He read the letter. It was an extremely artful letter, for Styr was at all times and above all things—for the present, at least—an artist. It was so deliberately clever that Ordham smiled again and again in sheer delight at its spontaneity, its naturalness. She talked irresistibly20 this midnight to her absent friend; and how much there was to talk about, to tell him! The letter was saturated21 with the atmosphere of Munich, an atmosphere of art, beauty, indolence, independence; a world in itself was that city on its lofty plateau, where poverty and “business” and the rush of modern life were almost unknown; an aristocratic, exclusive, segregated22 city, created as with a magic wand for pleasure, for dreams, not for work. No wonder he had found it difficult to study there. Never could he repay his debt to Lutz—and to this most wonderful of women. He sighed for his lost paradise, saw the gallery with its divan23 upon which he so often had made himself wholly at home!—and talked . . . and listened as she read to him . . . or to the Isar beneath the window, the birds in the green trees beyond . . .
She told him amusing anecdotes24 of his numerous acquaintance, of the opera house cabal25, of the King. And she was impelled26 to write to him upon this particular night, not only because he had been even more than commonly in her mind all day, but because of the news that he had been accredited27 to Rome, and she must express the hope that he travel via Munich instead of Paris. She had learned a new r?le—Katharine, in The Taming of the Shrew; he must see her in comedy. Perhaps he would not believe it, but the experiment was a success; the critics, even those that belonged to the opposite faction28, thought her as good as in tragedy, and her ovation29 from the public had been tremendous.
He read this letter through eagerly, then again more slowly, the second time in search of something that had induced a certain uneasiness in his mind. It did not take a third reading to discover the causes—for they were two.
She assumed, as a matter of course, that he was about to embark30 upon that career for which nature had so consummately31 equipped him, and to whose aid fortune had flown as if with a conscious sense of duty. How often they had discussed that future of his; she was on fire to witness the beginning of what must be an historical career; it was strange and delightful to be able to believe that she had played her little part in his life, and she was almost as excited as before her own début.
But this was the least of the jars, and although it stirred and shamed him, not in a moment could he be roused from the pleasant sloth32 into which he had fallen. She had written little of herself, but that little upon careful reading assumed a dark significance. The King’s moroseness33 and eccentricities34 increased daily. There were no more midnight performances in the Hof. And there were hints! He might shortly be relegated35 to a deeper obscurity still, and permanently36. His expenditures37 were passing belief; drastic action by the government might be necessary to save the state from bankruptcy38.
All this meant that Styr had lost her protector. The inimical party in the opera house, no longer restrained by fear of the King’s wrath39, would conquer, drive her forth40. It had required all the influence she possessed41 to obtain permission to learn two new r?les, and although her party was not contemptible42, it was not likely that her friends among the opera house officials would go so far as to threaten Munich with their own loss were she driven out.
Perhaps the most deeply human trait in Ordham was his quick and sincere sympathy. He experienced it toward mere18 acquaintances in trouble or slighted by fortune. It gushed43 warmly for those he loved, and only dried when, sulky and obstinate44, he turned his back after they had bored or otherwise alienated45 him. Then he could be as cold and unrelenting as if all his heart instead of that core were flint, and it is doubtful if he would turn his head to observe the most malignant46 straits to which the offender47 might be reduced. He shared this trait with certain women; the women whom too much desire has spoilt, and who mete48 out the extreme penalty to the man that bores them as coolly and remorselessly as the law disposes of its criminals.
Ordham was filled with pity and concern for this friend that had given him nothing but delight, and to whom he felt almost visibly linked by those latent vitalities which he would not permit to conquer his beloved inertia. But they shook him to-night. He rose and walked rapidly up and down the room. Driven from Munich, what would happen to this gifted unfortunate creature? There were other German capitals, but each had its hochdramatisch, who would use all her influence to exclude such a rival as Die Styr. She could merely gast about, with no assured income, while her lovely home was leased or sold. He had wished to think of her always in those intensely personal rooms which still seemed half his own, to see her moving about them with her noble pliant49 grace, or looking almost like a mere woman in that ugly rocking-chair. He had wished always to be able to close his eyes and conjure50 the vision of her Isolde, the notes of her great golden voice meeting in a rendezvous51 of happy birds in the cold classic dome52 of that opera house he had loved even before he knew her.
What ailed53 the world that it was so slow to accept Richard Wagner, one of the few positive geniuses it had produced? If he could but do something to rouse the British public at least, create in it a thirst for The Master, interpreted by the greatest of his pupils, surely that must add to their happiness. The most ignorant were often quite happy when surrendering themselves to the seductive charm of music, to that spell which enmeshes the facile senses and makes no demand upon a brain often tired out by nightfall. And what master had ever liberated54 from those mysterious centres of the musically gifted brain such a voluptuous55 perfumed sea of music as Richard Wagner? People that had been educated on the old barrel-organ operas had only forcibly to be introduced to the far more satisfying—intoxicating—music to crave56 it constantly, as the Germans did.
Suddenly he remembered that he possessed two hundred thousand pounds in his own right. To what better use could he put a part of it than to educate the musical taste of his country while assuring the future of the best of his friends? That a nice ethical57 point was involved in spending the gift of one woman upon another he would have dismissed as unworthy of consideration had it occurred to him. He was without conscious arrogance58, but he had the blood of kings in his veins59, as have all the older families of the British aristocracy, with or without the bend sinister60, for Plantagenets and Tudors had married more than one daughter to a peer of the realm; and in blood of this order democracy is but one more affectation, or policy, or manifest of good manners, as the individual is composed; all tributes, therefore, are his natural due. Ordham would have shrunk with a hot blush from admitting that his wife belonged to a nation of upstarts, that her family pretensions61 were absurd, and that the god of circumstance had shown uncommon62 judgment63 in sweeping64 that river of crude American gold across the Atlantic to be properly enjoyed by one of a mighty65 people to whom that bundle of states owed its being; he would have blushed, but, driven to the wall, he would have set his countenance66 into the mask of a type, opened his large cold eyes, and carelessly admitted it.
Therefore did he give no thought whatever to the source of his present affluence67. Besides, not only would he have done as much for one or two of his old college friends, but he was meditating68 a great public service. To hold London by the nose until it swallowed, and assimilated, and bred an appetite for the greatest music ever written, what signified it if the artist who should help him to accomplish the miracle happened to be his dearest friend threatened with disaster? Not that he pretended to any such sophistry69 as that he was not thinking quite as much of Margarethe Styr as of London, more perhaps; but facts were facts.
And he knew that in no more direct fashion would she ever accept aid from him. Were she driven from one opera house to the next by the jealousies70 of the most jealous of all artists, unable to obtain a permanent position, she could support herself by teaching; no doubt, too, she had a small private fortune, and the villa71 was hers. But that was not the point. She was a great and a very ambitious artist. The voice was the shortest-lived of all Nature’s gifts, and the voices devoted72 to the music of Wagner had an even shorter lease than the nightingales in the throats of the Violettas and Lucias. Something must be done at once. On Monday he would go up to London and ask advice of Hans Richter, who had conducted Wagner concerts with distinguished73 success, and whom Styr had met many times in Bayreuth and Munich. It must be the dream of his life to conduct a season of Wagner opera in London, and this could be made possible only if the experiment were privately74 financed. At this time Covent Garden was not a company; there was no board of directors to consult. It could be rented by any one that had the money to put up, so long as its traditions were not violated. Ordham knew that with Richter behind him, it would be possible to hire the opera house for a season—the season, were it not already disposed of; and that Styr could obtain a leave of absence either through the influence of her friends, or by flying into a rage and goading75 the directors to break her contract. He could rely upon many of his aristocratic and all of his artistic76 friends to spread the fame of Styr before her arrival, make her the fashion, fill the house for the first night with all that prided themselves upon being fad77 tasters, avid78 for new sensations. Let them be manipulated to that extent and Styr would do the rest. The English might not be able to appreciate the wonder of her voice, might yawn miserably79 during those everlasting80 recitatives, but they would succumb81 to her personality, her magic and magnetism82; for to these rare qualities no race is more susceptible83; and the mere sweetness of her voice would enchant84 them no matter what their lack of artistic instinct.
And then! A triumph in London, and New York, already nibbling85 at Wagner, would give him at least a season’s hearing and demand the Styr as a matter of course. Her fortune and greater fame would be assured. Ordham, as he strode up and down the room, had never felt so enthusiastic, so energetic, so inspired. He could give to England what Ludwig II had given to central Europe. He had never been sensible, save when Styr had deliberately played upon him, of wishing to be of any use to the world; but in these exalted86 moments, rattling87 those thin sheets of foreign paper (a link in themselves), he felt his first real impulse toward accomplishment88, to stand for something, experienced the real awakening89 of that gift for leadership which has raised him so high among men to-day, but which, so far, had only manifested itself occasionally in an obstinate determination to have his own way. He felt his power, saw his future more clearly than he had ever done before.
His mind flashed to the woman who had always roused his higher and better impulses, while other women sought to make a Lucien de Rubempré of him; to-night she had transmitted to him out of her own stupendous energies—Good God! what had they not accomplished90?—a tingling91 shock. She sent him his first opportunity to use his own energies, to taste the delights of power. It was something of the rapture92 of the creative artist that he felt on that never-to-be-forgotten night, for although no composition took form in his quickened brain, the genius of his personality came to life, the fires of his own peculiar93 gifts crackled in a mind created for the world’s use. As he finally made his way through the silent house to his room, he admitted with delight that he owed those moments of temperamental rapture, this awakening of his vital forces, which reached far beyond introducing Styr and Wagner to England, to the mate of that secret part of him the world would never suspect. His wife’s door was ajar, but he did not even glance at it. He made haste to get into bed, and, with the functional94 regularity95 of youth, was asleep in five minutes.
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1
purgatory
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| n.炼狱；苦难；adj.净化的，清洗的 | |
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delightful
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| adj.令人高兴的，使人快乐的 | |
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subtlety
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| n.微妙，敏锐，精巧；微妙之处，细微的区别 | |
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intimacy
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| n.熟悉，亲密，密切关系，亲昵的言行 | |
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severed
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| v.切断，断绝( sever的过去式和过去分词 )；断，裂 | |
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deliberately
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| adv.审慎地；蓄意地；故意地 | |
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tenor
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| n.男高音（歌手），次中音（乐器），要旨，大意 | |
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inaccessible
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| adj.达不到的，难接近的 | |
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immuring
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| v.禁闭，监禁( immure的现在分词 ) | |
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inertia
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| adj.惰性，惯性，懒惰，迟钝 | |
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hatred
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| n.憎恶，憎恨，仇恨 | |
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exertion
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| n.尽力，努力 | |
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dread
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| vt.担忧，忧虑；惧怕，不敢；n.担忧，畏惧 | |
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14
upheavals
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| 突然的巨变( upheaval的名词复数 )； 大动荡； 大变动； 胀起 | |
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15
whit
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| n.一点，丝毫 | |
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abated
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| 减少( abate的过去式和过去分词 )； 减去； 降价； 撤消（诉讼） | |
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nucleus
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| n.核，核心，原子核 | |
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mere
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| adj.纯粹的；仅仅，只不过 | |
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purely
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| adv.纯粹地，完全地 | |
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irresistibly
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| adv.无法抵抗地，不能自持地；极为诱惑人地 | |
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21
saturated
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| a.饱和的，充满的 | |
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segregated
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| 分开的； 被隔离的 | |
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divan
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| n.长沙发；（波斯或其他东方诗人的）诗集 | |
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anecdotes
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| n.掌故，趣闻，轶事( anecdote的名词复数 ) | |
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cabal
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| n.政治阴谋小集团 | |
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impelled
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| v.推动、推进或敦促某人做某事( impel的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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accredited
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| adj.可接受的；可信任的；公认的；质量合格的v.相信( accredit的过去式和过去分词 )；委托；委任；把…归结于 | |
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28
faction
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| n.宗派，小集团；派别；派系斗争 | |
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ovation
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| n.欢呼，热烈欢迎，热烈鼓掌 | |
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30
embark
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| vi.乘船，着手，从事，上飞机 | |
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consummately
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| adv.完成地，至上地 | |
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sloth
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| n.[动]树懒；懒惰，懒散 | |
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moroseness
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34
eccentricities
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| n.古怪行为( eccentricity的名词复数 )；反常；怪癖 | |
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relegated
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| v.使降级( relegate的过去式和过去分词 )；使降职；转移；把…归类 | |
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permanently
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| adv.永恒地，永久地，固定不变地 | |
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expenditures
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| n.花费( expenditure的名词复数 )；使用；（尤指金钱的）支出额；（精力、时间、材料等的）耗费 | |
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38
bankruptcy
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| n.破产；无偿付能力 | |
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wrath
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| n.愤怒，愤慨，暴怒 | |
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forth
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| adv.向前；向外，往外 | |
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41
possessed
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| adj.疯狂的；拥有的，占有的 | |
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42
contemptible
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| adj.可鄙的，可轻视的，卑劣的 | |
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43
gushed
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| v.喷，涌( gush的过去式和过去分词 )；滔滔不绝地说话 | |
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44
obstinate
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| adj.顽固的，倔强的，不易屈服的，较难治愈的 | |
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45
alienated
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| adj.感到孤独的，不合群的v.使疏远( alienate的过去式和过去分词 )；使不友好；转让；让渡（财产等） | |
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46
malignant
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| adj.恶性的，致命的；恶意的，恶毒的 | |
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47
offender
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| n.冒犯者，违反者，犯罪者 | |
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48
mete
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| v.分配；给予 | |
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49
pliant
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| adj.顺从的；可弯曲的 | |
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50
conjure
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| v.恳求，祈求；变魔术，变戏法 | |
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51
rendezvous
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| n.约会，约会地点，汇合点；vi.汇合，集合；vt.使汇合，使在汇合地点相遇 | |
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52
dome
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| n.圆屋顶，拱顶 | |
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53
ailed
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| v.生病( ail的过去式和过去分词 )；感到不舒服；处境困难；境况不佳 | |
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54
liberated
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| a.无拘束的，放纵的 | |
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55
voluptuous
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| adj.肉欲的，骄奢淫逸的 | |
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56
crave
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| vt.渴望得到，迫切需要，恳求，请求 | |
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57
ethical
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| adj.伦理的，道德的，合乎道德的 | |
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58
arrogance
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| n.傲慢，自大 | |
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59
veins
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| n.纹理；矿脉( vein的名词复数 )；静脉；叶脉；纹理 | |
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60
sinister
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| adj.不吉利的，凶恶的，左边的 | |
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61
pretensions
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| 自称( pretension的名词复数 )； 自命不凡； 要求； 权力 | |
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62
uncommon
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| adj.罕见的，非凡的，不平常的 | |
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63
judgment
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| n.审判；判断力，识别力，看法，意见 | |
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64
sweeping
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| adj.范围广大的，一扫无遗的 | |
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mighty
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| adj.强有力的；巨大的 | |
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66
countenance
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| n.脸色，面容；面部表情；vt.支持，赞同 | |
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affluence
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| n.充裕，富足 | |
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68
meditating
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| a.沉思的，冥想的 | |
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69
sophistry
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| n.诡辩 | |
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70
jealousies
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| n.妒忌( jealousy的名词复数 )；妒羡 | |
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71
villa
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| n.别墅，城郊小屋 | |
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72
devoted
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| adj.忠诚的，忠实的，热心的，献身于...的 | |
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73
distinguished
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| adj.卓越的，杰出的，著名的 | |
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privately
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| adv.以私人的身份，悄悄地，私下地 | |
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75
goading
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| v.刺激( goad的现在分词 )；激励；（用尖棒）驱赶；驱使（或怂恿、刺激）某人 | |
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76
artistic
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| adj.艺术(家)的，美术(家)的；善于艺术创作的 | |
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77
fad
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| n.时尚；一时流行的狂热；一时的爱好 | |
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avid
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| adj.热心的；贪婪的；渴望的；劲头十足的 | |
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79
miserably
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| adv.痛苦地；悲惨地；糟糕地；极度地 | |
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80
everlasting
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| adj.永恒的，持久的，无止境的 | |
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81
succumb
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| v.屈服，屈从；死 | |
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82
magnetism
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| n.磁性，吸引力，磁学 | |
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83
susceptible
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| adj.过敏的，敏感的；易动感情的，易受感动的 | |
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84
enchant
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| vt.使陶醉，使入迷；使着魔，用妖术迷惑 | |
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85
nibbling
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| v.啃，一点一点地咬（吃）( nibble的现在分词 )；啃出（洞），一点一点咬出（洞）；慢慢减少；小口咬 | |
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86
exalted
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| adj.(地位等)高的，崇高的；尊贵的，高尚的 | |
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87
rattling
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| adj. 格格作响的, 活泼的, 很好的 adv. 极其, 很, 非常 动词rattle的现在分词 | |
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88
accomplishment
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| n.完成，成就，（pl.）造诣，技能 | |
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89
awakening
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| n.觉醒，醒悟 adj.觉醒中的；唤醒的 | |
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90
accomplished
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| adj.有才艺的；有造诣的；达到了的 | |
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91
tingling
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| v.有刺痛感( tingle的现在分词 ) | |
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92
rapture
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| n.狂喜；全神贯注；着迷；v.使狂喜 | |
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93
peculiar
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| adj.古怪的，异常的；特殊的，特有的 | |
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94
functional
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| adj.为实用而设计的，具备功能的，起作用的 | |
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95
regularity
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| n.规律性，规则性；匀称，整齐 | |
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