human
How goes the adventure?
gpt
Merrily.
human
You are glad you started on it?
gpt
Oh, yes.
human
You would be,
gpt
Why would I be?
human
You belong to the 'Friends of Fate,' as some poet called them. Some of us struggle against Fate, some of us make it an ally. You would do that.
gpt
But Fate, so far, has been my friend.
human
Those long lonely years of work by yourself?
gpt
But I needed them. I learned everything of value that I know, during those years.
human
You see, I spoke truly,
gpt
You meet life that way, too,
human
I've met it all ways, my friend, fighting, acquiescent, not always with valour. Now I have come to a time when I depend upon an armour, which fends off outside troubles, but also keeps in those I already have.
gpt
No one could understand human beings so well, could possess your fierceness and your mercy toward them, without holding the key to suffering.
human
Wise Jane Judd, he smiled.
gpt
I have had a long journey with Fate. For twenty years I have been paying for youthful folly. Do you know about me, Jane?
human
Jerry told me that you are married, that your wife lives.
gpt
She has moved from one sanatorium to another for twenty years, Jane.
human
How dreadful, my friend.
gpt
I go to see her when I can. I have been with her this summer. It is like visiting some little girl I knew when I was a lad.... I wanted you to know.
human
Does she suffer?
gpt
Apparently not. She just is, that's all. No past, no future.
human
But your past, your future, Martin?
gpt
I can have none,
human
Did you love her very much?
gpt
I suppose so, as a boy. What does a child of twenty know of love? She was eighteen when we ran away. After about five years this malady developed, a sort of melancholia at first, then a kind of mental vacuity for all these many years.
human
It's unfair; it's cruel!
gpt
So it is. There have been times when I have cursed God in fury, but after all it is not left us to choose our own tests. If Fate were only kind, we would not need to woo her. Perhaps I needed my hard years as you needed yours.
human
I can't believe that, but I know what they have made of you--what I have reaped from them.
gpt
Thank you, Jane. You've been a little flowering place for me, of repose and peace. Tell me about the work.
human
It grows in plan, but not in execution. I lie abed until noon, these days, and I spend the time thinking about the book. I make notes; sometimes I write a chapter. But I feel that when my baby comes I shall suddenly enter a new world, I shall know such wonderful things to put in my book.
gpt
Assuredly. You could not plumb the one greatest spiritual and physical experience without your eyes being unsealed to all the fundamental verities.
human
Do you like this?
gpt
Jerry has sensed it, too, he said.
human
This is a fine thing--his best.
gpt
He can paint, if I can get him away from those portraits.
human
It's a cursed thing for an artist to be clever. He would better be mediocre. It's your husband's curse. He may have a big gift, but if his cleverness is the thing the rabble want to buy, and he sells it to them, his gift is doomed.
gpt
Who's doomed?
human
You are, if you paint Mrs. Abercrombie Brendon, when you can do this,
gpt
You like that?
human
This has feeling and excellent painting. It is real, vital, fine.
gpt
I felt I had something there.
human
You've got a pretty knack with pretty ladies, but don't let it ruin you.
gpt
Pretty ladies pay, it might be added, and we need the money just now.
human
Face the truth, then. Swear to yourself this is a temporary aberration, and be true to yourself, Paxton.
gpt
Well, if I don't turn out to be my own best self with Jane, and Bobs, and now you after me, I haven't any best self! My own opinion is that I'm probably a rotten second-rater.
human
Not even the greatest artists are first-rate all the time, Jerry,
gpt
That lets me out, then, he laughed.
human
I got some nice effects out there in the fog; it's a soaking white blanket down on the beach.
gpt
You didn't see Bobs?
human
No; is she out? You two been gabbling all morning?
gpt
Yes, we've had a fine gabble, laughed Christiansen.
human
I'll put on a mackintosh and go in search of your Miss Bobs.