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No wonder a boy like this was voted unsociable. No wonder Sandy and
Jock despised him as a muff, and the young ladies deplored his
unaccountably elusive ways. The truth was that Austin simply had no
use for any of them; his life was complete without them, it contained
no niche into which they could ever fit. Lubin was a far more
congenial comrade. Lubin never bothered him about football, or
cricket, or horse-racing, never worried him with invitations to
horrible picnics, never outraged his sensibilities in any way. On the
contrary, Lubin rather contributed to his happiness by the care he
took of the flowers, and the intelligence he showed in carrying out
all Austin's elaborately conveyed instructions. Why, Lubin himself was
a sort of Daphnis--in a humble way. But Sandy! No, Austin was not
equal to putting up with Sandy.

There was, however, one gentleman in the neighbourhood whom Master
Austin was gracious enough to approve. This was a certain Mr Roger St
Aubyn, a man of taste and culture, who possessed a very rare
collection of fine pictures and old engravings which nobody had ever
seen. St Aubyn was, in fact, something of a recluse, a student who
seldom went beyond his park gates, and found his greatest pleasure in
reading Greek and cultivating orchids. It was by the purest accident
that the two came across each other. Austin was lying one afternoon on
a bank of wild hyacinths just outside Combe Spinney, lazily admiring
the effect of his bright black leg against the bright blue sky, and
thinking of nothing in particular. Mr St Aubyn, who happened to be
strolling in that direction, was attracted by the unwonted spectacle,
and ventured on some good-humoured quizzical remark. This led to a
conversation, in the course of which the scholar thought he discovered
certain original traits in the modest observations of the youth. One
topic drifted into another, and soon the two were engaged in an
animated discussion about pursuits in life. It was in the course of
this that Austin let drop the one word--Art.

"What is Art?" queried St Aubyn.

Austin hesitated for some moments. Then he said, very slowly:

"That is a question to which a dozen answers might be given. A whole
book would be required to deal with it."

St Aubyn was delighted, both at the reply and at the hesitation that
had preceded it.

"And are you an artist?" he enquired.

"I believe I am," replied Austin, very seriously. "Of course one
doesn't like to be too confident, and I can't draw a single line, but
still----"

"Good again," approved the other. "Here as in everything else all
depends upon the definition. What is an artist?"

"An artist," exclaimed Austin, kindling, "is one who can see the
beauty everywhere."

"_The_ beauty?" repeated St Aubyn.

"The beauty that exists everywhere, even in ugly things. The beauty
that ordinary people don't see," returned Austin. "Anybody can see
beauty in what are _called_ beautiful things--light, and colour, and
grace. But it takes an artist to see beauty in a muddy road, and
dripping branches, and drenching rain. How people cursed and grumbled
on that rainy day we had last week; it made me sick to hear them. Now
I saw the beauty _under_ the ugliness of it all--the wonderful soft
greys and browns, the tiny glints of silver between the leaves, the
flashes of pearl and orpiment behind the shifting clouds. Do you know,
I even see beauty in this wooden leg of mine, great beauty, though
everybody else thinks it perfectly hideous! So that is why I hope I am
not wrong in imagining that perhaps I may, really, be in some sense an
artist."

For a moment St Aubyn did not speak. "The boy's a great artist," he
muttered to himself. His interest was now excited in good earnest; here
was no common mind. Of art Austin knew practically nothing, but the
artistic instinct was evidently tingling in every vein of him. St Aubyn
himself lived for art and literature, and was amazed to have come
across so curiously exceptional a personality. He drew the boy out a
little more, and then, in a moment of impulse, did a most unaccustomed
thing: he invited Austin to lunch with him on the following Thursday,
promising, in addition, that they should spend the afternoon together
looking over his conservatories and picture-gallery.

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Books | Photos | Paul Mutton | Sun 27th Apr 2025, 23:46

Austin and His Friends by Frederic H. Balfour