Various - "The Best Nonsense Verses"

Joseph Triemens - "The Handy Cyclopedia of Things Worth Knowing"

Mark Twain - "Chapters from My Autobiography"

Courtney Ryley Cooper - "The Cross Cut"

Annual Bibliography of Commonwealth Literature 2007
This paper argues that discourses of love in Ghanaian market literature for youth offer a view into complex negotiations of agency and empowerment. Drawing on Deborah Durham's notion of youth as "social `shifters'" and Francis Nyamnjoh's conception of the "interconnectedness" of agency, I take Ghanaian market literature as one specific case of how African literature for youth foregrounds questions of continuity and change as African societies enter into increasingly complex global relations. In this literature for youth, received notions of love, often constructed out of impressions from American pop and hip hop music, carry new notions of agency that compete with existing "domesticated" forms. Authors like Ike Tandoh and Evelyn Tay employ discourses of love to offer youth alternative avenues for empowerment in a context of socio-economic disenfranchizement. In a creative process of "straddling", this writing both reveals and reproduces the contradictions that obtain in youth configurations of agency.

Man and Maid

E >> Elinor Glyn >> Man and Maid




"What do you suppose men really want, George?"

"The continuous stimulation of the hunting instinct, of course. It is
satiety which kills everything, but what a small percentage of women
know how to keep it alive, on the mental side!"

I waited for him to go on.

"You see, dear boy, love which is only the camouflaged aspect of the
creative instinct, cannot really hold, but a clever woman acts as a spur
to the mind, keeps it hunting in the abstract, as well as gratifying,
not too generously, the physical desires. Unfortunately it has never
been my good fortune to encounter such a being, so I have never been
able to remain faithful. You are very much in luck if Bobby's girl shows
intelligence. She ought to be a remarkable creature because she was born
at the white heat of passion on both parents' side, and self-sacrifice
and devotion added on the mother's."

"She is, George."

"My best wishes, Nicholas. I think you are wise, probably wounded as
you are, it will be nice for you to have an agreeable companion," and he
sighed.

"You have quite finished with Violetta?"

"Now that is the odd part," and he actually removed his cigar from his
lips. "I thought I had, but when I went to see her with the certain
intention of deceiving her and backing out gracefully,--that vixen
Carmencita was drawing me so strongly!--I found Violetta quite tranquil.
She said she had realized that I was cooling off, and her rule was to
hold nothing which did not wish to stay, so she was quite prepared to
part from me. She was very tender, she looked beautiful, and you know
when it came to saying farewell, I found myself quite unable to do so! I
had prepared a lot of lies about my not being justified in giving the
time from my work, but before I could tell them Violetta had forestalled
me by assuring me that she knew I must really stick closer to my office,
and she would no longer expect much of my company. You know, Nicholas, I
suddenly found her charm renewed tenfold, and I could only congratulate
myself upon the fact that the affair with Carmencita had not gone far
enough to amount to anything, and now I am in pursuit of Violetta again,
and 'pon my soul, Nicholas, if she only keeps me wondering, I believe I
shall be really in love!"

"Shall you marry, George?"

He looked almost bashful.

"It is just possible,--Violetta is a widow."

Then our eyes met and we both laughed aloud.

"You can contemplate happiness, George with your widow, because you feel
that she now knows how to handle you, and I contemplate happiness with
my little girl, because I respect her character and adore every inch of
her, and by Jove! old man, I believe we shall both get what we are
looking for!"

Then our talk drifted to politics and the war, and it was just about
midnight before old George left, and when he had gone I opened the
window wide, and looked out on the night, there was a half moon almost
set, and the air was still, and very warm for the beginning of November.
There are nights like that, mysterious and electric when all sorts of
strange forces seem to be abroad. And something of romance in me exalted
my spirit, and I found myself saying a prayer that I might be true to my
trust, and have strength enough of will to wait patiently until my
Alathea comes voluntarily into my arms.

And how I wonder what she is thinking about, there at Auteuil?

I went along into the room which is to be hers to-morrow, and I saw that
it was all arranged, except the flowers, which would come in fresh in
the morning. And then I hobbled back to my own room and rang for Burton.
The faithful creature waits for me no matter how late I am.

When I was safely in bed, he came over to me, and his dear old face
showed emotion.

"I do indeed wish you happiness, Sir Nicholas, to-morrow will be the
best day of my life."

We shook hands silently, and he left me, still writing in this journal!

I feel no excitement, rather as if another act in the drama of life was
ended, that is all, and that to-morrow I am starting upon a new one
which will decide whether the end of the play shall be tragedy or
content?




XXII


I am not going to describe the wedding in this Journal. A civil ceremony
is not interesting in its baldness. I had literally no emotions, and
Alathea looked as pale as her white frock. She wore a little sable toque
and a big sable cloak I had sent her the night before, by Nelson. The
ring was the new diamond hoop set in platinum. No more gold fetters for
modern girls!

Old George and Mr. Nelson were our witnesses, and the whole thing was
over in a few minutes, and we were being congratulated. Burton was by
far the happiest face there, as he helped me into the automobile, lent
by the Embassy. Alathea had just shaken hands with Mr. Nelson and been
wished joy by George. I wonder what he thought of the glasses, which
even for the wedding she had not taken off!

"May you know every happiness, Lady Thormonde," he said. "Take care of
Nicholas and make him quite well, he is the best fellow on earth."

Alathea thanked him coldly. He is such a citizen of the world that he
showed no surprise, and finally we were off on our way to the flat.

Here Madame Bizot and her daughter, and the baby, awaited us! And in the
creature's tiny hand was a bunch of violets. This was the first time
Alathea smiled. She bent and kissed the wee face. These people know and
love her. I stayed behind a few moments to express my substantial
appreciation of their friendly interest. Burton had been beside the
chauffeur to help me in and out, and while we had been driving Alathea
had not spoken a word. She had turned from me, and her little body was
drawn back as far in the corner as possible.

My own emotions were queer. I did not feel actually excited. I felt just
as I used when we were going to take up a new position on the line where
great watchfulness would be necessary to succeed.

The maid Alathea had engaged arrived in the morning, and I had had the
loveliest flowers put in all the rooms. Pierre intended to outdo himself
for the wedding _dejeuner_, I knew, and Burton had been able to find
somewhere a really respectable looking footman, not too obviously
wounded.

Alathea handed me my crutch as we got out of the lift. Perhaps she
thinks this is going to be one of her new duties!

We went straight into the sitting-room and I sat down in my chair. Her
maid, named Henriette, had taken her cloak and hat in the hall, and I
suppose from sheer nervousness, and to cover the first awkward moments,
Alathea buried her face in the big bowl of roses on a table near another
arm chair, before she sat down in it.

"What lovely flowers!" she said. They were the first words she had
spoken to me directly.

"I wondered what would be your favorites. You must tell me for the
future. I just had roses because they happen to be mine."

"I like roses best too."

I was silent for quite two minutes. She tried to keep still, then I
spoke, and I could hear a tone of authority in my voice.

"Alathea, again I ask you please to remove your glasses, as I told you
before, I know that you wear them only so that I may not see your eyes,
not for sight or light or anything. To keep them on is a little
undignified and ridiculous now, and irritates me very much."

She colored and straightened herself.

"To remove my glasses was not part of the bargain. You should have made
it a condition if you had wanted to impose it. I do not admit that you
have the least right to ask me to take them off, and I prefer to wear
them."

"For what possible reason?"

"I will not tell you."

I felt my temper rising. If I had not been a cripple I could not have
resisted the temptation to rise and seize her in my arms, tear the d----
d things off! and punish her with a thousand kisses. As it was, I felt
an inward rage. What a fool I had been not to have actually made the
removal of them a _sine qua non_ before I signed the contract!

"It is very ungenerous of you, and shows a spirit of hostility which I
think we agreed that you would drop."

Silence.

The desire to punish her physically, beat her, make her obey me, was the
only thing I felt. A nice emotion for a wedding day!

"Do you mean to wear them all the time, even when we go out in the
world?" I asked when I could control my voice.

"Probably."

"Very well then, I consider you are breaking the bargain in spirit, if
not in the letter. You, yourself, said you were going to be my permanent
secretary--no secretary in the world would insist upon doing something
she knew to be a great irritation to her employer."

Silence.

"You are only lowering yourself in my estimation by showing this
obstinacy. Since we have now to live together, I would rather not have
to grow to despise you for childishness."

She started to her feet, and with violence threw the glasses on to the
table. Her beautiful eyes flashed at me; the lashes are that peculiar
curly kind, not black, but soft and dusky, a little lighter near the
skin. It is the first time I have ever seen such eyelashes on a woman's
lids. One sees them quite often on little boys, especially little
vagabonds in the street. The eyes themselves are intensely blue, and
with everything of passion and magnetism, and attraction, in them. It is
no wonder she wore glasses while having to face the world by herself! A
woman with eyes like that would not be safe alone in any avocation where
men could observe her. I have never seen such expressive, fascinating
eyes in my life. I thrilled in every fibre of my being, and with triumph
also to think that our first battle should be won!

"Thank you," I said, making my voice very calm. "I had grown so to
respect your balance and serenity, I should have been sorry to have to
change my opinion."

I could see that she was palpitating with fury at having been made to
obey. I felt it wise to turn the conversation.

"I suppose lunch will be ready soon."

She went towards the door then, and left me. I wondered what she would
say when she got to her room and found the three sapphire bangles
waiting for her on the dressing table!

I had written on a card inside the lid of the box:

"To Alathea with her husband's best wishes."

Burton announced lunch before she returned to the sitting-room. I sent
him to say that it was ready, and a moment after she came in. She had
the case in her hand which she put down on the table, and her cheeks
were very pink, her eyes she kept lowered.

"I wish you would not give me presents," she gasped a little
breathlessly, coming close up to my chair. "I do not care to receive
them, you have loaded me with things--the sables, the diamond ring, the
clothes, everything, and now these."

I took the case and opened it, removing the bangles.

"Give me your wrist," I said sternly.

She looked at me too surprised at my tone to speak.

I put out my hand and took her bare arm, her sleeves were to the elbows,
and I deliberately put the three bracelets on while she stood petrified.

"I have had enough of your disagreeable temper," I said in the same
voice. "You will wear these, and anything else I choose to give you,
though your rudeness will soon remove my desire to give you anything."

She was absolutely flabbergasted, but I had touched her pride.

"I apologize if I have seemed rude," she said at last. "I--suppose you
have the right really--only--" And her whole slender body quivered with
a wave of rebellion.

"Let us say no more about the matter, but go into lunch, only you will
find that I am not such a weakling, as you no doubt supposed you would
have to deal with." I hobbled up from my chair, Burton discreetly not
having entered the room. Alathea gave me my crutch, and we went in to
the dining-room.

While the servants were in there I led the conversation upon the war
news, and ordinary subjects, and she played the game, but when we were
alone with the coffee, I filled her glass with Benedictine, which she
had refused when Burton handed the liqueurs. She had taken no wine at
all.

"Now drink whatever toast you like," I told her. "I am going to drink
one to the time when you don't hate me so much and we can have a little
quiet friendship and peace."

She sipped her glass, and her eyes became inscrutable. What she was
thinking of I do not know.

I find myself watching those eyes all the time. Every reflection passes
through them, they are as expressive of all shades of emotion as the
eyes of a cat, though the beautiful Madonna tenderness I have never seen
again since the day when she held the child in her arms, and I was rude
to her.

When we went back into the salon I knew that I was passionately in love
with her. Her restiveness is absolutely alluring, and excites all my
hunting instinct. She looks quite lovely, and the subtle magnetism which
drew me the first days, even when she appeared poor and shabby, and red
of hand, is stronger than ever--I felt that I wanted to crush her in my
arms and devour her, the blood thumped in my temples, I had to use every
atom of my will with myself, and lay back in my chair and closed my eye.

She went straight to the piano and began to play. It seemed as though
she were talking, telling me of the passion in her soul. She played
weird Russian dances and crashed agonizing chords, then she played
laments, and finally a soft and soothing thing of McDowell's, and every
note had found an echo in me, and I had followed, it almost seemed, all
her pain.

"You play divinely, child," I said, when she had finished. "I am going
to rest now, will you give me some tea later on?"

"Yes," and her voice was quite meek, while she helped me with my
crutch, and I went to the door of my room.

"I would like you to wear nice soft teagowns. My eye gets so wearied
with everything bright after a while. I hope--you have got all you want,
and that your room is comfortable?"

"Yes, thanks."

I bowed and went on into my room and shut the door. Burton was waiting
to help me to lie down.

"It has been a very tiring day for you, Sir Nicholas," he said, "and for
her Ladyship also."

"Go and have a rest yourself, Burton, you have been up since cock crow,
the new man Antoine can call me at five." And soon I was in a land of
blissful dreams.

Of course it was the very irony of fate that Suzette should have
selected this very afternoon to come in and thank me for the Villa which
she was just now going down to see--!

Antoine opened the door to her while Burton was out. I heard afterwards
that she told him she had an appointment with me when he had hesitated
about letting her in. She was quite quietly dressed and had no great
look of the _demi-monde_, and a new footman, blunted with war service,
was probably impervious even to the very strong scent which she was
saturated with--that perfume which I had never been able entirely to
cure her liking for, and which she reverted to using always when she
went away from me, and had to be corrected of again and again when she
returned.

Antoine came to my room by the passage, and said "a lady was in the
salon to see me by appointment."

For a moment I was not suspicious. I thought it might be Coralie, and
fearing Alathea might be somewhere about, and it might be awkward for
her, I hastened to rise and go in to see and get rid of the inopportune
guest. I told Antoine he must never let anyone in again without
permission.

It was just growing dim in the salon, about half-past four o'clock, and
a figure rose from the sofa by the fire as I entered.

"_Mon chou--mon petit cheri_!" I heard, simultaneously with a softly
closing sound of the door behind the screen, which masks the entrance to
the room from the hall--Antoine leaving I supposed at the time, probably
it was Alathea I surmised afterwards!

"Suzette!" I exclaimed angrily. "Why do you come here?"

She flew to me and held out her arms, expressing affection and grateful
thanks. She had come for no other reason only just to express her
friendly appreciation! To get rid of her was all I desired. I never was
more angry, but to show it would have been the poorest game. I did not
tell her it was my wedding day. I just said I was expecting some
relatives, and that I knew she would understand and would go at once.

"Of course," she said, and shook me by the hand. I was still standing
with my crutch. She was passing to see her cousin Madame Angier, in the
flat above, and could not resist the temptation to come in.

"It must be the very last time, Suzette," I said. "I have given you all
that you wanted, and I would rather not see you again."

She pouted, but agreed, and I drew her to the door and saw her into the
corridor, and even followed her to the front door. She was chatting all
the time. I did not answer. I was speechless with rage, and could have
sworn aloud, when at last I heard the door shut between us, then I
strode back into my room, praying that Alathea _had_ been unaware of my
visitor.

Nemesis, on one's wedding day!

I waited until five and then went back into the sitting-room to my
chair, and Antoine brought in the tea, and turned on the lights, and a
moment or two afterwards Alathea came in. Her eyes were stony, and as
she advanced up the room she sniffed the air disgustedly, her fine
nostrils quivering. Suzette's pungent perfume was no doubt still present
to one coming from outside!

Hauteur, contempt and disgust, expressed themselves in my little
darling's blue eyes. There was nothing to be said--_qui s'excuse
s'accuse--!_

She wore a soft lavender frock, and was utterly delectable, and when I
reflected that but for this impassable barrier, which my own action in
the past had been the means of erecting between us, I might now have
made her love me, and that on this, our wedding day, she might have been
coming into my arms. I could have groaned aloud.

"May I open the window," she said with the air of an offended Empress.

"Yes, do, open it wide," and then I laughed aloud cynically. I could as
easily have cried.

Alathea would not of course have spoken about her suspicions, to do so
would have inferred that she took an interest in me beyond that of a
secretary; every impression she always has given me is that nothing in
my life can matter to her one jot. But I know that this affair of
Suzette does matter to her, that she resents it bitterly, that it is the
cause of her smouldering anger with me. She resents it because she is a
woman, and, how I wish I might believe that it is because she is not as
indifferent towards me as she pretends.

She poured out the tea. I expect my face looked like the devil, I did
not speak, I knew I was frowning angrily. A rising wind blew the curtain
out and banged the window. She got up and shut it, then she threw some
cedar dust on the fire from the box which it is kept in on a table near.
She had seen Burton do this no doubt. I love the smell of cedar burning.

Then she came back and poured out the tea and we both drank it silently.

The room looked so comfortable and home like, with its panelling of old
pitch pine, cleaned of its paint and mellowed and waxed, so that it
seems like deep amber, showing up the greyish pear-wood carvings. One
might have been in some room in old England of about 1699. Everything
looked the setting for a love scene. The glowing lamps, apricot shaded,
and the firelight, and the yellow roses everywhere, and two human
beings who belonged to one another and were young, and not cold of
nature, sitting there with faces of stone, and in each one's heart
bitterness. Again I laughed aloud.

The mocking sound seemed to disturb my bride. She allowed her tea cup to
rattle as she put it down nervously.

"Would you like me to read to you," she asked icily.

And I said "Yes."

And presently her beautiful cultivated voice was flowing along. It was
an article in the _Saturday Review_ she had picked up, and I did not
take in what it was about. I was gazing into the glowing logs, and
trying to see visions, and gain any inspiration of how to find a way out
of this tangle of false impression. I must wait and see, and endeavor
when we get more accustomed to one another--somehow to let Alathea know
the truth.

When she finished the pages she stopped.

"I think he is quite right," she said, but I had not heard what the
argument was, so I could only say "Yes!"

"Will it interest you going to England?" I then asked.

"I dare say."

"I have a place there you know. Shall you care to live in it after the
war is over?"

"I believe it is the duty of people to live in their homes if they have
inherited them as a trust."

"And I can always count upon you to do your duty."

"I hope so."

Then I exerted myself and talked to her about politics and what were my
views and aims. She entered into this stiffly, and so an hour passed,
but all the time I could feel that her inner self was disturbed, and
more resentful and rebellious than ever. We had been two puppets making
conversation all the time, neither had said anything naturally.

At last the pretense ended, and we went to our separate rooms to dress
for dinner.

Burton had returned by now, and I told him of the detestable thing which
had happened, at which he was much concerned.

"Best of her sort was Mam'zelle, Sir Nicholas, but I've always said they
bring trouble, every one of them,--if I may make so bold!"

And as I hobbled back into the salon to meet my wife for our first
dinner alone, once more I heartily agreed with him!




XXIII


Alathea looked perfectly lovely when she came into the salon dressed for
dinner. It is the first time I have seen her in anything pertaining to
the evening. She had a gauzy tea-gown on, of a shade of blue like her
eyes. Her nut brown hair was beautifully done, with the last "look" like
Coralie's, showing her tiny head. Whether she likes it or no, I must
give her some pearl earrings, and my mother's pearls. That will be a
moment! But I had better wait a little while. Her eyes were shining with
excitement or resentment, or a mixture of both. She was purely feminine.
She intended to attract me I am certain, her subconscious mind did at
all events, even though she would not have admitted it to herself. She
was smarting still about Suzette. The situation fills her with distrust
and uneasiness, but I know now, after analysing every point, when I
could not sleep last night, that she is not really indifferent to me.
And it is because she is not, that she is angry.

I registered a vow that I would _make_ her love me without explaining
about Suzette, fate can let her find out for herself.

I had not come to the comforting conclusion that she is not indifferent
at the beginning of the evening though, so the sense of self-confidence
and triumph did not uplift me then. I was still worried at the events
of the afternoon.

I had troubled to put on a tail coat and white waistcoat, not a dinner
jacket as usual, and had even a buttonhole of a gardenia, found by
Burton for this great occasion!

I looked into her eyes with my one blue one, which is I suppose, as blue
as her own. She instantly averted her glance.

"I cannot offer you my arm, milady," I said rather sarcastically, "So we
will have to go in after each other."

She bowed and led the way.

The table was too beautifully decorated, and the dinner a masterpiece!
while the champagne was iced to perfection, and the Burgundy a poem! The
pupils of Alathea's eyes before the partridge came, were black as night.
Burton discreetly marshalled Antoine out of the room each time after the
dishes were handed.

"When will you get your new eye?" my wife--I like to write that!--asked
in the first interval when we were alone, "and your new leg?"

"I suppose they will both be restored to me in a day or two. It will be
so wonderful to walk again."

"I should think so."

Then something seemed to strike her suddenly, of how hateful it must all
have been for me. Her hard expression changed and she almost whispered:

"It--will seem like a new life."

"I mean to make a new life, if you will help me. I want to get away from
all the old useless days. I want to do things which are worth while."

"Shall you soon go into Parliament?"

"I suppose it will take a year or two, but we shall begin to pave the
way directly we go back to England, and I hope that will be for
Christmas."

She avoided looking at me. I could never catch her eye, but her adorable
little profile was good enough to contemplate, the crisp curl by her ear
delighted me, and another in the nape of her neck filled me with wild
longings to kiss it, and the pearly skin beneath it!

I think I deserve great praise for the way I acted, for the whole thing
was acting. I was cold, and as haughty and aloof as she was herself, but
I used every art I knew of to draw her out and make her talk.

She is such a lady that she fell into the stride and spoke politely as
if to some stranger who had taken her into dinner at a party.

At last we talked of the Duchesse, and we discussed her interesting
character, such a marvel of the _ancien regime_!

"She is so very good and charitable," Alathea said, "and has always a
twinkle in her eye which carries her through things."

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