Philistines

Arlo Bates

Description

What happens when a bohemian artist finds himself thrust into the upper echelons of high society? Painter Arthur Fenton woos heiress Edith Caldwell with the express purpose of living the high life and turning her aristocratic friends into patrons of his art. But after he has succeeded in winning her hand, Fenton finds himself overwhelmed by the task of navigating the complex hierarchy and nuanced mores of this rarefied social stratum.

Informations

• Publié par: The Floating Press
• Date de parution: 01 septembre 2014
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781776585526
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 1 Mo

Extrait

THE PHILISTINES

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ARLO BATES

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The Philistines First published in 1888 PDF ISBN 978-1-77658-552-6 Also available: Epub ISBN 978-1-77658-551-9 © 2014 The Floating Press and its licensors. All rights reserved.

While every effort has been used to ensure the accuracy and reliability of the information contained in The Floating Press edition of this book, The Floating Press does not assume liability or responsibility for any errors or omissions in this book. The Floating Press does not accept responsibility for loss suffered as a result of reliance upon the accuracy or currency of information contained in this book. Do not use while operating a motor vehicle or heavy equipment. Many suitcases look alike.

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I - In Place and in Account Nothing II - Some Speech of Marriage III - In Way of Taste IV - Now He is for the Numbers V - 'Twas Wondrous Pitiful VI - The Inly Touch of Love VII - This Deed Unshapes Me VIII - A Necessary Evil IX - This is Not a Boon X - The Bitter Past XI - The Great Assay of Art XII - Whom the Fates Have Marked XIII - This "Would" Changes XIV - The Shot of Accident XV - Like Covered Fire XVI - Weighing Delight and Dole XVII - The Heavy Middle of the Night XVIII - He Speaks the Mere Contrary XIX - How Chances Mock XX - Voluble and Sharp Discourse XXI - A Mint of Phrases in His Brain XXII - His Pure Heart's Truth XXIII - As False as Stairs of Sand XXIV - There Begins Confusion XXV - After Such a Pagan Cut XXVI - O, Wicked Wit and Gift XXVII - Upon a Church Bench

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XXVIII - Bedecking Ornaments of Praise XXIX - Cruel Proof of this Man's Strength XXX - The World is Still Deceived XXXI - Parted Our Fellowship XXXII - Heart-Burning Heat of Duty XXXIII - A Bond of Air XXXIV - What Time She Chanted XXXV - Heartsick with Thought XXXVI - Farewell at Once, for Once, for All and Ever XXXVII - A Sympathy of Woe

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The web of our life is of a mingled yarn, good and ill together. All's Well that Ends Well; iv.—3

DEDICATION.

To my three friends who, by generously acting as amanuenses, have made it possible that the book should be finished, I take pleasure in gratefully dedicating

"This is no square temple to the gate of which thou canst arrive precipitately; this is no mosque to which thou canst come with tumult but without knowledge." Persian Religious Hymn.

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I - In Place and in Account Nothing

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I Henry IV.; v.—I.

When Arthur Fenton, the most outspoken of all that band of protesting spirits who had been so well known in artistic Boston as the Pagans, married Edith Caldwell, there had been in his mind a purpose, secret but well defined, to turn to his own account his wife's connection with the Philistine art patrons of the town. Miss Caldwell was a niece of Peter Calvin, a wealthy and well-meaning man against whom but two grave charges could be made,—that he supposed the growth of art in this country to depend largely upon his patronage, and that he could never be persuaded not to take himself seriously. Mr. Calvin was regarded by Philistine circles in Boston as a sort of re-incarnation of Apollo, clothed upon with modern enlightenment, and properly arrayed in respectable raiment. Had it been pointed out that to make this theory probable it was necessary to conceive of the god as having undergone mentally much the same metamorphosis as that which had transformed his flowing vestments into trousers, his admirers would have received the remark as highly complimentary to Mr. Peter Calvin. To assume identity between their idol and Apollo would be immensely flattering to the son of Latona.

Fenton understood perfectly the weight and extent of Calvin's influence, yet, in determining to profit by it, he did not in the least deceive himself as to the nature of his own course.

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"Honesty," he afterward confessed to his friend Helen Greyson, who scorned him for the admission, "is doubtless a charming thing for digestive purposes, but it is a luxury too expensive for me. The gods in this country bid for shams, and shams I purpose giving them."

So well did he carry out his intention, that in a few years he came to be the fashionable portrait-painter of the town; the artist to whom people went who rated the worth of a picture by the amount they were required to pay for it, and the reputation of the painter in conventional circles; the man to whom a Boston society woman inevitably turned when she wished the likeness of her charms preserved on canvas, and when no foreigner was for the moment in vogue and on hand.

The steps by which Fenton attained to this proud eminence were obvious enough. In the first place, he persuaded Mr. Calvin to sit to him. Mr. Calvin always sat to the portrait painters whom he endorsed. This was a sort of official recognition, and the results, as seen in the needlessly numerous likenesses of the gentleman which adorned his Beacon Hill mansion, would have afforded a cynic some amusement, and not a little food for reflection. Once launched under distinguished patronage, Fenton was clever enough to make his way. He really was able to paint well when he chose, a fact which was, on the whole, of less importance in his artistic career than were the adroitness of his address, and his ready and persuasive sympathy. The qualifications of a fashionable doctor, a fashionable clergyman, and a fashionable portrait-painter are much the same; it is only in the man-milliner that skill is demanded in addition to the art of pleasing.

As usually happens in such a case, Fenton's old friends avoided him, or found themselves left in the distance by his rapid strides toward fame and fortune. Then such of them as still came in

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contact with him made his acquaintance in a new character, and learned to accept him as a wholly different man from the one they had supposed themselves to know in the days when he was never weary of pouring forth tirades against the Philistinism he had now embraced. They admired the skill with which he painted stuffs and gowns, but among themselves they agreed that the old-time vigor and sincerity were painfully lacking in his work; and if they grumbled sometimes at the prices he got, it is only just to believe that it was seldom with any real willingness to pay, in the sacrifice of convictions and ideals, the equivalent which he had given for his popularity.

Fenton was one morning painting, in his luxuriously appointed studio, the portrait of a man who was in the prime of life, and over whom vulgar prosperity had, in forming him, left everywhere her finger marks plainly to be seen. He was tall and robust, with light eyes and blonde whiskers, and a general air of insisting upon his immense superiority to all the world. That he secretly felt some doubts of the perfection of his social knowledge, there were indications in his manner, but on the whole the complacency of a portly bank account overcame all misgivings of this sort. His character might have been easily inferred from the manner in which he now set his broad shoulders expansively back in the armchair in which he was posing, and regarded the artist with a patronizing air of condescending to be wonderfully entertained by his conversation.

"You are the frankest fellow I ever saw," he said, smiling broadly.

"Oh, frank," Fenton responded; "I am too frank. It will be the ruin of me sooner or later. It all comes of being born with a habit of being too honest with myself."

"Honesty with yourself is generally held up as a cardinal virtue."

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"Nonsense. A man is a fool who is too frank with himself; he is always sure to end by being too frank with everybody else, just from mere habit."

Mr. Irons smiled more broadly still. He by no means followed all Fenton's vagaries of thought, but they tickled his mental cuticle agreeably. The artist had the name of being a clever talker, and with such a listener this was more than half the battle. The men who can distinguish the real quality of talk are few and far to seek; most people receive what is said as wit and wisdom, or the reverse, simply because they are assured it is the one or the other; and Alfred Irons was of the majority in this.

Fenton painted in silence a moment, inwardly possessed of a desire to caricature, or even to paint in all its ugliness, the vulgar mouth upon which he was working. The desire, however, was not sufficiently strong to restrain him from the judicious flattery of cleverly softening and refining the coarse lips, and he was conscious of a faint amusement at the incongruity between his thought and his action.

"And there is the added disadvantage," he continued the conversation as he glanced up and saw that his sitter's face was quickly, in the silence, falling into a heavy repose, "that frankness begets frankness. My sitters are always telling me things which I do not want to know, just because I am so beastly outspoken and sympathetic."

"You must have an excellent chance to get pointers," responded the sitter, his pale eyes kindling with animation. "You've painted two or three men this winter that could have put you up to a good thing."

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