Jocelyn Pierston, celebrated sculptor, tries to create an image of his ideal woman - his imaginary "Well-Beloved" - in stone, just as he tries to find her in the flesh.
By degrees Pierston began to trace again the customary lines of his existence; and his profession occupied him much as of old. The next year or two only once brought him tidings, through some residents at his former home, of the movements of the Bencombs. The extended voyage of Marcia's parents had given them quite a zest for other scenes and countries; and it was said that her father, a man still in vigorous health except at brief intervals, was utilizing the outlook which his cosmopolitanism afforded him by investing capital in foreign undertakings.
What he had supposed turned out to be true; Marcia was with them; no necessity for joining him had arisen; and thus the separation of himself and his nearly married wife by common consent was likely to be a permanent one.
It seemed as if he would scarce ever again discover the carnate dwelling-place of the haunting minion of his imagination. Having gone so near to matrimony with Marcia as to apply for a licence, he had felt for a long while morally bound to her by the incipient contract, and would not intentionally look about him in search of the vanished Ideality. Thus during the first year of Miss Bencomb's absence, when absolutely bound to keep faith with the elusive one's late incarnation if she should return to claim him, this man of the odd fancy would sometimes tremble at the thought of what would become of his solemn intention if the Phantom were suddenly to disclose herself in an unexpected quarter, and seduce him before he was aware. Once or twice he imagined that he saw her in the distance-at the end of a street, on the far sands of a shore, in a window, in a meadow, at the opposite side of a railway station; but he determinedly turned on his heel, and walked the other way.
During the many uneventful seasons that followed Marcia's stroke of independence (for which he was not without a secret admiration at times), Jocelyn threw into plastic creations that ever-bubbling spring of emotion which, without some conduit into space, will surge upwards and ruin all but the greatest men. It was probably owing to this, certainly not on account of any care or anxiety for such a result, that he was successful in his art, successful by a seemingly sudden spurt, which carried him at one bound over the hindrances of years.
He prospered without effort. He was A.R.A.
But recognitions of this sort, social distinctions, which he had once coveted so keenly, seemed to have no utility for him now. By the accident of being a bachelor, he was floating in society without any soul-anchorage or shrine that he could call his own; and, for want of a domestic centre round which honours might crystallize, they dispersed impalpably without accumulating and adding weight to his material well-being.
He would have gone on working with his chisel with just as much zest if his creations had been doomed to meet no mortal eye but his own. This indifference to the popular reception of his dream-figures lent him a curious artistic aplomb that carried him through the gusts of opinion without suffering them to disturb his inherent bias.
The study of beauty was his only joy for years onward. In the streets he would observe a face, or a fraction of a face, which seemed to express to a hair's-breadth in mutable flesh what he was at that moment wishing to express in durable shape. He would dodge and follow the owner like a detective; in omnibus, in cab, in steam-boat, through crowds, into shops, churches, theatres, public-houses, and slums-mostly, when at close quarters, to be disappointed for his pains.
In these professional beauty-chases he sometimes cast his eye across the Thames to the wharves on the south side, and to that particular one whereat his father's tons of freestone were daily landed from the ketches of the south coast. He could occasionally discern the white blocks lying there, vast cubes so persistently nibbled by his parent from his island rock in the English Channel, that it seemed as if in time it would be nibbled all away.
One thing it passed him to understand: on what field of observation the poets and philosophers based their assumption that the passion of love was intensest in youth and burnt lower as maturity advanced. It was possibly because of his utter domestic loneliness that, during the productive interval which followed the first years of Marcia's departure, when he was drifting along from five-and-twenty to eight-and-thirty, Pierston occasionally loved with an ardour-though, it is true, also with a self-control-unknown to him when he was green in judgment.
* * *
His whimsical isle-bred fancy had grown to be such an emotion that the Well-Beloved-now again visible-was always existing somewhere near him. For months he would find her on the stage of a theatre: then she would flit away, leaving the poor, empty carcase that had lodged her to mumm on as best it could without her-a sorry lay figure to his eyes, heaped with imperfections and sullied with commonplace. She would reappear, it might be, in an at first unnoticed lady, met at some fashionable evening party, exhibition, bazaar, or dinner; to flit from her, in turn, after a few months, and stand as a graceful shop-girl at some large drapery warehouse into which he had strayed on an unaccustomed errand. Then she would forsake this figure and redisclose herself in the guise of some popular authoress, piano-player, or fiddleress, at whose shrine he would worship for perhaps a twelvemonth. Once she was a dancing-girl at the Royal Moorish Palace of Varieties, though during her whole continuance at that establishment he never once exchanged a word with her, nor did she first or last ever dream of his existence. He knew that a ten-minutes' conversation in the wings with the substance would send the elusive haunter scurrying fearfully away into some other even less accessible mask-figure.
She was a blonde, a brunette, tall, petite, svelte, straight-featured, full, curvilinear. Only one quality remained unalterable: her instability of tenure. In Borne's phrase, nothing was permanent in her but change.
'It is odd,' he said to himself, 'that this experience of mine, or idiosyncrasy, or whatever it is, which would be sheer waste of time for other men, creates sober business for me.' For all these dreams he translated into plaster, and found that by them he was hitting a public taste he had never deliberately aimed at, and mostly despised. He was, in short, in danger of drifting away from a solid artistic reputation to a popularity which might possibly be as brief as it would be brilliant and exciting.
'You will be caught some day, my friend,' Somers would occasionally observe to him. 'I don't mean to say entangled in anything discreditable, for I admit that you are in practice as ideal as in theory. I mean the process will be reversed. Some woman, whose Well-Beloved flits about as yours does now, will catch your eye, and you'll stick to her like a limpet, while she follows her Phantom and leaves you to ache as you will.'
'You may be right; but I think you are wrong,' said Pierston. 'As flesh she dies daily, like the Apostle's corporeal self; because when I grapple with the reality she's no longer in it, so that I cannot stick to one incarnation if I would.'
'Wait till you are older,' said Somers.
* * *
PART SECOND - A YOUNG MAN OF FORTY
'Since Love will needs that I shall love,
Of very force I must agree:
And since no chance may it remove
In wealth and in adversity
I shall alway myself apply
To serve and suffer patiently.'
-Sir T. Wyatt.
That, however, was thirteen years ago, and, in respect of the first opinion, I venture to think that those who care to read the story now will be quite astonished at the scrupulous propriety observed therein on the relations of the sexes; ...
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Dieses Werk ist Teil der Buchreihe TREDITION CLASSICS. Der Verlag tredition aus Hamburg ver??ffentlicht in der Buchreihe TREDITION CLASSICS Werke aus mehr als zwei Jahrtausenden. Diese waren zu einem Gro??teil vergriffen oder nur noch antiquarisch erh??ltlich. Mit der Buchreihe TREDITION CLASSICS verfolgt tredition das Ziel, tausende Klassiker der Weltliteratur verschiedener Sprachen wieder als gedruckte B\u00fccher zu verlegen \u2013 und das weltweit! Die Buchreihe dient zur Bewahrung der Literatur und F??rderung der Kultur. Sie tr??gt so dazu bei, dass viele tausend Werke nicht in Vergessenheit geraten.
Using the restoration of a castle as a framework, classic novelist Thomas Hardy (1840-1928) considers the ancient analogy between architecture and philosophy. "Laodicean" is a term for early Christians lukewarm in their beliefs. Hardy's character, passionate architect George Somerset finds himself captivated by "Laodicean" Paula Power, whose views on conventions of any kind are lukewarm at best.
A dozen minor novels that have been published in the periodical press collected together.
Marrying her best friend was a dream come true for Kelly, but everything truly has a limitation. Pierce is Kelly’s first love, but as his best friend, she knew well there was always another woman deep in his heart. Lexi Gilbert. The woman Pierce could never forget even if he had already been arranged to marry Kelly. *** Kelly finally realized their happy marriage of the last three years was just a beautiful dream when Pierce asked for a divorce just because Lexi returned. She could only be his best friend even if she was carrying his baby. *** Since their friendship had become a cage, Kelly chose to set him free, as well as the miserable herself. But why then, it was Pierce who became the one who refused to move on? To make matters worse, her devil stepbrother also domineeringly stepped in at the same time, asking her to be his. *** Her Prince Charming vs. Her Devil Stepbrother? How could Kelly save her heart in this battle of love and hate?
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Betrayed by her mate and sister on the eve of her wedding, Makenna was handed to the ruthless Lycan Princes as a lover, her indifferent father ignoring her plight. Determined to escape and seek revenge, she captured the interest of the three Lycan princes, who desired her exclusively amid many admirers. This complicated her plans, trapping her and making her a rival to the future Lycan queen. Entwined in jealousy and vindictiveness, could Makenna achieve her vengeance in the intricate dance with the three princes?
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