At first his road ran through the pasture land, where soft-eyed, brown cows moved cumbrously, clanging the great bells strapped about their necks, bells which had descended through many generations. In the lower fields men, and women too, were busy with the eternal cycle of the grass. Some paused in their scything to lift a hand in greeting, for he was known, and liked, no doubt because of his kindness to the children, or perhaps because he had taken pains to interest himself in all the local junketings. Indeed, the rustic weddings, made dolorous by the final sounding of the Alpenhorn, the traditional processions, both religious and civil, even the brassy discords of the village band, which had come to serenade him on his birthday . . . all these amused and entertained him.
Presently he came to the outer suburbs: streets which seemed to have been scrubbed, green-shuttered white houses, with their front plots of asters and begonias, their window-boxes filled with blooming geraniums and petunias. Such flowers—he had never seen the like! And over all such a clean quiet air of neatness and efficiency, as if everything were ordered and would never break down—and indeed nothing did; as if honesty, civility and politeness were the watchwords of the people.
How wise in his special circumstances to settle here, away from the vulgarity of the present age: the hipsters and the beatniks, the striptease, the rock-and-roll, the ridiculous mouthings of angry young men, the lunatic abstractions of modern art, and all the other horrors and obscenities of a world gone mad.
To friends in America who had protested against his decision, and in particular to Holbrook, his partner in the Stamford company, who had gone so far as to ridicule the country and its inhabitants, he had reasoned calmly, logically. Hadn’t Wagner spent seven happy and fruitful years in this same canton, composing Die Meistersinger and even—this with a smile—a brilliant march for the local fire brigade? The house, now a museum, still stood as evidence. Did not Shelley, Keats and Byron spend long periods of romantic leisure in the vicinity? As for the lake, Turner had painted it, Rousseau had rowed upon it, Ruskin had raved about it.
Nor was he burying himself in a soulless vacuum. He had his books, his collection of beautiful things. Besides, if the native Swiss were not—how should he put it nicely?—not intellectually stimulating, there existed in Melsburg an expatriate society, a number of delightful people, of whom Madame von Altishofer was one, who had accepted him as a member of their coterie. And if this were not enough, the airport at Zurich lay within a forty-minute drive, and thereafter in two hours, or less, he was in Paris . . . Milan . . . Vienna . . . studying the rich textures of Titian’s Entombment; hearing Callas in Tosca; savouring the marvellous Schafsragout mit Weisskraut in Sacher’s Bar.
By this time he had reached the Lauerbach nursery. Here he made his selection of roses, resolutely adding several varieties of his own choice to the list Wilhelm had given him, although wryly aware that his would probably perish mysteriously while the others would survive and flourish. When he left the nursery it was still quite early, only eleven o’clock. He decided to return by Melsburg and do some errands.
The town was pleasantly empty, most of the visitors gone, the lakeside promenade, where crisp leaves from the pollard chestnuts were already rustling, half deserted. This was the season Moray enjoyed, which he viewed as an act of repossession. The twin spires of the cathedral seemed to pierce the sky more sharply, the ring of ancient forts, no longer floodlit, grew old and grey again, the ancient Mels Brücke, free of gaping sightseers, calmly resumed its true identity.
He parked in the square by the fountain and, without even thinking of locking the car, strolled into the town. First he visited his tobacconist’s, bought a box of two hundred of his special Sobranie cigarettes, then at the apothecary’s a large flask of Pineau’s Eau de Quinine, the particular hair tonic he always used. In the next street was Maier’s, the famous confectioner’s. Here, after a chat with Herr Maier, he sent off a great package of milk chocolate to Holbrook’s children in Connecticut—they’d never get chocolate of that quality in Stamford. As an afterthought—he had a sweet tooth—he took away a demi-kilo of the new season’s marrons glacés for himself. Shopping here really was a joy, he told himself, one met smiles and politeness on every side.
He was now in the Stadplatz where, answering a subconscious prompting, his legs had borne him. He could not refrain from smiling, though with a slight sense of guilt. Immediately opposite stood the Galerie Leuschner: He hesitated, humorously aware that he was yielding to temptation. But the thought of the Vuillard pastel drove him on. He crossed the street, pushed open the door of the gallery, and went in.
Leuschner was in his office looking over a folio of pen-and-ink sketches. The dealer, a plump, smooth, smiling little man, whose morning coat, striped trousers and pearl tie-pin were notably de rigueur, greeted Moray with cordial deference, yet with an uncommercial air which assumed his presence in the gallery to be purely casual. They discussed the weather.
“These are quite nice,” Leuschner presently remarked, indicating the folio, when they had finished with the weather. “And reasonable. Kandinsky is a very underrated man.”
Moray had no interest in Kandinsky’s gaunt figures and simian faces, and he suspected that the dealer knew this, yet both spent the next fifteen minutes examining the drawings and praising them. Then Moray took up his hat.
“By the way,” he said offhandedly, “I suppose you still have the little Vuillard we glanced at last week.”
“Only just.” The dealer suddenly looked grave. “An American collector is most interested.”
“Rubbish,” Moray said lightly. “There are no Americans left in Melsburg.”
“This American is in Philadelphia—the Curator of the Art Museum. Shall I show you his telegram?”
Moray, inwardly alarmed, shook his head in a manner implying amused dubiety.
“Are you still asking that ridiculous price? After all, it’s only a pastel.”
“Pastel is Vuillard’s medium,” Leuschner replied, with calm authority. “And I assure you, sir, this one is worth every centime of the price. Why, when you consider the other day in London a few rough brush strokes by Renoir, some half-dozen wretched-looking strawberries, a pitiful thing, really, of which the master must have been heartily ashamed, brought twenty thousand pounds. . . . But this, this is a gem, worthy of your fine collection, and you know how rare good Post-Impressionists have become, yet I ask only nineteen thousand dollars. If you buy it, and I do not press you, for practically it is almost sold, you will never regret it.”
There was a silence. For the first time they both looked at the pastel which hung alone, against the neutral cartridge paper of the wall. Moray knew it well, it was recorded in the book and it was indeed a lovely thing—an interior, full of light and colour, pinks, greys and greens. The subject too, was exactly to his taste: a conversation piece, Madame Melo and her little daughter in the salon of the actress’s house.