Roderick Hudson

s. Hudson and inform her that her son had relieved him of his tutelage. He felt that she considered him an incorruptible Mentor, following Roderick like a sh

of the world. He would work none the worse for this; every artist needed to knock about and look at things for himself. They had parted company for a couple of months, for Roderick was now a great man and beyond the need of going about with a keeper. But they were to m

n hand. The same mail brought also an epistle from Cecilia. The latte

ation of wild oats. But from what you tell me, Mr. Striker may now go hang himself..... There is one thing, however, to say as a friend, in the way of warning. That candid soul can keep a secret, and he may have private designs on your equanimity which you don't begin to suspect. What do you think of his being engaged to Miss Garland? The two ladies had given no hint of it all winter, but a fortnight ago, when those big photographs of his statues arrived, they first pinned them up on the wall, and then trotted out into the town, made a dozen calls, and announced the news. Mrs. Hudson did, at least; Miss Garland, I suppose, sat at home writing letters. To me, I confess, the thing was a perfect surprise. I had not a suspicion that all the while he was coming so regularly to make himself agreeable on my veranda, he was quietly preferring his cousin to any one else. Not, indeed, that he was ever at particular pains to

as so much shorter that

en from different points of view. We know little about such things, but they seem to us wonderfully beautiful. We sent them to Boston to be handsomely framed, and the man, on returning them, wrote us that he had exhibited them for a week in his store, and that they had attracted great attention. The frames are magnificent, and the pictures now hang in a row on the parlor wall. Our only quarrel with them is that they make the old papering and the engravings look dreadfully shabby. Mr. Striker stood and looked at them the other day full

st respe

Gar

early painting. The letter renewed that impression of strong feeling combined with an almost rigid simplicity, which Roderick's betrothed had personally given him. And its homely stiffness seemed a vivid reflection of a life concentrated, as the young girl had borrowed warrant from her companion to say, in a single devoted idea. The monotonous days of the two women seemed to Rowland's fancy

m-poor, patient, trustful creatures! I don't know how to tell you what I am doing. It seems all amusing enough while I do it, but it would make a poor show in a narrative intended for your formidable eyes. I found Baxter in Switzerland, or rather he found me, and he grabbed me by the arm and brought me here. I was walking twenty miles a day in the Alps, drinking milk in lonely chalets, sleeping as you sleep, and thinking it was all very good fun; but Baxter told me it would never do, that the Alps were 'd--d rot,' that Baden-Baden was the place, and that if I knew what was good for me I would come along with him. It is a wonderful place, certainly, though, thank the Lord, Baxter departed last week, blaspheming horribly at trente et quarante. But you know all about it and what one does-wha

ded, to Rowland's mind, a key: the key arrived a week later. "In common charity," Roderick wrote, "lend me a hundred pounds! I have gambled away my last franc-I have made a mountain of debts. Send me the money first; lecture me afterwards!" Rowland sent the money by return of mail; then he proceeded, not to lecture, but to think. He hung his head; he was acutely disappointed. He had no right to be, he assured himself; but so it was. Roderick was young, impulsive, unpracticed in stoicism; it was a hundred to one that he was to pay the usual vulgar tribute to folly. But his friend had regarded it as securely gained to his own belief in virtue that he was not as other foolish youths are, and

, and he had no studio; in one way or another he had to pass the time. He passed it in dangling about several very pretty women in wonderful Paris toilets, and reflected that it was always something gained for a sculptor to sit under a tree, looking at his leisure into a charming face and saying things that made it smile and play its muscles and part its lips and show its teeth. Attached to these ladies were certain gentlemen who walked about in clouds of perfume, rose at midday, and supped at midnight. Roderick had found himself in the mood for thinking them very amusing fellows. He was surprised at his own taste, but he let it take its course. It led him to the discovery that to live with ladies who expect you to present them with expensive bouquets, to ride with them in the Black Forest on well-looking horses, to come into their opera-boxes on nights when Patti sang and prices were consequent, to propose little light suppers at the Conversation House after the opera or drives by moonlight to the Castle, to be always arrayed and anointed, trinketed and gloved,-that to move in such society, we say,

magination. The young sculptor reverted to his late adventures again in the evening, and this time talked of them more objectively, as the phrase is; more as if they had been the adventures of another person. He related half a dozen droll things that had happened to him, and, as if his responsibility had been disengaged by all this free discussion, he laughed extravagantly at the memory of them. Rowland sat perfectly grave, on principle. Then Roderick began to

of mysteries. Who can answer for his will? who can say beforehand that it 's strong? There are all kinds of indefinable currents moving to and fro between one's will and one's inclinations. People talk as if the two things were essentially distinct; on differen

ut the will being 'destined.' The will is de

have gathered from my summer's experience," he went on-"it 's as well to look it frankly in the

ng at pictures and exploring for out the way bits of fresco and carving, and Roderick recovered all his earlier fervor of appreciation and comment. In Rome he went eagerly to work again, and finished in a month two or three small things he had left standing on his departure. He talked the most joyous nonsense about finding himself back in his old quarters. On the first Sunday afternoon following their return, on their going together to Saint Peter's, he delivered himself of a lyrical greeting to the great church and to the city in general, in a tone of voice so irrepressibly elevated that it rang thro

derick, with a certain petulan

, and borrowed an even deeper crimson from his gleeful greeting of his most appreciative patron. He was making a careful and charming little sketch. On Rowland's asking him how he had spent his summer, he gave an account of his wanderings which made poor Mallet sigh with a sense of more contrasts than one. He had not been out of Italy, but he had been delving deep into the picturesque heart of the lovely land, and gathering a wonderful store of subjects. He had rambled about among the unvisited villages of the Apennines, pencil

her have looked at the things in peace and quiet. I did n't know I could t

an artist ever passed a more profitable three mo

I have got more facility!" And he lowered his voice as if he were communicating a secret which it took some courage to impart. "I hardly like to say it, for f

y think of you as living here in a state of scandalous bliss. I don't

ming the kindly jest, he walked about the room, scratching his head and laughing intensely

aid Rowland. "He is

n't need to stop and ask himself in fear and trembling every month or two whether he

part of it at

gleton, with profound simplicity. "They say

's line. Nevertheless, he tells me that at Baden he made some studies. Come when you can, by the way," he added after a moment, "to his studio, a

Tyrol. Her complexion was somewhat browned, which was very becoming, and her flowers were uncommonly pretty. Gloriani had been in Paris and had come away in high good-humor, finding no one there, in the artist-world, cleverer than himself. He came in a few days to Roderick's studio, one afternoon when R

t deal better. I did n't say how much, for fear of making your friend angry. But one can leave him alone now, for he 's coming

ly like this new st

e topping high art of three months ago. He has taken his turn sooner than I supposed. What has happened to him? Has

ry flash in his eye, which seemed to imply that his companion had undertaken to insure him against perplexities and was not fulfilling his contract-"this damnable uncertainty when he goes to bed at night as to whether he is going to wake up in a working humor or in a swearing humor? Have we only a season, over before we know it, in which we can call our faculties our

t and that the only remedy was plenty of courage and faith. And he reminded him

sque spots and stretching himself in the sun among a heap of overtangled stones. He let the scorching Roman luminary beat down upon him with an equanimity which Rowland found it hard to emulate. But in this situation Roderick talked so much amusing nonsense that, for the sake of his company, Rowland consented to be uncomfortable, and often forgot that, th

wland demanded, not from pusilla

tal vices. I have shuffled them in a measure out of sight, but I have not corrected them. I c

d with him on each of these points; the thing had faults enough, but they were not those faults. Rowland, unr

sight!" Roderick cried. "What am I to do now?" he went on. "I have n't an idea. I think of subjec

for heaven's sake, talk in that confoundedly querulous voice." But before he had utte

devil," he said, "and you see his horns! I

that just a year before he and his companion had seen in the Ludovisi gardens a wonderfully beautiful girl, strolling in the train of this conspicuous couple. He looked for her now, and in a moment she appeared, following her companions with the same nonchalant step as before, and leading her great snow-white poodle, decorated with motley ribbons. The elder lady offered the two young men

ith majesty. "We were told that Mr. Hudson had no fixed day,

g, and Rowland, looking at him, saw that he was looking amazedly at the young girl and was apparently unconscious of everything else. "By Jove!" he cried precipitately, "it 's that goddess of the Villa Ludovisi!" Rowland in some confu

re," said his companion. "I

of languid, imperturbable indifference. Her beauty was extraordinary; it grew and grew as the young man observed her. In such a face the maidenly custom of averted eyes and ready blushes would have seemed an anomaly; nature had produced it for man's delight and meant that it should surrender itself freely and coldly to admiration. It was not immed

than the people." And on Rowland's caressing him: "His name is Stenterello," she added. "Stenter

r short, shrill barks; upon which the elder

olish child," she added, turning to Roderick with an ag

l save me a great deal of trouble. Stenterello, love, give a pretty smile and say tanti complimenti!" The poodle wagged his whit

erful beast,"

girl. "A beast is something black

lady explained. "He was presented to

out him. It is for himself. H

gnificant glance at Rowland which seemed to bespeak his attention to the glor

ness, but Rowland mentally made the distinction that the mother was silly and that the daughter was not. The mother had a very silly mouth-a mouth, Rowland suspected, capable of expressing an inordinate degree of unreason. The young girl, in spite of her childish satisfaction in her poodle, was not a person of feeble understanding. Rowland received an impression that, for reasons of her own, she was playing a part. What was the part and what were her reasons? She was interesting; Rowland wondered what were her domestic secrets. If her mother

e of some slight hospitality. He altered the light, pulled forward two or three figures, and made an apo

ery well," Mrs. Light declared. "Cavalier

It is stupendous!" he murmured. "An

urs were among the things to see." This gracious speech went unanswered; Roderick had already wandered across to the other side of the studio and was revolving about Miss Light. "Ah, he 's gone to look at my beautiful daughter; he is not the first that has had his head turned," Mrs. Light resumed, lowering h

autiful," Rowla

ntioned to her as a feature of Roderick's establishment. It was the gaze, Rowland felt, which the vigilant and ambitious mamma of a beautiful daughter has always at her command for well-dressed young men of candid physiognomy. Her inspection in this case seemed sati

question-not the latent one. "Dear me

ress. "Ah, you 're a patron of the arts," she said. "That 's what I should like to be if I had a little money. I delight in beauty in every form. But all these people ask such monstrous prices. One must be a millionaire, to think of such things, eh? Twenty years ago my husband had my portrait painted, here in Rome, by Papucci, who was the great man in those days. I was in a ball dress, with all my jewels, my neck and arms, and all that. The man got six hundred fran

osition, when he was interrupted by the voice

own

es to model my bust.

a little chuckle. "

girl with his arms folded, looking at her as he would have done at the Medicean Venus. He never paid compliments, an

of me ever since." Her tone, in speaking, was peculiar; it had a kind of

bust-that 's all, madame!"

ome? I have spent half my life sitting for my photograph, in every conceivab

ghter's sitting to you, sir-to a young sculptor whom we don't know-it is a matter

gy, "I will make her from memory, and if the thing 's to

n't know whether you mean she shall pay you for the bu

tempt at majestic severity. "Of course," she added, in a momen

cried Roderic

can you carry a marble bust about the world with

sensical!" cried Mrs.

said the young girl, with

o pitied her, flushed and irrita

for action. Rowland, on the contrary, wished to avert the coming storm. "You had better not refuse," he said to Miss

dare say Mr. Hudson is very clever; but I don't

ust, I promise you!" cri

the Cavaliere, "one of the old

id Roderick, paying, to Rowland's

o be very amusing and make me laugh. What do y

anks. Cavaliere, call the carriage." The Cavaliere led the way out, backing like a silver-stick,

" cried Roderick, when they ha

l," said Rowland. "But I 'm sor

why,

will bring tro

ind of

amma, I suspect, is the least bit of an adve

oddess!" cr

is all the m

she do to me? She does

to know it by this time-the safe and the unsafe. Miss Light,

to whistle a triumphant air, in honor, appar

e saw the two ladies driving daily in a well-appointed landau, with the Cavaliere and the poodle in the front seat. From Mrs. Light he received a gracious salute, tempered by her native majesty; but the young girl, looking straight before her, seemed profoundly indifferent to observers. Her extraordinary beauty, however, had already made obs

ow become. Mr. Light was an American consul, newly appointed at one of the Adriatic ports. He was a mild, fair-whiskered young man, with some little property, and my impression is that he had got into bad company at home, and that his family procured him his place to keep him out of harm's way. He came up to Rome on a holiday, fell in love with Miss Savage, and married her on the spot. He had not been married three years when he was drowned in the Adriatic, no one ever knew how. The young widow came back to Rome, to her father, and here shortly afterwards, in the shadow of Saint Peter's, her little girl was born. It might have been supposed that Mrs. Light would marry again, and I know she had opportunities. But she overreached herself. She would take nothing less than a title and a fortune, and they were not forthcoming. She was admired and very fond of admiration; very vain, very worldly, very silly. She remained a pretty widow, with a surprising variety of bonnets and a dozen men always in her train. Giacosa dates from this period. He calls himself a Roman, but I have an impression he came up from Ancona with her. He was l'ami de la maison. He used to hold her bouquets, clean her gloves (I was told), run her errands, get her opera-boxes, and fight her battles with the shopkeepers. For this he needed courage, for she was smothered in debt. She at last left Rome to escape her creditors. Many of them must remember her still, but she seems now to have money

ed, "do you imagine the mother's adve

superior girl. My own impression is that she is a mixture of good and bad, of ambition and indifference. Mrs. Light, having failed to make her own fortune in matrimony, has transferred her hopes to her daughter, and nursed them till they have become a kind of monomania. She has a hobby, which she rides in secret; but some day she will let you see it. I 'm sure that if you go in some evening unannounced, you will find her scanning the tea-leaves in her cup, or telling her daughter's fortune with a greasy pack of cards, preserved for the purpose. She promises her a prince-a reigning prince. But if Mrs. Light is silly, she is shrewd, too, and, lest considerations of state should deny her prince the luxury of a l

does Chris

herself good enough to occupy the highest station in the world; but she knows that her mother talks nonsense, and that even a beautiful girl may look awkward in making unsuccessful advances. So she

and he congratulated himself on having listened to it when, a couple of days later, Mrs. Light and her daughter, attended by the Cav

be famously abused. It 's really selfish to be living all alone in such a place as this. Cavaliere, how should you like this suite of rooms and a fortune to fill them with pictures and statues? Christina, love, look at that mosaic table. Mr. Mallet, I could almost beg it from y

ce, had begun to wander round the room-looking at herself in the mirror, touching the ornaments and curiosities, glancing at the books and prints. Rowland's si

ulgar nowadays, and it is not every one that knows just the sort of ugliness that has chic. But chic is getting dreadfully common too. There 's a hint of it even in Mada

, smiling, "that you have arrive

t you are very prosaic; you have what is called a 'catholic' taste and yet you are full of obstinate little p

" laughed Rowland; "I assu

nd out I was wrong, and that would irritate me and make m

on't dis

for you certainly

very disc

ugh some day you will deny that. Wh

He is represented by t

es," she said, "they are not so silly as most of the things

Rowland. "They are beautiful, and

, I have a mind to let him make it. A reques

hat t

the beautiful. I must model your bust.' That almost should be rewarded. He

ontained a soul, but the soul had leaked out. Nevertheless, Rowland reflected, there are more profitless things than mere sound and gesture, in a consummate Italian. And the Cavaliere, too, had soul enough left to desire to speak a few words on his own account, and call Rowland's attention to the fact that he was not, after all

ome and see two quiet little women, we shall be most happy!" she said. "We

pardon," sai

avaliere," add

lease!" cried

avaliere; he was smiling

e of embroidery. She received him very graciously, and then, pointing mysteriously to a large screen which was unfolded across the embrasure of one of the deep windows, "I am keeping guard!" she said. Rowland looked interrogative; whereupon she beckoned him forward and motioned him to look behind the screen. He obeyed, and for some moments stood gazing. Roderick, with h