The Outcast and the Rite by Helen Simpson

Author:Helen Simpson
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781912766611
Publisher: Handheld Press
Published: 2021-10-29T09:24:02+00:00

8 A Curious Story

‘Yes,’ said the poet slowly, ‘that’s a very curious story.’

‘Curious?’ the author repeated, ‘Is that all? It’s damnable. Why should it happen to me? I don’t understand it. It’s not as if I were one of these imaginative fellers. I don’t drink, either.’

He pushed his glass away as though repudiating it; then, staring out of the window, fine brows drawn down and eyes fixed, he took it again and slowly, unconsciously, tilted it to his mouth. The whole gesture was magnificent; so might Tristan have looked out over the rim of the treacherous cup. This occurred to the poet, and amused him, but he knew the actor too well to smile. Instead he asked, ‘What’s to be done?’

‘How should I know? I don’t understand these things. Why to me? When I say I’m not imaginative, I don’t mean to say

I’ve no imagination. A man can’t play my parts without it.’

‘I know,’ murmured the poet.

‘What I mean, though,’ the actor went on, searching painfully, after the manner of a man unaccustomed to finding his own words, ‘what I mean is, I can imagine people; how they talk and move and look; give me the lines, and I’ll tell you how such and such a man would say them. I don’t understand how people feel, but I know how they show it. That’s imagination, isn’t it? Of a sort.’ He spoke almost wistfully, and the poet nodded. ‘I’m always watching, and remembering little things; tricks of the hands or the intonation of words. Then I make something out of all the things I’ve observed. That sounds like patchwork, but it hangs together, doesn’t it?’ Again the note of wistfulness, and again the poet nodded. ‘But, of course, I’m practical. And I’ve got to keep my eyes open. Now-a-days a man who doesn’t keep his eyes open in London—in a London theatre—is damned. Perpetually damned; and deserves it.’

‘Yes, I understand all that,’ said the poet, ‘but come back to the problem.’

‘That is the problem. Haven’t you been listening? Here am I, a man of—talent, shall we say?’

‘By all means.’

‘Anyhow, a man of some ability in his profession. A practical man, too, as I said before; business man as well as artist. I’m healthy. I don’t drink. I don’t overdo myself in any way. I’ve a useful imagination—not your wandering kind. I apply it only to my work. It doesn’t worry me. And yet in spite of all this I see things which are invisible to other people. That’s the problem, isn’t it?’

‘I don’t see how I can help,’ the poet said, slowly.

‘Well, you’re used to these things. Look at that stuff of yours, full of fantastic happenings. You might be able to interpret.’

‘Do you mean you want me to come and try to get into communication with her?’ the poet asked, flattered by the reference to his work from a man who boasted that he read one book a year.

‘That’s it. Come and see for yourself. You’re the sort of man—you might have more in common.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.