Henry James

The Real Thing and Other Tales Henry James

WHEN the porter's wife (she used to answer the house-bell), announced "A gentleman-with a lady, sir," I had, as I often had in those days, for the wish was father to the thought, an immediate visionof sitters. Sitters my visitors in this case proved to be; but not in the sense I should havepreferred. However, there was nothing at first to indicate that they might not have come for aportrait. The gentleman, a man of fifty, very high and very straight, with a moustache slightlygrizzled and a dark grey walking-coat admirably fitted, both of which I noted professionally-I don'tmean as a barber or yet as a tailor-would have struck me as a celebrity if celebrities often werestriking. It was a truth of which I had for some time been conscious that a figure with a good dealof frontage was, as one might say, almost never a public institution. A glance at the lady helped toremind me of this paradoxical law: she also looked too distinguished to be a"personality." Moreover one would scarcely come across two variations together. Neither of the pair spoke immediately-they only prolonged the preliminary gaze which suggestedthat each wished to give the other a chance. They were visibly shy; they stood there letting me takethem in-which, as I afterwards perceived, was the most practical thing they could have done. Inthis way their embarrassment served their cause. I had seen people painfully reluctant to mentionthat they desired anything so gross as to be represented on canvas; but the scruples of my newfriends appeared almost insurmountable. Yet the gentleman might have said "I should like a portraitof my wife," and the lady might have said "I should like a portrait of my husband." Perhaps theywere not husband and wife-this naturally would make the matter more delicate. Perhaps theywished to be done together-in which case they ought to have brought a third person to break thenews