The Portrait of a Lady by Henry James

  Silence—absolute silence—had not fallen upon her companions; but their conversation had an appearance of embarrassed continuity. The two good sisters had not settled themselves in their respective chairs; their attitude was noticeably provisional, and they evidently wished to emphasize the transitory character of their presence. They were plain, comfortable, mild-faced women, with a kind of business-like modesty, to which the impersonal aspect of their stiffened linen and inexpressive serge gave an advantage. One of them, a person of a certain age, in spectacles, with a fresh complexion and a full cheek, had a more discriminating manner than her colleague, and had evidently the responsibility of their errand, which apparently related to the young girl. This young lady wore her hat—a coiffure of extreme simplicity, which was not at variance with a plain muslin gown, too short for the wearer, though it must already have been ‘‘let out.’’ The gentleman who might have been supposed to be entertaining the two nuns was perhaps conscious of the difficulties of his function; to entertain a nun is, in fact, a sufficiently delicate operation. At the same time he was plainly much interested in his youthful companion, and while she turned her back to him his eyes rested gravely upon her slim, small figure. He was a man of forty, with a well-shaped head, upon which the hair, still dense, but prematurely grizzled, had been cropped close. He had a thin, delicate, sharply cut face, of which the only fault was that it looked too pointed; an appearance to which the shape of his beard contributed not a little. This beard, cut in the manner of the portraits of the sixteenth century and surmounted by a fair moustache, of which the ends had a picturesque upward flourish, gave its wearer a somewhat foreign, traditionary look, and suggested that he was a gentleman who studied effect. His luminous intelligent eye, an eye which expressed both softness and keenness—the nature of the observer as well as of the dreamer—would have assured you, however, that he studied it only within well-chosen limits, and that in so far as he sought it he found it. You would have been much at a loss to determine his nationality; he had none of the superficial signs that usually render the answer to this question an insipidly easy one. If he had English blood in his veins, it had probably received some French or Italian commixture; he was one of those persons who, in the matter of race, may, as the phrase is, pass for anything. He had a light, lean, lazy-looking figure, and was apparently neither tall nor short. He was dressed as a man dresses who takes little trouble about it.

  ‘‘Well, my dear, what do you think of it?’’ he asked of the young girl. He used the Italian tongue, and used it with perfect ease; but this would not have convinced you that he was an Italian.

  The girl turned her head a little to one side and the other.

  ‘‘It is very pretty, papa. Did you make it yourself?’’

  ‘‘Yes, my child; I made it. Don’t you think I am clever?’’

  ‘‘Yes, papa, very clever; I also have learned to make pictures.’’ And she turned round and showed a small, fair face, of which the natural and usual expression seemed to be a smile of perfect sweetness.

  ‘‘You should have brought me a specimen of your powers.’’

  ‘‘I have brought a great many; they are in my trunk,’’ said the child.

  ‘‘She draws very—very carefully,’’ the elder of the nuns remarked, speaking in French.

  ‘‘I am glad to hear it. Is it you who have instructed her?’’

  ‘‘Happily, no,’’ said the good sister, blushing a little. ‘‘Ce n’est pas ma partie. I teach nothing; I leave that to those who are wiser. We have an excellent drawing-master, Mr.—Mr.—what is his name?’’ she asked of her companion.

  Her companion looked about at the carpet.

  ‘‘It’s a German name,’’ she said in Italian, as if it needed to be translated.

  ‘‘Yes,’’ the other went on, ‘‘he is a German, and we have had him for many years.’’

  The young girl, who was not heeding the conversation, had wandered away to the open door of the large room, and stood looking into the garden.

  ‘‘And you, my sister, are French,’’ said the gentleman.

  ‘‘Yes, sir,’’ the woman replied, gently. ‘‘I speak to the pupils in my own language. I know no other. But we have sisters of other countries—English, German, Irish. They all speak their own tongue.’’

  The gentleman gave a smile.

  ‘‘Has my daughter been under the care of one of the Irish ladies?’’ And then, as he saw that his visitors suspected a joke, but failed to understand it—‘‘You are very complete,’’ he said, instantly.

  ‘‘Oh, yes, we are complete. We have everything, and everything is the best.’’

  ‘‘We have gymnastics,’’ the Italian sister ventured to remark. ‘‘But not dangerous.’’

  ‘‘I hope not. Is that your branch?’’ A question which provoked much candid hilarity on the part of the two ladies; on the subsidence of which their entertainer, glancing at his daughter, remarked that she had grown.

  ‘‘Yes, but I think she has finished. She will remain little,’’ said the French sister.

  ‘‘I am not sorry. I like little women,’’ the gentleman declared, frankly. ‘‘But I know no particular reason why my child should be short.’’

  The nun gave a temperate shrug, as if to intimate that such things might be beyond our knowledge.

  ‘‘She is in very good health; that is the best thing.’’

  ‘‘Yes, she looks well.’’ And the young girl’s father watched her a moment. ‘‘What do you see in the garden?’’ he asked, in French.

  ‘‘I see many flowers,’’ she replied, in a sweet, small voice, and with a French accent as good as his own.

  ‘‘Yes, but not many good ones. However, such as they are, go out and gather some for ces dames.’’

  The child turned to him, with her smile brightened by pleasure. ‘‘May I, truly?’’ she asked.

  ‘‘Ah, when I tell you,’’ said her father.

  The girl glanced at the elder of the nuns.

  ‘‘May I, truly, ma mère?’’

  ‘‘Obey monsieur your father, my child,’’ said the sister, blushing again.

  The child, satisfied with this authorization, descended from the threshold, and was presently lost to sight.

  ‘‘You don’t spoil them,’’ said her father, smiling.

  ‘‘For everything they must ask leave. That is our system. Leave is freely granted, but they must ask it.’’

  ‘‘Oh, I don’t quarrel with your system; I have no doubt it is a very good one. I sent you my daughter to see what you would make of her. I had faith.’’

  ‘‘One must have faith,’’ the sister blandly rejoined, gazing through her spectacles.

  ‘‘Well, has my faith been rewarded? What have you made of her?’’

  The sister dropped her eyes a moment.

  ‘‘A good Christian, monsieur.’’

  Her host dropped his eyes as well; but it was probable that the movement had in each case a different spring.

  ‘‘Yes,’’ he said in a moment, ‘‘and what else?’’

  He watched the lady from the convent, probably thinking that she would say that a good Christian was everything.

  But for all her simplicity, she was not so crude as that. ‘‘A charming young lady—a real little woman—a daughter in whom you will have nothing but contentment.’’

  ‘‘She seems to me very nice,’’ said the father. ‘‘She is very pretty.’’

  ‘‘She is perfect. She has no faults.’’

  ‘‘She never had any as a child, and I am glad you have given her none.’’

  ‘‘We love her too much,’’ said the spectacled sister, with dignity. ‘‘And as for faults, how can we give what we have not? Le couvent n’est comme le monde, monsieur. She is our child, as you may say. We have had her since she was so small.’’

  ‘‘Of all those we shall lose this year she is the one we shall miss most,’’ the younger woman murmured, deferentially
.

  ‘‘Ah, yes, we shall talk long of her,’’ said the other. ‘‘We shall hold her up to the new ones.’’

  And at this the good sister appeared to find her spectacles dim; while her companion, after fumbling a moment, presently drew forth a pocket-handkerchief of durable texture.

  ‘‘It is not certain that you will lose her; nothing is settled yet,’’ the host rejoined, quickly; not as if to anticipate their tears, but in the tone of a man saying what was most agreeable to himself.

  ‘‘We should be very happy to believe that. Fifteen is very young to leave us.’’

  ‘‘Oh,’’ exclaimed the gentleman, with more vivacity than he had yet used, ‘‘it is not I who wish to take her away. I wish you could keep her always!’’

  ‘‘Ah, monsieur,’’ said the elder sister, smiling and getting up, ‘‘good as she is, she is made for the world. Le monde y gagnera.’’

  ‘‘If all the good people were hidden away in convents, how would the world get on?’’ her companion softly inquired, rising also.

  This was a question of a wider bearing than the good woman apparently supposed; and the lady in spectacles took a harmonizing view by saying comfortably: ‘‘Fortunately there are good people everywhere.’’

  ‘‘If you are going there will be two less here,’’ her host remarked, gallantly.

  For this extravagant sally his simple visitors had no answer, and they simply looked at each other in decent deprecation; but their confusion was speedily covered by the return of the young girl, with two large bunches of roses—one of them all white, the other red.

  ‘‘I give you your choice, Mamman Catherine,’’ said the child. ‘‘It is only the colour that is different, Mamman Justine; there are just as many roses in one bunch as another.’’

  The two sisters turned to each other, smiling and hesitating, with—‘‘Which will you take?’’ and ‘‘No, it’s for you to choose.’’

  ‘‘I will take the red,’’ said Mother Catherine, in the spectacles. ‘‘I am so red myself. They will comfort us on our way back to Rome.’’

  ‘‘Ah, they won’t last,’’ cried the young girl. ‘‘I wish I could give you something that would last!’’

  ‘‘You have given us a good memory of yourself, my daughter. That will last!’’

  ‘‘I wish nuns could wear pretty things. I would give you my blue beads,’’ the child went on.

  ‘‘And do you go back to Rome to-night?’’ her father asked.

  ‘‘Yes, we take the train again. We have so much to do là-bas.’’

  ‘‘Are you not tired?’’

  ‘‘We are never tired.’’

  ‘‘Ah, my sister, sometimes,’’ murmured the junior votaress.

  ‘‘Not to-day, at any rate. We have rested too well here. Que Dieu vous garde, ma fille.’’

  Their host, while they exchanged kisses with his daughter, went forward to open the door through which they were to pass; but as he did so he gave a slight exclamation, and stood looking beyond. The door opened into a vaulted ante-chamber, as high as a chapel, and paved with red tiles; and into this ante-chamber a lady had just been admitted by a servant, a lad in shabby livery, who was now ushering her toward the apartment in which our friends were grouped. The gentleman at the door, after dropping his exclamation, remained silent; in silence, too, the lady advanced. He gave her no further audible greeting, and offered her no hand, but stood aside to let her pass into the drawing-room. At the threshold she hesitated.

  ‘‘Is there any one?’’ she asked.

  ‘‘Some one you may see.’’

  She went in, and found herself confronted with the two nuns and their pupil, who was coming forward between them, with a hand in the arm of each. At the sight of the new visitor they all paused, and the lady, who had stopped too, stood looking at them. The young girl gave a little soft cry: ‘‘Ah, Madame Merle!’’

  The visitor had been slightly startled; but her manner the next instant was none the less gracious.

  ‘‘Yes, it’s Madame Merle, come to welcome you home.’’

  And she held out two hands to the girl, who immediately came up to her, presenting her forehead to be kissed. Madame Merle saluted this portion of her charming little person, and then stood smiling at the two nuns. They acknowledged her smile with a decent obeisance, but permitted themselves no direct scrutiny of this imposing, brilliant woman, who seemed to bring in with her something of the radiance of the outer world.

  ‘‘These ladies have brought my daughter home, and now they return to the convent,’’ the gentleman explained.

  ‘‘Ah, you go back to Rome? I have lately come from there. It is very lovely now,’’ said Madame Merle.

  The good sisters, standing with their hands folded into their sleeves, accepted this statement uncritically; and the master of the house asked Madame Merle how long it was since she had left Rome.

  ‘‘She came to see me at the convent,’’ said the young girl, before her father’s visitors had time to reply.

  ‘‘I have been more than once, Pansy,’’ Madame Merle answered. ‘‘Am I not your great friend in Rome?’’

  ‘‘I remember the last time best,’’ said Pansy, ‘‘because you told me I should leave the place.’’

  ‘‘Did you tell her that?’’ the child’s father asked.

  ‘‘I hardly remember. I told her what I thought would please her. I have been in Florence a week. I hoped you would come and see me.’’

  ‘‘I should have done so if I had known you were here. One doesn’t know such things by inspiration—though I suppose one ought. You had better sit down.’’

  These two speeches were made in a peculiar tone of voice—a tone half-lowered, and carefully quiet, but as from habit rather than from any definite need.

  Madame Merle looked about her, choosing her seat.

  ‘‘You are going to the door with these women? Let me of course not interrupt the ceremony. Je vous salue, mesdames,’’ she added, in French, to the nuns, as if to dismiss them.

  ‘‘This lady is a great friend of ours; you will have seen her at the convent,’’ said the host. ‘‘We have much faith in her judgement, and she will help me to decide whether my daughter shall return to you at the end of the holidays.’’

  ‘‘I hope you will decide in our favour, madam,’’ the sister in spectacles ventured to remark.

  ‘‘That is Mr. Osmond’s pleasantry; I decide nothing,’’ said Madame Merle, smiling still. ‘‘I believe you have a very good school, but Miss Osmond’s friends must remember that she is meant for the world.’’

  ‘‘That is what I have told monsieur,’’ Sister Catherine answered. ‘‘It is precisely to fit her for the world,’’ she murmured, glancing at Pansy, who stood at a little distance, looking at Madame Merle’s elegant apparel.

  ‘‘Do you hear that, Pansy? You are meant for the world,’’ said Pansy’s father.

  The child gazed at him an instant with her pure young eyes.

  ‘‘Am I not meant for you, papa?’’ she asked.

  Papa gave a quick, light laugh.

  ‘‘That doesn’t prevent it! I am of the world, Pansy.’’

  ‘‘Kindly permit us to retire,’’ said Sister Catherine. ‘‘Be good, in any case, my daughter.’’

  ‘‘I shall certainly come back and see you,’’ Pansy declared, recommencing her embraces, which were presently interrupted by Madame Merle.

  ‘‘Stay with me, my child,’’ she said, ‘‘while your father takes the good ladies to the door.’’

  Pansy stared, disappointed, but not protesting. She was evidently impregnated with the idea of submission, which was due to any one who took the tone of authority; and she was a passive spectator of the operation of her fate.

  ‘‘May I not see Mamman Catherine get into the carriage?’’ she asked very gently.

  ‘‘It would please me better if you would remain with me,’’ said Madame Merle, while Mr. Osmond and his com
panions, who had bowed low again to the other visitor, passed into the ante-chamber.

  ‘‘Oh yes, I will stay,’’ Pansy answered; and she stood near Madame Merle, surrendering her little hand, which this lady took. She stared out of the window; her eyes had filled with tears.

  ‘‘I am glad they have taught you to obey,’’ said Madame Merle. ‘‘That is what little girls should do.’’

  ‘‘Oh yes, I obey very well,’’ said Pansy, with soft eagerness, almost with boastfulness, as if she had been speaking of her piano-playing. And then she gave a faint, just audible sigh.

  Madame Merle, holding her hand, drew it across her own fine palm and looked at it. The gaze was critical, but it found nothing to deprecate; the child’s small hand was delicate and fair.

  ‘‘I hope they always see that you wear gloves,’’ she said in a moment. ‘‘Little girls usually dislike them.’’

  ‘‘I used to dislike them, but I like them now,’’ the child answered.

  ‘‘Very good, I will make you a present of a dozen.’’