WEBVTT

NOTE XII. A Broken Symbol

1
00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:04.000
Chapter 12. A Broken Symbol

2
00:00:04.000 --> 00:00:13.000
1. Vera was by this time in high romantic quest of that which cannot be found outside oneself.

3
00:00:13.000 --> 00:00:26.000
She had a passion to be utterly free. It was a cold intellectual fantasy, defeated in every possibility by some strange morbid no-saying of her emotional nature.

4
00:00:26.000 --> 00:00:43.000
Her delusion had been that circumstances enthralled her. That refuge now was gone. Wealth gave her control over the circumstances of her life. She could do what she pleased. She was free to seek freedom, and her mind was strong and daring.

5
00:00:43.000 --> 00:00:56.000
She leased an old house in West 10th Street and had it all made over into studio apartments, four above to be let by favor to whom she liked, and one very grand on the ground floor for herself.

6
00:00:56.000 --> 00:01:11.000
Then she became a patron of the arts. It is an easy road. Art is hungry for praise and attention. Artists are democratic. They keep no rules, go anywhere, have lots of time and love to be entertained by wealth,

7
00:01:11.000 --> 00:01:14.960
by Wealth, if only to put their contempt upon it.

8
00:01:14.960 --> 00:01:19.760
The hospitality of a buyer must be bad indeed if they refuse it.

9
00:01:19.760 --> 00:01:23.920
Vera's hospitality was attractive in itself.

10
00:01:23.920 --> 00:01:26.140
Her teas were man-teas.

11
00:01:26.140 --> 00:01:28.880
Her dinners were gay and excellent.

12
00:01:28.880 --> 00:01:34.440
They were popular at once and soon became smart in a special exotic way.

13
00:01:34.440 --> 00:01:38.400
Her private exhibitions were written up in the art columns.

14
00:01:38.400 --> 00:01:43.040
He had first a conventional phase and harbored academic art.

15
00:01:43.040 --> 00:01:44.220
That passed.

16
00:01:44.220 --> 00:01:47.040
Her taste became more and more radical.

17
00:01:47.040 --> 00:01:49.680
So also, of course, did her company.

18
00:01:49.680 --> 00:01:54.680
I went often to see her there, to her teas and sometimes to her dinners, because one

19
00:01:54.680 --> 00:01:57.580
could seldom see her anywhere else.

20
00:01:57.580 --> 00:01:59.840
But it was a trial for both of us.

21
00:01:59.840 --> 00:02:05.280
She introduced me always with an air which meant, He doesn't belong as you see, but

22
00:02:05.280 --> 00:02:07.000
he is all right.

23
00:02:07.000 --> 00:02:12.540
I was accepted for her sake. The men were not polite with each other. They quarreled

24
00:02:12.540 --> 00:02:18.720
and squabbled incessantly, mulishly, pettishly, in terms as strange to me as the language

25
00:02:18.720 --> 00:02:24.320
of my trade would have been to them. They were polite to me. That was the distinction

26
00:02:24.320 --> 00:02:26.140
they made.

27
00:02:26.140 --> 00:02:32.420
As Vera progressed, her understanding of art becoming higher and higher, new figures appeared,

28
00:02:32.420 --> 00:02:38.180
Some of them grossly uncouth, either naturally so or by affectation.

29
00:02:38.180 --> 00:02:42.880
She discovered a sculptor who brought his things with him to be admired, small ones

30
00:02:42.880 --> 00:02:45.900
in his pockets, larger ones in his arms.

31
00:02:45.900 --> 00:02:47.760
I could not understand them.

32
00:02:47.760 --> 00:02:52.920
They resembled the monstrosities children dream of when they need paragoric.

33
00:02:52.920 --> 00:02:59.220
He had been stoker, prizefighter, mason, poet, tramp, heaven knows what, with this marvelous

34
00:02:59.220 --> 00:03:02.200
gift inside of him all the time.

35
00:03:02.200 --> 00:03:08.560
He wore brogans, trousers that sagged, a shirt open to the middle of his hairy chest, a red

36
00:03:08.560 --> 00:03:13.400
handkerchief around his neck, and often no hat at all.

37
00:03:13.400 --> 00:03:15.880
Vera seemed quite mad about him.

38
00:03:15.880 --> 00:03:21.580
She took me one day to his studio, saying particularly that she had never been there.

39
00:03:21.580 --> 00:03:27.240
It was a small room at the top of a palsied fire trap near Gramercy Park, reached by many

40
00:03:27.240 --> 00:03:32.140
turnings through dark hallways with sudden steps up and down.

41
00:03:32.140 --> 00:03:37.460
In it, besides the sculptor in a gunny sack smock, there was nothing but some planks laid

42
00:03:37.460 --> 00:03:43.340
over the tops of barrels, some heaps of clay, and his things, which he called pieces of

43
00:03:43.340 --> 00:03:44.840
form.

44
00:03:44.840 --> 00:03:49.900
On the walls, scrawled in pencil, were his social engagements, all with women.

45
00:03:49.900 --> 00:03:52.940
Vera's name was there.

46
00:03:52.940 --> 00:03:58.420
Once he came to tea, with nothing of his own to show, but from under his coat, he produced

47
00:04:28.420 --> 00:04:29.420
at Arms-Length.

48
00:04:29.420 --> 00:04:34.460
I found it on the east side in a rag-picker's place, he said.

49
00:04:34.460 --> 00:04:36.780
I seemed to see something in it.

50
00:04:36.780 --> 00:04:37.780
What?

51
00:04:37.780 --> 00:04:38.780
A force.

52
00:04:38.780 --> 00:04:40.280
Something elemental.

53
00:04:40.280 --> 00:04:41.860
Something.

54
00:04:41.860 --> 00:04:47.740
The respect with which this twaddle was received by a sane company, some of it distinguished,

55
00:04:47.740 --> 00:04:51.900
even by Vera herself, filled me with indignation.

56
00:04:51.900 --> 00:04:58.200
Later the sculptors sat by me and asked ingratiatingly how matters were in Wall Street.

57
00:04:58.200 --> 00:05:02.280
You are the third man who has asked me that question today, I said.

58
00:05:02.280 --> 00:05:05.560
Why are artists so much interested in Wall Street?

59
00:05:05.560 --> 00:05:07.020
I'm not, he said.

60
00:05:07.020 --> 00:05:10.000
I only thought it was a proper question to ask.

61
00:05:10.000 --> 00:05:11.000
Some of them are.

62
00:05:11.000 --> 00:05:13.120
I hear them talking about it.

63
00:05:13.120 --> 00:05:16.760
Pictures sell better when people are making money in Wall Street.

64
00:05:16.760 --> 00:05:18.400
Sculpture never sells anyway.

65
00:05:18.400 --> 00:05:19.760
Mine won't.

66
00:05:19.760 --> 00:05:22.720
I said men were doing very well in Wall Street.

67
00:05:22.720 --> 00:05:24.880
Times were prosperous again.

68
00:05:24.880 --> 00:05:26.840
So I understand, he replied.

69
00:05:26.840 --> 00:05:30.360
It seems very easy to make money there if you get in right.

70
00:05:30.360 --> 00:05:32.240
Do you know of anything sure?

71
00:05:32.240 --> 00:05:33.920
I said I didn't.

72
00:05:33.920 --> 00:05:35.160
You are with Mr. Galt?

73
00:05:35.160 --> 00:05:36.160
He asked.

74
00:05:36.160 --> 00:05:37.160
Yes.

75
00:05:37.160 --> 00:05:39.000
He is a great moneymaker, isn't he?

76
00:05:39.000 --> 00:05:40.000
What is he like?

77
00:05:40.000 --> 00:05:44.960
He is an elemental force, I said, leaving him.

78
00:05:44.960 --> 00:05:46.720
2.

79
00:05:46.720 --> 00:05:52.120
But Vera was shrewd and purposeful, having always her ends in view.

80
00:05:52.120 --> 00:05:55.980
Manifestations such as the sculptor person were kept in their place.

81
00:05:55.980 --> 00:06:10.300
In a mysterious way, she created an atmosphere of pagan metaphysical tranquillity, which

82
00:06:10.300 --> 00:06:14.500
rejects nothing and refines whatever it accepts.

83
00:06:14.500 --> 00:06:21.140
No thought, no representation of fact or experience, however extreme, was forbidden.

84
00:06:21.140 --> 00:06:24.660
But you must perceive all things aesthetically.

85
00:06:24.660 --> 00:06:27.180
Vulgarity was the only sin.

86
00:06:27.180 --> 00:06:29.060
Emotions were objects.

87
00:06:29.060 --> 00:06:32.700
You might enjoy them in any way you liked, save one.

88
00:06:32.700 --> 00:06:34.660
You must not touch them.

89
00:06:34.660 --> 00:06:37.300
For this was the higher sensuality,

90
00:06:37.300 --> 00:06:42.700
ethereal and philosophical, a sensuality of the mind alone.

91
00:06:42.700 --> 00:06:46.700
All of this was the unconscious expression of herself.

92
00:06:46.700 --> 00:06:49.060
Eros intellectualized.

93
00:06:49.060 --> 00:06:51.460
It can be done.

94
00:06:51.460 --> 00:06:54.580
Her achievement became known in a cultish way.

95
00:06:54.580 --> 00:06:59.340
She made admission to her circle more and more difficult, and the harder it was, the

96
00:06:59.340 --> 00:07:02.620
more anxious people were to get in.

97
00:07:02.620 --> 00:07:06.300
On Mrs. Valentine's world, she turned the tables.

98
00:07:06.300 --> 00:07:10.460
She flouted society, and it began to knock at her door.

99
00:07:10.460 --> 00:07:14.940
She had something it wanted, and sold it dear.

100
00:07:14.940 --> 00:07:20.260
There are always those who seek in art that which they have lost, or used up, or never

101
00:07:20.260 --> 00:07:22.940
dared take in life.

102
00:07:22.940 --> 00:07:28.100
There are those whose desires are projected upon the mind and obsess it long after the

103
00:07:28.100 --> 00:07:31.860
capacity for direct experience is ruined.

104
00:07:31.860 --> 00:07:37.180
There are those to whom anything esoteric and new is irresistible.

105
00:07:37.180 --> 00:07:43.260
There were those besides who sought Vera, notably among them a tall blonde animal of

106
00:07:43.260 --> 00:07:45.200
the golden series.

107
00:07:45.200 --> 00:07:50.660
He was the man I saw bring Vera home that evening I waited to have it out with her.

108
00:07:50.660 --> 00:07:55.740
I met him again in London on Galt's business while soliciting proxies among our foreign

109
00:07:55.740 --> 00:07:57.500
stockholders.

110
00:07:57.500 --> 00:08:02.220
At that time he was acting for his father's estate with an English syndicate that had

111
00:08:02.220 --> 00:08:05.740
large investments in American railroads.

112
00:08:05.740 --> 00:08:10.340
Since then, by the will of Providence, he had come into possession of the estate, together

113
00:08:10.340 --> 00:08:14.900
with an hereditary title of great social distinction.

114
00:08:14.900 --> 00:08:18.340
Enter as he pleases, Lord Porteous.

115
00:08:18.340 --> 00:08:24.280
With a thin, cynical head, a definite simplicity of outline, and an exaggerated voluptuous

116
00:08:24.280 --> 00:08:29.360
grace of body, he remarkably resembled an old Greek drawing.

117
00:08:29.360 --> 00:08:33.500
How he had found Vera in the first place, I never knew.

118
00:08:33.500 --> 00:08:36.840
That happened at any rate before she was rich.

119
00:08:36.840 --> 00:08:42.000
He had the trained British instinct for putting money with the right people, and it was true

120
00:08:42.000 --> 00:08:44.000
The Theory of Money and Credit

121
00:09:42.000 --> 00:09:48.000
by something Lord Porteous said to him in a moment of their being accidentally alone at the sideboard.

122
00:09:48.000 --> 00:09:54.000
The artist dropped his glass in a gibbering rage and went headlong forth.

123
00:09:54.000 --> 00:10:01.000
He was never seen alive again, and as Malord couldn't be asked, we never knew what it was.

124
00:10:01.000 --> 00:10:07.000
For all that, Lord Porteous was a capital social asset and a valiant protagonist.

125
00:10:07.000 --> 00:10:23.720
3.

126
00:10:23.720 --> 00:10:27.380
Like her father, Vera was adventurous with success.

127
00:10:27.380 --> 00:10:29.200
No measure was enough.

128
00:10:29.200 --> 00:10:33.700
She began to import art objects that were bound to be talked about.

129
00:10:33.700 --> 00:10:39.400
Not old masters, nothing so trite as that, but daring, controversial things, the latest

130
00:10:39.400 --> 00:10:45.300
word of a modern school, or the most authentic fetish of a new movement in thought.

131
00:10:45.300 --> 00:10:50.840
Her grand stroke was the purchase in London of the rarest piece of antique negro sculpture

132
00:10:50.840 --> 00:10:53.680
then known to exist in the world.

133
00:10:53.680 --> 00:10:59.180
It had been miraculously discovered in Africa and was brought to England for sale.

134
00:10:59.180 --> 00:11:04.780
Its importance lay in the fact that a certain self-advertised cult, leading a revolt against

135
00:11:04.780 --> 00:11:10.940
classic Greek tradition, acclaimed it on site as the perfect demonstration of some theory

136
00:11:10.940 --> 00:11:15.100
which only artists could pretend to understand.

137
00:11:15.100 --> 00:11:20.760
Modern sculpture, these people said, was pure in but two of its three dimensions.

138
00:11:20.760 --> 00:11:26.780
This African thing, wrought by savages in a time of great antiquity, was pure also in

139
00:11:26.780 --> 00:11:28.820
the third dimension.

140
00:11:28.820 --> 00:11:33.820
or it excelled anything that was Greek or derived there from.

141
00:11:33.820 --> 00:11:38.820
A storm of controversy broke upon the absurd little idol's head.

142
00:11:38.820 --> 00:11:44.820
Photographs of it were printed in hundreds of magazines and newspapers in Europe and the United States.

143
00:11:44.820 --> 00:11:50.820
And when it came to be sold at auction, it was one of the most notorious objects on earth.

144
00:11:50.820 --> 00:11:54.820
The British Museum retired after the second bid.

145
00:11:54.820 --> 00:12:12.820
The Bidding, according to the news reports cabled to this country the next morning, was very spirited, and the treasure passed at a fabulous price to the agent of Miss Vera Gault, the well-known American collector.

146
00:12:12.820 --> 00:12:18.820
She had engaged the assistance of a dealer who knew how to get publicity in these high matters.

147
00:12:18.820 --> 00:12:25.820
English art critics politely regretted that an object of such rare aesthetic interest should leave Europe.

148
00:12:25.820 --> 00:12:30.820
American critics exalted accordingly and praised Miss Galt's enterprise.

149
00:12:30.820 --> 00:12:35.820
I was at the studio the day the thing arrived and was unpacked.

150
00:12:35.820 --> 00:12:41.820
Besides the initiates, votaries and friends, a number of art critics were present by invitation.

151
00:12:41.820 --> 00:12:47.820
Vera, as usual, was detached and tentative, with no air of proprietorship whatever.

152
00:12:47.820 --> 00:12:49.500
and Entrepreneurship, whatever.

153
00:12:49.500 --> 00:12:52.020
She was like one of the spectators.

154
00:12:52.020 --> 00:12:56.540
Yet every detail of the ceremony had been rigidly ordained.

155
00:12:56.540 --> 00:13:00.820
The place prepared to receive the idol was not too conspicuous.

156
00:13:00.820 --> 00:13:03.860
It was to be important, but not paramount.

157
00:13:03.860 --> 00:13:07.080
It must not dominate the scene.

158
00:13:07.080 --> 00:13:11.860
As one not entitled to participate in the chatter, I was free to listen.

159
00:13:11.860 --> 00:13:17.660
There were ohs and ahs and guttural sounds, meant in each case to express that person's

160
00:13:17.660 --> 00:13:21.580
whole unique comprehension and theory of art.

161
00:13:21.580 --> 00:13:26.300
The more articulate had almost done better, I thought, to limit themselves to similar

162
00:13:26.300 --> 00:13:27.820
exclamations.

163
00:13:27.820 --> 00:13:31.180
What they said was quite meaningless, to me at least.

164
00:13:31.180 --> 00:13:36.120
With the enthusiasm of original discovery, one declared that it was wholly free of any

165
00:13:36.120 --> 00:13:39.080
representational quality.

166
00:13:39.080 --> 00:13:43.800
Another said, with profound wisdom, that it was neither the symbol nor the representation

167
00:13:43.800 --> 00:13:45.800
The Theory of Money and Credit

168
00:14:13.800 --> 00:14:33.400
Lord Porteous came in.

169
00:14:33.400 --> 00:14:38.560
He helped himself to tea and sat down with Vera at some distance from the murmuring group

170
00:14:38.560 --> 00:14:40.960
that surrounded the idol.

171
00:14:40.960 --> 00:14:43.320
Voices kept calling him to come.

172
00:14:43.320 --> 00:14:48.600
He went, holding his tea and munching his cake, and gave it one casual look.

173
00:14:48.600 --> 00:14:53.480
How very ugly, he said, and returned to Vera's side.

174
00:14:53.480 --> 00:14:56.480
I hated him for having the assurance to say it.

175
00:14:56.480 --> 00:14:58.400
No one else would have dared.

176
00:14:58.400 --> 00:15:00.920
I hated him for his possessive ways.

177
00:15:00.920 --> 00:15:03.680
I hated him for all the reasons there were.

178
00:15:03.680 --> 00:15:06.200
A malicious spirit invaded me.

179
00:15:06.200 --> 00:15:10.520
I sat near them, wishing my proximity to be disagreeable.

180
00:15:10.520 --> 00:15:14.600
He was very polite and friendly, which gave me extra reasons.

181
00:15:14.600 --> 00:15:18.000
He made some reference to a recent occurrence in Wall Street.

182
00:15:18.000 --> 00:15:20.560
He asked me what I made of the negro carving.

183
00:15:20.560 --> 00:15:23.360
I don't understand it, I said.

184
00:15:23.360 --> 00:15:25.680
We are the barbarians here, he said.

185
00:15:25.680 --> 00:15:27.120
They understand it.

186
00:15:27.120 --> 00:15:29.040
Look at them.

187
00:15:29.040 --> 00:15:31.400
Vera was silent.

188
00:15:31.400 --> 00:15:33.440
4.

189
00:15:33.440 --> 00:15:39.760
Gradually the party dispersed, everyone stopping on the way forth to inform Vera of her greatness,

190
00:15:39.760 --> 00:15:44.480
Her service to art, her hold upon their adoration and affection.

191
00:15:44.480 --> 00:15:47.860
At length, only Lord Porteous and I remained.

192
00:15:47.860 --> 00:15:54.000
The teethings were removed, twilight passed, lights were made, and still we lingered, making

193
00:15:54.000 --> 00:15:56.120
artificial conversation.

194
00:15:56.120 --> 00:16:02.680
Suddenly, with a subtle air of declining the competition, he took his leave.

195
00:16:02.680 --> 00:16:09.680
Vera lay in a great black ivory-mounted chair, her head far back, her feet on a hassock,

196
00:16:09.680 --> 00:16:22.320
The Presence of Lord Porteous seemed to linger between us long after his corporeal entity was gone.

197
00:16:22.320 --> 00:16:26.120
He says he thinks it very ugly, I remarked.

198
00:16:26.120 --> 00:16:32.920
Yes, she said, with that unresolved rising inflection which provokes a man to open the quarrel.

199
00:16:32.920 --> 00:16:36.920
No one else could have carried off that audacity, I said.

200
00:16:36.920 --> 00:16:38.920
She let that pass.

201
00:16:38.920 --> 00:16:43.240
I wonder what your archaic sculptor man would think of it, I said.

202
00:16:43.240 --> 00:16:44.360
He wasn't here.

203
00:16:44.360 --> 00:16:47.460
We haven't seen him for a long time.

204
00:16:47.460 --> 00:16:52.520
She shrugged her shoulders and continued to gaze into the smoke of her cigarette.

205
00:16:52.520 --> 00:16:54.240
So you are bored, I said.

206
00:16:54.240 --> 00:16:57.080
A world of your own, a lord at your feet.

207
00:16:57.080 --> 00:16:59.480
And still, you are bored.

208
00:16:59.480 --> 00:17:01.400
Do you mean to pick a quarrel with me?

209
00:17:01.400 --> 00:17:02.400
She asked.

210
00:17:02.400 --> 00:17:05.060
I wish to cancel our bargain, I said.

211
00:17:05.060 --> 00:17:09.140
and the one we made that time long ago in the tea shop.

212
00:17:09.140 --> 00:17:11.440
Very well, she said, it is cancelled.

213
00:17:11.440 --> 00:17:12.860
Is that all?

214
00:17:12.860 --> 00:17:17.500
What more could there be, she asked, looking at me for the first time, with that naive

215
00:17:17.500 --> 00:17:21.860
expression of blameless innocence which was Eve's fig leaf.

216
00:17:21.860 --> 00:17:23.260
You have nothing to say?

217
00:17:23.260 --> 00:17:25.000
No, she said.

218
00:17:25.000 --> 00:17:28.900
Women are not as vocal about these things as men seem to be.

219
00:17:28.900 --> 00:17:31.920
You were vocal enough when we were making the bargain, I said.

220
00:17:31.920 --> 00:17:36.360
Have you no curiosity to know why I wish to cancel it?

221
00:17:36.360 --> 00:17:39.240
Friendship does not satisfy a man, she said.

222
00:17:39.240 --> 00:17:41.320
Have you made the same bargain with others?

223
00:17:41.320 --> 00:17:42.320
With Lord Porteous?

224
00:17:42.320 --> 00:17:43.320
I asked.

225
00:17:43.320 --> 00:17:44.320
No.

226
00:17:44.320 --> 00:17:46.360
Why not?

227
00:17:46.360 --> 00:17:50.680
Please don't be stupid, she said, lighting another cigarette and beginning to toy with

228
00:17:50.680 --> 00:17:51.800
the smoke.

229
00:17:51.800 --> 00:17:53.320
Are you staying for dinner?

230
00:17:53.320 --> 00:17:56.920
I'm going, I said, but not until I have told you.

231
00:17:56.920 --> 00:17:57.920
What?

232
00:17:57.920 --> 00:18:00.480
Why I ask to cancel our bargain.

233
00:18:00.480 --> 00:18:04.440
Oh, she said, I thought that was quite done with.

234
00:18:04.440 --> 00:18:06.480
Well then, why you are bored?

235
00:18:06.480 --> 00:18:11.400
Yes, she said, why I am bored, you will tell me that.

236
00:18:11.400 --> 00:18:15.440
Her profile was in silhouette against the black of the chair.

237
00:18:15.440 --> 00:18:17.240
She was smiling derisively.

238
00:18:17.240 --> 00:18:22.760
It is because you have imprisoned yourself in a lonely castle, I said.

239
00:18:22.760 --> 00:18:27.120
You used that figure of speech yourself when we were making the bargain.

240
00:18:27.120 --> 00:18:29.520
It is my castle, you said.

241
00:18:29.520 --> 00:18:31.180
Therefore you know it.

242
00:18:31.180 --> 00:18:34.120
The name of that castle is selfishness.

243
00:18:34.120 --> 00:18:37.280
The name of your jailer is Vera Afraid.

244
00:18:37.280 --> 00:18:41.060
What you fear is life, for its pain and scars.

245
00:18:41.060 --> 00:18:42.780
You hail it from afar.

246
00:18:42.780 --> 00:18:45.840
You call it inside the walls under penalties.

247
00:18:45.840 --> 00:18:47.040
It must be good.

248
00:18:47.040 --> 00:18:49.880
It shall not bite or scratch or kiss you.

249
00:18:49.880 --> 00:18:52.700
You are too precious to be touched.

250
00:18:52.700 --> 00:18:56.280
You haven't named the prisoner, she said slowly.

251
00:18:56.280 --> 00:18:59.020
She is Vera Desireful, I said.

252
00:18:59.020 --> 00:19:02.980
She is starved for life, for the bread of participation.

253
00:19:02.980 --> 00:19:06.420
She lives upon the poisonous crusts of fantasy.

254
00:19:06.420 --> 00:19:09.100
She is probably in danger of going mad.

255
00:19:09.100 --> 00:19:10.980
Her dreams are terrible.

256
00:19:10.980 --> 00:19:18.380
You cannot be saying these things to me, she exclaimed, with a startled, incredulous face.

257
00:19:18.380 --> 00:19:21.380
Long ago I might have said them just as well, I answered.

258
00:19:21.380 --> 00:19:27.300
I have known always what an unnatural, self-saving woman you are, how treacherous you are to

259
00:19:27.300 --> 00:19:32.740
to the impulse which brings you again and again to the verge of experience.

260
00:19:32.740 --> 00:19:38.020
There in the act of embracing life, you suddenly freeze with selfish fear.

261
00:19:38.020 --> 00:19:40.580
Do you think life can be so cheated?

262
00:19:40.580 --> 00:19:43.200
If it cannot burn you, it will wither you.

263
00:19:43.200 --> 00:19:47.740
When it is too late, you may realize that to have, one must give.

264
00:19:47.740 --> 00:19:50.260
Well, it is impossible, of course.

265
00:19:50.260 --> 00:19:52.220
You cannot give yourself.

266
00:19:52.220 --> 00:19:54.860
The impulse is betrayed on the threshold.

267
00:19:54.860 --> 00:19:58.860
I knew it when I was fool enough to ask you to marry me.

268
00:19:58.860 --> 00:20:03.780
You never asked me, she said thoughtfully, as reviewing a state of facts.

269
00:20:03.780 --> 00:20:06.860
You only said you wanted to marry me.

270
00:20:06.860 --> 00:20:08.940
I construed it as a challenge.

271
00:20:08.940 --> 00:20:12.100
No, that is as I think of it now.

272
00:20:12.100 --> 00:20:15.940
What happened to me then was beyond any process of thought.

273
00:20:15.940 --> 00:20:19.700
It occurred outside of me, if that means anything.

274
00:20:19.700 --> 00:20:26.860
There was a sense of dissolving. Objects, ideas, place, planes, dimensions, my own egoistic

275
00:20:26.860 --> 00:20:33.180
importance, all seemed to dissolve in one significant sensation. There is a recollection

276
00:20:33.180 --> 00:20:39.620
that at this moment something became extremely vivid. What it was that became vivid I do

277
00:20:39.620 --> 00:20:47.740
not know. The word that comprehends without defining it is completion. In the whole world

278
00:20:47.740 --> 00:20:51.460
There was nothing else of consequence or meaning.

279
00:20:51.460 --> 00:20:54.540
I ask you now, I said.

280
00:20:54.540 --> 00:20:56.980
I heard my own words from afar.

281
00:20:56.980 --> 00:21:00.260
They were uttered by someone who had been sitting where I sat

282
00:21:00.260 --> 00:21:04.140
and for all I knew or cared might be sitting there still.

283
00:21:04.140 --> 00:21:08.540
I was a body moving through space with a single anxiety,

284
00:21:08.540 --> 00:21:11.740
which was to meet another body in space for a purpose

285
00:21:11.740 --> 00:21:14.300
I could not stop to examine.

286
00:21:14.300 --> 00:21:20.940
I remember thinking, I may, I may, the bargain is cancelled.

287
00:21:20.940 --> 00:21:26.860
She leaped to her feet, evading me, and laughed with her head tossed back, an icy brilliant

288
00:21:26.860 --> 00:21:28.860
laugh that made me rigid.

289
00:21:28.860 --> 00:21:35.220
I could not interpret it, I do not know yet what it meant, nor do I comprehend the astonishing

290
00:21:35.220 --> 00:21:37.820
gesture that followed.

291
00:21:37.820 --> 00:21:42.660
Slowly she moved to the African idol, picked it up, brought it to the mantle under a strong

292
00:21:42.660 --> 00:21:58.100
Lord Porteous thinks it very ugly.

293
00:21:58.100 --> 00:22:03.740
So he said, I replied.

294
00:22:03.740 --> 00:22:05.460
He may be right, she said.

295
00:22:05.460 --> 00:22:06.980
Perhaps it is.

296
00:22:06.980 --> 00:22:12.980
So many things turn ugly when you look at them closely, friendship even.

297
00:22:12.980 --> 00:22:15.200
Then she dropped it.

298
00:22:15.200 --> 00:22:20.520
As it crashed on the hearthstone she turned without a glance at the fragments or at me

299
00:22:20.520 --> 00:22:23.400
and walked out of the room.

300
00:22:23.400 --> 00:22:27.400
Three days later, her engagement to Lord Porteous was announced.