish I could, but I am off in the morning. What is she like?"
Verisschenzko paid particular attention to the selection of a quail, and
then he answered:
"She is of the same type as the family, Denzil,--that is, a good
skeleton--bones in the right place, firm white flesh, colouring as
yours--well bred, balanced, unawakened as yet. Was she a relation?"
"Yes, I believe so--a cousin of a generation even before mine. I wish I
could have dined, I would awfully like to have met them; I shall have
to make a chance in England. It is stupid not to know one's own family,
but our fathers quarrelled and we have never had a chance of mending
the break."
"They were at the Russian Embassy last night; the throng admired Lady
Ardayre very much."
"And what are you doing in Paris, Stepan? The last I heard of you, you
were on your yacht in the Black Sea."
"I was cruising near countries whose internal affairs interest me for the
moment. I returned to my _appartement_ in Paris to see a friend of mine,
Stanislass Boleski--he also has a lovely wife. Look, she has just come
in with him. She is in the devil of a temper--observe her. If I sit back,
the pillar hides me--I do not wish them to see me yet."
Denzil glanced down the room; two people were taking their seats by the
wall. The mask was off Harietta Boleski's face for the moment; it looked
silly with its raised eyebrows and was full of ill temper and spite. The
husband had an air of extreme worry on his clever, intellectual face, but
that he was solicitous to gratify his wife's caprices, any casual
observer could have perceived.
"You mean the woman with the wonderful _cigrettes_--she is good-looking,
isn't she? I wonder who it is she has caught sight of now, though? Look
at the eagerness which has come into her eyes--you can see her in the
mirror if you want to."
But Verisschenzko had missed nothing, and he bent forward to endeavour
to identify the person upon whom Madame Boleski's gaze had turned. There
was nothing to distinguish any individual--the company were of several
nations--German and Austrian and Balkan and Russian scattered about here
and there among the French and American _habitues_. The only plan would
be to continue to watch Harietta--but although he did this throughout the
dinner, not a flicker of her eyelids gave him any further clue.
Denzil was interested--he felt something beyond what appeared on the
surface was taking place, so he waited for his friend to speak.
Verisschenzko was silent for a little, and then he casually gave a resume
of the character and place of Madame Boleski and her husband, a good deal
more baldly expressed, but in substance much the same as he had given to
Amaryllis at the Russian Embassy the night before.
Pages:
1 |
2 |
3 |
4 |
5 |
6 |
7 |
8 |
9 |
10 |
11 |
12 |
13 |
14 |
15 |
16 |
17