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It was the hour before dinner. We drank vermuth. Those who knew Rothenstein were pointing him out to those who knew him only by name. Men were constantly coming in through the swing-doors and wandering slowly up and down in search of vacant tables or of tables occupied by friends. One of these rovers interested me because I was sure he wanted to catch Rothenstein's eye.
I asked if I might ask what kind of book it was to be. 'My poems, he answered. Rothenstein asked if this was to be the title of the book. The poet meditated on this suggestion, but said he rather thought of giving the book no title at all. 'If a book is good in itself he murmured, waving his cigarette. Rothenstein objected that absence of title might be bad for the sale of a book.
No one is a better judge of literature than Rothenstein; but it wouldn't have done to tell him so in those days, and I knew that I must form an unaided judgment of "Negations." Not to buy a book of which I had met the author face to face would have been for me in those days an impossible act of self-denial. When I returned to Oxford for the Christmas term I had duly secured "Negations."
It was to him I owed my first knowledge of that forever-enchanting little world-in-itself, Chelsea, and my first acquaintance with Walter Sickert and other August elders who dwelt there. It was Rothenstein that took me to see, in Cambridge Street, Pimlico, a young man whose drawings were already famous among the few Aubrey Beardsley by name.
He wasn't resented. It didn't occur to anybody that he or his Catholic diabolism mattered. I meant, but forgot, to buy it. I never saw it, and am ashamed to say I don't even remember what it was called. But I did, at the time of its publication, say to Rothenstein that I thought poor old Soames was really a rather tragic figure, and that I believed he would literally die for want of recognition.
Dragon broods of miniature motor cars nested in realistic garages. Dramatic scenes from real plays were being enacted in dumb show on the stages of theatres apparently decorated by Rothenstein. The Russian ballet had stopped in the midst of "Le Spectre de la Rose."
'In Life there are illusions of good and evil, but' his voice trailed away to a murmur in which the words 'vieux jeu' and 'rococo' were faintly audible. I think he felt he was not doing himself justice, and feared that Rothenstein was going to point out fallacies. Anyhow, he cleared his throat and said 'Parlons d'autre chose. It occurs to you that he was a fool? It didn't to me.
And I may as well get the thing done now. In the summer term of '93 a bolt from the blue flashed down on Oxford. It drove deep; it hurtlingly embedded itself in the soil. Dons and undergraduates stood around, rather pale, discussing nothing but it. Whence came it, this meteorite? From Paris. Its name? Will Rothenstein. Its aim? To do a series of twenty-four portraits in lithograph.
How can one draw a man who doesn't exist?" "He is dim," I admitted. But my mot juste fell flat. Rothenstein repeated that Soames was non-existent. Still, Soames had written a book. I asked if Rothenstein had read "Negations." He said he had looked into it, "but," he added crisply, "I don't profess to know anything about writing." A reservation very characteristic of the period!
Rothenstein said he was going to have a doublebreasted waistcoat made with rosettes of decorations for buttons. Tomorrow Lord Dufferin has asked me to breakfast at the Embassy. He was at the masked ball last night and was very nice. He reminds me exactly of Disraeli in appearance. It is awfully hot here and a Fair for charity has asked me to put my name in "Gallegher" to have it raffled for.
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