A SUBTLE STORY.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 19270, 6 September 1924, Page 4

A SUBTLE STORY.

TRAGEDY, PSYCHOLOGY, SPIRITUALISM. By Constant Reader. It is thirty years since Mr Robert Hichens burst upon public notice with “The Green Carnation,” that clever caricature of a certain phase of London society, which set tongues wagging concerning the identity of his characters. Ten years later he scored an .artistic success with “The Garden of Allah,” the first and certainly the best of the “desert” stories which have been published in such profusion. Since then he has published many novels, introducing scones in Algeria and in Sicily, at, times dabbling in spiritualism and tho occult, and over and anon coming back to London for his milieu ; but always proving himself a bold and effective colourist. His liking for long books has caused some critics to cry for condensation; whilst others have objcctcd-C’to the unhealthy atmosphere which pervades certain of his stories. Critcism will lie silent, however, in regard to “After the Verdict,” a finished piece of work which may bo hailed as Mr Hichens’s finest achievement in fiction, and which is destined to rank as the most masterly novel which has vet seen tne light since the war. It is a tragedy, but with a moral and a splendid ending; it is psychological, but of a sort that makes universal appeal; it trenches on spiritualism, but only in a domain and to an extent that will gain general acceptance. There are certain keynotes in this subtle story which merit stressing if its scope and purpose are properly to be appreciated. One appears in the following passage;— Since the War!” echoed Vivian, “everything that goes wrong now, from the morals of men and women to the holes in the road, is scored up against the war.” “And yet not half the tale is ever told or hinted at,” said Clive. “If the world knew how much hidden evil, evil that’s past and that’s in being at this very moment, is duo to that great orgy of abomination, due solely to that, perhaps there might be a chance of a long peace. That is if human beings in the mass are capable any more of being shocked at anything, of recoiling from anything. God, now I hate war I” Another of the key-passages reads: During the war Vivian had wished, as had many girls, to be among tho fighting men. Although she had been very young, only a school girl when the war began, she had insisted on helping in various ways. She had been in hospitals, had served at night in railway station canteens. And experience of men had soaked into her without her being self-consciously aware of it. Her eyes were not ignorant eyes. She could road the signs on men’s faces. When subtle alteration came on a face she knew well she did not miss it. And, like most people who were not wrapped up in cotton wool during the war, she knew the part drink had played in the struggle, and through that knowledge also knew the part drink might play in any life that was in disorder, that lacked a moral basis, that was secretly the prey of disappointment or deep unhappiness. She could not understand tho attraction of drink in a personal way, but she knew in an impersonal way of its lure for nerve-racked, reckless, and miserable men Yet another key passage: — Nevertheless, it had been far more horrible to her than she had anticipated it would be. During it and after it was over, she began at last to understand what a man on trial for murder has to go through. She had thought that she already understood that, believing that love had brought such understanding to her. In the High Court she had foundout that it was not so, that imagination, prompted and helped by love, had not enabled her to realise the ordeal of Clive. What the eye does not see the heart does not feel. But she had seen now. She had seen human nature stripped by curiosity and showing its nakedness unabashed; crowds of men and women gathered outside tho Law Courts, pressed together, struggling, fighting even to get into tho courts where tho man accused and acquitted of murder was to be seen once more at grips with his reputation. She had seen women, and not of the socalled lower classes, frantically trying to force their way past the doorkeepers. She had hoard their shrill voices raised in violent altercations. She had personally experienced the soulstirring sensation of being “mobbed.” Yes, she and Clive had been mobbed. A great crowd had fought to get a sight of her and of Clive. She would never forget the expression she had seen in the eyes of that fighting crowd of human beings in the nude, dead for tho moment to everything but tho desperate lust of curiosity. Those oyea of the stripped had made her feel stripped. Their momentary complete degradation had made her feel degraded. She had felt sunk with them in depths of abject humiliation. Helped by the police, she and Clive had got into tho court to face the passionate stare of another crowd. And that stare bad lasted for hours. And all those eyes had been at work trying to undress their souls—the souls of Clive and of her. That had been their business. Oh, the human being that is at work trying to undress a soul is ugly, horribly ugly. Tho story opens with Clive Baratrie being tried for murder, and his mother and his bethrothed, Vivian Denys, awaiting the verdict. The suspense of these first two or three chapters is tremendous. The reader is first of all shown Mrs Baratrie sitting at a window looking out upon Hyde Park on a May morning awaiting the verdict and saying to herself, “And my boy is being tried at the Old Bailey for murder.” “After weeks, months even, of mental and spiritual travail, she said to herself: ‘But—it’s incredible !’ ” Incredible that she out of all tho mothers in London should have been chosen to go thr&jgh what she was now going through 1 Incredible that tho boy she had given birth to, and known intimately. and loved passionately for thirtythroe years, should now, at this moment, be on his trial for murder! And then she told herself that she had never really faced life till now, that she had only imagined she was facing it. From afar she had watched its tragedies and had thought that she realised and understood them. But she had not realised or understood them. She had not understood anything. From this poignant picture of Mrs Baratrio awaiting the verdict, tho novelist passes to Vivian Denys. She was famous as a tennis player. On the very day of tho trial she was down to play at King’s in an open mixed doubles, her partner being Jim Gordon. “People*,will say I’m heartless,” she wrote to Mrs Baratrie. “They don’t know. My heart’s with you and Clive.” It was Vivian’s way of showing to “the tennis crowd” her implicit belief in Clive’s innocence and her determination to stick by her accused lover. Arohio Denys, Vivian’s brother, goes to the tennis tournament, and tho play is vividly and stirringly described. In deer!, nil through tho book the tennis enthusiast will find much to interest and entertain. _ Jim Gordon, a crack player, is in love with Vivian, and ho would have asked her hand jn marriage had not Clivo intervened. Very subtly, while the reader is kept on tenterhooks waiting for the verdict, Mr Hichens reveals the attitude of mind towards Clivo Baratrie of his mother, of his betrothed, of her father, and mother, and brother, of Jim' Gordon, and especially of “tho tennis crowd.” And behind all these people and their little world looms the shadow of the woman Clive is accused of murdering— Mrs Sabine. The artistry of the novelist is displayed in the gradual way in which the story culminating in this tragedy is unfolded. Indeed, while the reader may cherish suspicions as the story progresses, it is not until more than 500 pages are past that the truth is actually revealed. There is a sense of relief when Clivo hiimsclf returns to his mother’s house, acquitted of the charge, and his return makes one of the tensest of the many dramatic situations in the book. It is safe to predict that ere long a version of “After the Verdict’ will be seen upon the stage. But with tho acquittal tho problem of life and conduct begins. Clive’s first impulse is to change his name and bury himself in some remote part of the world —in Africa, for preference. He had been badly gassed and shell shocked during-the war, and it was when removed to a hospital presided over by Mrs • “ After the Verdict.” By Robert Hichens. London: Methuea and Co. Dunedin: Whiteombo and Tombs,

Sahino that tho entanglement began which ended in such tragic fashion. Vivian, however, is determined to marry him and urges him to face tho thing out and, dominated by her stronger will, ho consents. The battle is a bitter one and were it not for the friendships of tho Rev. Bob and Mrs Herries—delightful characters both, in pleasing contrast to tho caricatures which too often pass for ministers of the Gospel in modern fiction —things at times would have gone hardly with Vivian and with Clive. A cruel scandal, circulated by a relative of Mrs Sabine, practically charging Clive with tho murder, compels him to take criminal proceedings—and this at a time when Vivian was expecting her first-born.

Rumours about tho coming slander action were all over London. Not only the tennis world but all the world of society and beyond it, those less known, or unknown, circles which ring round it, were discussing tho extraordinary case, unique, some said in legal history, which promised to provide all newspaper readers with a really first class sensation to liven up tho depression of the autumn. Photographs of Vivian, of Clive, of Sir Aubrey Sabine, of Wilfred Heathcote, Lady Dartrco, Jim Gordon, Mrs Lorrimer, and others, who it was thought might appear in the trial, wero being published in the numerous picture papers with appropriate comments. They stared down at travellers above tho big bookstalls at the principal railway stations, and looked out upon pedestrians in the streets from many shop windows. And one well known weekly, to be found in all clubs and most country houses, brought off a coup by using as a frontispiece a photograph, hitherto unknown to the public, of “the late Mrs Sabine” in a coat and skirt, a smart little black hat, and white gloves, with a pair of race glasses slung over her shoulder, which had apparently been taken on tho course at Newmarket, Further on in the same paper there was a whole-page picture of Clive, underneath which' was printed in large letters, “Mr Clive Baratrie, who will be the plaintiff in the forthcoming sensational slander case.”

Clive and Vivian again experienced “all the horror of being known ” and when Clive won his case and was awarded £SOOO damages—which ho promptly handed over to Bob Herrios for philanthropic work— Vivian agreed to his original idea, their baby having died, of changing their name and going to Africa. Even in this remote retreat they wore pursued bv the shadow of Mrs Sabine with a result as surprising ns it was dramatic. The change of scene to Africa gave Mr Hichens the opportunity to paint that desert scenery in which ho so excels.

This outline gives but a faint idea of the power and interest of the story. It is a great piece of work, complete in characterisation. clever m construction, and carrying conviction on every page and in every lino. It is safe to say that “After the Verdict” will be the best read novel for months to com©.