Part 31 (1/2)

'Doubtless,' said Wilderspin, 'there are fathers and fathers. The son of Philip Aylwin has a.s.suredly a right to be critical in regard to all other fathers than his own.'

I looked in his face; the expression of solemn earnestness was quite unmistakable.

'It is not you,' I said, 'it is Heaven, or else it is the blind jester Circ.u.mstance, that is playing this joke upon me!'

'To your honoured father,' he continued, taking not the slightest notice of my interjection, 'I owe everything. From his grave he supports my soul; from his grave he gives me ideas; from his grave he makes my fame. How should I fail to honour his son, even though he--'

Of course he was going to add--'even though he be a vagabond a.s.sociating with vagabonds,'--but he left the sentence unfinished.

'I confess, Mr. Wilderspin,' said I, 'that you speak in such enigmas that it would be folly for me to attempt to answer you.'

'I wish,' said Wilderspin, 'that all enigmas were as soluble as this.

Let me ask you a question, sir. When you stood before my picture, ”Faith and Love,” in Bond Street, did you not perceive that both it and the predella were inspired entirely by your father's great work, _The Veiled Queen_, or rather that they are mere pictorial renderings and ill.u.s.trations of that grand effort of man's soul in its loftiest development?'

I had never heard of the picture in question. As for the book, my father, perceiving my great dislike of mysticism, had always shrunk from showing me any effusion of his that was not of a simply antiquarian kind. In Switzerland, however, after his death, while waiting for the embalmer to finish his work, I had become, during a few days' reading, acquainted with _The Veiled Queen_. It was a new edition containing an 'added chapter,' full of subtle spiritualistic symbols. Amid what had seemed to me mere mystical jargon about the veil of Isis being uplifted, not by Man's reason, not by such researches as those of Darwin, Huxley, Spencer, and the continental evolutionists, but by Faith and Love, I had come across pa.s.sages of burning eloquence.

'I am sorry to say,' I replied, 'that my Gypsy wanderings are again answerable for my shortcomings. I have not yet seen your picture.

When I do see it I--'

'Not seen ”Faith and Love” and the equally wonderful predella at the foot of it!' he exclaimed incredulously. 'Ah, but you have been living among the Gypsies. It is the greatest picture of the modern world; for, Mr. Aylwin, it renders in Art the inevitable att.i.tude of its own time and country towards the unseen world, and renders it as completely as did the masterpiece of Polygnotus in the Lesche of the 'Not in the flesh; in the spirit, who knows him so well? Your mother I have had the pleasure of meeting at the house of Lord Sleaford, and indeed I have had the distinguished honour of painting her portrait; but the great author of _The Veiled Queen_--the inspired designer of the vignette symbolical of the Renascence of Wonder in Art--I never had the rapture of seeing. This very day, the anniversary of his birth,' he continued, 'is a great day in the Aylwinian calendar.'

'My father's birthday? Why, so it is!'

'Mr. Aylwin, is it possible that the anniversary of a day so momentous for the world is forgotten--forgotten by the very issue of the great man's loins?'

'The fact is,' said I, in some confusion, 'I have been living with the Gypsies, and, you see, Mr. Wilderspin, the pa.s.sage of time--'

'The son of Philip Aylwin a Gypsy!' murmured Wilderspin meditatively, and unconscious evidently that he was speaking aloud--'a Gypsy! Still it would surely be a mistake to suppose,' he continued, perfectly oblivious now of my presence, 'that the vagaries of his son can really bring shame upon the head of the father.'

'But, by G.o.d!' I cried, 'it is no mistake that the vagaries of the father can bring shame and sorrow and misery upon the child. I could name a couple of fathers--sleeping very close to each other now--whose vagaries--'

My sudden anger was carrying me away; but I stopped, recollecting myself.

'Doubtless,' said Wilderspin, 'there are fathers and fathers. The son of Philip Aylwin has a.s.suredly a right to be critical in regard to all other fathers than his own.'

I looked in his face; the expression of solemn earnestness was quite unmistakable.

'It is not you,' I said, 'it is Heaven, or else it is the blind jester Circ.u.mstance, that is playing this joke upon me!'

'To your honoured father,' he continued, taking not the slightest notice of my interjection, 'I owe everything. From his grave he supports my soul; from his grave he gives me ideas; from his grave he makes my fame. How should I fail to honour his son, even though he--'

Of course he was going to add--'even though he be a vagabond a.s.sociating with vagabonds,'--but he left the sentence unfinished.

'I confess, Mr. Wilderspin,' said I, 'that you speak in such enigmas that it would be folly for me to attempt to answer you.'

'I wish,' said Wilderspin, 'that all enigmas were as soluble as this.

Let me ask you a question, sir. When you stood before my picture, ”Faith and Love,” in Bond Street, did you not perceive that both it and the predella were inspired entirely by your father's great work, _The Veiled Queen_, or rather that they are mere pictorial renderings and ill.u.s.trations of that grand effort of man's soul in its loftiest development?'

I had never heard of the picture in question. As for the book, my father, perceiving my great dislike of mysticism, had always shrunk from showing me any effusion of his that was not of a simply antiquarian kind. In Switzerland, however, after his death, while waiting for the embalmer to finish his work, I had become, during a few days' reading, acquainted with _The Veiled Queen_. It was a new edition containing an 'added chapter,' full of subtle spiritualistic symbols. Amid what had seemed to me mere mystical jargon about the veil of Isis being uplifted, not by Man's reason, not by such researches as those of Darwin, Huxley, Spencer, and the continental evolutionists, but by Faith and Love, I had come across pa.s.sages of burning eloquence.