The Yellow Book Volume II Part 16

"Have you a large garden?" I asked; "and how many pigs have you got?"

"I've no garden at all," he replied sadly, "and they don't allow me to keep pigs, though I'd like to, awfully. It's very hard."

"But what do you do all day, then," I cried, "and where do you go and play, without any garden, or pigs, or things?"

"When I want to play," he said gravely, "I have to go and play in the street; but it's poor fun, I grant you. There's a goat, though, not far off, and sometimes I talk to him when I'm feeling lonely; but he's very proud."

"Goats _are_ proud," I admitted. "There's one lives near here, and if you say anything to him at all, he hits you in the wind with his head.

You know what it feels like when a fellow hits you in the wind?"

"I do, well," he replied, in a tone of proper melancholy, and painted on.

"And have you been to any other places," I began again presently, "besides Rome and Piccy-what's-his-name?"

"Heaps," he said. "I'm a sort of Ulysses--seen men and cities, you know. In fact, about the only place I never got to was the Fortunate Island."

I began to like this man. He answered your questions briefly and to the point, and never tried to be funny. I felt I could be confidential with him.

"Wouldn't you like," I inquired, "to find a city without any people in it at all?"

He looked puzzled. "I'm afraid I don't quite understand," said he.

"I mean," I went on eagerly, "a city where you walk in at the gates, and the shops are all full of beautiful things, and the houses furnished as grand as can be, and there isn't anybody there whatever!

And you go into the shops, and take anything you want--chocolates and magic-lanterns and injirubber b.a.l.l.s--and there's nothing to pay; and you choose your own house and live there and do just as you like, and never go to bed unless you want to!"

The artist laid down his brush. "That _would_ be a nice city," he said. "Better than Rome. You can't do that sort of thing in Rome--or in Piccadilly either. But I fear it's one of the places I've never been to."

"And you'd ask your friends," I went on, warming to my subject; "only those whoyou really like, of course; and they'd each have a house to themselves--there'd be lots of houses, and no relations at all, unless they promised they'd be pleasant, and if they weren't they'd have to go."

"So you wouldn't have any relations?" said the artist. "Well, perhaps you're right. We have tastes in common, I see."

"I'd have Harold," I said reflectively, "and Charlotte. They'd like it awfully. The others are getting too old. Oh! and Martha--I'd have Martha to cook and wash up and do things. You'd like Martha. She's ever so much nicer than Aunt Eliza. She's my idea of a real lady."

"Then I'm sure I should like her," he replied heartily, "and when I come to--what do you call this city of yours? Nephelo--something, did you say!"

"I--I don't know," I replied timidly. "I'm afraid it hasn't got a name--yet."

The artist gazed out over the downs. "'The poet says dear city of Cecrops;'" he said softly to himself, "'and wilt not thou say, dear city of Zeus?' That's from Marcus Aurelius," he went on, turning again to his work. "You don't know him, I suppose; you will some day."

"Who's he?" I inquired.

"Oh, just another fellow who lived in Rome," he replied, dabbing away.

"O dear!" I cried, disconsolately. "What a lot of people seem to live at Rome, and I've never even been there! But I think I'd like _my_ city best."

"And so would I," he replied with unction. "But Marcus Aurelius wouldn't, you know."

"Then we won't invite him," I said: "will we?"

"_I_ won't if you won't," said he. And that point being settled, we were silent for a while.

"Do you know," he said presently, "I've met one or two fellows from time to time, who have been to a city like yours--perhaps it was the same one. They won't talk much about it--only broken hints, now and then; but they've been there sure enough. They don't seem to care about anything in particular--and everything's the same to them, rough or smooth; and sooner or later they slip off and disappear; and you never see them again. Gone back, I suppose."

"Of course," said I. "Don't see what they ever came away for; _I_ wouldn't. To be told you've broken things when you haven't, and stopped having tea with the servants in the kitchen, and not allowed to have a dog to sleep with you. But _I've_ known people, too, who've gone there."

The artist stared, but without incivility.

"Well, there's Lancelot," I went on. "The book says he died, but it never seemed to read right, somehow. He just went away, like Arthur.

And Crusoe, when he got tired of wearing clothes and being respectable. And all the nice men in the stories who don't marry the Princess, 'cos only one man ever gets married in a book, you know.

They'll be there!"

"And the men who fail," he said, "who try like the rest, and toil, and eat their hearts out, and somehow miss--or break down or get bowled over in the melee--and get no Princess, nor even a second-cla.s.s kingdom--some of them'll be there, I hope?"

"Yes, if you like," I replied, not quite understanding him; "if they're friends of yours, we'll ask 'em, of course."

"What a time we shall have!" said the artist reflectively; "and how shocked old Marcus Aurelius will be!"

The shadows had lengthened uncannily, a tide of golden haze began to flood the grey-green surface of the downs, and the artist put his traps together, preparatory to a move. I felt very low: we would have to part, it seemed, just as we were getting on so well together. Then he stood up, and he was very straight and tall, and the sunset was in his hair and beard as he stood there, high over me. He took my hand like an equal. "I've enjoyed our conversation very much," he said.

"That was an interesting subject you started, and we haven't half exhausted it. We shall meet again, I hope?"

"Of course we shall," I replied, surprised that there should be any doubt about it.

"In Rome perhaps?" said he.

"Yes, in Rome," I answered; "or Piccy-the-other-place, or somewhere."

"Or else," said he, "in that other city--when we've found the way there. And I'll look out for you, and you'll sing out as soon as you see me. And we'll go down the street arm-in-arm, and into all the shops, and then I'll choose my house, and you'll choose your house, and we'll live there like princes and good fellows."

"Oh, but you'll stay in my house, won't you?" I cried; "I wouldn't ask everybody; but I'll ask _you_."

He affected to consider a moment; then "Right!" he said: "I believe you mean it, and I _will_ come and stay with you. I won't go to anybody else, if they ask me ever so much. And I'll stay quite a long time, too, and I won't be any trouble."

Upon this compact we parted, and I went down-heartedly from the man who understood me, back to the house where I never could do anything right. How was it that everything seemed natural and sensible to him, which these uncles, vicars, and other grown-up men took for the merest tomfoolery? Well, he would explain this, and many another thing, when we met again. The Knight's Road! How it always brought consolation!

Was he possibly one of those vanished knights I had been looking for so long? Perhaps he would be in armour next time--why not? He would look well in armour, I thought. And I would take care to get there first, and see the sunlight flash and play on his helmet and s.h.i.+eld, as he rode up the High Street of the Golden City.

Meantime, there only remained the finding it,--an easy matter.

Three Pictures

By Walter Sickert

I. The Old Bedford Music Hall II. Portrait of Aubrey Beardsley III. Ada Lundberg

[Ill.u.s.tration: The Old Bedford Music Hall]