CHAPTER III.

THE WOMAN.

(And Augustus Grabble; General Murger; Sergeant-Major Lawrence-Smith; Mr. and Mrs. Cornelius Gosling-Green; Mr. Horace Faggit; as well as a reformed JOHN ROBIN ROSS-ELLISON.)

Sec. 1.  MR. GROBBLE.

There was something very maidenly about the appearance of Augustus Clarence Percy Marmaduke Grobble.  One could not imagine him doing anything unfashionable, perspiry, rough or rude; nor could one possibly imagine him doing anything ruthless, fine, terrible, strong or difficult.

One expected his hose to be of the same tint as his shirt and handkerchief, his dress-trousers to be braided, his tie to be delicate and beautiful, his dainty shoes to be laced with black silk ribbon,—­but one would never expect him to go tiger-shooting, to ride a gay and giddy young horse, to box, or to do his own cooking and washing in the desert or jungle.

Augustus had been at College during that bright brief period of the attempted apotheosis of the dirty-minded little Decadent whose stock in trade was a few Aubrey Beardsley drawings, a widow’s-cruse-like bottle of Green Chartreuse, an Oscar Wilde book, some dubious blue china, some floppy ties, an assortment of second-hand epigrams, scent and scented tobacco, a nil admirari attitude and long weird hair.

Augustus had become a Decadent—­a silly harmless conventionally-unconventional Decadent.  But, as Carey, a contemporary Rugger blood, coarsely remarked, he hadn’t the innards to go far wrong.

It was part of his cheap and childish ritual as a Decadent to draw the curtains after breakfast, light candles, place the flask of Green Chartreuse and a liqueur-glass on the table, drop one drip of the liquid into the glass, burn a stinking pastille of incense, place a Birmingham “god” or an opening lily before him, ruffle his hair, and sprawl on the sofa with a wicked French novel he could not read—­hoping for visitors and an audience.

If any fellow dropped in and, very naturally, exclaimed, “What the devil are you doing?” he would reply:—­

“Wha’?  Oh, sunligh’?  Very vulgar thing sunligh’.  Art is always superior to Nature.  You love the garish day being a gross Philistine, wha’?  Now I only live at night.  Glorious wicked nigh’.  So I make my own nigh’.  Wha’?  Have some Green Chartreuse—­only drink fit for a Hedonist.  I drink its colour and I taste its glorious greenness.  Ichor and Nectar of Helicon and the Pierian Spring.  I loved a Wooman once, with eyes of just that glowing glorious green and a soul of ruby red.  I called her my Emerald-eyed, Ruby-souled Devil, and we drank together deep draughts of the red red Wine of Life——­”

Sometimes the visitor would say:  “Look here, Grobb, you ought to be in the Zoo, you know.  There’s a lot there like you, all in one big cage,” or similar words of disapproval.

Sometimes a young fresher would be impressed, especially if he had been brought up by Aunts in a Vicarage, and would also become a Decadent.