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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/10812-0.txt b/10812-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..c6f6a3e --- /dev/null +++ b/10812-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,2471 @@ +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 10812 *** + +The Worshipper of the Image + + +By +RICHARD LE GALLIENNE + + +JOHN LANE: THE BODLEY HEAD +LONDON AND NEW YORK +1900 + +THE UNIVERSITY PRESS, CAMBRIDGE, U.S.A. + +TO SILENCIEUX + +THIS TRAGIC FAIRY-TALE + + + + +Contents + + +CHAPTER + +I. SMILING SILENCE + +II. THE COMING OF SILENCIEUX + +III. THE NORTHERN SPHINX + +IV. AT THE RISING OF THE MOON + +V. SILENCIEUX SPEAKS + +VI. THE THREE BLACK PONDS + +VII. THE LOVERS OF SILENCIEUX + +VIII. A STRANGE KISS FOR SILENCIEUX + +IX. THE WONDERFUL WEEK + +X. SILENCIEUX WHISPERS + +XI. WONDER IN THE WOOD + +XII. AUTUMN IN THE VALLEY + +XIII. THE HUMAN SACRIFICE + +XIV. A SONG OF THE LITTLE DEAD + +XV. SILENCIEUX ALONE IN THE WOOD + +XVI. THE FIRST TALK ON THE HILLS + +XVII. ANTONY ALONE ON THE HILLS + +XVIII. THE SECOND TALK ON THE HILLS + +XIX. LAST TALK ON THE HILLS + +XX. ANTONY'S JUDGMENT UPON SILENCIEUX + +XXI. "RESURGAM!" + +XXII. THE STRANGENESS OF ANTONY + +XXIII. BEATRICE FULFILS HER DESTINY + + + +The Worshipper of the Image + + + + +CHAPTER I + + +SMILING SILENCE + +Evening was in the wood, still as the dreaming bracken, secretive, +moving softly among the pines as a young witch gathering simples. She +wore a hood of finely woven shadows, yet, though she drew it close, +sunbeams trooping westward flashed strange lights across her haunted +face. + +The birds that lived in the wood had broken out into sudden singing as +she stole in, hungry for silence, passionate to be alone; and at the +foot of every tree she cried "Hush! Hush!" to the bedtime nests. When +all but one were still, she slipped the hood from her face and listened +to her own bird, the night-jar, toiling at his hopeless love from a +bough on which already hung a little star. + +Then it was that a young man, with a face shining with sorrow, vaulted +lightly over the mossed fence and dipped down the green path, among the +shadows and the toadstools and the silence. + +"Silencieux," he said over to himself--"I love you, Silencieux." + +Far down the wood came and went through the trees the black and white +gable of a little châlet to which he was dreaming his way. + +Suddenly a small bronze object caught his eye moving across the mossy +path. It was a beautiful beetle, very slim and graceful in shape, with +singularly long and fine antennae. Antony had loved these things since +he was a child,--dragonflies with their lamp-like eyes of luminous horn, +moths with pall-like wings that filled the world with silence as you +looked at them, sleepy as death--loved them with the passion of a +Japanese artist who delights to carve them on quaint nuggets of metal. +Perhaps it was that they were so like words--words to which he had given +all the love and worship of his life. Surely he had loved Silencieux[1] +more since he had found for her that beautiful name. + +He held the beetle in his hand a long while, loving it. Then he said to +himself, with a smile in which was the delight of a success: "A +vase-shaped beetle with deer's horns." + +The phrase delighted him. He set the insect down on the path, tenderly. +He had done with it. He had carved it in seven words. The little model +might now touch its delicate way among the ferns at peace. + +"A vase-shaped beetle with deer's horns," he repeated as he walked on, +and then the gathering gloom of the wood suggested an addition: "And +some day I shall find in the wood that moth of which I have dreamed +since childhood--the dark moth with the face of death between his +wings." + +The châlet stood on a little clearing, in a little circle of pines. From +it the ground sloped down towards the valley, and at some distance +beneath smoke curled from a house lost amid clouds of foliage, the +abounding green life of this damp and brooding hollow. A great window +looking down the woodside filled one side of the châlet, and the others +were dark with books, an occasional picture or figured jar lighting up +the shadow. A small fire flickered beneath a quaintly devised mantel, +though it was summer--for the mists crept up the hill at night and +chilled the souls of the books. A great old bureau, with a wonderful +belly of mahogany, filled a corner of the room, breathing antique +mystery and refinement. At one end of it, on a small vacant space of +wall, hung a cast, apparently the death-mask of a woman, by which the +eye was immediately attracted with something of a shock and held by a +curious fascination. The face was smiling, a smile of great peace, and +also of a strange cunning. One other characteristic it had: the woman +looked as though at any moment she would suddenly open her eyes, and if +you turned away from her and looked again, she seemed to be smiling to +herself because she had opened them that moment behind your back, and +just closed them again in time. + +It was a face that never changed and yet was always changing. + +She looked doubly strange in the evening light, and her smile softened +and deepened as the shadows gathered in the room. + +Antony came and stood in front of her. + +"Silencieux," he whispered, "I love you, Silencieux. Smiling Silence, I +love you. All day long on the moors your smile has stolen like a +moonbeam by my side--" + +As he spoke, from far down the wood came the gentle sound of a woman's +voice calling "Antony," and coming nearer as it called. + +With a shade of impatience, Antony bent nearer to the image and kissed +it. + +"Good-bye, Silencieux," he whispered, "Good-bye, until the rising of the +moon." + +Then he passed out on to the little staircase that led down into the +wood, and called back to the approaching voice: "I am coming, +Beatrice,"--'Beatrice' being the name of his wife. + +As he called, a shaft of late sunlight suddenly irradiated the tall +slim form of a woman coming up the wood. She wore no hat, and the sun +made a misty glory of her pale gold hair. She seemed a fairy romantic +thing thus gliding in her yellow silk gown through the darkening pines. +And her face was the face of the image, feature for feature. There was +on it too the same light, the same smile. + +"Antony," she called, as they drew nearer to each other, "where in the +wide world have you been? Dinner has been waiting for half-an-hour." + +"Dinner!" he said, laughing, and kissing her kindly. "Fancy! the High +Muses have made me half-an-hour late for dinner. Beauty has made me +forget my dinner. Disgraceful!" + +"I don't mind your forgetting dinner, Antony--but you might have +remembered me." + +"Do you think I could remember Beauty and forget you? Yes! you _are_ +beautiful to-night, Silen--Beatrice. You look like a lady one meets +walking by a haunted well in some old Arthurian tale." + +"Hush!" said Beatrice, "listen to the night-jar. He is worth a hundred +nightingales." + +"Yes; what a passion is that!" said Antony, "so sincere, and yet so +fascinating too." + +"'Yet,' do you say, Antony? Why, sincerity is the most fascinating thing +in the world." + +And as they listened, Antony's heart had stolen back to Silencieux, and +once more in fancy he pressed his lips to hers in the dusk: "It is with +such an eternal passion that I love you, Silencieux." + +FOOTNOTES: + +[Footnote 1: Of course, the writer is aware that while "Silencieux" is +feminine, her name is masculine. In such fanciful names, however, such +license has always been considered allowable.] + + + + +CHAPTER II + + +THE COMING OF SILENCIEUX + +The manner in which Antony had found and come to love Silencieux was a +strange illustration of that law by which one love grows out of +another--that law by which men love living women because of the dead, +and dead women because of the living. + +One day as chance had sent him, picking his way among the orange boxes, +the moving farms, and the wig-makers of Covent Garden, he had come upon +a sculptor's shop, oddly crowded in among Cockney carters and decaying +vegetables. Faces of Greece and Rome gazed at him suddenly from a broad +window, and for a few moments he forsook the motley beauty of modern +London for the ordered loveliness of antiquity. + +Through white corridors of faces he passed, with the cold breath of +classic art upon his cheek, and in the company of the dead who live for +ever he was conscious of a contagion of immortality. + +Soon in an alcove of faces he grew conscious of a presence. Some one was +smiling near him. He turned, and, almost with a start, found that--as he +then thought--it was no living thing, but just a plaster cast among the +others, that was thus shining, like a star among the dead. A face not +ancient, not modern; but a face of yesterday, to-day, and for ever. + +Instantly he knew he had seen the face before. Where? + +Why, of course, it was the face of Beatrice, feature for feature. How +strange!--and, loving Beatrice, he bought it, because of his great love +for her! Who was the artist, what the time and circumstance, that had +anticipated in this strange fashion the only face he had ever really +loved on earth? + +He sought information of the shopkeeper, who told him a strange little +story of an unknown model and an unknown artist, and two tragic fates. + +When Antony had brought Silencieux home to Beatrice, she had at first +taken that delight in her which every created thing takes in a perfect, +or even an imperfect, reflection of itself. To have been anticipated in +a manner so unusual gave back in romantic suggestiveness what at first +sight it seemed to steal from one's personal originality. Only at first +sight--for, if like Beatrice, you were the possessor of a face so +uncommon in type that your lover might, with little fear of disproof, +declare, at all events in England, that there was none other like it, +you might grow superstitious as you looked at an anticipation so +creepily identical, and conceive strange fancies of re-incarnation. What +if this had been you in some former existence! Or at all events, if +there is any truth in those who tell us that in the mould and lines of +our faces and hands--yes! and in every secret marking of our bodies--our +fates are written as in a parchment; would it not be reasonable to +surmise, perhaps to fear, that the writing should mean the same on one +face as on the other, and the fates as well as the faces prove +identical? + +Beatrice gave the mask back to Antony, with a little shiver. + +"It is very wonderful, very strange, but she makes me frightened. What +was the story the man told you, Antony?" + +"No doubt it was all nonsense," Antony replied, "but he said that it was +the death-mask of an unknown girl found drowned in the Seine." + +"Drowned in the Seine!" exclaimed Beatrice, growing almost as white as +the image. + +"Yes! and he said too that the story went that the sculptor who moulded +it had fallen so in love with the dead girl, that he had gone mad and +drowned himself in the Seine also." + +"Can it be true, Antony?" + +"I hope so, for it is so beautiful,--and nothing is really beautiful +till it has come true." + +"But the pain, the pity of it--Antony." + +"That is a part of the beauty, surely--the very essence of its beauty--" + +"Beauty! beauty! O Antony, that is always your cry. I can only think of +the terror, the human anguish. Poor girl--" and she turned again to the +image as it lay upon the table,--"see how the hair lies moulded round +her ears with the water, and how her eyelashes stick to her cheek--Poor +girl." + +"But see how happy she looks. Why should we pity one who can smile like +that? See how peaceful she looks;" and with a sudden whim, Antony took +the image and set it lying back on a soft cushion in a corner of the +couch, at the same time throwing round its neck his black cloak, which +he had cast off as he came in. + +The image nestled into the cushion as though it had veritably been a +living woman weary for sleep, and softly smiling that it was near at +last. So comfortable she seemed, you could have sworn she breathed. + +Antony lifted her head once or twice with his fingers, to delight +himself with seeing her sink back luxuriously once more. + +Beatrice grew more and more white. + +"Antony, please stop. I cannot bear it. She looks so terribly alive." + +At that moment Antony's touch had been a little too forcible, the image +hung poised for a moment and then began to fall in the direction of +Beatrice. + +"Oh, she is falling," she almost screamed, as Antony saved the cast from +the floor. "For God's sake, stop!" + +"How childish of you, Beatrice. She is only plaster. I never knew you +such a baby." + +"I cannot help it, Antony. I know it is foolish, but I cannot help it. I +think living in this place has made me morbid. She seems so alive--so +evil, so cruel. I am sorry you bought her, Antony. I cannot bear to look +at her. Won't you take her away? Take her up into the wood. Keep her +there. Take her now. I shall not be able to sleep all night if I know +she is in the house." + +She was half hysterical, and Antony soothed her gently. + +"Yes, yes, dear. I'm sorry. I'll take her up the wood now this minute. +Wait till I light the lantern. Poor Beatrice, I never dreamed she would +affect you so. I loved her, dear--because I love you; but I would rather +break her in pieces than that she should make you unhappy. Though to +break any image of you, dear," he added tenderly, "would seem a kind of +sacrilege. You know how I love you, Beatrice, don't you?" + +"Of course I do, dear; and it was sweet of you to buy her for my sake, +and I'm quite silly to-night. To-morrow I shall think nothing about her. +Still, dear, she does frighten me, I can't tell why. There seems +something malignant about her, something that threatens our happiness. +Oh, how silly I am--" + +Meanwhile, Antony had lit an old brass lantern, and presently he was +flashing his way up among the dark sounds of the black old wood, with +that ghostly face tenderly pressed against his side. + +He stopped once to turn his lantern upon her. How mysterious she looked, +here in the night, under the dark pines! + +He too felt a little haunted as he climbed his châlet staircase and +unlocked the door, every sound he made echoing fatefully in the silent +wood; and when he had found a place for the image and hung her there, +she certainly looked a ghostly companion for the midnight lamp, in the +middle of a wood. + +How strangely she smiled, the smile almost of one taking possession. + +No wonder Beatrice had been frightened. Was there some mysterious life +in the thing, after all? Why should these indefinite forebodings come +over him as he looked at her!--But he was growing as childish as +Beatrice. Surely midnight, a dark wood, a lantern, and a death-mask, +with two owls whistling to each other across the valley, were enough to +account for any number of forebodings! But Antony shivered, for all +that, as he locked the door and hastened back again down the wood. + + + + +CHAPTER III + + +THE NORTHERN SPHINX + +Antony had not written a poem to his wife since their little girl Wonder +had been born, now some four years ago. Surely it was from no lack of +love, this silence, but merely due to the working of what would seem to +be a law of the artistic temperament: that to turn a muse into a wife, +however long and faithfully loved, is to bid good-bye to the muse. But a +day or two after the coming of Silencieux, Antony found himself suddenly +inspired once more to sing of his wife. It was the best poem he had +written for a long time, and when it was finished, he came down the wood +impatient to read it to Beatrice. This was the poem, which he called +"The Northern Sphinx":-- + + Sphinx of the North, with subtler smile + Than hers who in the yellow South, + With make-believe mysterious mouth, + Deepens the _ennui_ of the Nile; + + And, with no secret left to tell, + A worn and withered old coquette, + Dreams sadly that she draws us yet, + With antiquated charm and spell: + + Tell me your secret, Sphinx,--for mine!-- + What means the colour of your eyes, + Half innocent and all so wise, + Blue as the smoke whose wavering line + + Curls upward from the sacred pyre + Of sacrifice or holy death, + Pale twisting wreaths of opal breath, + From fire mounting into fire. + + What is the meaning of your hair? + That little fairy palace wrought + With many a grave fantastic thought; + I send a kiss to wander there, + + To climb from golden stair to stair, + Wind in and out its cunning bowers,-- + O garden gold with golden flowers, + O little palace built of hair! + + The meaning of your mouth, who knows? + O mouth, where many meanings meet-- + Death kissed it stern, Love kissed it sweet, + And each has shaped its mystic rose. + + Mouth of all sweets, whose sweetness sips + Its tribute honey from all hives, + The sweetest of the sweetest lives, + Soft flowers and little children's lips; + + Yet rather learnt its heavenly smile + From sorrow, God's divinest art, + Sorrow that breaks and breaks the heart, + Yet makes a music all the while. + + Ah! what is that within your eyes, + Upon your lips, within your hair, + The sacred art that makes you fair, + The wisdom that hath made you wise? + + Tell me your secret, Sphinx,--for mine!-- + The mystic word that from afar + God spake and made you rose and star, + The _fiat lux_ that bade you shine. + +While Antony read, Beatrice's face grew sadder and sadder. When he had +finished she said:-- + +"It is very beautiful, Antony--but it is not written for me." + +"What can you mean, Beatrice? Who else can it be written for?" + +"To the Image of me that you have set up in my place." + +"Beatrice, are you going mad?" + +"It is quite true, all the same. Time will show. Perhaps you don't know +it yourself as yet, but you will before long." + +"But, Beatrice, the poem shows its own origin. Has your image blue eyes, +or curiously coiled hair--" + +"Oh, yes, of course, you thought of me. You filled in from me. But the +inspiration, the wish to write it, came from the image--" + +"It is certainly true that I love to look at it, as I love to look at a +picture of you--because it is you--" + +"As yet, no doubt, but you will soon love it for its own sake. You are +already beginning." + +"I love an image! You are too ridiculous, Beatrice." + +"Does it really seem so strange, dear? I sometimes think you have never +loved anything else." + +Antony had laughed down Beatrice's fancies, yet all the time she had +been talking he was conscious that the idea she had suggested was +appealing to him with a perverse fascination. + +To love, not the literal beloved, but the purified stainless image of +her,--surely this would be to ascend into the region of spiritual love, +a love unhampered and untainted by the earth. + +As he said this to himself, his mind, ever pitilessly self-conscious, +knew it was but a subterfuge, a fine euphemism for a strange desire +which he had known was already growing within him; for when Beatrice had +spoken of his loving an image, it was no abstract passion he had +conceived, but some fanciful variation of earthly love--a love of +beauty centring itself upon some form midway between life and death, +inanimate and yet alive, human and yet removed from the accidents of +humanity. + +To love an image with one's whole heart! If only one could achieve +that--and never come out of the dream. + +These thoughts gave him a new desire to look again at the image. He felt +that in some way she would be changed, and he hastened up the wood in a +strange expectancy. + + + + +CHAPTER IV + + +AT THE RISING OF THE MOON + +But a week or two more, and Beatrice's prophecy had progressed so far +towards fulfilment, that Antony was going about the woods and the moors +saying over to himself the name he had found for the Image, as we saw in +the first chapter; and his love for Silencieux, begun more or less as a +determined self-illusion, grew more and more of a reality. Every day new +life welled into Silencieux's face, as every day life ebbed from the +face of Beatrice, surely foreseeing the coming on of what she had +feared. For the love he gave to Silencieux Antony must take away from +Beatrice, from whom as the days went by he grew more and more withdrawn. + +It was true that the long lonely days which he spent in the wood bore +fruit in a remarkable productiveness. Never had his imagination been so +enkindled, or his pen so winged. But this very industry, the proofs of +which he would each evening bring down the wood for that fine judgment +of Beatrice's, which, in spite of all, still remained more to him than +any other praise--this very industry was the secret confirmation for +Beatrice's sad heart. No longer the inspirer, she was yet, she bitterly +told herself, honoured among women as a critic. Her heart might bleed, +and her eyes fill with tears, as he read; but then, as he would say, the +Beauty, the Music! Is it Beautiful? Is it Music? If it be that, no +matter how it has been made! Let us give thanks for creation, though it +involves the sacrifice of our own most tender and sacred feelings. To +set mere personal feelings against Beauty--human tears against an +immortal creation! Did he spare his own feelings? Indeed he did not. + +On the night when we first met him bidding good-bye to Silencieux "until +the rising of the moon," he had sat through dinner eating but little, +feverishly and somewhat cruelly gay. Though he was as yet too kind to +admit it to himself, Beatrice was beginning to bore him, not merely by +her sadness, which his absorption prevented his realising except in +flashes, but by her very resemblance to the Image--of which, from having +been the beloved original, she was, in his eyes, becoming an indifferent +materialisation. The sweet flesh he had loved so tenderly became an +offence to him, as a medium too gross for the embodiment of so beautiful +a face. Such a face as Silencieux's demanded a more celestial porcelain. + +Dinner at last finished, he made an excuse to Beatrice for leaving her +alone once more at the end as he had during all the rest of the day, +and hastened to keep his tryst with Silencieux. During dinner the +conscious side of his mind had been luxuriating in the romantic sound of +"until the rising of the moon,"--for he was as yet a long way from being +quite simple even with Silencieux,--and the idea of his going out with +serious eagerness to meet one who, if she was as he knew a living being, +was an image too, delighted his sense of fantastic make-believe. + +There is in all love that element of make-believe. Every woman who is +loved is partly the creation of her lover's fancy. He consciously +siderealises her, and with open eyes magnifies her importance to his +life. Antony but made believe and magnified uncommonly--and his dream of +vivifying white plaster was perhaps less desperate than the dreams of +some, that would breathe the breath of life into the colder clay of some +beloved woman, who seems spontaneously to live but is dead all the +while. + +Silencieux appeared to be dead, but beneath that eternal smile, as +Beatrice had divined, as Antony was learning, she was only too terribly +alive. Yes! Antony's was the easier dream. + +The moon and Antony came up the wood together from opposite ends, and +when Antony entered his châlet Silencieux was already waiting for him, +her head crowned with a moonbeam. He kissed her softly and took her with +him out into the ferns. + + + + +CHAPTER V + + +SILENCIEUX SPEAKS + +So long as the moon held, Antony stole up the wood each night to meet +Silencieux--"at the rising of the moon." Sometimes he would lie in a +hollow with her head upon his knee, and gaze for an hour at a time, +entranced, into her face. He would feign to himself that she slept, and +he would hold his breath lest he should awaken her. Sometimes he would +say in a tender whisper, not loud enough for her to hear:-- + +"It is cold to-night, Silencieux. See, my cloak will keep you warm." + +Once as he did this she heaved a gentle sigh, as though thanking him. + +At other times he would place her against the gable of the châlet, so +that the moonlight fell upon her, and then he would plunge into the +wood and walk its whole length, so that, as he wound his way back +through the intervening brakes, her face would come and go, glimmering +away off through the leafage, beckoning to him to return. And once he +thought he heard her call his name very softly through the wood. + +That may have been an illusion, but it was during these days that he did +actually hear her speak for the first time. He had been writing till +past midnight, with her smile just above him, and when he had turned out +the lamp and was moving to the door through the vague flickering light +of the fire, he distinctly heard a voice very luxurious and tender say +"Antony," just behind him. It was hardly more than a whisper, but its +sweetness thrilled his blood, and half in joy and fear he turned to her +again. But she was only smiling inscrutably as before, and she spoke no +more for that night. + + + + +CHAPTER VI + + +THE THREE BLACK PONDS + +At the bottom of the valley, approached by sunken honeysuckle lanes that +seemed winding into the centre of the earth, lay three black ponds, +almost hidden in a _cul-de-sac_ of woodland. Though long since +appropriated by nature, made her own by moss and rooted oaks, they were +so set one below the other, with green causeways between each, that an +ancient art, long since become nature, had evidently designed and dug +them, years, perhaps centuries, ago. So long dead were the old +pond-makers that great trees grew now upon the causeways, and vast +jungles of rush and water grasses choked the trickling overflows from +one pond to the other. Once, it was said, when the earth of those parts +had been rich in iron, these ponds had driven great hammers,--but long +before the memory of the oldest cottager they had rested from their +labours, and lived only the life of beauty and silence. Where iron had +once been was now the wild rose, and the grim wounds of the earth had +been healed by the kisses of five hundred springs. + +About these ponds stole many a secret path, veined with clumsy roots, +shadowed with the thick bush of many a clustering parasite, and echoing +sometimes beneath from the hollowed shelter of coot or water-rat. Lilies +floated in circles about the ponds, like the crowns of sunken queens, +and sometimes a bird broke the silence with a frightened cry. + +It was here that Beatrice and Wonder would often take their morning +walk,--Wonder, though but a little girl of four, having grown more and +more of a companion to her mother, since Antony's love for Silencieux. + +A morning in August the two were walking hand in hand. Wonder was one of +those little girls that seem to know all the meanings of life, while yet +struggling with the alphabet of its unimportant words. + +The soul of such a child is, of all things, the most mysterious. There +was that in her face, as she clung on to her mother's hand, which seemed +to say: "O mother, I understand it all, and far more; if I might only +talk to you in the language of heaven,--but my words are like my little +legs, frail and uncertain of their footing, and, while I think all your +strange grown-up thoughts, I can only talk of toys and dolls. Mother, +father's blood as well as yours is in my veins, and so I understand you +both. Poor little mother! Poor little father!" + +Little Wonder looked these things, she may indeed have thought them; +but all she said was: "O mother, what was that?" + +"That was a rabbit, dear. See, there is another! See his fluffy white +tail!" + +And again: "O mother, what was that?" + +"That was a water-hen, dear. She has a little house, a warm nest, close +to the water among the bushes yonder, and she calls like that to let her +little children know she's coming home with some dainty things for +lunch. She means 'Hush! Hush! Don't be frightened. I'm coming just as +fast as I can.'" + +"Funny little mother! What pretty stories you tell me. But do the birds +really talk--Oh, but look, little mother, there's Daddy--" + +It was Antony, deep in some dream of Silencieux. + +"Daddy! Daddy!" cried the little girl. + +He took her tenderly by the hand. + +"Daddy, where have you been all this long time? You have brought me no +flowers for ever so long." + +"Flowers, little Wonder--they are nearly all gone away, gone to sleep +till next year--But see, I will gather you something prettier than +flowers." + +And, hardly marking Beatrice, he led Wonder up and down among the +winding underwood. Fungi of exquisite yellows and browns were popping up +all about the wood. He gathered some of the most delicate, and put them +into the fresh small hands. + +"But, Daddy, I mustn't eat them, must I?" + +"No, dear--they are too beautiful to eat. You must just look at them and +love them, like flowers." + +"But they are not flowers, Daddy. They don't smell like flowers. I would +rather have flowers, Daddy." + +"But there are no flowers till next year. You must learn to love these +too, little Wonder; they are more beautiful than flowers." + +"Oh, no, Daddy, they are not--" + +"Antony," said Beatrice, "how strange you are! Would you poison her? +See, dear," (turning to Wonder) "Daddy is only teasing. Let us throw +them away. They are nasty, nasty things. Promise me never to gather +them, won't you, Wonder?" + +"Yes, mother. I don't like them. They frighten me." + +Antony turned into a by-path with a strange laugh, and was lost to them +in the wood. + + + + +CHAPTER VII + + +THE LOVERS OF SILENCIEUX + +Silencieux often spoke to Antony now. Sometimes a sudden, startling word +when he was writing late at night; sometimes long tender talks; once a +terrible whisper. But all this time she never opened her eyes. The +lashes still lay wet upon her cheeks, and when she spoke her lips seemed +hardly to move, only to smile with a deeper meaning, an intenser life. +Indeed, at these times, her face shone with so great a brightness that +Antony's vision was dazzled, and to his gaze she seemed almost +featureless as a star. + +Once he had begged to see her eyes. + +"You know not what you ask," she had answered. "When you see my eyes you +will die. Some day, Antony, you shall see my eyes. But not yet. You +have much to do for me yet. There is yet much love for you and me before +the end." + +"Have all died who saw your eyes, Silencieux?" + +"Yes, all died." + +"You have had many lovers, Silencieux. Many lovers, and far from here, +and long ago." + +"Yes, many lovers, long ago," echoed Silencieux. + +"You have been very cruel, Silencieux." + +"Yes, very cruel, but very kind. It is true men have died for me. I have +been cruel, yes, but to die for me has seemed better than to live for +any other. And some of my lovers I have never forsaken. When they have +lost all in the world, they have had me. Lonely garrets have seemed +richly furnished because of my face, and men with foodless lips have +died blest because I was near them at the last. Sometimes I have kissed +their lips and died with them, and the world has missed my face for a +hundred unlovely years--for the world is only beautiful when I and my +lovers are in it. Antony, you are one of my lovers, one of my dearest +lovers; be great enough, be all mine, and perhaps I will die with you, +Antony--and leave the world in darkness for your sake, another hundred +years." + +"Tell me of your lovers, Silencieux." + +"Nearly three thousand years ago I loved a woman of Mitylene, very fair +and made of fire. But she loved another more than I, and for his sake +threw herself from a rock into the sea. As she fell, the rose we had +made together fell from her bosom, and was torn to pieces by the sea. +Fishermen gathered here and there a petal floating on the waters,--but +what were they?--and the world has never known how wonderful was that +rose of our love which she took with her into the depths of the sea." + +"You are faithful, Silencieux; you love her still." + +"Yes, I love her still." + +"And with whom did love come next, Silencieux?" + +"Oh, I loved many those years, for the loss of a great love sends us +vainly from hand to hand of many lesser loves, to ease a little the +great ache; and at that time the world seemed full of my lovers. I have +forgotten none of them. They pass before me, a fair frieze of +unforgotten faces; but most I loved a Roman poet, because, perhaps, he +loved so well the memory of her I had loved, and knew so skilfully to +make bloom again among his own red roses those petals of passionate +ivory which the fishermen of Lesbos had recovered from the sea." + +"Tell me of your lovers, Silencieux," said Antony again. + +"Hundreds of years after, I loved in Florence a young poet with a face +of silver. His soul was given to a little red-cheeked girl. She died, +and then I took him to my bosom, and loved him on through the years, +till his face had grown iron with many sorrows. Now at last, his +baby-girl by his side, he sits in heaven, with a face of gold. In +Paris," she went on, "have I been wonderfully beloved, and in northern +lands near the pole--" + +"But--England?" said Antony. "Tell me of your English lovers." + +"Best of them I love two: one a laughing giant who loved me three +hundred years ago, and the other a little London boy with large eyes of +velvet, who mid all the gloom of your great city saw and loved my face, +as none had seen and loved it since she of Mitylene. I found the giant +sitting by a country stream, holding a daffodil in his mighty hands and +whistling to the birds. He took and wore me like a flower. I was to him +as a nightingale that sang from his sleeve, for he loved so much +besides. Yet me he loved best, as those who can read his secret poems +understand. But my little London boy loved me only. For him the world +held nothing but my face, and it was of his great love for me that he +died." + +"But these were all poets," said Antony. + +"Yes, poets are the greatest of all lovers. Though all who since the +world began have been the makers of beautiful things have loved me, I +love my poets best. Sweeter than marble or many colours to my eyes is +the sound of a poet singing in my ears--" + +"For whom, Silencieux, did you step down into the sad waters of the +Seine?" + +"It was a young poet of Paris, beloved of many women, a drunkard of +strange dreams. He too died because he loved me, and when he died there +was none left whose voice seemed sweet after his. So I died with him. I +died with him," she repeated, "to come to life again with you. Many +lips have been pressed to mine, Antony, since the cold sleep of the +Seine fell over me, but none were warm and wild like yours. I loved my +sleep while the others kissed me, but with the touch of your lips the +dreams of life began to stir within me again. O Antony, be great enough, +be all mine, that we may fulfil our dream; and perhaps, Antony, I will +die with you--and leave the world in darkness for your sake, another +hundred years." + +Exalted above the earth with the joy of Silencieux's words, Antony +pressed his lips to hers in an ecstasy, and vowed his life and all +within it inviolably to her. + + + + +CHAPTER VIII + + +A STRANGE KISS FOR SILENCIEUX + +One hot August afternoon Antony took Silencieux with him to a +bramble-covered corner of the dark moor which bounded his little wood. A +ruined bank soaked with sunshine, a haunt of lizards, a catacomb of +little lives that creep and run and whisper, made their seat. + +Silencieux's face, out there under the open sky and in the full blaze of +the sun, at once lost and gained in reality; gained by force of a +contrast which accentuated while it limited her, lost by opposition to +the great faces of earth and sky. Her life, so concentrated, so +self-absorbed, seemed more of an essence, potently distilled, compared +with this abounding ichor of existence, that audibly sang in brimming +circulation through the veins of this carelessly immortal earth. + +For some moments of self-conscious thought she shrank into a symbol,--a +symbol of but one of the elements of the mighty world. Yet to this +element did not all the others, more brutal in force, more extended in +space, conspire? + +So in some hours will the most mortal maid of warmest flesh and blood +become an abstraction to her lover--sometimes shrink to the significance +of one more flower, and sometimes expand to the significance of a +microcosm, a firmament in mystical miniature. + +Thus in like manner for Antony did Silencieux alternate between reality +and dream that afternoon, though all the time he knew that, however now +and again the daylight seemed to create an illusion of her remoteness, +she was still his, and he of all men her chosen lover. + +Suddenly as they sat there together, silent and immovable, Antony +caught the peer of two bright little eyes fixed on the white face of +Silencieux. A tiny wedge-shaped head, with dashes of white across the +brows, reared itself out of a crevice in the bank. A forked tongue came +and went like black lightning through its eager little lips, and a +handsomely marked adder began to glide, like molten metal, along the +bank to Silencieux. The brilliant whiteness of the image had fascinated +the little creature. Antony kept very still. Darting its head from side +to side, venomously alert against the smallest sound, the adder reached +Silencieux. Then to Antony's delight it coiled itself round the white +throat, still restlessly moving its head wonderingly beneath the chin. +With a grace to which all movement from the beginning of time seemed to +have led up, it clasped Silencieux's neck and softly reared its lips to +hers. Its black tongue darted to and fro along that strange smile. + +"He has kissed her!" Antony exclaimed, and in an instant the adder was +nothing more than a terrified rustle in the brushwood. + +He took Silencieux into his hands. There was poison on her lips. For +another moment his fancy made him self-conscious, and turned Silencieux +again into a symbol,--though it was but for a moment. + +"There is always poison on the lips of Art," he said to himself. + + + + +CHAPTER IX + + +THE WONDERFUL WEEK. + +As Antony and Silencieux became more and more to each other, poor +Beatrice, though she had been the first occasion of their love, and +little as she now demanded, seldom as Antony spoke to her, seldom as he +smiled upon her, distant as were the lonely walks she took, infrequent +as was her sad footfall in the little wood,--poor Beatrice, though +indeed, so far from active intrusion upon their loves, and as if only by +her breathing with them the heavy air of that green unwholesome valley, +was becoming an irksome presence of the imagination. They longed to be +somewhere together where Beatrice had never been, where her sad face +could not follow them; and one night Silencieux whispered to Antony:-- + +"Take me to the sea, Antony--to some lonely sea." + +"To-morrow I will take you," said Antony, "where the loneliest land +meets the loneliest sea." + +On the morrow evening the High Muses had once more made Antony late for +dinner. One hour, and two hours, went by, and then Beatrice, in alarm, +took the lantern and courageously braved the blackness of the wood. + +The châlet was in darkness, and the door was locked, but through the +uncurtained glass of the window, she was able to irradiate the emptiness +of its interior. Antony was not there. + +But she noticed, with a shudder, that the space usually filled by the +Image was vacant. Then she understood, and with a hopeless sigh went +down the wood again. + +Already Antony and Silencieux had found the place where the loneliest +land meets the loneliest sea. Side by side they were sitting on a +moonlit margin of the world, and Antony was singing low to the murmur of +the waves:-- + + Hopeless of hope, past desire even of thee, + There is one place I long for, + A desolate place + That I sing all my songs for, + A desolate place for a desolate face, + Where the loneliest land meets the loneliest sea. + + Green waves and green grasses--and nought else is nigh, + But a shadow that beckons; + A desolate face, + And a shadow that beckons + The desolate face to the desolate place + Where the loneliest sea meets the loneliest sky. + + Wide sea and wide heaven, and all else afar, + But a spirit is singing, + A desolate soul + That is joyfully winging-- + A desolate soul--to that desolate goal + Where the loneliest wave meets the loneliest star. + +"It is not good," said Silencieux. + +"I know," answered Antony. + +"Throw it into the sea." + +"It is not worthy of the sea." + +"Burn it." + +"Fire is too august." + +"Throw it to the winds." + +"They are too busy." + +"Bury it." + +"It would make barren a whole meadow." + +"Forget it." + +"I will--And you?" + +"I will." + +And Antony and Silencieux laughed softly together by the sea. + +Many days Antony and Silencieux stayed together by the sea. They loved +it together in all its changes, in sun and rain, in wild wind and dreamy +calm; at morning when it shone like a spirit, at evening when it +flickered like a ghost, at noon when it lay asleep curled up like a +woman in the arms of the land. Sometimes at evening they sat in the +little fishing harbour, watching the incoming boats, till the sky grew +sad with rigging and old men's faces. + +Then at last Silencieux said: "I am weary of the sea. Let us go to the +town--to the lights and the sad cries of the human waves." + +So they went to the town and found a room high up, where they sat at the +window and watched the human lights, and listened to the human music. + +Never had it been so wonderful to be together. + +For a week Antony lived in heaven. Never had Silencieux been so kind, so +close to him. + +"Let us be little children," he said. "Let us do anything that comes +into our heads." + +So they ran in and out among pleasures together, joined strange dances +and sang strange songs. They clapped their hands to jugglers and +acrobats, and animals tortured into talent. And sometimes, as the gaudy +theatre resounded about them, they looked so still at each other that +all the rest faded away, and they were left alone with each other's eyes +and great thoughts of God. + +"I love you, Silencieux." + +"I love you, Antony." + +"You will never leave me lonely in my dream, Silencieux?" + +"Never, Antony." + +Oh, how tender sometimes was Silencieux! + +Several nights they had the whim that Silencieux should masquerade in +the wardrobe of her past. + +"To-night, you shall go clothed as when you loved that woman in +Mitylene," Antony would say. + +Or: "To-night you shall be a little shepherd-boy, with a leopard-skin +across your shoulder and mountain berries in your hair." + +Or again: "To-night you shall be Pierrot--mourning for his Columbine." + +Ah! how divine was Silencieux in all her disguises!--a divine child. Oh, +how tender those nights was Silencieux! + +Antony sat and watched her face in awe and wonder. Surely it was the +noblest face that had ever been seen in the world. + +"Is it true that that noble face is mine?" he would ask; "I cannot +believe it." + +"Kiss it," said Silencieux gaily, "and see." + + * * * * * + +Then on a sudden, what was this change in Silencieux! So cold, so +silent, so cruel, had she grown. + +"Silencieux," Antony called to her. "Silencieux," he pleaded. + +But she never spoke. + +"O Silencieux, speak! I cannot bear it." + +Then her lips moved. "Shall I speak?" she said, with a cruel smile. + +"Yes," he besought her again. + +"I shall love you no more in this world. The lights are gone out, the +magic faded." + +"Silencieux!" + +But she spoke no more, and, with those lonely words in his ears, Antony +came out of his dream and heard the rain falling miserably through the +wood. + + + + +CHAPTER X + + +SILENCIEUX WHISPERS + +So Antony first knew how cruel could be Silencieux to those who loved +her. Her sudden silences he had grown to understand, even to love. +Always they had been broken again by some wonderful word, which he had +known would come sooner or later. All great natures are full of silence. +Silence is the soil of all passion. But now it was not silence that was +between them, but terrible speech. As with a knife she had stabbed their +love right in its heart. Yet Antony knew that his love could never die, +but only suffer. + +During these days he half turned to Beatrice. How kind was her simple +earth-warm affection, after the star-cold transcendentalism in which he +had been living! How full of comfort was her unselfish humanity, after +the pitiless egoism of the divine! + +And yet, while it momentarily soothed him, he realised, with a heart sad +for Beatrice as for himself, that it could never satisfy him again. For +days he left Silencieux alone in the wood, and Beatrice's face +brightened with their renewed companionship; but all the time he seemed +to hear Silencieux calling him, and he knew that he would have to go +back. + +One night, almost happy again, as he lay by the side of Beatrice, who +was sleeping deeply, he rose stealthily, and looked out into the wood. + +The moonlight fell through it mysteriously, as on that night when he had +stolen up there to meet Silencieux--"at the rising of the moon." He +could hesitate no longer. Leaving Beatrice asleep, he was soon making +his way once more through the moonlit trees. + +The little châlet looked very still and solemn, like a temple of +Chaldean mysteries, and an unwonted chill of fear passed through Antony +as he stood in the circle of moonlight outside. His spirit seemed aware +of some dread menace to the future in that moment, and a voice was +crying within him to go back. + +But the longing that had brought him so far was too strong for such +undefined warnings. Once more he turned the key in the lock, and looked +on Silencieux once more. + +The moonlight fell over her face like a veil of silver, and on her +eyelashes was a glitter of tears. + +Her face was alive again, alive too with a softness of womanhood he had +never seen before. + +"Forgive me, Antony," she said. "I loved you all the time." + +What else need Silencieux say! + +"But it was so strange," said Antony after a while, "so strange. I +could have borne the pain, if only I could have understood." + +"Shall I tell you the reason, Antony?" + +"Yes." + +"It was because I saw in your eyes a thought of Beatrice. For a moment +your thoughts had forsaken me and gone to pity Beatrice. I saw it in +your eyes." + +"Poor Beatrice!" said Antony. "It is little indeed I give her. Could you +not spare her so little, Silencieux?" + +"I can spare her nothing. You must be all mine, Antony--your every +thought and hope and dream. So long as there is another woman in the +world for you except me, I cannot be yours in the depths of my being, +nor you mine. There must always be something withheld. It will never be +perfect, until--" + +"Until when?" + +"Until, Antony,"--and Silencieux lowered her voice to an awful +whisper,--"until you have made for me the human sacrifice." + +"The human sacrifice!" + +"Yes, Antony,--all my lovers have done that for me. They were not really +mine till then. Some have brought me many such offerings. Antony, when +will you bring me the human sacrifice?" + +"O Silencieux!" + +Antony's heart chilled with terror at Silencieux's words. It was against +this that the voices had warned him as he came up the wood. O that he +had never seen Silencieux more, never heard her poisonous voice again! + +As one fleeing before the shadow of uncommitted sin that gains upon him +at each stride, Antony fled from the place, and sought the moors. The +moon was near its setting, and soon the dawn would throw open the +eastern doors of the sky. He walked on and on, waiting, praying for, +stifling for the light; and, at last, with a freshening of the air, and +faint sounds of returning consciousness from distant farms, it came. + +High over a lake of ethereal silver welling up out of space, hung the +morning star, shining as though its heart would break, bright as a tear +that must slip down the face of heaven and fall amid the grass. + +As Antony looked up at it, his soul escaped from its prison of dark +thought, and such an exaltation had come with the quickening light, that +it seemed as though the body, with little more than pure aspiration to +wing it, might follow the soul's flight to that crystal sphere. + +In that moment, Antony knew that the love in the soul of man is mated +only with the infinite universe. In no marriage less than that shall it +find lasting fulfilment of itself. No single face, however beautiful, no +single human soul, however vast, can absorb it. Silencieux, Beatrice, +Wonder, himself, all faded away, in a trance-like sense of a stupendous +passion, an august possession. He felt that within him which rose up +gigantic from the earth, and towered into eyries of space, from whence +that morning star seemed like a dewdrop glittering low down upon the +earth. + +It was the god in him that knew itself for one brief space, a moment's +awakening in the sleep of fact. + +Could a god so great, so awakened, be again the slave of one earthly +face? + +Yes, the greater the god, the greater the slave; and so it was that, +falling plumb down from that skyey exaltation, human again with the +weakness that follows divine moments, Antony returned from the morning +star to Silencieux. + +Her face was bathed in the delicate early sunlight and looked very pure +and gentle, and he kissed her. + +Surely those terrible words had been an illusion of the dark hours. +Silencieux had never said them. He kissed her again. + +"I love you, Silencieux," he said. And then she spoke. + +"If you love me, Antony," she said, "if you love me--" + +"O what, Silencieux?" he cried, his heart growing cold once more. + +"Come nearer, Antony. Put your ear to my lips--Antony, if you love +me--the human sacrifice." + +"O God," he cried, "here in the sunlight--It is true--" + +And, a man with the doom of his nature heavy upon him, he once more went +out into the wood. + + + + +CHAPTER XI + + +WONDER IN THE WOOD + +A few days after this, little Wonder, playing about the garden, had +slipped away from her nurse, and, pleased in her little soul at her +cleverness, had found her way up to her father's châlet. Antony was +sitting at his desk, writing, with his door open. + +"Daddy," suddenly came a little voice from the bottom of the staircase, +"Daddy, where are you?" + +Antony rose and went to the door. + +"Come in, little Wonder. Well, it is a clever girl to come all the way +up the wood by herself." + +"Yes, Daddy," said the self-possessed little girl, as she toddled into +the châlet and looked round wonderingly at the books and pictures. Then +presently: + +"Daddy, what do you do all day in the wood?" + +"I make beautiful things." + +"Show me some." + +Antony showed her a page of his beautiful manuscript. + +"Why, those are only words, silly Daddy!" + +"But words, little Wonder, are the most beautiful things in the world. +Listen--" and he took the child on his knee. "Listen:-- + + In Xanadu did Kubla Khan + A stately pleasure-dome decree: + Where Alph, the sacred river, ran + Through caverns measureless to man + Down to a sunless sea. + +The child had inherited a love of beautiful sound, and, though she +understood nothing of the meaning, the music charmed her, and she +nestled close to her father, with wide eyes. + +"Say some more, Daddy." + +The sobbing cadences of the greatest of Irish songs came to Antony's +mind, and he crooned a verse or two at random: + + All day long, in unrest, + To and fro, do I move. + The very soul within my breast + Is wasted for you, love! + The heart in my bosom faints + To think of you, my queen, + My life of life, my saint of saints, + My dark Rosaleen! + My own Rosaleen! + To hear your sweet and sad complaints, + My life, my love, my saint of saints, + My dark Rosaleen!.... + + Over dews, over sands, + Will I fly for your weal: + Your holy delicate white hands + Shall girdle me with steel. + At home in your emerald bowers, + From morning's dawn till e'en, + + You'll pray for me, my flower of flowers, + My dark Rosaleen! + My fond Rosaleen! + You'll think of me thro' daylight hours, + My virgin flower, my flower of flowers, + My dark Rosaleen! + + I could scale the blue air, + I could plough the high hills, + Oh, I could kneel all night in prayer + To heal your many ills! + And one beamy smile from you + Would float like light between + My toils and me, my own, my true, + My dark Rosaleen! + My fond Rosaleen! + Would give me life and soul anew, + A second life, a soul anew, + My dark Rosaleen! + +Wonder, child-like, wearied with the length of the verses, and suddenly +the white face of Silencieux caught her eye. + +"Who is that lady, Daddy?" + +"That is Silencieux." + +"What a pretty name! Is she a kind lady, Daddy?" + +"Sometimes." + +"She is very beautiful. She is like little mother. But her face is so +white. She makes me frightened. Hold me, Daddy--" and she crouched in +his arms. + +"You mustn't be frightened of her, Wonder. She loves little girls. See +how she is smiling at you. She wants to be friends with you. She wants +you to kiss her, little Wonder." + +"Oh, no! no!" almost screamed the little girl. + +But suddenly a cruel whim to insist came over the father, and, +half-coaxingly and half-forcibly, he held her up to the image, stroking +its white cheek to reassure her. + +"See, how kind she is, little Wonder! See how she smiles--how she loves +you. She loves little girls, and she never sees any up here in the +lonely wood. It will make her so happy. Kiss her, little Wonder!" + +Reluctantly the child obeyed, and with a shudder she said:-- + +"Oh, how cold her lips are, Daddy!" + +"But were they not sweet, little Wonder?" + +"No, Daddy, they tasted of dust." + +And as Antony had lifted her up, he had said in his heart: "Silencieux, +I bring you my little child." + + + + +CHAPTER XII + + +AUTUMN IN THE VALLEY + +Autumn in the valley was autumn, melancholy and sinister, as you find +her only in such low-lying immemorial drifting places of leaves, and +oozy sinks of dank water. For the moors autumn is the spring come back +in purple, and in golden woods and many another place where the year +dies happily, she smiles like a widow so young and fair that one thinks +rather of life than death in her presence. + +But in the valley Autumn was a fearsome hag, a little crazy, two-double, +gathering sticks in a scarlet cloak. When she turned her wicked old eyes +upon you, the life died within you, and wherever you walked she was +always somewhere in the bushes muttering evil spells. All the year +round under the green cloud of summer, you might meet Autumn creeping +somewhere in the valley, like foul mists that creep from pool to pool; +for here all the year was decay to feed upon and dead leaves for her to +sleep on. Always the year round in the valley, if you listened close, +you would hear something sighing, something dying. To the happiest +walking there would come strange sinkings of the heart, unaccountable +premonitions of overhanging doom. There the least superstitious would +start at the sight of a toad, and come upon three magpies at once not +without fear. Over all was a breath of imminent disaster, a look of +sorrow from which there was no escape. It was not many yards away from a +merry high-road, but once in the shade of its lanes, it seemed as though +you had been shut away from the world of living men. Black slopes of +pine and melancholy bars of sunset walled you in, as in some funeral +hall of judgment. + +Alas! Beatrice's was not the happiest of hearts, and all day long this +autumn, as the mornings came later and darker and the evenings earlier, +always voices in the valley, voices of low-hanging mist and dripping +rain, kept saying: "Death is coming! Death is coming!" + +Tapped at the windows, ticking and crying in the rooms, was the same +message; till, in a terror of the walls, she would flee into the wider +prison of the woods, and oppressed by them in turn, would escape with a +beating heart into the honest daylight of the high-road. So one flies +from a haunted house, or comes out of an evil dream. + +Sometimes it seemed as if the white face of Silencieux looked out from +the woodside, and mocked her with the same cry: "Death is coming! Death +is coming!" + +Silencieux! Ah, how happy they had been before the coming of +Silencieux! How frail is our happiness, how suddenly it can die! One +moment it seems built for eternity, marble-based and glittering with +towers,--the next, where it stood is lonely grass and dew, not a stone +left. Ah, yes, how happy they had been; and then Antony by a heartless +chance had seen Silencieux, and in an instant their happiness had been +at an end for ever. Only a glance of the eyes and love is born, only a +glance of the eyes, and alas! love must die. + +A glance of the eyes and all the old kindness is gone, a glance of the +eyes, and from the face you love the look you seek has died out for +everlasting. + +"O Antony! Antony!" moaned Beatrice, as she wandered alone in those dank +autumn lanes, "if you would only come back to me for one short day, come +back with the old look on your face, be to me for a little while as you +once were, I think I could gladly die--" + +Die! A tattered flower caught her glance, shaking chilly in the damp +wind, and once more she heard the whisper, "Death is coming!" + +Near where she walked, stood, in the midst of a small meadow overgrown +with nettles, the blackened ruin of a cottage long since destroyed by +fire. On the edge of the little sandy lane, perilously near the feet of +the passer-by, was its forgotten well, the mouth choked with weeds and +briers. + +In her absorption Beatrice had almost walked into it. Now she parted the +bushes and looked down. A stone fell as she looked, making a sepulchral +echo. What a place to hide one's sorrow in! No one would think of +looking there. Antony might think she had gone away, or he might drag +the three black ponds, but here it was unlikely any one would come. And +in a little while--a very little while--Antony would forget, or +sometimes make himself happy with his unhappiness. + +Ah! but Wonder! No, if Antony needed her no more, Wonder did. She must +stay for Wonder's sake. And perhaps, who could say, Antony might yet +need her, might come to her some day and say "Beatrice," with the old +voice. To be really necessary to Antony again, if only for one little +hour,--yes! she could wait and suffer for that. + + + + +CHAPTER XIII + + +THE HUMAN SACRIFICE + +The valley was an ill place even for the body, a lair of rheums and +agues; and disembodied fevers waited in wells for the sunk pail. For the +valley was very beautiful, beautiful with that green beauty that only +comes of damp and decay. + +Late one October night, Antony, alone with Silencieux, as was now again +his custom, was surprised to hear footsteps coming hastily up the wood, +and even more surprised at the sudden unusual appearance of Beatrice. + +"I am sorry to disturb you, Antony," she said, noting with a pang how +the lamp had been arranged to throw a vivid light upon Silencieux, "but +I want you to come down and look at Wonder. I'm afraid she is ill." + +"Wonder, ill!" exclaimed Antony, rising with a start, "I will come at +once;" and they went together. + +Wonder was lying in her bed, with flushed cheeks and bright yet heavy +eyes. + +"Wonder, my little Wonder," said Antony caressingly, as he bent over +her. "Does little Wonder feel ill?" + +"Yes, Daddy. I feel so sick, Daddy." + +"Never mind; she will be better to-morrow." But he had noticed how +burning hot were her hands, and how dry were her fresh little lips. + +"I must go for the doctor at once," he said to his wife, when they were +outside the room. The father, so long asleep, had sprung awake at the +first hint of danger to the little child that in his neglectful way he +loved deeply all the time; and, in spite of the danger to Wonder, a +faint joy stirred in Beatrice's heart to see him thus humanly aroused +once more. + +"Kiss me, Beatrice," he said, as he set out upon his errand. "Don't be +anxious, it will be all right." It was the first time he had kissed his +wife for many days. + +The doctor's was some three miles away across the moor. It was a bright +starlit night, and Antony, who knew the moor well, had no difficulty in +making his way at a good pace along the mossy tracks. Presently he gave +a little cry of pain and stood still. + +"O God," he cried, "it cannot be that. Oh, it cannot." + +At that moment for the first time a dreadful thought had crossed his +mind. Suddenly a memory of that afternoon when he had bade Wonder kiss +Silencieux flashed upon him; and once more he heard himself saying: +"Silencieux, I bring you my little child." + +But he had never meant it so. It had all been a mad fancy. What was +Silencieux herself but a wilful, selfish dream? He saw it all now. How +could a lifeless image have power over the life of his child? + +And yet again, was Silencieux a lifeless image? And still again, if she +were an image, was it not always to an image that humanity from the +beginning had been sacrificed? Yes; perhaps if Silencieux were only an +image there was all the more reason to fear her. + +When he returned he would go to Silencieux, go on his knees and beg for +the life of his child. Silencieux had been cruel, but she could hardly +be so cruel as that. + +He drove back across the moor by the doctor's side. + +"I have always thought you unwise to live in that valley," said the +doctor. "It's pretty, but like most pretty places, it's unhealthy. +Nature can seldom be good and beautiful at the same time." The doctor +was somewhat of a philosopher. + +"Your little girl needs the hills. In fact you all do. Your wife isn't +half the woman she was since you took her into the valley. You don't +look any better for it, either. No, sir, believe me, beauty's all very +well, but it's not good to live with--And, by the way, have you had your +well looked at lately? That valley is just a beautiful sewer for the +drainage of the hills; a very market-town for all the germs and bacilli +of the district." + +And the doctor laughed, as, curiously enough, people always do at jests +about bacilli. + +But when he looked at Wonder, he took a more serious view of bacilli. + +"You must have your well looked to at once," he said. "Your little girl +is very ill. She must be kept very quiet, and on no account excited." + +Beatrice and Antony took it in turns to watch by Wonder's bed that +night, and once while Beatrice was watching, Antony found time to steal +up the wood with his prayer to Silencieux. + +Never had she looked more mask-like, more lifeless. + +"Silencieux," he cried, "I wickedly brought you my little child. O give +her back to me again! I cannot bear it. I cannot give her to you, +Silencieux. Take me, if you will. I will gladly die for you. But spare +her. O give her back to me, Silencieux!" + +But the image was impassive and made no sign. + +"Silencieux," he implored, "speak, for I know you hear me. Are you a +devil, Silencieux; a devil I have worshipped all this time? God help me! +Have you no pity,--what is her little flower-life to you? Why should you +snatch it out of the sun--" + +But Silencieux made no sign. + +Then Antony grew angry in his remorse: "I hate you, Silencieux. Never +will I look on your face again. You are an evil dream that has stolen +from me the truth of life. I have broken a true heart that loved me, +that would have died for me--for your sake; just to watch your loveless +beauty, to hear the cold music of your voice. You are like the moon that +turns men mad, a hollow shell of silver drawing all your light from the +sun of life, a silver shadow of the golden sun." + +But prayer and reproach were alike in vain. Silencieux remained +unheeding, and Antony returned to watch by Beatrice's side, with a heart +that had now no hope, and a soul weighed down with the sense of +irrevocable sin. There lay the little life he had murdered, delivered up +to the Moloch of Art. No sorrow, no agonies, were now of any avail for +ever. Little Wonder would surely die, and all the old lost opportunities +of loving her could never return. He had loved the shadow. This was a +part of the price. + +Day after day the cruel fever consumed Wonder as fire consumes a flower. +Her tiny face seemed too small for the visitation of such suffering as +burned and hammered behind the high white brow, and yellowed and drew +tight the skin upon the cheeks. She had so recently known the strange +pain of being born. Already, for so little of life, she was to endure +the pain of death. + +Day after day, hour after hour, Antony hung over her bed, with a +devotion and an unconsciousness of fatigue that made Beatrice look at +him with astonishment, and sometimes even for a moment forget Wonder in +the joy with which she saw him transfigured by simple human love. Now, +when it was too late, he had become a father indeed. And it brought some +ease to his fiercely tortured heart to notice that it was his +ministrations that the dying child seemed to welcome most. For the most +part she lay in a semi-conscious state, heeding nothing, and only +moaning now and again, a sad little moan, like an injured bird. She +seemed to say she was so little a thing to suffer so. Once, however, +when Antony had just placed some fresh ice around her head, she opened +her eyes and said, "Dear little Daddy," and the light on Antony's +face--poor victim of perverse instincts that too often drew his really +fine nature awry--was sanctifying to see. + +As terrible was the look of torture that came over his face, one night +near the end, when Wonder in a sudden nightmare of delirium had seized +his hand and cried:-- + +"O Daddy, the white lady! See her there at the end of the bed. She is +smiling, Daddy--" Then lower, "You will not make me kiss her any more, +will you, Daddy?"-- + +Beatrice had gone to snatch an hour or two's sleep, so she never heard +this, and it was no mere cowardly consolation for Antony to think +afterwards that no one but he and his little child had known of that +fatal afternoon in the wood. The dead understand all,--yes, even the +dead we have murdered. But the living can never be told a secret such as +that which Antony and his little daughter, whose soul was really grown +up, though she spoke still in baby language, shared immortally between +them. + +When Beatrice returned to the room Wonder was sleeping peacefully again, +but at the chill hour when watchers blow out the night-lights, and a +dreary greyness comes like a fog through the curtains, Antony and +Beatrice fell into each other's arms in anguish, for Wonder was dead. + + + + +CHAPTER XIV + + +A SONG OF THE LITTLE DEAD + +They carried little Wonder to a green churchyard, a place of kind old +trees and tender country bells. There were few birds to welcome her in +the grim November morning, but the grasses stole close and whispered +that very soon the thrush and the nightingale would be coming, that the +violets were already on their way, and that when May was there she +should lie all day in a bed of perfume. + +For very dear to Nature's heart are the Little Dead. The great dead lie +imprisoned in escutcheoned vaults, but for the little dead Nature +spreads out soft small graves, all snowdrops and dewdrops, where +day-long they can feel the earth rocking them as in a cradle, and at +night hear the hushed singing of the stars. + +Yes, Earth loves nothing so much as her little graves. There the tiny +bodies, like unexhausted censers, pour out all the stored sweetness they +had no time to use above the ground, turning the earth they lie in to +precious spices. There the roots of the old yew trees feel about +tenderly for the little unguided hands, and sometimes at nightfall the +rain bends over them weeping like an inconsolable mother. + +It is on the little graves that the sun first rises at morn, and it is +there at evening that the moon lays softly her first silver flowers. + +There the wren will sometimes bring her sky-blue eggs for a gift, and +the summer wind come sowing seeds of magic to take the fancy of the +little one beneath. Sometimes it shakes the hyacinths like a rattle of +silver, and spreads the turf above with a litter of coloured toys. + +Here the butterflies are born with the first warm breath of the spring. +All the winter they lie hidden in the crevices of the stone, in the +carving of little names, and with the first spring day they stand +delicately and dry their yellow wings on the little graves. There are +the honeycombs of friendly bees, and the shelters of many a timid +earth-born speck of life no bigger than a dewdrop, mysteriously small. +Radiant pin-points of existence have their palaces on the broad blades +of the grasses, and in the cellars at their roots works many a humble +little slave of the mighty elements. + +Yes, the emperors and the ants of Nature's vast economy alike love to be +kind to the little graves. + + + + +CHAPTER XV + + +SILENCIEUX ALONE IN THE WOOD. + +Beatrice's grief for Wonder was such as only a mother can know. She had +but one consolation,--the kind sad eyes of Antony. She had lost Wonder, +but Antony had come back again. Wonder was not so dead as Antony had +seemed a month ago. + +When they had left Wonder and were back in the house which was now twice +desolate, Antony took Beatrice's hands very tenderly and said:-- + +"I have been very wrong all these months. For a shadow I have missed the +lovely reality of a little child--and for a shadow, my own faithful +wife, I have all this time done you cruel wrong. But my eyes are open +now, I have come out of the evil dream that bound me--and never shall I +enter it again. Let us go from here. Let us leave this valley and never +come back to it any more." + +So it was arranged that they should winter far away, returning only to +the valley for a few short days in the spring, and then leave it for +ever. They had no heart now for more than just to fly from that haunted +place, and before night fell in the valley they were already far away. + +In vain Silencieux listened for the sound of her lover's step in the +wood, for he had vowed that he would never look upon her face again. + + + + +CHAPTER XVI + + +THE FIRST TALK ON THE HILLS + +Antony took Beatrice to the high hills where all the year long the sun +and the snow shine together. He was afraid of the sea, for the sea was +Silencieux's for ever. In its depths lay a magic harp which filled all +its waves with music--music lovely and accursed, the voice of +Silencieux. That he must never hear again. He would pile the hills +against his ears. Inland and upland, he and Beatrice should go, ever +closer to the kind heart of the land, ever nearer to the forgetful +silences of the sky, till huge walls of space were between them and that +harp of the sea. Nor in the whisper of leaves nor in the gloom of +forests should the thought of Silencieux beset them. The earth that +held least of her--to that earth they would go; the earth that rose +nearest to heaven. + +Beauty indeed should be theirs--the Beauty of Nature and Love; no more +the vampire's beauty of Art. + +It was strange to each how their souls lightened as the valleys of the +world folded away behind them, and the simple slopes mounted in their +path. In that pure unladen air which so exhilarated their very bodies, +there seemed some mysterious property of exhilaration for the soul also. +One might have dreamed that just to breathe on those heights all one's +days would be to grow holy by the more cleansing power of the air. With +such bright currents ever running through the brain, surely one's +thoughts would circle there white as stones at the bottom of a spring. + +"O Antony," said Beatrice, "why were we so long in finding the hills?" + +"We found them once before, Beatrice--do you remember?" + +"Yes! You have not forgotten?" said Beatrice, with the ray of a lost +happiness in her eyes--lost, and yet could it be dawning again? There +was a morning star in Antony's face. + +"And then," said Antony, "we went into the valley--the Valley of Beauty +and Death." + +Beatrice pressed his hand and looked all her love at him for comfort. He +knew how precious was such a forgiveness, the forgiveness of a mother +heart broken for the child, which he, directly or indirectly, had +sacrificed,--directly as he and Wonder alone knew, indirectly by taking +them with him into the Valley of Beauty. + +"Ah, Beatrice, your love is almost greater than I can bear. I am not +worthy of it. I never shall be worthy. There is something in the love of +a woman like you to which the best man is unequal. We can love--and +greatly--but it is not the same." + +"We went into the valley," he cried, "and I lost you your little +Wonder--" + +"_Our_ little Wonder," gently corrected Beatrice. "We found her +together, and we lost her together. Perhaps some day we shall find her +together again--" + +"And do you know, Antony," Beatrice continued, "I sometimes wonder if +her little soul was not sent and so taken away all as part of a mission +to us, which in its turn is a part of the working out of her own +destiny. For life is very mysterious, Antony--" + +"Alas! I had forgotten life," answered Antony with a sigh. + +"Yes, dear," Beatrice went on, pursuing her thought. "I have dared to +hope that perhaps Wonder, as she was the symbol of our coming together, +was taken away just at this time because we were being drawn apart. +Perhaps it was to save our love that little Wonder died--" + +Antony looked at Beatrice; half as one looks at a child, and half as one +might look at an angel. + +"Beatrice," he said tenderly, "you believe in God." + +"All women believe in God," answered Beatrice. + +"Yes," said Antony musingly, and with no thought of irony, "it is that +which makes you women." + + + + +CHAPTER XVII + + +ANTONY ALONE ON THE HILLS + +But although Beatrice might forgive Antony, from himself came no +forgiveness. He hid his remorse from her, sparing the mother-wound in +her heart--but always when he was walking alone he kept saying to +himself: "I have lost our little Wonder. I killed our little Wonder." + +One day he climbed up the highest hill within reach, and there leaned +into the enormous silence, that he might cry it aloud for God to hear-- + +God!--poor little Beatrice, what God was there to hear! To look at +Beatrice one might indeed believe in God--and yet was it not Beatrice +who had made God in her own image? Was not God created of all pure +overflows of the human soul, the kind light of human eyes that not all +the suffering of the world can exhaust, the idealism of the human spirit +that not all the infamies of natural law can dismay? + +Nevertheless, Antony confessed himself to God upon the hills, not indeed +as one seeking pardon, but punishment. + +Yet Heaven's benign untroubled blue carried no cloud upon its face, +because one breaking human heart had thus breathed into it its unholy +secret. Around that whole enormous circle such cries and such +confessions were being poured like noxious vapours, from a thousand +cities; but that incorruptible ether remained unsullied as on the first +morning, the black smoke of it all lost in the optimism of God. + +On some days he would live over again the scene with Wonder in the wood +with unbearable vividness. + +"Why, those are only words, silly Daddy!"--How many times a day did he +not hear that quaint little voice making, with a child's profundity, +that tremendous criticism upon literature. + +He had silenced her with the music of words, as he had silenced his own +heart and soul with the same music, but they were still only words none +the less. Ah! if she were only here to-day, he would bring her something +more beautiful than words--or toadstools. + +He shuddered as he thought of the loathsome form his decaying fancy had +taken, that morning by the Three Black Ponds. He had filled the small +outstretched hands with Nature's filth and poison. She had asked for +flowers, he had brought her toadstools. Oh, the shame, the crime, the +anguish! + +But worst of all was to hear himself saying in the silence of his soul, +over and over again without any power to still it, as one is forced +sometimes to hear the beating of one's heart: "Silencieux, I bring you +my little child." + +There were times he heard this so plainly when he was with Beatrice that +he had to leave her and walk for hours alone. Only unseen among the +hills dare he give vent to the mad despair with which that memory tore +him. + +Yes, for words--"only words"--he had sacrificed that wonderful living +thing, a child. For words he had missed that magical intercourse, the +intercourse with the mind of a child. How often had she come to him for +a story, and he had been dull and preoccupied--with words; how often +asked him to take her a walk up the lane, but he had been too busy--with +words! + +O God, if only she might come and ask again. Now when she was so far +away his fancy teemed with stories. Every roadside flower had its +fairy-tale which cried, "Tell me to little Wonder"--and once he tried +to make believe to himself that Wonder was holding his hand, and looking +up into his face with her big grave eyes, as he told some child's +nonsense to the eternal hills. He broke off--half in anger with himself. +Was he changing one illusion for another? + +"Fool, no one hears you," and he threw himself face down in the grass +and sobbed. + +But a gentle hand was laid upon his shoulder and Beatrice's voice +said,-- + +"I heard you, Antony--and loved you for it." + +So Antony had found the heart of a father when no longer he had a child. + + + + +CHAPTER XVIII + + +THE SECOND TALK ON THE HILLS + +"But to think," said Antony presently, in answer to Beatrice's soothing +hand, "to think that I might have lived with a child--and I chose +instead to live with words. In all the mysterious ways of man, is there +anything quite so mysterious as that? Poor dream-led fool, poor lover of +coloured shadows! + +"And yet, how proud I was of the madness! How I loved to say that words +were more beautiful than the things for which they stood, and that the +names of the world's beautiful women, Sappho, Fiametta, Guinivere, were +more beautiful than Sappho, Fiametta, Guinivere themselves; that the +names of the stars were lovelier than any star--who has ever found the +Pleiades so beautiful as their name, or any king so great as the sound +of Orion?--and what, anywhere in the Universe, is lovely enough to bear +Arcturus for its name?--Ah! you know how I used to talk--poor fool, poor +lover of coloured shadows!" + +"Yes, dear," said Beatrice soothingly, "but that is passed now, and you +must not dwell too persistently in the sorrow of it, or in your grief +for little Wonder. That too is to dwell with shadows, and to dwell with +shadows either of grief or joy is dangerous for the soul." + +"I know. But fear not, Beatrice. Perhaps there was the danger of my +passing from one cloudland to another--for I never knew how I loved our +Wonder till now, and I longed, if only by imagination, to follow her +where she has gone, and share with her the life together we have lost +here--" + +"But that can never be," said Beatrice; "you must accept it, Antony. We +shall only meet her again by doing that. The sooner we can say from our +hearts 'She is lost here,' the nearer is she to being found in another +world. Yes, Antony dear, even Wonder's little shadow must be left +behind, if we are to mount together the hills of life." + +"My wonderful Beatrice! Yes, the hills of life. No more its woods, but +its hills, bathed in a vast and open sunshine. Look around us--how nobly +simple is every line and shape! Far below the horizon nature is +elaborate, full of fancies,--mazy watercourses, delicate dingles, +fantastically gloomy ravines, misshapen woods, gibbering with diablerie; +but here how simple, how great, how good she is! There is not a shape +subtler than a common bowl, and the colours are alphabetical--and yet, +by what taking of thought could she have achieved an effect so grand, +at once so beautiful and so holy?" + +"Yes, one might call it the good beauty," said Beatrice. + +"Yes," continued Antony, perhaps somewhat ominously interested in the +subject, "that is a great mystery--the seeming moral meaning of the +forms of things. Some shapes, however beautiful, suggest evil; others, +however ugly, suggest good. As we look at a snake, or a spider, we know +that evil is shaped like that; and not only animate things but +inanimate. Some aspects of nature are essentially evil. There are +landscapes that injure the soul to look at, there are sunsets that are +unholy, there are trees breathing spiritual pestilence as surely as some +men breathe it--" + +"Do you remember," continued Antony with a smile, which died as he +realised he was committed to an allusion best forgotten, "that old +twisted tree that stood on the moor near our wood? I often wonder what +mysterious sin he had committed--" + +"Yes," laughed Beatrice, "he looked a terribly depraved old tree, I must +admit--but don't you think that when we have arrived at the discussion +of the mysterious sins of trees it is time to start home?" + +"Yes, indeed," said Antony gaily, "let us change the subject to the +vices of flowers." + +From which conversation it will be seen that Antony's mind was still +revolving with unconscious attraction around the mystery of Art. Was it +some far-travelled sea-wind bringing faint strains from that sunken +harp, strains too subtle for the ear, and even unrecognised by the mind? + + + + +CHAPTER XIX + + +LAST TALK ON THE HILLS + +Beatrice's prayer had been answered. Antony had come back to her. She +was necessary to him once more. The old look was in his eyes, the old +sound in his voice. One day as they were out together she was so +conscious of this happiness returned that she could not forbear speaking +of it--with an inner feeling that it was better to be happy in silence. + +What is that instinct in us which tells us that we risk our happiness in +speaking of it? Happiness is such a frightened thing that it flies at +the sound of its own name. And yet of what shall we speak if not our +happiness? Of our sorrows we can keep silence, but our joys we long to +utter. + +So Beatrice spoke of her great happiness to Antony, and told him too of +her old great unhappiness and her longing for death. + +"What a strange and terrible dream it has been--but thank God, we are +out in the daylight at last," said Antony. "O my little Beatrice, to +think that I could have forsaken you like that! Surely if you had come +and taken me by the hands and looked deep into my eyes, and called me +out of the dream, I must have awakened, for, cruel as it was, the dream +was but part of a greater dream, the dream of my love for you--" + +"But I understand it all now," he continued, "see it all. Do you +remember saying that perhaps I had never loved anything but images all +my life? It was quite true. Since I can remember, when I thought I loved +something I was sure to find sooner or later that I loved less the +object itself than what I could say about it, and when I had said +something beautiful, something I could remember and say over and over to +myself, I cared little if the object were removed. The spiritual essence +of it seemed to have passed over into my words, and I loved the +reincarnation best. Only at last have I awakened to realities, and the +shadows flee away. The worshipper of the Image is dead within me. But +alas! that little Wonder had to die first--" + +"I used to tell myself," he went on, "that human life, however +exquisite, without art to eternalise it, was like a rose showering its +petals upon the ground. For so brief a space the rose stood perfect, +then fell in a ruin of perfume. Wonderful moments had human life, but +without art were they not like pearls falling into a gulf? So I said: +there is nothing real but art. The material of art passes--human love, +human beauty--but art remains. It is the image, not the reality, that +is everlasting. I will live in the image." + +"But I know now," he once more resumed, "that there is a higher +immortality than art's,--the immortality of love. The immortality of art +indeed is one of those curious illusions of man's self-love which a +moment's thought dispels. Art, who need be told, is as dependent for its +survival on the survival of its physical media as man's body itself--and +though the epic and the great canvas escape combustion for a million +years, they must burn at last, burn with all the other accumulated +shadows of time. What we call immortality in art is but the shadow of +the soul's immortality; but the immortality of love is that of the soul +itself--" + +"O Antony," interrupted Beatrice, "you really believe that now? You will +never doubt it again?" + +"We never doubt what we have really seen, and I had never seen before," +answered Antony, taking her hand and looking deep into her eyes, "never +seen it as I see it now." + +"And you will never doubt it again?" + +"Never." + +"Whatever that voice should say to you?" + +"I shall never hear that voice again." + +"O Antony, is it really true? You have come back to me. I can hardly +believe it." + +"Listen, Beatrice; when we return to the Valley, return only to leave it +for ever, I will take the Image and smash it in a hundred pieces--for I +hate it now as much as I once loved it. Fear not; it will never trouble +our peace again." + +The mention of the valley was a momentary cloud on Beatrice's happiness, +but as she looked into Antony's resolute love-lit face, it melted away. + + + + +CHAPTER XX + + +ANTONY'S JUDGMENT UPON SILENCIEUX + +So the weeks and months went by for those two upon the hills, and the +soul of Antony grew stronger day by day, and his love with it--and the +face of Beatrice was like a bird singing. At last the spring came, and +the snow was no more needed to keep warm the flowers. With the flowers +came the snowdrop-soul of Wonder, and the thoughts of mother and father +turned to the place of kind old trees and tender country bells, where in +the unflowering November they had laid her. These dark months the chemic +earth had been busy with the little body they loved, and by this time +Wonder would be many violets. + +"Let us go to Wonder," they said; "she is awake now." + +So they went to Wonder, and found her surrounded, in her earth cradle, +by a great singing of birds, and blossoms and green leaves innumerable. +It was more like a palace than a graveyard, and they went away happy for +their little one. + +There remained now to take leave of the valley, which indeed looked its +loveliest, as though to allure them to remain. Some days they must stay +to make the necessary preparations for their departure. Among these, in +Antony's mind, the first and most necessary was that destruction of +Silencieux which he had promised himself and his wife upon the hills. + +The first afternoon Beatrice noted him take a great hammer, and set out +up the wood. She gave him a look of love and trust as he went--though +there was a secret tremor in her heart, for she knew, perhaps better +than he, how strong was the power of Silencieux. + +But in Antony's heart was no misgiving, or backsliding. In those months +on the hills he had realised human love, in the love of a true and +tender and fairy-like woman, and he knew that no illusions, however +specious, were worth that reality--a reality with all the magic of an +illusion. He gripped the hammer in his hand joyfully, eager to smite +featureless the face which had so misled him, brought such tragic sorrow +to those he had loved. + +Still, for all his unshaken purpose, it was strange to see again the +face that had meant so much to him, around which his thoughts had +circled consciously or unconsciously all these absent weeks. + +Seldom has a face seen again after long separation seemed so +disenchanted as Silencieux's. Was this she whom he had worshipped, she +who had told him in that strange voice of her immortal lovers, she with +whom he had sung by the sea, she with whom he had danced those strange +dances in the town, she who had whispered low that awful command, she to +whom he had sacrificed his little child? + +She was just a dusty, neglected cast--nothing more. + +Wonder's voice came back to him: "No, Daddy, they tasted of dust"--and +at that thought he gripped the hammer ready to strike. + +And yet, even thus, she was a beautiful work of man's hands, and Antony, +hating to destroy beauty, still forbore to strike--just as he would have +shrunk from breaking in pieces a shapely vase. Then, too, the +resemblance to Beatrice took him again. Crudely to smash features so +like hers seemed a sort of mimic murder. So he still hesitated. Was +there no other way? Then the thought came to him: "Bury her." It pleased +him. Yes, he would bury her. + +So, having found a spade, he took her from the wall, and looked from +his door into the wood, pondering where her grave should be. A whitebeam +at a little distance made a vivid conflagration of green amid the sombre +boles of the pines. Pinewoods rely on their undergrowth--bracken and +whortleberry and occasional bushes--for their spring illuminations, and +the whitebeam shone as bright in that wood as a lamp in the dark. + +"I will bury her beneath the whitebeam," said Antony, and he carried her +thither. + +Soon the grave was dug amid the pushing fronds of the young ferns, and +taking one long look at her, Antony laid her in the earth, and covered +her up from sight. Was it only fancy that as he turned away a faint +music seemed to arise from the ground, forming into the word "Resurgam" +as it died away? + +"It is done," said Antony to Beatrice. "But I could not break her, she +looked so like you; so I buried her in the wood." + +Beatrice kissed him gratefully. But her heart would have been more +satisfied had Silencieux been broken. + + + + +CHAPTER XXI + + +"RESURGAM!" + +"Resurgam!" + +Had his senses deceived him? They must have deceived him. And yet that +music at least had seemed startlingly near, sudden, and sweet, as though +one should tread upon a harp in the grass. For the next day or two +Antony could not get it out of his ears, and often, like a sweet wail +through the wood, he seemed to hear the word "Resurgam." + +Was Silencieux a living spirit, after all,--no mere illusion, but one of +those beautiful demons of evil that do possess the souls of men? + +He went and stood by Silencieux's grave. It was just as he had left it. +Only an early yellow butterfly stood fanning itself on the freshly +turned earth. + +Was it the soul of Silencieux? + +Cursing himself for a madman, he turned away, but had not gone many +yards, when once more--there was that sudden strain of music and the +word "Resurgam" somewhere on the wind. + +This time he knew he was not mistaken, but to believe it true--O God, he +must not believe it true. Reality or fancy, it was an evil thing which +he had cast out of his life--and he closed his ears and fled. + +Yet, though he loyally strove to quench that music in the sound of +Beatrice's voice, deep in his heart he knew that the night would come +when he would take his lantern and spade, wearily, as one who at length +after hopeless striving obeys once more some imperious weakness--and +look on the face of Silencieux again. + +Too surely that night came, and, as in a dream, Antony found himself in +the dark spring night hastening with lantern and spade to Silencieux's +grave. It was only just to look on her face again, to see if she really +lived like a vampire in the earth; and were she to be alive, he vowed to +kill her where she lay--for into his life again he knew she must not +come. + +As he neared the whitebeam, a gust of wind blew out his lantern, and he +stood in the profound darkness of the trees. While he attempted to +relight it, he thought he saw a faint light at the foot of the +whitebeam, as of a radiance welling out of the earth; but he dismissed +it as fancy. + +Then, having relit the lantern, he set the spade into the ground, and +speedily removed the soil from the white face below. As he uncovered it, +the wind again extinguished the lantern, and there, to his amazement and +terror, was the face of Silencieux shining radiantly in the darkness. +The hole in which she lay brimmed over with light, as a spring wells +out of the hillside. Her face was almost transparent with brightness, +and presently she spoke low, with a voice sweeter than Antony had ever +heard before. It was the voice of that magic harp at the bottom of the +sea, it was the voice that had told him of her lovers, the voice of +hidden music that had cried "Resurgam" through the wood. + +"Antony," she said, "sing me songs of little Wonder." + +And, forgetting all but the magic of her voice, the ecstasy of being +hers again, Antony carried her with him to the châlet, and setting her +in her accustomed place, gazed at her with his whole soul. + +"Sing me songs of little Wonder," she repeated. + +"You bid me sing of little Wonder!" cried Antony, half in terror of this +beautiful evil face that drew him irresistibly as the moon, "you, who +took her from me!" + +"Who but I should bid you sing of Wonder?" answered Silencieux. "I +loved her. That was why I took her from you, that by your grief she +should live for ever. There is no one but I who can give you back your +little Wonder--no one but I who can give you back anything you have +lost. If you love me faithfully, Antony--there is nothing you can lose +but in me you will find it again." + +Antony bowed his head, his heart breaking for Beatrice--but who is not +powerless against his own soul? + +"Listen," said Silencieux again. "Once on a time there was a beautiful +girl who died, and from her grave grew a wonderful flower, which all the +world came to see. 'Yet it seems a pity,' said one, 'that so beautiful a +girl should have died.' 'Ah,' said a poet standing by, 'there was no +other way of making the flower!'" + +And again, as Antony still kept silence in his agony, Silencieux said, +"Listen." + +"Listen, Antony. You have hidden yourself away from me, you have put +seas and lands between us, you have denied me with bitter curses, you +have vowed to thrust me from your life, you have given your allegiance +to the warm and pretty humanity of a day, and reviled the august cold +marble of immortality. But it is all in vain. In your heart of hearts +you love no human thing, you love not even yourself, you love only the +eternal spirit of beauty in all things, you love only me. Me you may +sacrifice, your own heart you may deny, in the weakness of human pity +for human love; but, should this be, your life will be in secret broken, +purposeless, and haunted, and to me at last you will come, at the +end--at the end and too late. This is your own heart's voice; you know +if it be true." + +"It is true," moaned Antony. + +"Many men and many loves are there in this world," continued +Silencieux, "and each knows the way of his own love, nor shall anything +turn him from it in the end. Here he may go and thither he may turn, but +in the end there is only one way of joy for each, and in that way must +he go or perish. Many faces are fair upon the earth, but for each man is +a face fairest of all, for which, unless he win it, each must go +desolate forever--" + +"Face of Eternal Beauty," said Antony, "there is but one face for me for +ever. It is yours." + + * * * * * + +On the morrow Beatrice saw once more that light in Antony's face which +made her afraid. He had brought with him some sheets of paper on which +were written the songs of little Wonder Silencieux had bidden him sing. +They were songs of grief so poignant and beautiful one grew happy in +listening to them, and Antony forgot all in the joy of having made +them. He read them to Beatrice in an ecstasy. Her face grew sadder and +sadder as he read. When he had finished she said:-- + +"Antony!--Silencieux has risen again." + +"O Beatrice, Beatrice--I would do anything in the world for you--but I +cannot live without her." + + + + +CHAPTER XXII + + +THE STRANGENESS OF ANTONY + +From this moment Silencieux took possession of Antony as she had never +taken it before. Never had he been so inaccessibly withdrawn into his +fatal dream. Beatrice forgot her own bitter sorrow in her fear for him, +so wrought was he with the fires that consumed him. Some days she almost +feared for his reason, and she longed to watch over him, but his old +irritation at her presence had returned. + +As the summer days came on, she would see him disappear through the +green door of the wood at morning and return by it at evening; but all +the day each had been alone, Beatrice alone with a solitude in which was +now no longer any Wonder. The summer beauty gave her courage, but she +knew that the end could not be very far away. + +One day there had been that in Antony's manner which had more than +usually alarmed her, and when night fell and he had not returned, she +went up the wood in search of him, her heart full of forebodings. As she +neared the châlet she seemed to hear voices. No! there was only one +voice. Antony was talking to some one. Careful to make no noise, she +stole up to the window and looked in. The sight that met her eyes filled +her with a great dread. "O God, he is going mad," she cried to herself. + +Antony was sitting in a big chair drawn up to the fire. Opposite to him, +lying back in her cushions, was the Image draped in a large black velvet +cloak. A table stood between them, and on it stood two glasses, and a +decanter nearly empty of wine, Silencieux's glass stood untasted, but +Antony had evidently been drinking deeply, for his cheeks were flushed +and his eyes wild. + +He was speaking in angry, passionate, despairing tones. One of her +strange moods of silence had come upon Silencieux, and she lay back in +her pillows stonily unresponsive. + +"For God's sake speak to me," Antony cried. "I love you with my whole +heart. I have sacrificed all I love for your sake. I would die for you +this instant--yes! a hundred thousand deaths. But you will not answer me +one little word--" + +But there was no answer. + +"Silencieux! Have you ceased to love me? Is the dream once more at an +end, the magic faded? Oh, speak--tell me--anything--only speak!" But +still Silencieux neither spoke nor smiled. + +"Listen, Silencieux," at last cried Antony, beside himself, "unless you +answer me, I will die this night, and my blood shall be upon your cruel +altar for ever." + +As he spoke he snatched a dagger from among some bibelots on his mantel, +and drew it from its sheath. + +"You are proud of your martyrs," he laughed; "see, I will bleed to death +for your sake. In God's name speak." + +But Silencieux spoke nothing at all. + +Then Beatrice, watching in terror, seeing by his face that he would +really kill himself, ran round to the door and broke in, crying, "O my +poor Antony!" but already he had plunged the dagger amid the veins of +his left wrist, and was watching the blood gush out with a strange +delight. + +As Beatrice burst in, he looked up at her, and mistook her for +Silencieux. + +"Ah!" he said, "you speak at last. You love me now, when it is too +late--when I am dying." + +As he said this his face grew white and he fainted away. + +For many days Antony lay unconscious, racked by terrible delirium. The +doctor called it brain fever. It was not the common form, he said, but a +more dangerous form, to which only imaginative men were subject. It was +a form of madness all the more malignant because the sufferer, and +particularly his friends, might go for years without suspecting it. The +doctor gave the disease no name. + +During his illness Antony spoke to Beatrice all the time as Silencieux, +but one day, when he was nearly well again, he suddenly turned upon her +in enraged disappointment, with a curious harshness he had never shown +before, as though the gentleness of his soul had died during his +illness, and exclaimed:--"Why, you are not Silencieux, after all!" + +"I am Beatrice," said his wife gently; "Beatrice, who loves you with her +whole heart." + +"But I love Silencieux--" + +Beatrice hid her face and sobbed. + +"Where is Silencieux? Bring me Silencieux. I see! You have taken her +away while I was ill--I will go and seek her myself," and he attempted +to rise. + +"You are too weak. You must not get up, Antony. I will bring you +Silencieux." + +And so, till he was well enough to leave his bed, Silencieux hung facing +Antony on his bedroom wall, and on his first walk out into the air, he +took her with him and set her once more in her old shrine in the wood. + +Now, by this time, the heart of Beatrice was broken. + + + + +CHAPTER XXIII + + +BEATRICE FULFILS HER DESTINY + +The heart of Beatrice was broken, and there was now no use or place for +her in the world. Wonder was gone, and Antony was even further away. She +knew now that he would never come back to her. Never again could return +even the illusion of those happy weeks on the hills. Antony would be +hers no more for ever. + +There but remained for her to fulfil her destiny, the destiny she had +vaguely known ever since Antony had brought home the Image, and shown +her how the Seine water had moulded the hair and made wet the eyelashes. + +For some weeks now Beatrice had been living on the border of another +world. She had finally abandoned all her hopes of earthly joy--and to +Antony she was no longer any help or happiness. He had needed her again +for a few brief weeks, but now he needed her no more. His every look +told her how he wished her out of his life. And she had no one else in +the world. + +But in another world she had her little Wonder. Lately she had begun to +meet her in the lanes. In the day she wore garlands of flowers round her +head, and in the night a great light. She would go to meet her at night, +that the light might lead her steps. + +So one night while Antony banqueted strangely with Silencieux, she drew +her cloak around her and stole up the wood, to look a last good-bye at +him as he sat laughing with his shadows. + +"Good-bye, Antony, good-bye," she cried. "I had but human love to give +you. I surrender you to the love of the divine." + +Then noting how full of blossom were the lanes, and how sweet was the +night air, and smitten through all her senses with the song and perfume +of the world she was about to leave, she found her way, with a strange +gladness of release, to the Three Black Ponds. + +It was moonlight, and the dwarf oak-trees made druid shadows all along +the leafy galleries that overhung the pools. The pools themselves shone +with a startling silver--so hushed, so dreamy was all that surrounded +them that there seemed something of an unnatural wakefulness, a daylight +observation, in their brilliant surfaces,--and on them, as last year, +the lilies floated like the crowns of sunken queens. But the third pool +lay more in shadow, and by that, as it seemed to Beatrice, a light was +shining. + +Yes, a light was shining and a voice was calling. "Mother," it called, +"little Mother. I am waiting for you. Here, little Mother. Here by the +water-lilies we could not gather." + +Beatrice, following the voice, stepped along the causeway and sank among +the lilies; and as she sank she seemed to see Antony bending over the +pond, saying: "How beautiful she looks, how beautiful, lying there among +the lilies!" + + * * * * * + +On the morrow, when they had drawn Beatrice from the pond, with lilies +in her hair, Antony bent over her and said:-- + +"It is very sad--Poor little Beatrice--but how beautiful! It must be +wonderful to die like that." + +And then again he said: "She is strangely like Silencieux." + +Then he walked up the wood, in a great serenity of mind. He had lost +Wonder, but she lived again in his songs. He had lost Beatrice, but he +had her image--did she not live for ever in Silencieux? + +So he went up the wood, whistling softly to himself--but lo! when he +opened his châlet door, there was a strange light in the room. The eyes +of Silencieux were wide open, and from her lips hung a dark moth with +the face of death between his wings. + +THE END + + + + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Worshipper of the Image +by Richard Le Gallienne + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 10812 *** diff --git a/10812-h/10812-h.htm b/10812-h/10812-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..650a75a --- /dev/null +++ b/10812-h/10812-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,3131 @@ +<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN"> +<html> +<head> +<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" + content="text/html; charset=UTF-8"> +<title>The Project Gutenberg eBook of + The Worshipper of the Image, + by Richard Le Gallienne. +</title> +<style type="text/css"> + <!-- + * { font-family: Times;} + P { text-indent: 1em; + margin-top: .75em; + font-size: 12pt; + text-align: justify; + margin-bottom: .75em; } + H1,H2,H3,H4,H5,H6 { text-align: center; } + HR { width: 33%; } + PRE { font-family: Courier, monospaced; } + // --> +</style> +</head> +<body> +<div>*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 10812 ***</div> + +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<h1>The Worshipper of the Image</h1> +<center> +<b>By RICHARD LE GALLIENNE </b> +</center> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<center> +JOHN LANE: THE BODLEY HEAD +LONDON AND NEW YORK +1900 +</center> +<center> +THE UNIVERSITY PRESS, CAMBRIDGE, U.S.A. +</center> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<center> +TO SILENCIEUX +</center> +<center> +THIS TRAGIC FAIRY-TALE +</center> + +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> + +<hr> + +<a name="TOC"><!-- TOC --></a> +<h2> + Contents +</h2> + +<pre> +CHAPTER +</pre> +<pre> +<a href="#CH1">I. SMILING SILENCE</a> +</pre> +<pre> +<a href="#CH2">II. THE COMING OF SILENCIEUX</a> +</pre> +<pre> +<a href="#CH3">III. THE NORTHERN SPHINX</a> +</pre> +<pre> +<a href="#CH4">IV. AT THE RISING OF THE MOON</a> +</pre> +<pre> +<a href="#CH5">V. SILENCIEUX SPEAKS</a> +</pre> +<pre> +<a href="#CH6">VI. THE THREE BLACK PONDS</a> +</pre> +<pre> +<a href="#CH7">VII. THE LOVERS OF SILENCIEUX</a> +</pre> +<pre> +<a href="#CH8">VIII. A STRANGE KISS FOR SILENCIEUX</a> +</pre> +<pre> +<a href="#CH9">IX. THE WONDERFUL WEEK</a> +</pre> +<pre> +<a href="#CH10">X. SILENCIEUX WHISPERS</a> +</pre> +<pre> +<a href="#CH11">XI. WONDER IN THE WOOD</a> +</pre> +<pre> +<a href="#CH12">XII. AUTUMN IN THE VALLEY</a> +</pre> +<pre> +<a href="#CH13">XIII. THE HUMAN SACRIFICE</a> +</pre> +<pre> +<a href="#CH14">XIV. A SONG OF THE LITTLE DEAD</a> +</pre> +<pre> +<a href="#CH15">XV. SILENCIEUX ALONE IN THE WOOD</a> +</pre> +<pre> +<a href="#CH16">XVI. THE FIRST TALK ON THE HILLS</a> +</pre> +<pre> +<a href="#CH17">XVII. ANTONY ALONE ON THE HILLS</a> +</pre> +<pre> +<a href="#CH18">XVIII. THE SECOND TALK ON THE HILLS</a> +</pre> +<pre> +<a href="#CH19">XIX. LAST TALK ON THE HILLS</a> +</pre> +<pre> +<a href="#CH20">XX. ANTONY'S JUDGMENT UPON SILENCIEUX</a> +</pre> +<pre> +<a href="#CH21">XXI. "RESURGAM!"</a> +</pre> +<pre> +<a href="#CH22">XXII. THE STRANGENESS OF ANTONY</a> +</pre> +<pre> +<a href="#CH23">XXIII. BEATRICE FULFILS HER DESTINY</a> +</pre> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> +The Worshipper of the Image +</p> + +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<a name="CH1"><!-- CH1 --></a> +<h2> + CHAPTER I +</h2> + +<center> +SMILING SILENCE +</center> +<p> +Evening was in the wood, still as the dreaming bracken, secretive, +moving softly among the pines as a young witch gathering simples. She +wore a hood of finely woven shadows, yet, though she drew it close, +sunbeams trooping westward flashed strange lights across her haunted +face. +</p> +<p> +The birds that lived in the wood had broken out into sudden singing as +she stole in, hungry for silence, passionate to be alone; and at the +foot of every tree she cried "Hush! Hush!" to the bedtime nests. When +all but one were still, she slipped the hood from her face and listened +to her own bird, the night-jar, toiling at his hopeless love from a +bough on which already hung a little star. +</p> +<p> +Then it was that a young man, with a face shining with sorrow, vaulted +lightly over the mossed fence and dipped down the green path, among the +shadows and the toadstools and the silence. +</p> +<p> +"Silencieux," he said over to himself—"I love you, Silencieux." +</p> +<p> +Far down the wood came and went through the trees the black and white +gable of a little châlet to which he was dreaming his way. +</p> +<p> +Suddenly a small bronze object caught his eye moving across the mossy +path. It was a beautiful beetle, very slim and graceful in shape, with +singularly long and fine antennae. Antony had loved these things since +he was a child,—dragonflies with their lamp-like eyes of luminous horn, +moths with pall-like wings that filled the world with silence as you +looked at them, sleepy as death—loved them with the passion of a +Japanese artist who delights to carve them on quaint nuggets of metal. +Perhaps it was that they were so like words—words to which he had given +all the love and worship of his life. Surely he had loved Silencieux[<a href="#note-1">1</a>] +more since he had found for her that beautiful name. +</p> +<p> +He held the beetle in his hand a long while, loving it. Then he said to +himself, with a smile in which was the delight of a success: "A +vase-shaped beetle with deer's horns." +</p> +<p> +The phrase delighted him. He set the insect down on the path, tenderly. +He had done with it. He had carved it in seven words. The little model +might now touch its delicate way among the ferns at peace. +</p> +<p> +"A vase-shaped beetle with deer's horns," he repeated as he walked on, +and then the gathering gloom of the wood suggested an addition: "And +some day I shall find in the wood that moth of which I have dreamed +since childhood—the dark moth with the face of death between his +wings." +</p> +<p> +The châlet stood on a little clearing, in a little circle of pines. From +it the ground sloped down towards the valley, and at some distance +beneath smoke curled from a house lost amid clouds of foliage, the +abounding green life of this damp and brooding hollow. A great window +looking down the woodside filled one side of the châlet, and the others +were dark with books, an occasional picture or figured jar lighting up +the shadow. A small fire flickered beneath a quaintly devised mantel, +though it was summer—for the mists crept up the hill at night and +chilled the souls of the books. A great old bureau, with a wonderful +belly of mahogany, filled a corner of the room, breathing antique +mystery and refinement. At one end of it, on a small vacant space of +wall, hung a cast, apparently the death-mask of a woman, by which the +eye was immediately attracted with something of a shock and held by a +curious fascination. The face was smiling, a smile of great peace, and +also of a strange cunning. One other characteristic it had: the woman +looked as though at any moment she would suddenly open her eyes, and if +you turned away from her and looked again, she seemed to be smiling to +herself because she had opened them that moment behind your back, and +just closed them again in time. +</p> +<p> +It was a face that never changed and yet was always changing. +</p> +<p> +She looked doubly strange in the evening light, and her smile softened +and deepened as the shadows gathered in the room. +</p> +<p> +Antony came and stood in front of her. +</p> +<p> +"Silencieux," he whispered, "I love you, Silencieux. Smiling Silence, I +love you. All day long on the moors your smile has stolen like a +moonbeam by my side—" +</p> +<p> +As he spoke, from far down the wood came the gentle sound of a woman's +voice calling "Antony," and coming nearer as it called. +</p> +<p> +With a shade of impatience, Antony bent nearer to the image and kissed +it. +</p> +<p> +"Good-bye, Silencieux," he whispered, "Good-bye, until the rising of the +moon." +</p> +<p> +Then he passed out on to the little staircase that led down into the +wood, and called back to the approaching voice: "I am coming, +Beatrice,"—'Beatrice' being the name of his wife. +</p> +<p> +As he called, a shaft of late sunlight suddenly irradiated the tall +slim form of a woman coming up the wood. She wore no hat, and the sun +made a misty glory of her pale gold hair. She seemed a fairy romantic +thing thus gliding in her yellow silk gown through the darkening pines. +And her face was the face of the image, feature for feature. There was +on it too the same light, the same smile. +</p> +<p> +"Antony," she called, as they drew nearer to each other, "where in the +wide world have you been? Dinner has been waiting for half-an-hour." +</p> +<p> +"Dinner!" he said, laughing, and kissing her kindly. "Fancy! the High +Muses have made me half-an-hour late for dinner. Beauty has made me +forget my dinner. Disgraceful!" +</p> +<p> +"I don't mind your forgetting dinner, Antony—but you might have +remembered me." +</p> +<p> +"Do you think I could remember Beauty and forget you? Yes! you <i>are</i> +beautiful to-night, Silen—Beatrice. You look like a lady one meets +walking by a haunted well in some old Arthurian tale." +</p> +<p> +"Hush!" said Beatrice, "listen to the night-jar. He is worth a hundred +nightingales." +</p> +<p> +"Yes; what a passion is that!" said Antony, "so sincere, and yet so +fascinating too." +</p> +<p> +"'Yet,' do you say, Antony? Why, sincerity is the most fascinating thing +in the world." +</p> +<p> +And as they listened, Antony's heart had stolen back to Silencieux, and +once more in fancy he pressed his lips to hers in the dusk: "It is with +such an eternal passion that I love you, Silencieux." +</p> +<center> +FOOTNOTES: +</center> +<p> +<a name="note-1"><!-- Note Anchor 1 --></a>[Footnote 1: Of course, the writer is aware that while "Silencieux" is +feminine, her name is masculine. In such fanciful names, however, such +license has always been considered allowable.] +</p> + +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<a name="CH2"><!-- CH2 --></a> +<h2> + CHAPTER II +</h2> + +<center> +THE COMING OF SILENCIEUX +</center> +<p> +The manner in which Antony had found and come to love Silencieux was a +strange illustration of that law by which one love grows out of +another—that law by which men love living women because of the dead, +and dead women because of the living. +</p> +<p> +One day as chance had sent him, picking his way among the orange boxes, +the moving farms, and the wig-makers of Covent Garden, he had come upon +a sculptor's shop, oddly crowded in among Cockney carters and decaying +vegetables. Faces of Greece and Rome gazed at him suddenly from a broad +window, and for a few moments he forsook the motley beauty of modern +London for the ordered loveliness of antiquity. +</p> +<p> +Through white corridors of faces he passed, with the cold breath of +classic art upon his cheek, and in the company of the dead who live for +ever he was conscious of a contagion of immortality. +</p> +<p> +Soon in an alcove of faces he grew conscious of a presence. Some one was +smiling near him. He turned, and, almost with a start, found that—as he +then thought—it was no living thing, but just a plaster cast among the +others, that was thus shining, like a star among the dead. A face not +ancient, not modern; but a face of yesterday, to-day, and for ever. +</p> +<p> +Instantly he knew he had seen the face before. Where? +</p> +<p> +Why, of course, it was the face of Beatrice, feature for feature. How +strange!—and, loving Beatrice, he bought it, because of his great love +for her! Who was the artist, what the time and circumstance, that had +anticipated in this strange fashion the only face he had ever really +loved on earth? +</p> +<p> +He sought information of the shopkeeper, who told him a strange little +story of an unknown model and an unknown artist, and two tragic fates. +</p> +<p> +When Antony had brought Silencieux home to Beatrice, she had at first +taken that delight in her which every created thing takes in a perfect, +or even an imperfect, reflection of itself. To have been anticipated in +a manner so unusual gave back in romantic suggestiveness what at first +sight it seemed to steal from one's personal originality. Only at first +sight—for, if like Beatrice, you were the possessor of a face so +uncommon in type that your lover might, with little fear of disproof, +declare, at all events in England, that there was none other like it, +you might grow superstitious as you looked at an anticipation so +creepily identical, and conceive strange fancies of re-incarnation. What +if this had been you in some former existence! Or at all events, if +there is any truth in those who tell us that in the mould and lines of +our faces and hands—yes! and in every secret marking of our bodies—our +fates are written as in a parchment; would it not be reasonable to +surmise, perhaps to fear, that the writing should mean the same on one +face as on the other, and the fates as well as the faces prove +identical? +</p> +<p> +Beatrice gave the mask back to Antony, with a little shiver. +</p> +<p> +"It is very wonderful, very strange, but she makes me frightened. What +was the story the man told you, Antony?" +</p> +<p> +"No doubt it was all nonsense," Antony replied, "but he said that it was +the death-mask of an unknown girl found drowned in the Seine." +</p> +<p> +"Drowned in the Seine!" exclaimed Beatrice, growing almost as white as +the image. +</p> +<p> +"Yes! and he said too that the story went that the sculptor who moulded +it had fallen so in love with the dead girl, that he had gone mad and +drowned himself in the Seine also." +</p> +<p> +"Can it be true, Antony?" +</p> +<p> +"I hope so, for it is so beautiful,—and nothing is really beautiful +till it has come true." +</p> +<p> +"But the pain, the pity of it—Antony." +</p> +<p> +"That is a part of the beauty, surely—the very essence of its beauty—" +</p> +<p> +"Beauty! beauty! O Antony, that is always your cry. I can only think of +the terror, the human anguish. Poor girl—" and she turned again to the +image as it lay upon the table,—"see how the hair lies moulded round +her ears with the water, and how her eyelashes stick to her cheek—Poor +girl." +</p> +<p> +"But see how happy she looks. Why should we pity one who can smile like +that? See how peaceful she looks;" and with a sudden whim, Antony took +the image and set it lying back on a soft cushion in a corner of the +couch, at the same time throwing round its neck his black cloak, which +he had cast off as he came in. +</p> +<p> +The image nestled into the cushion as though it had veritably been a +living woman weary for sleep, and softly smiling that it was near at +last. So comfortable she seemed, you could have sworn she breathed. +</p> +<p> +Antony lifted her head once or twice with his fingers, to delight +himself with seeing her sink back luxuriously once more. +</p> +<p> +Beatrice grew more and more white. +</p> +<p> +"Antony, please stop. I cannot bear it. She looks so terribly alive." +</p> +<p> +At that moment Antony's touch had been a little too forcible, the image +hung poised for a moment and then began to fall in the direction of +Beatrice. +</p> +<p> +"Oh, she is falling," she almost screamed, as Antony saved the cast from +the floor. "For God's sake, stop!" +</p> +<p> +"How childish of you, Beatrice. She is only plaster. I never knew you +such a baby." +</p> +<p> +"I cannot help it, Antony. I know it is foolish, but I cannot help it. I +think living in this place has made me morbid. She seems so alive—so +evil, so cruel. I am sorry you bought her, Antony. I cannot bear to look +at her. Won't you take her away? Take her up into the wood. Keep her +there. Take her now. I shall not be able to sleep all night if I know +she is in the house." +</p> +<p> +She was half hysterical, and Antony soothed her gently. +</p> +<p> +"Yes, yes, dear. I'm sorry. I'll take her up the wood now this minute. +Wait till I light the lantern. Poor Beatrice, I never dreamed she would +affect you so. I loved her, dear—because I love you; but I would rather +break her in pieces than that she should make you unhappy. Though to +break any image of you, dear," he added tenderly, "would seem a kind of +sacrilege. You know how I love you, Beatrice, don't you?" +</p> +<p> +"Of course I do, dear; and it was sweet of you to buy her for my sake, +and I'm quite silly to-night. To-morrow I shall think nothing about her. +Still, dear, she does frighten me, I can't tell why. There seems +something malignant about her, something that threatens our happiness. +Oh, how silly I am—" +</p> +<p> +Meanwhile, Antony had lit an old brass lantern, and presently he was +flashing his way up among the dark sounds of the black old wood, with +that ghostly face tenderly pressed against his side. +</p> +<p> +He stopped once to turn his lantern upon her. How mysterious she looked, +here in the night, under the dark pines! +</p> +<p> +He too felt a little haunted as he climbed his châlet staircase and +unlocked the door, every sound he made echoing fatefully in the silent +wood; and when he had found a place for the image and hung her there, +she certainly looked a ghostly companion for the midnight lamp, in the +middle of a wood. +</p> +<p> +How strangely she smiled, the smile almost of one taking possession. +</p> +<p> +No wonder Beatrice had been frightened. Was there some mysterious life +in the thing, after all? Why should these indefinite forebodings come +over him as he looked at her!—But he was growing as childish as +Beatrice. Surely midnight, a dark wood, a lantern, and a death-mask, +with two owls whistling to each other across the valley, were enough to +account for any number of forebodings! But Antony shivered, for all +that, as he locked the door and hastened back again down the wood. +</p> + +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<a name="CH3"><!-- CH3 --></a> +<h2> + CHAPTER III +</h2> + +<center> +THE NORTHERN SPHINX +</center> +<p> +Antony had not written a poem to his wife since their little girl Wonder +had been born, now some four years ago. Surely it was from no lack of +love, this silence, but merely due to the working of what would seem to +be a law of the artistic temperament: that to turn a muse into a wife, +however long and faithfully loved, is to bid good-bye to the muse. But a +day or two after the coming of Silencieux, Antony found himself suddenly +inspired once more to sing of his wife. It was the best poem he had +written for a long time, and when it was finished, he came down the wood +impatient to read it to Beatrice. This was the poem, which he called +"The Northern Sphinx":— +</p> +<pre> + Sphinx of the North, with subtler smile + Than hers who in the yellow South, + With make-believe mysterious mouth, + Deepens the <i>ennui</i> of the Nile; + + And, with no secret left to tell, + A worn and withered old coquette, + Dreams sadly that she draws us yet, + With antiquated charm and spell: + + Tell me your secret, Sphinx,—for mine!— + What means the colour of your eyes, + Half innocent and all so wise, + Blue as the smoke whose wavering line + + Curls upward from the sacred pyre + Of sacrifice or holy death, + Pale twisting wreaths of opal breath, + From fire mounting into fire. + + What is the meaning of your hair? + That little fairy palace wrought + With many a grave fantastic thought; + I send a kiss to wander there, + + To climb from golden stair to stair, + Wind in and out its cunning bowers,— + O garden gold with golden flowers, + O little palace built of hair! + + The meaning of your mouth, who knows? + O mouth, where many meanings meet— + Death kissed it stern, Love kissed it sweet, + And each has shaped its mystic rose. + + Mouth of all sweets, whose sweetness sips + Its tribute honey from all hives, + The sweetest of the sweetest lives, + Soft flowers and little children's lips; + + Yet rather learnt its heavenly smile + From sorrow, God's divinest art, + Sorrow that breaks and breaks the heart, + Yet makes a music all the while. + + Ah! what is that within your eyes, + Upon your lips, within your hair, + The sacred art that makes you fair, + The wisdom that hath made you wise? + + Tell me your secret, Sphinx,—for mine!— + The mystic word that from afar + God spake and made you rose and star, + The <i>fiat lux</i> that bade you shine. +</pre> +<p> +While Antony read, Beatrice's face grew sadder and sadder. When he had +finished she said:— +</p> +<p> +"It is very beautiful, Antony—but it is not written for me." +</p> +<p> +"What can you mean, Beatrice? Who else can it be written for?" +</p> +<p> +"To the Image of me that you have set up in my place." +</p> +<p> +"Beatrice, are you going mad?" +</p> +<p> +"It is quite true, all the same. Time will show. Perhaps you don't know +it yourself as yet, but you will before long." +</p> +<p> +"But, Beatrice, the poem shows its own origin. Has your image blue eyes, +or curiously coiled hair—" +</p> +<p> +"Oh, yes, of course, you thought of me. You filled in from me. But the +inspiration, the wish to write it, came from the image—" +</p> +<p> +"It is certainly true that I love to look at it, as I love to look at a +picture of you—because it is you—" +</p> +<p> +"As yet, no doubt, but you will soon love it for its own sake. You are +already beginning." +</p> +<p> +"I love an image! You are too ridiculous, Beatrice." +</p> +<p> +"Does it really seem so strange, dear? I sometimes think you have never +loved anything else." +</p> +<p> +Antony had laughed down Beatrice's fancies, yet all the time she had +been talking he was conscious that the idea she had suggested was +appealing to him with a perverse fascination. +</p> +<p> +To love, not the literal beloved, but the purified stainless image of +her,—surely this would be to ascend into the region of spiritual love, +a love unhampered and untainted by the earth. +</p> +<p> +As he said this to himself, his mind, ever pitilessly self-conscious, +knew it was but a subterfuge, a fine euphemism for a strange desire +which he had known was already growing within him; for when Beatrice had +spoken of his loving an image, it was no abstract passion he had +conceived, but some fanciful variation of earthly love—a love of +beauty centring itself upon some form midway between life and death, +inanimate and yet alive, human and yet removed from the accidents of +humanity. +</p> +<p> +To love an image with one's whole heart! If only one could achieve +that—and never come out of the dream. +</p> +<p> +These thoughts gave him a new desire to look again at the image. He felt +that in some way she would be changed, and he hastened up the wood in a +strange expectancy. +</p> + +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<a name="CH4"><!-- CH4 --></a> +<h2> + CHAPTER IV +</h2> + +<center> +AT THE RISING OF THE MOON +</center> +<p> +But a week or two more, and Beatrice's prophecy had progressed so far +towards fulfilment, that Antony was going about the woods and the moors +saying over to himself the name he had found for the Image, as we saw in +the first chapter; and his love for Silencieux, begun more or less as a +determined self-illusion, grew more and more of a reality. Every day new +life welled into Silencieux's face, as every day life ebbed from the +face of Beatrice, surely foreseeing the coming on of what she had +feared. For the love he gave to Silencieux Antony must take away from +Beatrice, from whom as the days went by he grew more and more withdrawn. +</p> +<p> +It was true that the long lonely days which he spent in the wood bore +fruit in a remarkable productiveness. Never had his imagination been so +enkindled, or his pen so winged. But this very industry, the proofs of +which he would each evening bring down the wood for that fine judgment +of Beatrice's, which, in spite of all, still remained more to him than +any other praise—this very industry was the secret confirmation for +Beatrice's sad heart. No longer the inspirer, she was yet, she bitterly +told herself, honoured among women as a critic. Her heart might bleed, +and her eyes fill with tears, as he read; but then, as he would say, the +Beauty, the Music! Is it Beautiful? Is it Music? If it be that, no +matter how it has been made! Let us give thanks for creation, though it +involves the sacrifice of our own most tender and sacred feelings. To +set mere personal feelings against Beauty—human tears against an +immortal creation! Did he spare his own feelings? Indeed he did not. +</p> +<p> +On the night when we first met him bidding good-bye to Silencieux "until +the rising of the moon," he had sat through dinner eating but little, +feverishly and somewhat cruelly gay. Though he was as yet too kind to +admit it to himself, Beatrice was beginning to bore him, not merely by +her sadness, which his absorption prevented his realising except in +flashes, but by her very resemblance to the Image—of which, from having +been the beloved original, she was, in his eyes, becoming an indifferent +materialisation. The sweet flesh he had loved so tenderly became an +offence to him, as a medium too gross for the embodiment of so beautiful +a face. Such a face as Silencieux's demanded a more celestial porcelain. +</p> +<p> +Dinner at last finished, he made an excuse to Beatrice for leaving her +alone once more at the end as he had during all the rest of the day, +and hastened to keep his tryst with Silencieux. During dinner the +conscious side of his mind had been luxuriating in the romantic sound of +"until the rising of the moon,"—for he was as yet a long way from being +quite simple even with Silencieux,—and the idea of his going out with +serious eagerness to meet one who, if she was as he knew a living being, +was an image too, delighted his sense of fantastic make-believe. +</p> +<p> +There is in all love that element of make-believe. Every woman who is +loved is partly the creation of her lover's fancy. He consciously +siderealises her, and with open eyes magnifies her importance to his +life. Antony but made believe and magnified uncommonly—and his dream of +vivifying white plaster was perhaps less desperate than the dreams of +some, that would breathe the breath of life into the colder clay of some +beloved woman, who seems spontaneously to live but is dead all the +while. +</p> +<p> +Silencieux appeared to be dead, but beneath that eternal smile, as +Beatrice had divined, as Antony was learning, she was only too terribly +alive. Yes! Antony's was the easier dream. +</p> +<p> +The moon and Antony came up the wood together from opposite ends, and +when Antony entered his châlet Silencieux was already waiting for him, +her head crowned with a moonbeam. He kissed her softly and took her with +him out into the ferns. +</p> + +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<a name="CH5"><!-- CH5 --></a> +<h2> + CHAPTER V +</h2> + +<center> +SILENCIEUX SPEAKS +</center> +<p> +So long as the moon held, Antony stole up the wood each night to meet +Silencieux—"at the rising of the moon." Sometimes he would lie in a +hollow with her head upon his knee, and gaze for an hour at a time, +entranced, into her face. He would feign to himself that she slept, and +he would hold his breath lest he should awaken her. Sometimes he would +say in a tender whisper, not loud enough for her to hear:— +</p> +<p> +"It is cold to-night, Silencieux. See, my cloak will keep you warm." +</p> +<p> +Once as he did this she heaved a gentle sigh, as though thanking him. +</p> +<p> +At other times he would place her against the gable of the châlet, so +that the moonlight fell upon her, and then he would plunge into the +wood and walk its whole length, so that, as he wound his way back +through the intervening brakes, her face would come and go, glimmering +away off through the leafage, beckoning to him to return. And once he +thought he heard her call his name very softly through the wood. +</p> +<p> +That may have been an illusion, but it was during these days that he did +actually hear her speak for the first time. He had been writing till +past midnight, with her smile just above him, and when he had turned out +the lamp and was moving to the door through the vague flickering light +of the fire, he distinctly heard a voice very luxurious and tender say +"Antony," just behind him. It was hardly more than a whisper, but its +sweetness thrilled his blood, and half in joy and fear he turned to her +again. But she was only smiling inscrutably as before, and she spoke no +more for that night. +</p> + +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<a name="CH6"><!-- CH6 --></a> +<h2> + CHAPTER VI +</h2> + +<center> +THE THREE BLACK PONDS +</center> +<p> +At the bottom of the valley, approached by sunken honeysuckle lanes that +seemed winding into the centre of the earth, lay three black ponds, +almost hidden in a <i>cul-de-sac</i> of woodland. Though long since +appropriated by nature, made her own by moss and rooted oaks, they were +so set one below the other, with green causeways between each, that an +ancient art, long since become nature, had evidently designed and dug +them, years, perhaps centuries, ago. So long dead were the old +pond-makers that great trees grew now upon the causeways, and vast +jungles of rush and water grasses choked the trickling overflows from +one pond to the other. Once, it was said, when the earth of those parts +had been rich in iron, these ponds had driven great hammers,—but long +before the memory of the oldest cottager they had rested from their +labours, and lived only the life of beauty and silence. Where iron had +once been was now the wild rose, and the grim wounds of the earth had +been healed by the kisses of five hundred springs. +</p> +<p> +About these ponds stole many a secret path, veined with clumsy roots, +shadowed with the thick bush of many a clustering parasite, and echoing +sometimes beneath from the hollowed shelter of coot or water-rat. Lilies +floated in circles about the ponds, like the crowns of sunken queens, +and sometimes a bird broke the silence with a frightened cry. +</p> +<p> +It was here that Beatrice and Wonder would often take their morning +walk,—Wonder, though but a little girl of four, having grown more and +more of a companion to her mother, since Antony's love for Silencieux. +</p> +<p> +A morning in August the two were walking hand in hand. Wonder was one of +those little girls that seem to know all the meanings of life, while yet +struggling with the alphabet of its unimportant words. +</p> +<p> +The soul of such a child is, of all things, the most mysterious. There +was that in her face, as she clung on to her mother's hand, which seemed +to say: "O mother, I understand it all, and far more; if I might only +talk to you in the language of heaven,—but my words are like my little +legs, frail and uncertain of their footing, and, while I think all your +strange grown-up thoughts, I can only talk of toys and dolls. Mother, +father's blood as well as yours is in my veins, and so I understand you +both. Poor little mother! Poor little father!" +</p> +<p> +Little Wonder looked these things, she may indeed have thought them; +but all she said was: "O mother, what was that?" +</p> +<p> +"That was a rabbit, dear. See, there is another! See his fluffy white +tail!" +</p> +<p> +And again: "O mother, what was that?" +</p> +<p> +"That was a water-hen, dear. She has a little house, a warm nest, close +to the water among the bushes yonder, and she calls like that to let her +little children know she's coming home with some dainty things for +lunch. She means 'Hush! Hush! Don't be frightened. I'm coming just as +fast as I can.'" +</p> +<p> +"Funny little mother! What pretty stories you tell me. But do the birds +really talk—Oh, but look, little mother, there's Daddy—" +</p> +<p> +It was Antony, deep in some dream of Silencieux. +</p> +<p> +"Daddy! Daddy!" cried the little girl. +</p> +<p> +He took her tenderly by the hand. +</p> +<p> +"Daddy, where have you been all this long time? You have brought me no +flowers for ever so long." +</p> +<p> +"Flowers, little Wonder—they are nearly all gone away, gone to sleep +till next year—But see, I will gather you something prettier than +flowers." +</p> +<p> +And, hardly marking Beatrice, he led Wonder up and down among the +winding underwood. Fungi of exquisite yellows and browns were popping up +all about the wood. He gathered some of the most delicate, and put them +into the fresh small hands. +</p> +<p> +"But, Daddy, I mustn't eat them, must I?" +</p> +<p> +"No, dear—they are too beautiful to eat. You must just look at them and +love them, like flowers." +</p> +<p> +"But they are not flowers, Daddy. They don't smell like flowers. I would +rather have flowers, Daddy." +</p> +<p> +"But there are no flowers till next year. You must learn to love these +too, little Wonder; they are more beautiful than flowers." +</p> +<p> +"Oh, no, Daddy, they are not—" +</p> +<p> +"Antony," said Beatrice, "how strange you are! Would you poison her? +See, dear," (turning to Wonder) "Daddy is only teasing. Let us throw +them away. They are nasty, nasty things. Promise me never to gather +them, won't you, Wonder?" +</p> +<p> +"Yes, mother. I don't like them. They frighten me." +</p> +<p> +Antony turned into a by-path with a strange laugh, and was lost to them +in the wood. +</p> + +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<a name="CH7"><!-- CH7 --></a> +<h2> + CHAPTER VII +</h2> + +<center> +THE LOVERS OF SILENCIEUX +</center> +<p> +Silencieux often spoke to Antony now. Sometimes a sudden, startling word +when he was writing late at night; sometimes long tender talks; once a +terrible whisper. But all this time she never opened her eyes. The +lashes still lay wet upon her cheeks, and when she spoke her lips seemed +hardly to move, only to smile with a deeper meaning, an intenser life. +Indeed, at these times, her face shone with so great a brightness that +Antony's vision was dazzled, and to his gaze she seemed almost +featureless as a star. +</p> +<p> +Once he had begged to see her eyes. +</p> +<p> +"You know not what you ask," she had answered. "When you see my eyes you +will die. Some day, Antony, you shall see my eyes. But not yet. You +have much to do for me yet. There is yet much love for you and me before +the end." +</p> +<p> +"Have all died who saw your eyes, Silencieux?" +</p> +<p> +"Yes, all died." +</p> +<p> +"You have had many lovers, Silencieux. Many lovers, and far from here, +and long ago." +</p> +<p> +"Yes, many lovers, long ago," echoed Silencieux. +</p> +<p> +"You have been very cruel, Silencieux." +</p> +<p> +"Yes, very cruel, but very kind. It is true men have died for me. I have +been cruel, yes, but to die for me has seemed better than to live for +any other. And some of my lovers I have never forsaken. When they have +lost all in the world, they have had me. Lonely garrets have seemed +richly furnished because of my face, and men with foodless lips have +died blest because I was near them at the last. Sometimes I have kissed +their lips and died with them, and the world has missed my face for a +hundred unlovely years—for the world is only beautiful when I and my +lovers are in it. Antony, you are one of my lovers, one of my dearest +lovers; be great enough, be all mine, and perhaps I will die with you, +Antony—and leave the world in darkness for your sake, another hundred +years." +</p> +<p> +"Tell me of your lovers, Silencieux." +</p> +<p> +"Nearly three thousand years ago I loved a woman of Mitylene, very fair +and made of fire. But she loved another more than I, and for his sake +threw herself from a rock into the sea. As she fell, the rose we had +made together fell from her bosom, and was torn to pieces by the sea. +Fishermen gathered here and there a petal floating on the waters,—but +what were they?—and the world has never known how wonderful was that +rose of our love which she took with her into the depths of the sea." +</p> +<p> +"You are faithful, Silencieux; you love her still." +</p> +<p> +"Yes, I love her still." +</p> +<p> +"And with whom did love come next, Silencieux?" +</p> +<p> +"Oh, I loved many those years, for the loss of a great love sends us +vainly from hand to hand of many lesser loves, to ease a little the +great ache; and at that time the world seemed full of my lovers. I have +forgotten none of them. They pass before me, a fair frieze of +unforgotten faces; but most I loved a Roman poet, because, perhaps, he +loved so well the memory of her I had loved, and knew so skilfully to +make bloom again among his own red roses those petals of passionate +ivory which the fishermen of Lesbos had recovered from the sea." +</p> +<p> +"Tell me of your lovers, Silencieux," said Antony again. +</p> +<p> +"Hundreds of years after, I loved in Florence a young poet with a face +of silver. His soul was given to a little red-cheeked girl. She died, +and then I took him to my bosom, and loved him on through the years, +till his face had grown iron with many sorrows. Now at last, his +baby-girl by his side, he sits in heaven, with a face of gold. In +Paris," she went on, "have I been wonderfully beloved, and in northern +lands near the pole—" +</p> +<p> +"But—England?" said Antony. "Tell me of your English lovers." +</p> +<p> +"Best of them I love two: one a laughing giant who loved me three +hundred years ago, and the other a little London boy with large eyes of +velvet, who mid all the gloom of your great city saw and loved my face, +as none had seen and loved it since she of Mitylene. I found the giant +sitting by a country stream, holding a daffodil in his mighty hands and +whistling to the birds. He took and wore me like a flower. I was to him +as a nightingale that sang from his sleeve, for he loved so much +besides. Yet me he loved best, as those who can read his secret poems +understand. But my little London boy loved me only. For him the world +held nothing but my face, and it was of his great love for me that he +died." +</p> +<p> +"But these were all poets," said Antony. +</p> +<p> +"Yes, poets are the greatest of all lovers. Though all who since the +world began have been the makers of beautiful things have loved me, I +love my poets best. Sweeter than marble or many colours to my eyes is +the sound of a poet singing in my ears—" +</p> +<p> +"For whom, Silencieux, did you step down into the sad waters of the +Seine?" +</p> +<p> +"It was a young poet of Paris, beloved of many women, a drunkard of +strange dreams. He too died because he loved me, and when he died there +was none left whose voice seemed sweet after his. So I died with him. I +died with him," she repeated, "to come to life again with you. Many +lips have been pressed to mine, Antony, since the cold sleep of the +Seine fell over me, but none were warm and wild like yours. I loved my +sleep while the others kissed me, but with the touch of your lips the +dreams of life began to stir within me again. O Antony, be great enough, +be all mine, that we may fulfil our dream; and perhaps, Antony, I will +die with you—and leave the world in darkness for your sake, another +hundred years." +</p> +<p> +Exalted above the earth with the joy of Silencieux's words, Antony +pressed his lips to hers in an ecstasy, and vowed his life and all +within it inviolably to her. +</p> + +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<a name="CH8"><!-- CH8 --></a> +<h2> + CHAPTER VIII +</h2> + +<center> +A STRANGE KISS FOR SILENCIEUX +</center> +<p> +One hot August afternoon Antony took Silencieux with him to a +bramble-covered corner of the dark moor which bounded his little wood. A +ruined bank soaked with sunshine, a haunt of lizards, a catacomb of +little lives that creep and run and whisper, made their seat. +</p> +<p> +Silencieux's face, out there under the open sky and in the full blaze of +the sun, at once lost and gained in reality; gained by force of a +contrast which accentuated while it limited her, lost by opposition to +the great faces of earth and sky. Her life, so concentrated, so +self-absorbed, seemed more of an essence, potently distilled, compared +with this abounding ichor of existence, that audibly sang in brimming +circulation through the veins of this carelessly immortal earth. +</p> +<p> +For some moments of self-conscious thought she shrank into a symbol,—a +symbol of but one of the elements of the mighty world. Yet to this +element did not all the others, more brutal in force, more extended in +space, conspire? +</p> +<p> +So in some hours will the most mortal maid of warmest flesh and blood +become an abstraction to her lover—sometimes shrink to the significance +of one more flower, and sometimes expand to the significance of a +microcosm, a firmament in mystical miniature. +</p> +<p> +Thus in like manner for Antony did Silencieux alternate between reality +and dream that afternoon, though all the time he knew that, however now +and again the daylight seemed to create an illusion of her remoteness, +she was still his, and he of all men her chosen lover. +</p> +<p> +Suddenly as they sat there together, silent and immovable, Antony +caught the peer of two bright little eyes fixed on the white face of +Silencieux. A tiny wedge-shaped head, with dashes of white across the +brows, reared itself out of a crevice in the bank. A forked tongue came +and went like black lightning through its eager little lips, and a +handsomely marked adder began to glide, like molten metal, along the +bank to Silencieux. The brilliant whiteness of the image had fascinated +the little creature. Antony kept very still. Darting its head from side +to side, venomously alert against the smallest sound, the adder reached +Silencieux. Then to Antony's delight it coiled itself round the white +throat, still restlessly moving its head wonderingly beneath the chin. +With a grace to which all movement from the beginning of time seemed to +have led up, it clasped Silencieux's neck and softly reared its lips to +hers. Its black tongue darted to and fro along that strange smile. +</p> +<p> +"He has kissed her!" Antony exclaimed, and in an instant the adder was +nothing more than a terrified rustle in the brushwood. +</p> +<p> +He took Silencieux into his hands. There was poison on her lips. For +another moment his fancy made him self-conscious, and turned Silencieux +again into a symbol,—though it was but for a moment. +</p> +<p> +"There is always poison on the lips of Art," he said to himself. +</p> + +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<a name="CH9"><!-- CH9 --></a> +<h2> + CHAPTER IX +</h2> + +<center> +THE WONDERFUL WEEK. +</center> +<p> +As Antony and Silencieux became more and more to each other, poor +Beatrice, though she had been the first occasion of their love, and +little as she now demanded, seldom as Antony spoke to her, seldom as he +smiled upon her, distant as were the lonely walks she took, infrequent +as was her sad footfall in the little wood,—poor Beatrice, though +indeed, so far from active intrusion upon their loves, and as if only by +her breathing with them the heavy air of that green unwholesome valley, +was becoming an irksome presence of the imagination. They longed to be +somewhere together where Beatrice had never been, where her sad face +could not follow them; and one night Silencieux whispered to Antony:— +</p> +<p> +"Take me to the sea, Antony—to some lonely sea." +</p> +<p> +"To-morrow I will take you," said Antony, "where the loneliest land +meets the loneliest sea." +</p> +<p> +On the morrow evening the High Muses had once more made Antony late for +dinner. One hour, and two hours, went by, and then Beatrice, in alarm, +took the lantern and courageously braved the blackness of the wood. +</p> +<p> +The châlet was in darkness, and the door was locked, but through the +uncurtained glass of the window, she was able to irradiate the emptiness +of its interior. Antony was not there. +</p> +<p> +But she noticed, with a shudder, that the space usually filled by the +Image was vacant. Then she understood, and with a hopeless sigh went +down the wood again. +</p> +<p> +Already Antony and Silencieux had found the place where the loneliest +land meets the loneliest sea. Side by side they were sitting on a +moonlit margin of the world, and Antony was singing low to the murmur of +the waves:— +</p> +<pre> + Hopeless of hope, past desire even of thee, + There is one place I long for, + A desolate place + That I sing all my songs for, + A desolate place for a desolate face, + Where the loneliest land meets the loneliest sea. + + Green waves and green grasses—and nought else is nigh, + But a shadow that beckons; + A desolate face, + And a shadow that beckons + The desolate face to the desolate place + Where the loneliest sea meets the loneliest sky. + + Wide sea and wide heaven, and all else afar, + But a spirit is singing, + A desolate soul + That is joyfully winging— + A desolate soul—to that desolate goal + Where the loneliest wave meets the loneliest star. +</pre> +<p> +"It is not good," said Silencieux. +</p> +<p> +"I know," answered Antony. +</p> +<p> +"Throw it into the sea." +</p> +<p> +"It is not worthy of the sea." +</p> +<p> +"Burn it." +</p> +<p> +"Fire is too august." +</p> +<p> +"Throw it to the winds." +</p> +<p> +"They are too busy." +</p> +<p> +"Bury it." +</p> +<p> +"It would make barren a whole meadow." +</p> +<p> +"Forget it." +</p> +<p> +"I will—And you?" +</p> +<p> +"I will." +</p> +<p> +And Antony and Silencieux laughed softly together by the sea. +</p> +<p> +Many days Antony and Silencieux stayed together by the sea. They loved +it together in all its changes, in sun and rain, in wild wind and dreamy +calm; at morning when it shone like a spirit, at evening when it +flickered like a ghost, at noon when it lay asleep curled up like a +woman in the arms of the land. Sometimes at evening they sat in the +little fishing harbour, watching the incoming boats, till the sky grew +sad with rigging and old men's faces. +</p> +<p> +Then at last Silencieux said: "I am weary of the sea. Let us go to the +town—to the lights and the sad cries of the human waves." +</p> +<p> +So they went to the town and found a room high up, where they sat at the +window and watched the human lights, and listened to the human music. +</p> +<p> +Never had it been so wonderful to be together. +</p> +<p> +For a week Antony lived in heaven. Never had Silencieux been so kind, so +close to him. +</p> +<p> +"Let us be little children," he said. "Let us do anything that comes +into our heads." +</p> +<p> +So they ran in and out among pleasures together, joined strange dances +and sang strange songs. They clapped their hands to jugglers and +acrobats, and animals tortured into talent. And sometimes, as the gaudy +theatre resounded about them, they looked so still at each other that +all the rest faded away, and they were left alone with each other's eyes +and great thoughts of God. +</p> +<p> +"I love you, Silencieux." +</p> +<p> +"I love you, Antony." +</p> +<p> +"You will never leave me lonely in my dream, Silencieux?" +</p> +<p> +"Never, Antony." +</p> +<p> +Oh, how tender sometimes was Silencieux! +</p> +<p> +Several nights they had the whim that Silencieux should masquerade in +the wardrobe of her past. +</p> +<p> +"To-night, you shall go clothed as when you loved that woman in +Mitylene," Antony would say. +</p> +<p> +Or: "To-night you shall be a little shepherd-boy, with a leopard-skin +across your shoulder and mountain berries in your hair." +</p> +<p> +Or again: "To-night you shall be Pierrot—mourning for his Columbine." +</p> +<p> +Ah! how divine was Silencieux in all her disguises!—a divine child. Oh, +how tender those nights was Silencieux! +</p> +<p> +Antony sat and watched her face in awe and wonder. Surely it was the +noblest face that had ever been seen in the world. +</p> +<p> +"Is it true that that noble face is mine?" he would ask; "I cannot +believe it." +</p> +<p> +"Kiss it," said Silencieux gaily, "and see." +</p> +<hr> +<p> +Then on a sudden, what was this change in Silencieux! So cold, so +silent, so cruel, had she grown. +</p> +<p> +"Silencieux," Antony called to her. "Silencieux," he pleaded. +</p> +<p> +But she never spoke. +</p> +<p> +"O Silencieux, speak! I cannot bear it." +</p> +<p> +Then her lips moved. "Shall I speak?" she said, with a cruel smile. +</p> +<p> +"Yes," he besought her again. +</p> +<p> +"I shall love you no more in this world. The lights are gone out, the +magic faded." +</p> +<p> +"Silencieux!" +</p> +<p> +But she spoke no more, and, with those lonely words in his ears, Antony +came out of his dream and heard the rain falling miserably through the +wood. +</p> + +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<a name="CH10"><!-- CH10 --></a> +<h2> + CHAPTER X +</h2> + +<center> +SILENCIEUX WHISPERS +</center> +<p> +So Antony first knew how cruel could be Silencieux to those who loved +her. Her sudden silences he had grown to understand, even to love. +Always they had been broken again by some wonderful word, which he had +known would come sooner or later. All great natures are full of silence. +Silence is the soil of all passion. But now it was not silence that was +between them, but terrible speech. As with a knife she had stabbed their +love right in its heart. Yet Antony knew that his love could never die, +but only suffer. +</p> +<p> +During these days he half turned to Beatrice. How kind was her simple +earth-warm affection, after the star-cold transcendentalism in which he +had been living! How full of comfort was her unselfish humanity, after +the pitiless egoism of the divine! +</p> +<p> +And yet, while it momentarily soothed him, he realised, with a heart sad +for Beatrice as for himself, that it could never satisfy him again. For +days he left Silencieux alone in the wood, and Beatrice's face +brightened with their renewed companionship; but all the time he seemed +to hear Silencieux calling him, and he knew that he would have to go +back. +</p> +<p> +One night, almost happy again, as he lay by the side of Beatrice, who +was sleeping deeply, he rose stealthily, and looked out into the wood. +</p> +<p> +The moonlight fell through it mysteriously, as on that night when he had +stolen up there to meet Silencieux—"at the rising of the moon." He +could hesitate no longer. Leaving Beatrice asleep, he was soon making +his way once more through the moonlit trees. +</p> +<p> +The little châlet looked very still and solemn, like a temple of +Chaldean mysteries, and an unwonted chill of fear passed through Antony +as he stood in the circle of moonlight outside. His spirit seemed aware +of some dread menace to the future in that moment, and a voice was +crying within him to go back. +</p> +<p> +But the longing that had brought him so far was too strong for such +undefined warnings. Once more he turned the key in the lock, and looked +on Silencieux once more. +</p> +<p> +The moonlight fell over her face like a veil of silver, and on her +eyelashes was a glitter of tears. +</p> +<p> +Her face was alive again, alive too with a softness of womanhood he had +never seen before. +</p> +<p> +"Forgive me, Antony," she said. "I loved you all the time." +</p> +<p> +What else need Silencieux say! +</p> +<p> +"But it was so strange," said Antony after a while, "so strange. I +could have borne the pain, if only I could have understood." +</p> +<p> +"Shall I tell you the reason, Antony?" +</p> +<p> +"Yes." +</p> +<p> +"It was because I saw in your eyes a thought of Beatrice. For a moment +your thoughts had forsaken me and gone to pity Beatrice. I saw it in +your eyes." +</p> +<p> +"Poor Beatrice!" said Antony. "It is little indeed I give her. Could you +not spare her so little, Silencieux?" +</p> +<p> +"I can spare her nothing. You must be all mine, Antony—your every +thought and hope and dream. So long as there is another woman in the +world for you except me, I cannot be yours in the depths of my being, +nor you mine. There must always be something withheld. It will never be +perfect, until—" +</p> +<p> +"Until when?" +</p> +<p> +"Until, Antony,"—and Silencieux lowered her voice to an awful +whisper,—"until you have made for me the human sacrifice." +</p> +<p> +"The human sacrifice!" +</p> +<p> +"Yes, Antony,—all my lovers have done that for me. They were not really +mine till then. Some have brought me many such offerings. Antony, when +will you bring me the human sacrifice?" +</p> +<p> +"O Silencieux!" +</p> +<p> +Antony's heart chilled with terror at Silencieux's words. It was against +this that the voices had warned him as he came up the wood. O that he +had never seen Silencieux more, never heard her poisonous voice again! +</p> +<p> +As one fleeing before the shadow of uncommitted sin that gains upon him +at each stride, Antony fled from the place, and sought the moors. The +moon was near its setting, and soon the dawn would throw open the +eastern doors of the sky. He walked on and on, waiting, praying for, +stifling for the light; and, at last, with a freshening of the air, and +faint sounds of returning consciousness from distant farms, it came. +</p> +<p> +High over a lake of ethereal silver welling up out of space, hung the +morning star, shining as though its heart would break, bright as a tear +that must slip down the face of heaven and fall amid the grass. +</p> +<p> +As Antony looked up at it, his soul escaped from its prison of dark +thought, and such an exaltation had come with the quickening light, that +it seemed as though the body, with little more than pure aspiration to +wing it, might follow the soul's flight to that crystal sphere. +</p> +<p> +In that moment, Antony knew that the love in the soul of man is mated +only with the infinite universe. In no marriage less than that shall it +find lasting fulfilment of itself. No single face, however beautiful, no +single human soul, however vast, can absorb it. Silencieux, Beatrice, +Wonder, himself, all faded away, in a trance-like sense of a stupendous +passion, an august possession. He felt that within him which rose up +gigantic from the earth, and towered into eyries of space, from whence +that morning star seemed like a dewdrop glittering low down upon the +earth. +</p> +<p> +It was the god in him that knew itself for one brief space, a moment's +awakening in the sleep of fact. +</p> +<p> +Could a god so great, so awakened, be again the slave of one earthly +face? +</p> +<p> +Yes, the greater the god, the greater the slave; and so it was that, +falling plumb down from that skyey exaltation, human again with the +weakness that follows divine moments, Antony returned from the morning +star to Silencieux. +</p> +<p> +Her face was bathed in the delicate early sunlight and looked very pure +and gentle, and he kissed her. +</p> +<p> +Surely those terrible words had been an illusion of the dark hours. +Silencieux had never said them. He kissed her again. +</p> +<p> +"I love you, Silencieux," he said. And then she spoke. +</p> +<p> +"If you love me, Antony," she said, "if you love me—" +</p> +<p> +"O what, Silencieux?" he cried, his heart growing cold once more. +</p> +<p> +"Come nearer, Antony. Put your ear to my lips—Antony, if you love +me—the human sacrifice." +</p> +<p> +"O God," he cried, "here in the sunlight—It is true—" +</p> +<p> +And, a man with the doom of his nature heavy upon him, he once more went +out into the wood. +</p> + +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<a name="CH11"><!-- CH11 --></a> +<h2> + CHAPTER XI +</h2> + +<center> +WONDER IN THE WOOD +</center> +<p> +A few days after this, little Wonder, playing about the garden, had +slipped away from her nurse, and, pleased in her little soul at her +cleverness, had found her way up to her father's châlet. Antony was +sitting at his desk, writing, with his door open. +</p> +<p> +"Daddy," suddenly came a little voice from the bottom of the staircase, +"Daddy, where are you?" +</p> +<p> +Antony rose and went to the door. +</p> +<p> +"Come in, little Wonder. Well, it is a clever girl to come all the way +up the wood by herself." +</p> +<p> +"Yes, Daddy," said the self-possessed little girl, as she toddled into +the châlet and looked round wonderingly at the books and pictures. Then +presently: +</p> +<p> +"Daddy, what do you do all day in the wood?" +</p> +<p> +"I make beautiful things." +</p> +<p> +"Show me some." +</p> +<p> +Antony showed her a page of his beautiful manuscript. +</p> +<p> +"Why, those are only words, silly Daddy!" +</p> +<p> +"But words, little Wonder, are the most beautiful things in the world. +Listen—" and he took the child on his knee. "Listen:— +</p> +<pre> + In Xanadu did Kubla Khan + A stately pleasure-dome decree: + Where Alph, the sacred river, ran + Through caverns measureless to man + Down to a sunless sea. +</pre> +<p> +The child had inherited a love of beautiful sound, and, though she +understood nothing of the meaning, the music charmed her, and she +nestled close to her father, with wide eyes. +</p> +<p> +"Say some more, Daddy." +</p> +<p> +The sobbing cadences of the greatest of Irish songs came to Antony's +mind, and he crooned a verse or two at random: +</p> +<pre> + All day long, in unrest, + To and fro, do I move. + The very soul within my breast + Is wasted for you, love! + The heart in my bosom faints + To think of you, my queen, + My life of life, my saint of saints, + My dark Rosaleen! + My own Rosaleen! + To hear your sweet and sad complaints, + My life, my love, my saint of saints, + My dark Rosaleen!.... + + Over dews, over sands, + Will I fly for your weal: + Your holy delicate white hands + Shall girdle me with steel. + At home in your emerald bowers, + From morning's dawn till e'en, + + You'll pray for me, my flower of flowers, + My dark Rosaleen! + My fond Rosaleen! + You'll think of me thro' daylight hours, + My virgin flower, my flower of flowers, + My dark Rosaleen! + + I could scale the blue air, + I could plough the high hills, + Oh, I could kneel all night in prayer + To heal your many ills! + And one beamy smile from you + Would float like light between + My toils and me, my own, my true, + My dark Rosaleen! + My fond Rosaleen! + Would give me life and soul anew, + A second life, a soul anew, + My dark Rosaleen! +</pre> +<p> +Wonder, child-like, wearied with the length of the verses, and suddenly +the white face of Silencieux caught her eye. +</p> +<p> +"Who is that lady, Daddy?" +</p> +<p> +"That is Silencieux." +</p> +<p> +"What a pretty name! Is she a kind lady, Daddy?" +</p> +<p> +"Sometimes." +</p> +<p> +"She is very beautiful. She is like little mother. But her face is so +white. She makes me frightened. Hold me, Daddy—" and she crouched in +his arms. +</p> +<p> +"You mustn't be frightened of her, Wonder. She loves little girls. See +how she is smiling at you. She wants to be friends with you. She wants +you to kiss her, little Wonder." +</p> +<p> +"Oh, no! no!" almost screamed the little girl. +</p> +<p> +But suddenly a cruel whim to insist came over the father, and, +half-coaxingly and half-forcibly, he held her up to the image, stroking +its white cheek to reassure her. +</p> +<p> +"See, how kind she is, little Wonder! See how she smiles—how she loves +you. She loves little girls, and she never sees any up here in the +lonely wood. It will make her so happy. Kiss her, little Wonder!" +</p> +<p> +Reluctantly the child obeyed, and with a shudder she said:— +</p> +<p> +"Oh, how cold her lips are, Daddy!" +</p> +<p> +"But were they not sweet, little Wonder?" +</p> +<p> +"No, Daddy, they tasted of dust." +</p> +<p> +And as Antony had lifted her up, he had said in his heart: "Silencieux, +I bring you my little child." +</p> + +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<a name="CH12"><!-- CH12 --></a> +<h2> + CHAPTER XII +</h2> + +<center> +AUTUMN IN THE VALLEY +</center> +<p> +Autumn in the valley was autumn, melancholy and sinister, as you find +her only in such low-lying immemorial drifting places of leaves, and +oozy sinks of dank water. For the moors autumn is the spring come back +in purple, and in golden woods and many another place where the year +dies happily, she smiles like a widow so young and fair that one thinks +rather of life than death in her presence. +</p> +<p> +But in the valley Autumn was a fearsome hag, a little crazy, two-double, +gathering sticks in a scarlet cloak. When she turned her wicked old eyes +upon you, the life died within you, and wherever you walked she was +always somewhere in the bushes muttering evil spells. All the year +round under the green cloud of summer, you might meet Autumn creeping +somewhere in the valley, like foul mists that creep from pool to pool; +for here all the year was decay to feed upon and dead leaves for her to +sleep on. Always the year round in the valley, if you listened close, +you would hear something sighing, something dying. To the happiest +walking there would come strange sinkings of the heart, unaccountable +premonitions of overhanging doom. There the least superstitious would +start at the sight of a toad, and come upon three magpies at once not +without fear. Over all was a breath of imminent disaster, a look of +sorrow from which there was no escape. It was not many yards away from a +merry high-road, but once in the shade of its lanes, it seemed as though +you had been shut away from the world of living men. Black slopes of +pine and melancholy bars of sunset walled you in, as in some funeral +hall of judgment. +</p> +<p> +Alas! Beatrice's was not the happiest of hearts, and all day long this +autumn, as the mornings came later and darker and the evenings earlier, +always voices in the valley, voices of low-hanging mist and dripping +rain, kept saying: "Death is coming! Death is coming!" +</p> +<p> +Tapped at the windows, ticking and crying in the rooms, was the same +message; till, in a terror of the walls, she would flee into the wider +prison of the woods, and oppressed by them in turn, would escape with a +beating heart into the honest daylight of the high-road. So one flies +from a haunted house, or comes out of an evil dream. +</p> +<p> +Sometimes it seemed as if the white face of Silencieux looked out from +the woodside, and mocked her with the same cry: "Death is coming! Death +is coming!" +</p> +<p> +Silencieux! Ah, how happy they had been before the coming of +Silencieux! How frail is our happiness, how suddenly it can die! One +moment it seems built for eternity, marble-based and glittering with +towers,—the next, where it stood is lonely grass and dew, not a stone +left. Ah, yes, how happy they had been; and then Antony by a heartless +chance had seen Silencieux, and in an instant their happiness had been +at an end for ever. Only a glance of the eyes and love is born, only a +glance of the eyes, and alas! love must die. +</p> +<p> +A glance of the eyes and all the old kindness is gone, a glance of the +eyes, and from the face you love the look you seek has died out for +everlasting. +</p> +<p> +"O Antony! Antony!" moaned Beatrice, as she wandered alone in those dank +autumn lanes, "if you would only come back to me for one short day, come +back with the old look on your face, be to me for a little while as you +once were, I think I could gladly die—" +</p> +<p> +Die! A tattered flower caught her glance, shaking chilly in the damp +wind, and once more she heard the whisper, "Death is coming!" +</p> +<p> +Near where she walked, stood, in the midst of a small meadow overgrown +with nettles, the blackened ruin of a cottage long since destroyed by +fire. On the edge of the little sandy lane, perilously near the feet of +the passer-by, was its forgotten well, the mouth choked with weeds and +briers. +</p> +<p> +In her absorption Beatrice had almost walked into it. Now she parted the +bushes and looked down. A stone fell as she looked, making a sepulchral +echo. What a place to hide one's sorrow in! No one would think of +looking there. Antony might think she had gone away, or he might drag +the three black ponds, but here it was unlikely any one would come. And +in a little while—a very little while—Antony would forget, or +sometimes make himself happy with his unhappiness. +</p> +<p> +Ah! but Wonder! No, if Antony needed her no more, Wonder did. She must +stay for Wonder's sake. And perhaps, who could say, Antony might yet +need her, might come to her some day and say "Beatrice," with the old +voice. To be really necessary to Antony again, if only for one little +hour,—yes! she could wait and suffer for that. +</p> + +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<a name="CH13"><!-- CH13 --></a> +<h2> + CHAPTER XIII +</h2> + +<center> +THE HUMAN SACRIFICE +</center> +<p> +The valley was an ill place even for the body, a lair of rheums and +agues; and disembodied fevers waited in wells for the sunk pail. For the +valley was very beautiful, beautiful with that green beauty that only +comes of damp and decay. +</p> +<p> +Late one October night, Antony, alone with Silencieux, as was now again +his custom, was surprised to hear footsteps coming hastily up the wood, +and even more surprised at the sudden unusual appearance of Beatrice. +</p> +<p> +"I am sorry to disturb you, Antony," she said, noting with a pang how +the lamp had been arranged to throw a vivid light upon Silencieux, "but +I want you to come down and look at Wonder. I'm afraid she is ill." +</p> +<p> +"Wonder, ill!" exclaimed Antony, rising with a start, "I will come at +once;" and they went together. +</p> +<p> +Wonder was lying in her bed, with flushed cheeks and bright yet heavy +eyes. +</p> +<p> +"Wonder, my little Wonder," said Antony caressingly, as he bent over +her. "Does little Wonder feel ill?" +</p> +<p> +"Yes, Daddy. I feel so sick, Daddy." +</p> +<p> +"Never mind; she will be better to-morrow." But he had noticed how +burning hot were her hands, and how dry were her fresh little lips. +</p> +<p> +"I must go for the doctor at once," he said to his wife, when they were +outside the room. The father, so long asleep, had sprung awake at the +first hint of danger to the little child that in his neglectful way he +loved deeply all the time; and, in spite of the danger to Wonder, a +faint joy stirred in Beatrice's heart to see him thus humanly aroused +once more. +</p> +<p> +"Kiss me, Beatrice," he said, as he set out upon his errand. "Don't be +anxious, it will be all right." It was the first time he had kissed his +wife for many days. +</p> +<p> +The doctor's was some three miles away across the moor. It was a bright +starlit night, and Antony, who knew the moor well, had no difficulty in +making his way at a good pace along the mossy tracks. Presently he gave +a little cry of pain and stood still. +</p> +<p> +"O God," he cried, "it cannot be that. Oh, it cannot." +</p> +<p> +At that moment for the first time a dreadful thought had crossed his +mind. Suddenly a memory of that afternoon when he had bade Wonder kiss +Silencieux flashed upon him; and once more he heard himself saying: +"Silencieux, I bring you my little child." +</p> +<p> +But he had never meant it so. It had all been a mad fancy. What was +Silencieux herself but a wilful, selfish dream? He saw it all now. How +could a lifeless image have power over the life of his child? +</p> +<p> +And yet again, was Silencieux a lifeless image? And still again, if she +were an image, was it not always to an image that humanity from the +beginning had been sacrificed? Yes; perhaps if Silencieux were only an +image there was all the more reason to fear her. +</p> +<p> +When he returned he would go to Silencieux, go on his knees and beg for +the life of his child. Silencieux had been cruel, but she could hardly +be so cruel as that. +</p> +<p> +He drove back across the moor by the doctor's side. +</p> +<p> +"I have always thought you unwise to live in that valley," said the +doctor. "It's pretty, but like most pretty places, it's unhealthy. +Nature can seldom be good and beautiful at the same time." The doctor +was somewhat of a philosopher. +</p> +<p> +"Your little girl needs the hills. In fact you all do. Your wife isn't +half the woman she was since you took her into the valley. You don't +look any better for it, either. No, sir, believe me, beauty's all very +well, but it's not good to live with—And, by the way, have you had your +well looked at lately? That valley is just a beautiful sewer for the +drainage of the hills; a very market-town for all the germs and bacilli +of the district." +</p> +<p> +And the doctor laughed, as, curiously enough, people always do at jests +about bacilli. +</p> +<p> +But when he looked at Wonder, he took a more serious view of bacilli. +</p> +<p> +"You must have your well looked to at once," he said. "Your little girl +is very ill. She must be kept very quiet, and on no account excited." +</p> +<p> +Beatrice and Antony took it in turns to watch by Wonder's bed that +night, and once while Beatrice was watching, Antony found time to steal +up the wood with his prayer to Silencieux. +</p> +<p> +Never had she looked more mask-like, more lifeless. +</p> +<p> +"Silencieux," he cried, "I wickedly brought you my little child. O give +her back to me again! I cannot bear it. I cannot give her to you, +Silencieux. Take me, if you will. I will gladly die for you. But spare +her. O give her back to me, Silencieux!" +</p> +<p> +But the image was impassive and made no sign. +</p> +<p> +"Silencieux," he implored, "speak, for I know you hear me. Are you a +devil, Silencieux; a devil I have worshipped all this time? God help me! +Have you no pity,—what is her little flower-life to you? Why should you +snatch it out of the sun—" +</p> +<p> +But Silencieux made no sign. +</p> +<p> +Then Antony grew angry in his remorse: "I hate you, Silencieux. Never +will I look on your face again. You are an evil dream that has stolen +from me the truth of life. I have broken a true heart that loved me, +that would have died for me—for your sake; just to watch your loveless +beauty, to hear the cold music of your voice. You are like the moon that +turns men mad, a hollow shell of silver drawing all your light from the +sun of life, a silver shadow of the golden sun." +</p> +<p> +But prayer and reproach were alike in vain. Silencieux remained +unheeding, and Antony returned to watch by Beatrice's side, with a heart +that had now no hope, and a soul weighed down with the sense of +irrevocable sin. There lay the little life he had murdered, delivered up +to the Moloch of Art. No sorrow, no agonies, were now of any avail for +ever. Little Wonder would surely die, and all the old lost opportunities +of loving her could never return. He had loved the shadow. This was a +part of the price. +</p> +<p> +Day after day the cruel fever consumed Wonder as fire consumes a flower. +Her tiny face seemed too small for the visitation of such suffering as +burned and hammered behind the high white brow, and yellowed and drew +tight the skin upon the cheeks. She had so recently known the strange +pain of being born. Already, for so little of life, she was to endure +the pain of death. +</p> +<p> +Day after day, hour after hour, Antony hung over her bed, with a +devotion and an unconsciousness of fatigue that made Beatrice look at +him with astonishment, and sometimes even for a moment forget Wonder in +the joy with which she saw him transfigured by simple human love. Now, +when it was too late, he had become a father indeed. And it brought some +ease to his fiercely tortured heart to notice that it was his +ministrations that the dying child seemed to welcome most. For the most +part she lay in a semi-conscious state, heeding nothing, and only +moaning now and again, a sad little moan, like an injured bird. She +seemed to say she was so little a thing to suffer so. Once, however, +when Antony had just placed some fresh ice around her head, she opened +her eyes and said, "Dear little Daddy," and the light on Antony's +face—poor victim of perverse instincts that too often drew his really +fine nature awry—was sanctifying to see. +</p> +<p> +As terrible was the look of torture that came over his face, one night +near the end, when Wonder in a sudden nightmare of delirium had seized +his hand and cried:— +</p> +<p> +"O Daddy, the white lady! See her there at the end of the bed. She is +smiling, Daddy—" Then lower, "You will not make me kiss her any more, +will you, Daddy?"— +</p> +<p> +Beatrice had gone to snatch an hour or two's sleep, so she never heard +this, and it was no mere cowardly consolation for Antony to think +afterwards that no one but he and his little child had known of that +fatal afternoon in the wood. The dead understand all,—yes, even the +dead we have murdered. But the living can never be told a secret such as +that which Antony and his little daughter, whose soul was really grown +up, though she spoke still in baby language, shared immortally between +them. +</p> +<p> +When Beatrice returned to the room Wonder was sleeping peacefully again, +but at the chill hour when watchers blow out the night-lights, and a +dreary greyness comes like a fog through the curtains, Antony and +Beatrice fell into each other's arms in anguish, for Wonder was dead. +</p> + +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<a name="CH14"><!-- CH14 --></a> +<h2> + CHAPTER XIV +</h2> + +<center> +A SONG OF THE LITTLE DEAD +</center> +<p> +They carried little Wonder to a green churchyard, a place of kind old +trees and tender country bells. There were few birds to welcome her in +the grim November morning, but the grasses stole close and whispered +that very soon the thrush and the nightingale would be coming, that the +violets were already on their way, and that when May was there she +should lie all day in a bed of perfume. +</p> +<p> +For very dear to Nature's heart are the Little Dead. The great dead lie +imprisoned in escutcheoned vaults, but for the little dead Nature +spreads out soft small graves, all snowdrops and dewdrops, where +day-long they can feel the earth rocking them as in a cradle, and at +night hear the hushed singing of the stars. +</p> +<p> +Yes, Earth loves nothing so much as her little graves. There the tiny +bodies, like unexhausted censers, pour out all the stored sweetness they +had no time to use above the ground, turning the earth they lie in to +precious spices. There the roots of the old yew trees feel about +tenderly for the little unguided hands, and sometimes at nightfall the +rain bends over them weeping like an inconsolable mother. +</p> +<p> +It is on the little graves that the sun first rises at morn, and it is +there at evening that the moon lays softly her first silver flowers. +</p> +<p> +There the wren will sometimes bring her sky-blue eggs for a gift, and +the summer wind come sowing seeds of magic to take the fancy of the +little one beneath. Sometimes it shakes the hyacinths like a rattle of +silver, and spreads the turf above with a litter of coloured toys. +</p> +<p> +Here the butterflies are born with the first warm breath of the spring. +All the winter they lie hidden in the crevices of the stone, in the +carving of little names, and with the first spring day they stand +delicately and dry their yellow wings on the little graves. There are +the honeycombs of friendly bees, and the shelters of many a timid +earth-born speck of life no bigger than a dewdrop, mysteriously small. +Radiant pin-points of existence have their palaces on the broad blades +of the grasses, and in the cellars at their roots works many a humble +little slave of the mighty elements. +</p> +<p> +Yes, the emperors and the ants of Nature's vast economy alike love to be +kind to the little graves. +</p> + +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<a name="CH15"><!-- CH15 --></a> +<h2> + CHAPTER XV +</h2> + +<center> +SILENCIEUX ALONE IN THE WOOD. +</center> +<p> +Beatrice's grief for Wonder was such as only a mother can know. She had +but one consolation,—the kind sad eyes of Antony. She had lost Wonder, +but Antony had come back again. Wonder was not so dead as Antony had +seemed a month ago. +</p> +<p> +When they had left Wonder and were back in the house which was now twice +desolate, Antony took Beatrice's hands very tenderly and said:— +</p> +<p> +"I have been very wrong all these months. For a shadow I have missed the +lovely reality of a little child—and for a shadow, my own faithful +wife, I have all this time done you cruel wrong. But my eyes are open +now, I have come out of the evil dream that bound me—and never shall I +enter it again. Let us go from here. Let us leave this valley and never +come back to it any more." +</p> +<p> +So it was arranged that they should winter far away, returning only to +the valley for a few short days in the spring, and then leave it for +ever. They had no heart now for more than just to fly from that haunted +place, and before night fell in the valley they were already far away. +</p> +<p> +In vain Silencieux listened for the sound of her lover's step in the +wood, for he had vowed that he would never look upon her face again. +</p> + +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<a name="CH16"><!-- CH16 --></a> +<h2> + CHAPTER XVI +</h2> + +<center> +THE FIRST TALK ON THE HILLS +</center> +<p> +Antony took Beatrice to the high hills where all the year long the sun +and the snow shine together. He was afraid of the sea, for the sea was +Silencieux's for ever. In its depths lay a magic harp which filled all +its waves with music—music lovely and accursed, the voice of +Silencieux. That he must never hear again. He would pile the hills +against his ears. Inland and upland, he and Beatrice should go, ever +closer to the kind heart of the land, ever nearer to the forgetful +silences of the sky, till huge walls of space were between them and that +harp of the sea. Nor in the whisper of leaves nor in the gloom of +forests should the thought of Silencieux beset them. The earth that +held least of her—to that earth they would go; the earth that rose +nearest to heaven. +</p> +<p> +Beauty indeed should be theirs—the Beauty of Nature and Love; no more +the vampire's beauty of Art. +</p> +<p> +It was strange to each how their souls lightened as the valleys of the +world folded away behind them, and the simple slopes mounted in their +path. In that pure unladen air which so exhilarated their very bodies, +there seemed some mysterious property of exhilaration for the soul also. +One might have dreamed that just to breathe on those heights all one's +days would be to grow holy by the more cleansing power of the air. With +such bright currents ever running through the brain, surely one's +thoughts would circle there white as stones at the bottom of a spring. +</p> +<p> +"O Antony," said Beatrice, "why were we so long in finding the hills?" +</p> +<p> +"We found them once before, Beatrice—do you remember?" +</p> +<p> +"Yes! You have not forgotten?" said Beatrice, with the ray of a lost +happiness in her eyes—lost, and yet could it be dawning again? There +was a morning star in Antony's face. +</p> +<p> +"And then," said Antony, "we went into the valley—the Valley of Beauty +and Death." +</p> +<p> +Beatrice pressed his hand and looked all her love at him for comfort. He +knew how precious was such a forgiveness, the forgiveness of a mother +heart broken for the child, which he, directly or indirectly, had +sacrificed,—directly as he and Wonder alone knew, indirectly by taking +them with him into the Valley of Beauty. +</p> +<p> +"Ah, Beatrice, your love is almost greater than I can bear. I am not +worthy of it. I never shall be worthy. There is something in the love of +a woman like you to which the best man is unequal. We can love—and +greatly—but it is not the same." +</p> +<p> +"We went into the valley," he cried, "and I lost you your little +Wonder—" +</p> +<p> +"<i>Our</i> little Wonder," gently corrected Beatrice. "We found her +together, and we lost her together. Perhaps some day we shall find her +together again—" +</p> +<p> +"And do you know, Antony," Beatrice continued, "I sometimes wonder if +her little soul was not sent and so taken away all as part of a mission +to us, which in its turn is a part of the working out of her own +destiny. For life is very mysterious, Antony—" +</p> +<p> +"Alas! I had forgotten life," answered Antony with a sigh. +</p> +<p> +"Yes, dear," Beatrice went on, pursuing her thought. "I have dared to +hope that perhaps Wonder, as she was the symbol of our coming together, +was taken away just at this time because we were being drawn apart. +Perhaps it was to save our love that little Wonder died—" +</p> +<p> +Antony looked at Beatrice; half as one looks at a child, and half as one +might look at an angel. +</p> +<p> +"Beatrice," he said tenderly, "you believe in God." +</p> +<p> +"All women believe in God," answered Beatrice. +</p> +<p> +"Yes," said Antony musingly, and with no thought of irony, "it is that +which makes you women." +</p> + +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<a name="CH17"><!-- CH17 --></a> +<h2> + CHAPTER XVII +</h2> + +<center> +ANTONY ALONE ON THE HILLS +</center> +<p> +But although Beatrice might forgive Antony, from himself came no +forgiveness. He hid his remorse from her, sparing the mother-wound in +her heart—but always when he was walking alone he kept saying to +himself: "I have lost our little Wonder. I killed our little Wonder." +</p> +<p> +One day he climbed up the highest hill within reach, and there leaned +into the enormous silence, that he might cry it aloud for God to hear— +</p> +<p> +God!—poor little Beatrice, what God was there to hear! To look at +Beatrice one might indeed believe in God—and yet was it not Beatrice +who had made God in her own image? Was not God created of all pure +overflows of the human soul, the kind light of human eyes that not all +the suffering of the world can exhaust, the idealism of the human spirit +that not all the infamies of natural law can dismay? +</p> +<p> +Nevertheless, Antony confessed himself to God upon the hills, not indeed +as one seeking pardon, but punishment. +</p> +<p> +Yet Heaven's benign untroubled blue carried no cloud upon its face, +because one breaking human heart had thus breathed into it its unholy +secret. Around that whole enormous circle such cries and such +confessions were being poured like noxious vapours, from a thousand +cities; but that incorruptible ether remained unsullied as on the first +morning, the black smoke of it all lost in the optimism of God. +</p> +<p> +On some days he would live over again the scene with Wonder in the wood +with unbearable vividness. +</p> +<p> +"Why, those are only words, silly Daddy!"—How many times a day did he +not hear that quaint little voice making, with a child's profundity, +that tremendous criticism upon literature. +</p> +<p> +He had silenced her with the music of words, as he had silenced his own +heart and soul with the same music, but they were still only words none +the less. Ah! if she were only here to-day, he would bring her something +more beautiful than words—or toadstools. +</p> +<p> +He shuddered as he thought of the loathsome form his decaying fancy had +taken, that morning by the Three Black Ponds. He had filled the small +outstretched hands with Nature's filth and poison. She had asked for +flowers, he had brought her toadstools. Oh, the shame, the crime, the +anguish! +</p> +<p> +But worst of all was to hear himself saying in the silence of his soul, +over and over again without any power to still it, as one is forced +sometimes to hear the beating of one's heart: "Silencieux, I bring you +my little child." +</p> +<p> +There were times he heard this so plainly when he was with Beatrice that +he had to leave her and walk for hours alone. Only unseen among the +hills dare he give vent to the mad despair with which that memory tore +him. +</p> +<p> +Yes, for words—"only words"—he had sacrificed that wonderful living +thing, a child. For words he had missed that magical intercourse, the +intercourse with the mind of a child. How often had she come to him for +a story, and he had been dull and preoccupied—with words; how often +asked him to take her a walk up the lane, but he had been too busy—with +words! +</p> +<p> +O God, if only she might come and ask again. Now when she was so far +away his fancy teemed with stories. Every roadside flower had its +fairy-tale which cried, "Tell me to little Wonder"—and once he tried +to make believe to himself that Wonder was holding his hand, and looking +up into his face with her big grave eyes, as he told some child's +nonsense to the eternal hills. He broke off—half in anger with himself. +Was he changing one illusion for another? +</p> +<p> +"Fool, no one hears you," and he threw himself face down in the grass +and sobbed. +</p> +<p> +But a gentle hand was laid upon his shoulder and Beatrice's voice +said,— +</p> +<p> +"I heard you, Antony—and loved you for it." +</p> +<p> +So Antony had found the heart of a father when no longer he had a child. +</p> + +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<a name="CH18"><!-- CH18 --></a> +<h2> + CHAPTER XVIII +</h2> + +<center> +THE SECOND TALK ON THE HILLS +</center> +<p> +"But to think," said Antony presently, in answer to Beatrice's soothing +hand, "to think that I might have lived with a child—and I chose +instead to live with words. In all the mysterious ways of man, is there +anything quite so mysterious as that? Poor dream-led fool, poor lover of +coloured shadows! +</p> +<p> +"And yet, how proud I was of the madness! How I loved to say that words +were more beautiful than the things for which they stood, and that the +names of the world's beautiful women, Sappho, Fiametta, Guinivere, were +more beautiful than Sappho, Fiametta, Guinivere themselves; that the +names of the stars were lovelier than any star—who has ever found the +Pleiades so beautiful as their name, or any king so great as the sound +of Orion?—and what, anywhere in the Universe, is lovely enough to bear +Arcturus for its name?—Ah! you know how I used to talk—poor fool, poor +lover of coloured shadows!" +</p> +<p> +"Yes, dear," said Beatrice soothingly, "but that is passed now, and you +must not dwell too persistently in the sorrow of it, or in your grief +for little Wonder. That too is to dwell with shadows, and to dwell with +shadows either of grief or joy is dangerous for the soul." +</p> +<p> +"I know. But fear not, Beatrice. Perhaps there was the danger of my +passing from one cloudland to another—for I never knew how I loved our +Wonder till now, and I longed, if only by imagination, to follow her +where she has gone, and share with her the life together we have lost +here—" +</p> +<p> +"But that can never be," said Beatrice; "you must accept it, Antony. We +shall only meet her again by doing that. The sooner we can say from our +hearts 'She is lost here,' the nearer is she to being found in another +world. Yes, Antony dear, even Wonder's little shadow must be left +behind, if we are to mount together the hills of life." +</p> +<p> +"My wonderful Beatrice! Yes, the hills of life. No more its woods, but +its hills, bathed in a vast and open sunshine. Look around us—how nobly +simple is every line and shape! Far below the horizon nature is +elaborate, full of fancies,—mazy watercourses, delicate dingles, +fantastically gloomy ravines, misshapen woods, gibbering with diablerie; +but here how simple, how great, how good she is! There is not a shape +subtler than a common bowl, and the colours are alphabetical—and yet, +by what taking of thought could she have achieved an effect so grand, +at once so beautiful and so holy?" +</p> +<p> +"Yes, one might call it the good beauty," said Beatrice. +</p> +<p> +"Yes," continued Antony, perhaps somewhat ominously interested in the +subject, "that is a great mystery—the seeming moral meaning of the +forms of things. Some shapes, however beautiful, suggest evil; others, +however ugly, suggest good. As we look at a snake, or a spider, we know +that evil is shaped like that; and not only animate things but +inanimate. Some aspects of nature are essentially evil. There are +landscapes that injure the soul to look at, there are sunsets that are +unholy, there are trees breathing spiritual pestilence as surely as some +men breathe it—" +</p> +<p> +"Do you remember," continued Antony with a smile, which died as he +realised he was committed to an allusion best forgotten, "that old +twisted tree that stood on the moor near our wood? I often wonder what +mysterious sin he had committed—" +</p> +<p> +"Yes," laughed Beatrice, "he looked a terribly depraved old tree, I must +admit—but don't you think that when we have arrived at the discussion +of the mysterious sins of trees it is time to start home?" +</p> +<p> +"Yes, indeed," said Antony gaily, "let us change the subject to the +vices of flowers." +</p> +<p> +From which conversation it will be seen that Antony's mind was still +revolving with unconscious attraction around the mystery of Art. Was it +some far-travelled sea-wind bringing faint strains from that sunken +harp, strains too subtle for the ear, and even unrecognised by the mind? +</p> + +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<a name="CH19"><!-- CH19 --></a> +<h2> + CHAPTER XIX +</h2> + +<center> +LAST TALK ON THE HILLS +</center> +<p> +Beatrice's prayer had been answered. Antony had come back to her. She +was necessary to him once more. The old look was in his eyes, the old +sound in his voice. One day as they were out together she was so +conscious of this happiness returned that she could not forbear speaking +of it—with an inner feeling that it was better to be happy in silence. +</p> +<p> +What is that instinct in us which tells us that we risk our happiness in +speaking of it? Happiness is such a frightened thing that it flies at +the sound of its own name. And yet of what shall we speak if not our +happiness? Of our sorrows we can keep silence, but our joys we long to +utter. +</p> +<p> +So Beatrice spoke of her great happiness to Antony, and told him too of +her old great unhappiness and her longing for death. +</p> +<p> +"What a strange and terrible dream it has been—but thank God, we are +out in the daylight at last," said Antony. "O my little Beatrice, to +think that I could have forsaken you like that! Surely if you had come +and taken me by the hands and looked deep into my eyes, and called me +out of the dream, I must have awakened, for, cruel as it was, the dream +was but part of a greater dream, the dream of my love for you—" +</p> +<p> +"But I understand it all now," he continued, "see it all. Do you +remember saying that perhaps I had never loved anything but images all +my life? It was quite true. Since I can remember, when I thought I loved +something I was sure to find sooner or later that I loved less the +object itself than what I could say about it, and when I had said +something beautiful, something I could remember and say over and over to +myself, I cared little if the object were removed. The spiritual essence +of it seemed to have passed over into my words, and I loved the +reincarnation best. Only at last have I awakened to realities, and the +shadows flee away. The worshipper of the Image is dead within me. But +alas! that little Wonder had to die first—" +</p> +<p> +"I used to tell myself," he went on, "that human life, however +exquisite, without art to eternalise it, was like a rose showering its +petals upon the ground. For so brief a space the rose stood perfect, +then fell in a ruin of perfume. Wonderful moments had human life, but +without art were they not like pearls falling into a gulf? So I said: +there is nothing real but art. The material of art passes—human love, +human beauty—but art remains. It is the image, not the reality, that +is everlasting. I will live in the image." +</p> +<p> +"But I know now," he once more resumed, "that there is a higher +immortality than art's,—the immortality of love. The immortality of art +indeed is one of those curious illusions of man's self-love which a +moment's thought dispels. Art, who need be told, is as dependent for its +survival on the survival of its physical media as man's body itself—and +though the epic and the great canvas escape combustion for a million +years, they must burn at last, burn with all the other accumulated +shadows of time. What we call immortality in art is but the shadow of +the soul's immortality; but the immortality of love is that of the soul +itself—" +</p> +<p> +"O Antony," interrupted Beatrice, "you really believe that now? You will +never doubt it again?" +</p> +<p> +"We never doubt what we have really seen, and I had never seen before," +answered Antony, taking her hand and looking deep into her eyes, "never +seen it as I see it now." +</p> +<p> +"And you will never doubt it again?" +</p> +<p> +"Never." +</p> +<p> +"Whatever that voice should say to you?" +</p> +<p> +"I shall never hear that voice again." +</p> +<p> +"O Antony, is it really true? You have come back to me. I can hardly +believe it." +</p> +<p> +"Listen, Beatrice; when we return to the Valley, return only to leave it +for ever, I will take the Image and smash it in a hundred pieces—for I +hate it now as much as I once loved it. Fear not; it will never trouble +our peace again." +</p> +<p> +The mention of the valley was a momentary cloud on Beatrice's happiness, +but as she looked into Antony's resolute love-lit face, it melted away. +</p> + +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<a name="CH20"><!-- CH20 --></a> +<h2> + CHAPTER XX +</h2> + +<center> +ANTONY'S JUDGMENT UPON SILENCIEUX +</center> +<p> +So the weeks and months went by for those two upon the hills, and the +soul of Antony grew stronger day by day, and his love with it—and the +face of Beatrice was like a bird singing. At last the spring came, and +the snow was no more needed to keep warm the flowers. With the flowers +came the snowdrop-soul of Wonder, and the thoughts of mother and father +turned to the place of kind old trees and tender country bells, where in +the unflowering November they had laid her. These dark months the chemic +earth had been busy with the little body they loved, and by this time +Wonder would be many violets. +</p> +<p> +"Let us go to Wonder," they said; "she is awake now." +</p> +<p> +So they went to Wonder, and found her surrounded, in her earth cradle, +by a great singing of birds, and blossoms and green leaves innumerable. +It was more like a palace than a graveyard, and they went away happy for +their little one. +</p> +<p> +There remained now to take leave of the valley, which indeed looked its +loveliest, as though to allure them to remain. Some days they must stay +to make the necessary preparations for their departure. Among these, in +Antony's mind, the first and most necessary was that destruction of +Silencieux which he had promised himself and his wife upon the hills. +</p> +<p> +The first afternoon Beatrice noted him take a great hammer, and set out +up the wood. She gave him a look of love and trust as he went—though +there was a secret tremor in her heart, for she knew, perhaps better +than he, how strong was the power of Silencieux. +</p> +<p> +But in Antony's heart was no misgiving, or backsliding. In those months +on the hills he had realised human love, in the love of a true and +tender and fairy-like woman, and he knew that no illusions, however +specious, were worth that reality—a reality with all the magic of an +illusion. He gripped the hammer in his hand joyfully, eager to smite +featureless the face which had so misled him, brought such tragic sorrow +to those he had loved. +</p> +<p> +Still, for all his unshaken purpose, it was strange to see again the +face that had meant so much to him, around which his thoughts had +circled consciously or unconsciously all these absent weeks. +</p> +<p> +Seldom has a face seen again after long separation seemed so +disenchanted as Silencieux's. Was this she whom he had worshipped, she +who had told him in that strange voice of her immortal lovers, she with +whom he had sung by the sea, she with whom he had danced those strange +dances in the town, she who had whispered low that awful command, she to +whom he had sacrificed his little child? +</p> +<p> +She was just a dusty, neglected cast—nothing more. +</p> +<p> +Wonder's voice came back to him: "No, Daddy, they tasted of dust"—and +at that thought he gripped the hammer ready to strike. +</p> +<p> +And yet, even thus, she was a beautiful work of man's hands, and Antony, +hating to destroy beauty, still forbore to strike—just as he would have +shrunk from breaking in pieces a shapely vase. Then, too, the +resemblance to Beatrice took him again. Crudely to smash features so +like hers seemed a sort of mimic murder. So he still hesitated. Was +there no other way? Then the thought came to him: "Bury her." It pleased +him. Yes, he would bury her. +</p> +<p> +So, having found a spade, he took her from the wall, and looked from +his door into the wood, pondering where her grave should be. A whitebeam +at a little distance made a vivid conflagration of green amid the sombre +boles of the pines. Pinewoods rely on their undergrowth—bracken and +whortleberry and occasional bushes—for their spring illuminations, and +the whitebeam shone as bright in that wood as a lamp in the dark. +</p> +<p> +"I will bury her beneath the whitebeam," said Antony, and he carried her +thither. +</p> +<p> +Soon the grave was dug amid the pushing fronds of the young ferns, and +taking one long look at her, Antony laid her in the earth, and covered +her up from sight. Was it only fancy that as he turned away a faint +music seemed to arise from the ground, forming into the word "Resurgam" +as it died away? +</p> +<p> +"It is done," said Antony to Beatrice. "But I could not break her, she +looked so like you; so I buried her in the wood." +</p> +<p> +Beatrice kissed him gratefully. But her heart would have been more +satisfied had Silencieux been broken. +</p> + +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<a name="CH21"><!-- CH21 --></a> +<h2> + CHAPTER XXI +</h2> + +<center> +"RESURGAM!" +</center> +<p> +"Resurgam!" +</p> +<p> +Had his senses deceived him? They must have deceived him. And yet that +music at least had seemed startlingly near, sudden, and sweet, as though +one should tread upon a harp in the grass. For the next day or two +Antony could not get it out of his ears, and often, like a sweet wail +through the wood, he seemed to hear the word "Resurgam." +</p> +<p> +Was Silencieux a living spirit, after all,—no mere illusion, but one of +those beautiful demons of evil that do possess the souls of men? +</p> +<p> +He went and stood by Silencieux's grave. It was just as he had left it. +Only an early yellow butterfly stood fanning itself on the freshly +turned earth. +</p> +<p> +Was it the soul of Silencieux? +</p> +<p> +Cursing himself for a madman, he turned away, but had not gone many +yards, when once more—there was that sudden strain of music and the +word "Resurgam" somewhere on the wind. +</p> +<p> +This time he knew he was not mistaken, but to believe it true—O God, he +must not believe it true. Reality or fancy, it was an evil thing which +he had cast out of his life—and he closed his ears and fled. +</p> +<p> +Yet, though he loyally strove to quench that music in the sound of +Beatrice's voice, deep in his heart he knew that the night would come +when he would take his lantern and spade, wearily, as one who at length +after hopeless striving obeys once more some imperious weakness—and +look on the face of Silencieux again. +</p> +<p> +Too surely that night came, and, as in a dream, Antony found himself in +the dark spring night hastening with lantern and spade to Silencieux's +grave. It was only just to look on her face again, to see if she really +lived like a vampire in the earth; and were she to be alive, he vowed to +kill her where she lay—for into his life again he knew she must not +come. +</p> +<p> +As he neared the whitebeam, a gust of wind blew out his lantern, and he +stood in the profound darkness of the trees. While he attempted to +relight it, he thought he saw a faint light at the foot of the +whitebeam, as of a radiance welling out of the earth; but he dismissed +it as fancy. +</p> +<p> +Then, having relit the lantern, he set the spade into the ground, and +speedily removed the soil from the white face below. As he uncovered it, +the wind again extinguished the lantern, and there, to his amazement and +terror, was the face of Silencieux shining radiantly in the darkness. +The hole in which she lay brimmed over with light, as a spring wells +out of the hillside. Her face was almost transparent with brightness, +and presently she spoke low, with a voice sweeter than Antony had ever +heard before. It was the voice of that magic harp at the bottom of the +sea, it was the voice that had told him of her lovers, the voice of +hidden music that had cried "Resurgam" through the wood. +</p> +<p> +"Antony," she said, "sing me songs of little Wonder." +</p> +<p> +And, forgetting all but the magic of her voice, the ecstasy of being +hers again, Antony carried her with him to the châlet, and setting her +in her accustomed place, gazed at her with his whole soul. +</p> +<p> +"Sing me songs of little Wonder," she repeated. +</p> +<p> +"You bid me sing of little Wonder!" cried Antony, half in terror of this +beautiful evil face that drew him irresistibly as the moon, "you, who +took her from me!" +</p> +<p> +"Who but I should bid you sing of Wonder?" answered Silencieux. "I +loved her. That was why I took her from you, that by your grief she +should live for ever. There is no one but I who can give you back your +little Wonder—no one but I who can give you back anything you have +lost. If you love me faithfully, Antony—there is nothing you can lose +but in me you will find it again." +</p> +<p> +Antony bowed his head, his heart breaking for Beatrice—but who is not +powerless against his own soul? +</p> +<p> +"Listen," said Silencieux again. "Once on a time there was a beautiful +girl who died, and from her grave grew a wonderful flower, which all the +world came to see. 'Yet it seems a pity,' said one, 'that so beautiful a +girl should have died.' 'Ah,' said a poet standing by, 'there was no +other way of making the flower!'" +</p> +<p> +And again, as Antony still kept silence in his agony, Silencieux said, +"Listen." +</p> +<p> +"Listen, Antony. You have hidden yourself away from me, you have put +seas and lands between us, you have denied me with bitter curses, you +have vowed to thrust me from your life, you have given your allegiance +to the warm and pretty humanity of a day, and reviled the august cold +marble of immortality. But it is all in vain. In your heart of hearts +you love no human thing, you love not even yourself, you love only the +eternal spirit of beauty in all things, you love only me. Me you may +sacrifice, your own heart you may deny, in the weakness of human pity +for human love; but, should this be, your life will be in secret broken, +purposeless, and haunted, and to me at last you will come, at the +end—at the end and too late. This is your own heart's voice; you know +if it be true." +</p> +<p> +"It is true," moaned Antony. +</p> +<p> +"Many men and many loves are there in this world," continued +Silencieux, "and each knows the way of his own love, nor shall anything +turn him from it in the end. Here he may go and thither he may turn, but +in the end there is only one way of joy for each, and in that way must +he go or perish. Many faces are fair upon the earth, but for each man is +a face fairest of all, for which, unless he win it, each must go +desolate forever—" +</p> +<p> +"Face of Eternal Beauty," said Antony, "there is but one face for me for +ever. It is yours." +</p> +<hr> +<p> +On the morrow Beatrice saw once more that light in Antony's face which +made her afraid. He had brought with him some sheets of paper on which +were written the songs of little Wonder Silencieux had bidden him sing. +They were songs of grief so poignant and beautiful one grew happy in +listening to them, and Antony forgot all in the joy of having made +them. He read them to Beatrice in an ecstasy. Her face grew sadder and +sadder as he read. When he had finished she said:— +</p> +<p> +"Antony!—Silencieux has risen again." +</p> +<p> +"O Beatrice, Beatrice—I would do anything in the world for you—but I +cannot live without her." +</p> + +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<a name="CH22"><!-- CH22 --></a> +<h2> + CHAPTER XXII +</h2> + +<center> +THE STRANGENESS OF ANTONY +</center> +<p> +From this moment Silencieux took possession of Antony as she had never +taken it before. Never had he been so inaccessibly withdrawn into his +fatal dream. Beatrice forgot her own bitter sorrow in her fear for him, +so wrought was he with the fires that consumed him. Some days she almost +feared for his reason, and she longed to watch over him, but his old +irritation at her presence had returned. +</p> +<p> +As the summer days came on, she would see him disappear through the +green door of the wood at morning and return by it at evening; but all +the day each had been alone, Beatrice alone with a solitude in which was +now no longer any Wonder. The summer beauty gave her courage, but she +knew that the end could not be very far away. +</p> +<p> +One day there had been that in Antony's manner which had more than +usually alarmed her, and when night fell and he had not returned, she +went up the wood in search of him, her heart full of forebodings. As she +neared the châlet she seemed to hear voices. No! there was only one +voice. Antony was talking to some one. Careful to make no noise, she +stole up to the window and looked in. The sight that met her eyes filled +her with a great dread. "O God, he is going mad," she cried to herself. +</p> +<p> +Antony was sitting in a big chair drawn up to the fire. Opposite to him, +lying back in her cushions, was the Image draped in a large black velvet +cloak. A table stood between them, and on it stood two glasses, and a +decanter nearly empty of wine, Silencieux's glass stood untasted, but +Antony had evidently been drinking deeply, for his cheeks were flushed +and his eyes wild. +</p> +<p> +He was speaking in angry, passionate, despairing tones. One of her +strange moods of silence had come upon Silencieux, and she lay back in +her pillows stonily unresponsive. +</p> +<p> +"For God's sake speak to me," Antony cried. "I love you with my whole +heart. I have sacrificed all I love for your sake. I would die for you +this instant—yes! a hundred thousand deaths. But you will not answer me +one little word—" +</p> +<p> +But there was no answer. +</p> +<p> +"Silencieux! Have you ceased to love me? Is the dream once more at an +end, the magic faded? Oh, speak—tell me—anything—only speak!" But +still Silencieux neither spoke nor smiled. +</p> +<p> +"Listen, Silencieux," at last cried Antony, beside himself, "unless you +answer me, I will die this night, and my blood shall be upon your cruel +altar for ever." +</p> +<p> +As he spoke he snatched a dagger from among some bibelots on his mantel, +and drew it from its sheath. +</p> +<p> +"You are proud of your martyrs," he laughed; "see, I will bleed to death +for your sake. In God's name speak." +</p> +<p> +But Silencieux spoke nothing at all. +</p> +<p> +Then Beatrice, watching in terror, seeing by his face that he would +really kill himself, ran round to the door and broke in, crying, "O my +poor Antony!" but already he had plunged the dagger amid the veins of +his left wrist, and was watching the blood gush out with a strange +delight. +</p> +<p> +As Beatrice burst in, he looked up at her, and mistook her for +Silencieux. +</p> +<p> +"Ah!" he said, "you speak at last. You love me now, when it is too +late—when I am dying." +</p> +<p> +As he said this his face grew white and he fainted away. +</p> +<p> +For many days Antony lay unconscious, racked by terrible delirium. The +doctor called it brain fever. It was not the common form, he said, but a +more dangerous form, to which only imaginative men were subject. It was +a form of madness all the more malignant because the sufferer, and +particularly his friends, might go for years without suspecting it. The +doctor gave the disease no name. +</p> +<p> +During his illness Antony spoke to Beatrice all the time as Silencieux, +but one day, when he was nearly well again, he suddenly turned upon her +in enraged disappointment, with a curious harshness he had never shown +before, as though the gentleness of his soul had died during his +illness, and exclaimed:—"Why, you are not Silencieux, after all!" +</p> +<p> +"I am Beatrice," said his wife gently; "Beatrice, who loves you with her +whole heart." +</p> +<p> +"But I love Silencieux—" +</p> +<p> +Beatrice hid her face and sobbed. +</p> +<p> +"Where is Silencieux? Bring me Silencieux. I see! You have taken her +away while I was ill—I will go and seek her myself," and he attempted +to rise. +</p> +<p> +"You are too weak. You must not get up, Antony. I will bring you +Silencieux." +</p> +<p> +And so, till he was well enough to leave his bed, Silencieux hung facing +Antony on his bedroom wall, and on his first walk out into the air, he +took her with him and set her once more in her old shrine in the wood. +</p> +<p> +Now, by this time, the heart of Beatrice was broken. +</p> + +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<a name="CH23"><!-- CH23 --></a> +<h2> + CHAPTER XXIII +</h2> + +<center> +BEATRICE FULFILS HER DESTINY +</center> +<p> +The heart of Beatrice was broken, and there was now no use or place for +her in the world. Wonder was gone, and Antony was even further away. She +knew now that he would never come back to her. Never again could return +even the illusion of those happy weeks on the hills. Antony would be +hers no more for ever. +</p> +<p> +There but remained for her to fulfil her destiny, the destiny she had +vaguely known ever since Antony had brought home the Image, and shown +her how the Seine water had moulded the hair and made wet the eyelashes. +</p> +<p> +For some weeks now Beatrice had been living on the border of another +world. She had finally abandoned all her hopes of earthly joy—and to +Antony she was no longer any help or happiness. He had needed her again +for a few brief weeks, but now he needed her no more. His every look +told her how he wished her out of his life. And she had no one else in +the world. +</p> +<p> +But in another world she had her little Wonder. Lately she had begun to +meet her in the lanes. In the day she wore garlands of flowers round her +head, and in the night a great light. She would go to meet her at night, +that the light might lead her steps. +</p> +<p> +So one night while Antony banqueted strangely with Silencieux, she drew +her cloak around her and stole up the wood, to look a last good-bye at +him as he sat laughing with his shadows. +</p> +<p> +"Good-bye, Antony, good-bye," she cried. "I had but human love to give +you. I surrender you to the love of the divine." +</p> +<p> +Then noting how full of blossom were the lanes, and how sweet was the +night air, and smitten through all her senses with the song and perfume +of the world she was about to leave, she found her way, with a strange +gladness of release, to the Three Black Ponds. +</p> +<p> +It was moonlight, and the dwarf oak-trees made druid shadows all along +the leafy galleries that overhung the pools. The pools themselves shone +with a startling silver—so hushed, so dreamy was all that surrounded +them that there seemed something of an unnatural wakefulness, a daylight +observation, in their brilliant surfaces,—and on them, as last year, +the lilies floated like the crowns of sunken queens. But the third pool +lay more in shadow, and by that, as it seemed to Beatrice, a light was +shining. +</p> +<p> +Yes, a light was shining and a voice was calling. "Mother," it called, +"little Mother. I am waiting for you. Here, little Mother. Here by the +water-lilies we could not gather." +</p> +<p> +Beatrice, following the voice, stepped along the causeway and sank among +the lilies; and as she sank she seemed to see Antony bending over the +pond, saying: "How beautiful she looks, how beautiful, lying there among +the lilies!" +</p> +<hr> +<p> +On the morrow, when they had drawn Beatrice from the pond, with lilies +in her hair, Antony bent over her and said:— +</p> +<p> +"It is very sad—Poor little Beatrice—but how beautiful! It must be +wonderful to die like that." +</p> +<p> +And then again he said: "She is strangely like Silencieux." +</p> +<p> +Then he walked up the wood, in a great serenity of mind. He had lost +Wonder, but she lived again in his songs. He had lost Beatrice, but he +had her image—did she not live for ever in Silencieux? +</p> +<p> +So he went up the wood, whistling softly to himself—but lo! when he +opened his châlet door, there was a strange light in the room. The eyes +of Silencieux were wide open, and from her lips hung a dark moth with +the face of death between his wings. +</p> +<center> +THE END +</center> + +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> + +<div>*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 10812 ***</div> +</body> +</html> diff --git a/LICENSE.txt b/LICENSE.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6312041 --- /dev/null +++ b/LICENSE.txt @@ -0,0 +1,11 @@ +This eBook, including all associated images, markup, improvements, +metadata, and any other content or labor, has been confirmed to be +in the PUBLIC DOMAIN IN THE UNITED STATES. + +Procedures for determining public domain status are described in +the "Copyright How-To" at https://www.gutenberg.org. + +No investigation has been made concerning possible copyrights in +jurisdictions other than the United States. Anyone seeking to utilize +this eBook outside of the United States should confirm copyright +status under the laws that apply to them. diff --git a/README.md b/README.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000..92322a4 --- /dev/null +++ b/README.md @@ -0,0 +1,2 @@ +Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org) public repository for +eBook #10812 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/10812) diff --git a/old/10812-8.txt b/old/10812-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..b20648f --- /dev/null +++ b/old/10812-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,2890 @@ +Project Gutenberg's The Worshipper of the Image, by Richard Le Gallienne + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Worshipper of the Image + +Author: Richard Le Gallienne + +Release Date: January 23, 2004 [EBook #10812] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE WORSHIPPER OF THE IMAGE *** + + + + +Produced by Brendan Lane, Garrett Alley and PG Distributed Proofreaders + + + + + +The Worshipper of the Image + + +By +RICHARD LE GALLIENNE + + +JOHN LANE: THE BODLEY HEAD +LONDON AND NEW YORK +1900 + +THE UNIVERSITY PRESS, CAMBRIDGE, U.S.A. + +TO SILENCIEUX + +THIS TRAGIC FAIRY-TALE + + + + +Contents + + +CHAPTER + +I. SMILING SILENCE + +II. THE COMING OF SILENCIEUX + +III. THE NORTHERN SPHINX + +IV. AT THE RISING OF THE MOON + +V. SILENCIEUX SPEAKS + +VI. THE THREE BLACK PONDS + +VII. THE LOVERS OF SILENCIEUX + +VIII. A STRANGE KISS FOR SILENCIEUX + +IX. THE WONDERFUL WEEK + +X. SILENCIEUX WHISPERS + +XI. WONDER IN THE WOOD + +XII. AUTUMN IN THE VALLEY + +XIII. THE HUMAN SACRIFICE + +XIV. A SONG OF THE LITTLE DEAD + +XV. SILENCIEUX ALONE IN THE WOOD + +XVI. THE FIRST TALK ON THE HILLS + +XVII. ANTONY ALONE ON THE HILLS + +XVIII. THE SECOND TALK ON THE HILLS + +XIX. LAST TALK ON THE HILLS + +XX. ANTONY'S JUDGMENT UPON SILENCIEUX + +XXI. "RESURGAM!" + +XXII. THE STRANGENESS OF ANTONY + +XXIII. BEATRICE FULFILS HER DESTINY + + + +The Worshipper of the Image + + + + +CHAPTER I + + +SMILING SILENCE + +Evening was in the wood, still as the dreaming bracken, secretive, +moving softly among the pines as a young witch gathering simples. She +wore a hood of finely woven shadows, yet, though she drew it close, +sunbeams trooping westward flashed strange lights across her haunted +face. + +The birds that lived in the wood had broken out into sudden singing as +she stole in, hungry for silence, passionate to be alone; and at the +foot of every tree she cried "Hush! Hush!" to the bedtime nests. When +all but one were still, she slipped the hood from her face and listened +to her own bird, the night-jar, toiling at his hopeless love from a +bough on which already hung a little star. + +Then it was that a young man, with a face shining with sorrow, vaulted +lightly over the mossed fence and dipped down the green path, among the +shadows and the toadstools and the silence. + +"Silencieux," he said over to himself--"I love you, Silencieux." + +Far down the wood came and went through the trees the black and white +gable of a little châlet to which he was dreaming his way. + +Suddenly a small bronze object caught his eye moving across the mossy +path. It was a beautiful beetle, very slim and graceful in shape, with +singularly long and fine antennae. Antony had loved these things since +he was a child,--dragonflies with their lamp-like eyes of luminous horn, +moths with pall-like wings that filled the world with silence as you +looked at them, sleepy as death--loved them with the passion of a +Japanese artist who delights to carve them on quaint nuggets of metal. +Perhaps it was that they were so like words--words to which he had given +all the love and worship of his life. Surely he had loved Silencieux[1] +more since he had found for her that beautiful name. + +He held the beetle in his hand a long while, loving it. Then he said to +himself, with a smile in which was the delight of a success: "A +vase-shaped beetle with deer's horns." + +The phrase delighted him. He set the insect down on the path, tenderly. +He had done with it. He had carved it in seven words. The little model +might now touch its delicate way among the ferns at peace. + +"A vase-shaped beetle with deer's horns," he repeated as he walked on, +and then the gathering gloom of the wood suggested an addition: "And +some day I shall find in the wood that moth of which I have dreamed +since childhood--the dark moth with the face of death between his +wings." + +The châlet stood on a little clearing, in a little circle of pines. From +it the ground sloped down towards the valley, and at some distance +beneath smoke curled from a house lost amid clouds of foliage, the +abounding green life of this damp and brooding hollow. A great window +looking down the woodside filled one side of the châlet, and the others +were dark with books, an occasional picture or figured jar lighting up +the shadow. A small fire flickered beneath a quaintly devised mantel, +though it was summer--for the mists crept up the hill at night and +chilled the souls of the books. A great old bureau, with a wonderful +belly of mahogany, filled a corner of the room, breathing antique +mystery and refinement. At one end of it, on a small vacant space of +wall, hung a cast, apparently the death-mask of a woman, by which the +eye was immediately attracted with something of a shock and held by a +curious fascination. The face was smiling, a smile of great peace, and +also of a strange cunning. One other characteristic it had: the woman +looked as though at any moment she would suddenly open her eyes, and if +you turned away from her and looked again, she seemed to be smiling to +herself because she had opened them that moment behind your back, and +just closed them again in time. + +It was a face that never changed and yet was always changing. + +She looked doubly strange in the evening light, and her smile softened +and deepened as the shadows gathered in the room. + +Antony came and stood in front of her. + +"Silencieux," he whispered, "I love you, Silencieux. Smiling Silence, I +love you. All day long on the moors your smile has stolen like a +moonbeam by my side--" + +As he spoke, from far down the wood came the gentle sound of a woman's +voice calling "Antony," and coming nearer as it called. + +With a shade of impatience, Antony bent nearer to the image and kissed +it. + +"Good-bye, Silencieux," he whispered, "Good-bye, until the rising of the +moon." + +Then he passed out on to the little staircase that led down into the +wood, and called back to the approaching voice: "I am coming, +Beatrice,"--'Beatrice' being the name of his wife. + +As he called, a shaft of late sunlight suddenly irradiated the tall +slim form of a woman coming up the wood. She wore no hat, and the sun +made a misty glory of her pale gold hair. She seemed a fairy romantic +thing thus gliding in her yellow silk gown through the darkening pines. +And her face was the face of the image, feature for feature. There was +on it too the same light, the same smile. + +"Antony," she called, as they drew nearer to each other, "where in the +wide world have you been? Dinner has been waiting for half-an-hour." + +"Dinner!" he said, laughing, and kissing her kindly. "Fancy! the High +Muses have made me half-an-hour late for dinner. Beauty has made me +forget my dinner. Disgraceful!" + +"I don't mind your forgetting dinner, Antony--but you might have +remembered me." + +"Do you think I could remember Beauty and forget you? Yes! you _are_ +beautiful to-night, Silen--Beatrice. You look like a lady one meets +walking by a haunted well in some old Arthurian tale." + +"Hush!" said Beatrice, "listen to the night-jar. He is worth a hundred +nightingales." + +"Yes; what a passion is that!" said Antony, "so sincere, and yet so +fascinating too." + +"'Yet,' do you say, Antony? Why, sincerity is the most fascinating thing +in the world." + +And as they listened, Antony's heart had stolen back to Silencieux, and +once more in fancy he pressed his lips to hers in the dusk: "It is with +such an eternal passion that I love you, Silencieux." + +FOOTNOTES: + +[Footnote 1: Of course, the writer is aware that while "Silencieux" is +feminine, her name is masculine. In such fanciful names, however, such +license has always been considered allowable.] + + + + +CHAPTER II + + +THE COMING OF SILENCIEUX + +The manner in which Antony had found and come to love Silencieux was a +strange illustration of that law by which one love grows out of +another--that law by which men love living women because of the dead, +and dead women because of the living. + +One day as chance had sent him, picking his way among the orange boxes, +the moving farms, and the wig-makers of Covent Garden, he had come upon +a sculptor's shop, oddly crowded in among Cockney carters and decaying +vegetables. Faces of Greece and Rome gazed at him suddenly from a broad +window, and for a few moments he forsook the motley beauty of modern +London for the ordered loveliness of antiquity. + +Through white corridors of faces he passed, with the cold breath of +classic art upon his cheek, and in the company of the dead who live for +ever he was conscious of a contagion of immortality. + +Soon in an alcove of faces he grew conscious of a presence. Some one was +smiling near him. He turned, and, almost with a start, found that--as he +then thought--it was no living thing, but just a plaster cast among the +others, that was thus shining, like a star among the dead. A face not +ancient, not modern; but a face of yesterday, to-day, and for ever. + +Instantly he knew he had seen the face before. Where? + +Why, of course, it was the face of Beatrice, feature for feature. How +strange!--and, loving Beatrice, he bought it, because of his great love +for her! Who was the artist, what the time and circumstance, that had +anticipated in this strange fashion the only face he had ever really +loved on earth? + +He sought information of the shopkeeper, who told him a strange little +story of an unknown model and an unknown artist, and two tragic fates. + +When Antony had brought Silencieux home to Beatrice, she had at first +taken that delight in her which every created thing takes in a perfect, +or even an imperfect, reflection of itself. To have been anticipated in +a manner so unusual gave back in romantic suggestiveness what at first +sight it seemed to steal from one's personal originality. Only at first +sight--for, if like Beatrice, you were the possessor of a face so +uncommon in type that your lover might, with little fear of disproof, +declare, at all events in England, that there was none other like it, +you might grow superstitious as you looked at an anticipation so +creepily identical, and conceive strange fancies of re-incarnation. What +if this had been you in some former existence! Or at all events, if +there is any truth in those who tell us that in the mould and lines of +our faces and hands--yes! and in every secret marking of our bodies--our +fates are written as in a parchment; would it not be reasonable to +surmise, perhaps to fear, that the writing should mean the same on one +face as on the other, and the fates as well as the faces prove +identical? + +Beatrice gave the mask back to Antony, with a little shiver. + +"It is very wonderful, very strange, but she makes me frightened. What +was the story the man told you, Antony?" + +"No doubt it was all nonsense," Antony replied, "but he said that it was +the death-mask of an unknown girl found drowned in the Seine." + +"Drowned in the Seine!" exclaimed Beatrice, growing almost as white as +the image. + +"Yes! and he said too that the story went that the sculptor who moulded +it had fallen so in love with the dead girl, that he had gone mad and +drowned himself in the Seine also." + +"Can it be true, Antony?" + +"I hope so, for it is so beautiful,--and nothing is really beautiful +till it has come true." + +"But the pain, the pity of it--Antony." + +"That is a part of the beauty, surely--the very essence of its beauty--" + +"Beauty! beauty! O Antony, that is always your cry. I can only think of +the terror, the human anguish. Poor girl--" and she turned again to the +image as it lay upon the table,--"see how the hair lies moulded round +her ears with the water, and how her eyelashes stick to her cheek--Poor +girl." + +"But see how happy she looks. Why should we pity one who can smile like +that? See how peaceful she looks;" and with a sudden whim, Antony took +the image and set it lying back on a soft cushion in a corner of the +couch, at the same time throwing round its neck his black cloak, which +he had cast off as he came in. + +The image nestled into the cushion as though it had veritably been a +living woman weary for sleep, and softly smiling that it was near at +last. So comfortable she seemed, you could have sworn she breathed. + +Antony lifted her head once or twice with his fingers, to delight +himself with seeing her sink back luxuriously once more. + +Beatrice grew more and more white. + +"Antony, please stop. I cannot bear it. She looks so terribly alive." + +At that moment Antony's touch had been a little too forcible, the image +hung poised for a moment and then began to fall in the direction of +Beatrice. + +"Oh, she is falling," she almost screamed, as Antony saved the cast from +the floor. "For God's sake, stop!" + +"How childish of you, Beatrice. She is only plaster. I never knew you +such a baby." + +"I cannot help it, Antony. I know it is foolish, but I cannot help it. I +think living in this place has made me morbid. She seems so alive--so +evil, so cruel. I am sorry you bought her, Antony. I cannot bear to look +at her. Won't you take her away? Take her up into the wood. Keep her +there. Take her now. I shall not be able to sleep all night if I know +she is in the house." + +She was half hysterical, and Antony soothed her gently. + +"Yes, yes, dear. I'm sorry. I'll take her up the wood now this minute. +Wait till I light the lantern. Poor Beatrice, I never dreamed she would +affect you so. I loved her, dear--because I love you; but I would rather +break her in pieces than that she should make you unhappy. Though to +break any image of you, dear," he added tenderly, "would seem a kind of +sacrilege. You know how I love you, Beatrice, don't you?" + +"Of course I do, dear; and it was sweet of you to buy her for my sake, +and I'm quite silly to-night. To-morrow I shall think nothing about her. +Still, dear, she does frighten me, I can't tell why. There seems +something malignant about her, something that threatens our happiness. +Oh, how silly I am--" + +Meanwhile, Antony had lit an old brass lantern, and presently he was +flashing his way up among the dark sounds of the black old wood, with +that ghostly face tenderly pressed against his side. + +He stopped once to turn his lantern upon her. How mysterious she looked, +here in the night, under the dark pines! + +He too felt a little haunted as he climbed his châlet staircase and +unlocked the door, every sound he made echoing fatefully in the silent +wood; and when he had found a place for the image and hung her there, +she certainly looked a ghostly companion for the midnight lamp, in the +middle of a wood. + +How strangely she smiled, the smile almost of one taking possession. + +No wonder Beatrice had been frightened. Was there some mysterious life +in the thing, after all? Why should these indefinite forebodings come +over him as he looked at her!--But he was growing as childish as +Beatrice. Surely midnight, a dark wood, a lantern, and a death-mask, +with two owls whistling to each other across the valley, were enough to +account for any number of forebodings! But Antony shivered, for all +that, as he locked the door and hastened back again down the wood. + + + + +CHAPTER III + + +THE NORTHERN SPHINX + +Antony had not written a poem to his wife since their little girl Wonder +had been born, now some four years ago. Surely it was from no lack of +love, this silence, but merely due to the working of what would seem to +be a law of the artistic temperament: that to turn a muse into a wife, +however long and faithfully loved, is to bid good-bye to the muse. But a +day or two after the coming of Silencieux, Antony found himself suddenly +inspired once more to sing of his wife. It was the best poem he had +written for a long time, and when it was finished, he came down the wood +impatient to read it to Beatrice. This was the poem, which he called +"The Northern Sphinx":-- + + Sphinx of the North, with subtler smile + Than hers who in the yellow South, + With make-believe mysterious mouth, + Deepens the _ennui_ of the Nile; + + And, with no secret left to tell, + A worn and withered old coquette, + Dreams sadly that she draws us yet, + With antiquated charm and spell: + + Tell me your secret, Sphinx,--for mine!-- + What means the colour of your eyes, + Half innocent and all so wise, + Blue as the smoke whose wavering line + + Curls upward from the sacred pyre + Of sacrifice or holy death, + Pale twisting wreaths of opal breath, + From fire mounting into fire. + + What is the meaning of your hair? + That little fairy palace wrought + With many a grave fantastic thought; + I send a kiss to wander there, + + To climb from golden stair to stair, + Wind in and out its cunning bowers,-- + O garden gold with golden flowers, + O little palace built of hair! + + The meaning of your mouth, who knows? + O mouth, where many meanings meet-- + Death kissed it stern, Love kissed it sweet, + And each has shaped its mystic rose. + + Mouth of all sweets, whose sweetness sips + Its tribute honey from all hives, + The sweetest of the sweetest lives, + Soft flowers and little children's lips; + + Yet rather learnt its heavenly smile + From sorrow, God's divinest art, + Sorrow that breaks and breaks the heart, + Yet makes a music all the while. + + Ah! what is that within your eyes, + Upon your lips, within your hair, + The sacred art that makes you fair, + The wisdom that hath made you wise? + + Tell me your secret, Sphinx,--for mine!-- + The mystic word that from afar + God spake and made you rose and star, + The _fiat lux_ that bade you shine. + +While Antony read, Beatrice's face grew sadder and sadder. When he had +finished she said:-- + +"It is very beautiful, Antony--but it is not written for me." + +"What can you mean, Beatrice? Who else can it be written for?" + +"To the Image of me that you have set up in my place." + +"Beatrice, are you going mad?" + +"It is quite true, all the same. Time will show. Perhaps you don't know +it yourself as yet, but you will before long." + +"But, Beatrice, the poem shows its own origin. Has your image blue eyes, +or curiously coiled hair--" + +"Oh, yes, of course, you thought of me. You filled in from me. But the +inspiration, the wish to write it, came from the image--" + +"It is certainly true that I love to look at it, as I love to look at a +picture of you--because it is you--" + +"As yet, no doubt, but you will soon love it for its own sake. You are +already beginning." + +"I love an image! You are too ridiculous, Beatrice." + +"Does it really seem so strange, dear? I sometimes think you have never +loved anything else." + +Antony had laughed down Beatrice's fancies, yet all the time she had +been talking he was conscious that the idea she had suggested was +appealing to him with a perverse fascination. + +To love, not the literal beloved, but the purified stainless image of +her,--surely this would be to ascend into the region of spiritual love, +a love unhampered and untainted by the earth. + +As he said this to himself, his mind, ever pitilessly self-conscious, +knew it was but a subterfuge, a fine euphemism for a strange desire +which he had known was already growing within him; for when Beatrice had +spoken of his loving an image, it was no abstract passion he had +conceived, but some fanciful variation of earthly love--a love of +beauty centring itself upon some form midway between life and death, +inanimate and yet alive, human and yet removed from the accidents of +humanity. + +To love an image with one's whole heart! If only one could achieve +that--and never come out of the dream. + +These thoughts gave him a new desire to look again at the image. He felt +that in some way she would be changed, and he hastened up the wood in a +strange expectancy. + + + + +CHAPTER IV + + +AT THE RISING OF THE MOON + +But a week or two more, and Beatrice's prophecy had progressed so far +towards fulfilment, that Antony was going about the woods and the moors +saying over to himself the name he had found for the Image, as we saw in +the first chapter; and his love for Silencieux, begun more or less as a +determined self-illusion, grew more and more of a reality. Every day new +life welled into Silencieux's face, as every day life ebbed from the +face of Beatrice, surely foreseeing the coming on of what she had +feared. For the love he gave to Silencieux Antony must take away from +Beatrice, from whom as the days went by he grew more and more withdrawn. + +It was true that the long lonely days which he spent in the wood bore +fruit in a remarkable productiveness. Never had his imagination been so +enkindled, or his pen so winged. But this very industry, the proofs of +which he would each evening bring down the wood for that fine judgment +of Beatrice's, which, in spite of all, still remained more to him than +any other praise--this very industry was the secret confirmation for +Beatrice's sad heart. No longer the inspirer, she was yet, she bitterly +told herself, honoured among women as a critic. Her heart might bleed, +and her eyes fill with tears, as he read; but then, as he would say, the +Beauty, the Music! Is it Beautiful? Is it Music? If it be that, no +matter how it has been made! Let us give thanks for creation, though it +involves the sacrifice of our own most tender and sacred feelings. To +set mere personal feelings against Beauty--human tears against an +immortal creation! Did he spare his own feelings? Indeed he did not. + +On the night when we first met him bidding good-bye to Silencieux "until +the rising of the moon," he had sat through dinner eating but little, +feverishly and somewhat cruelly gay. Though he was as yet too kind to +admit it to himself, Beatrice was beginning to bore him, not merely by +her sadness, which his absorption prevented his realising except in +flashes, but by her very resemblance to the Image--of which, from having +been the beloved original, she was, in his eyes, becoming an indifferent +materialisation. The sweet flesh he had loved so tenderly became an +offence to him, as a medium too gross for the embodiment of so beautiful +a face. Such a face as Silencieux's demanded a more celestial porcelain. + +Dinner at last finished, he made an excuse to Beatrice for leaving her +alone once more at the end as he had during all the rest of the day, +and hastened to keep his tryst with Silencieux. During dinner the +conscious side of his mind had been luxuriating in the romantic sound of +"until the rising of the moon,"--for he was as yet a long way from being +quite simple even with Silencieux,--and the idea of his going out with +serious eagerness to meet one who, if she was as he knew a living being, +was an image too, delighted his sense of fantastic make-believe. + +There is in all love that element of make-believe. Every woman who is +loved is partly the creation of her lover's fancy. He consciously +siderealises her, and with open eyes magnifies her importance to his +life. Antony but made believe and magnified uncommonly--and his dream of +vivifying white plaster was perhaps less desperate than the dreams of +some, that would breathe the breath of life into the colder clay of some +beloved woman, who seems spontaneously to live but is dead all the +while. + +Silencieux appeared to be dead, but beneath that eternal smile, as +Beatrice had divined, as Antony was learning, she was only too terribly +alive. Yes! Antony's was the easier dream. + +The moon and Antony came up the wood together from opposite ends, and +when Antony entered his châlet Silencieux was already waiting for him, +her head crowned with a moonbeam. He kissed her softly and took her with +him out into the ferns. + + + + +CHAPTER V + + +SILENCIEUX SPEAKS + +So long as the moon held, Antony stole up the wood each night to meet +Silencieux--"at the rising of the moon." Sometimes he would lie in a +hollow with her head upon his knee, and gaze for an hour at a time, +entranced, into her face. He would feign to himself that she slept, and +he would hold his breath lest he should awaken her. Sometimes he would +say in a tender whisper, not loud enough for her to hear:-- + +"It is cold to-night, Silencieux. See, my cloak will keep you warm." + +Once as he did this she heaved a gentle sigh, as though thanking him. + +At other times he would place her against the gable of the châlet, so +that the moonlight fell upon her, and then he would plunge into the +wood and walk its whole length, so that, as he wound his way back +through the intervening brakes, her face would come and go, glimmering +away off through the leafage, beckoning to him to return. And once he +thought he heard her call his name very softly through the wood. + +That may have been an illusion, but it was during these days that he did +actually hear her speak for the first time. He had been writing till +past midnight, with her smile just above him, and when he had turned out +the lamp and was moving to the door through the vague flickering light +of the fire, he distinctly heard a voice very luxurious and tender say +"Antony," just behind him. It was hardly more than a whisper, but its +sweetness thrilled his blood, and half in joy and fear he turned to her +again. But she was only smiling inscrutably as before, and she spoke no +more for that night. + + + + +CHAPTER VI + + +THE THREE BLACK PONDS + +At the bottom of the valley, approached by sunken honeysuckle lanes that +seemed winding into the centre of the earth, lay three black ponds, +almost hidden in a _cul-de-sac_ of woodland. Though long since +appropriated by nature, made her own by moss and rooted oaks, they were +so set one below the other, with green causeways between each, that an +ancient art, long since become nature, had evidently designed and dug +them, years, perhaps centuries, ago. So long dead were the old +pond-makers that great trees grew now upon the causeways, and vast +jungles of rush and water grasses choked the trickling overflows from +one pond to the other. Once, it was said, when the earth of those parts +had been rich in iron, these ponds had driven great hammers,--but long +before the memory of the oldest cottager they had rested from their +labours, and lived only the life of beauty and silence. Where iron had +once been was now the wild rose, and the grim wounds of the earth had +been healed by the kisses of five hundred springs. + +About these ponds stole many a secret path, veined with clumsy roots, +shadowed with the thick bush of many a clustering parasite, and echoing +sometimes beneath from the hollowed shelter of coot or water-rat. Lilies +floated in circles about the ponds, like the crowns of sunken queens, +and sometimes a bird broke the silence with a frightened cry. + +It was here that Beatrice and Wonder would often take their morning +walk,--Wonder, though but a little girl of four, having grown more and +more of a companion to her mother, since Antony's love for Silencieux. + +A morning in August the two were walking hand in hand. Wonder was one of +those little girls that seem to know all the meanings of life, while yet +struggling with the alphabet of its unimportant words. + +The soul of such a child is, of all things, the most mysterious. There +was that in her face, as she clung on to her mother's hand, which seemed +to say: "O mother, I understand it all, and far more; if I might only +talk to you in the language of heaven,--but my words are like my little +legs, frail and uncertain of their footing, and, while I think all your +strange grown-up thoughts, I can only talk of toys and dolls. Mother, +father's blood as well as yours is in my veins, and so I understand you +both. Poor little mother! Poor little father!" + +Little Wonder looked these things, she may indeed have thought them; +but all she said was: "O mother, what was that?" + +"That was a rabbit, dear. See, there is another! See his fluffy white +tail!" + +And again: "O mother, what was that?" + +"That was a water-hen, dear. She has a little house, a warm nest, close +to the water among the bushes yonder, and she calls like that to let her +little children know she's coming home with some dainty things for +lunch. She means 'Hush! Hush! Don't be frightened. I'm coming just as +fast as I can.'" + +"Funny little mother! What pretty stories you tell me. But do the birds +really talk--Oh, but look, little mother, there's Daddy--" + +It was Antony, deep in some dream of Silencieux. + +"Daddy! Daddy!" cried the little girl. + +He took her tenderly by the hand. + +"Daddy, where have you been all this long time? You have brought me no +flowers for ever so long." + +"Flowers, little Wonder--they are nearly all gone away, gone to sleep +till next year--But see, I will gather you something prettier than +flowers." + +And, hardly marking Beatrice, he led Wonder up and down among the +winding underwood. Fungi of exquisite yellows and browns were popping up +all about the wood. He gathered some of the most delicate, and put them +into the fresh small hands. + +"But, Daddy, I mustn't eat them, must I?" + +"No, dear--they are too beautiful to eat. You must just look at them and +love them, like flowers." + +"But they are not flowers, Daddy. They don't smell like flowers. I would +rather have flowers, Daddy." + +"But there are no flowers till next year. You must learn to love these +too, little Wonder; they are more beautiful than flowers." + +"Oh, no, Daddy, they are not--" + +"Antony," said Beatrice, "how strange you are! Would you poison her? +See, dear," (turning to Wonder) "Daddy is only teasing. Let us throw +them away. They are nasty, nasty things. Promise me never to gather +them, won't you, Wonder?" + +"Yes, mother. I don't like them. They frighten me." + +Antony turned into a by-path with a strange laugh, and was lost to them +in the wood. + + + + +CHAPTER VII + + +THE LOVERS OF SILENCIEUX + +Silencieux often spoke to Antony now. Sometimes a sudden, startling word +when he was writing late at night; sometimes long tender talks; once a +terrible whisper. But all this time she never opened her eyes. The +lashes still lay wet upon her cheeks, and when she spoke her lips seemed +hardly to move, only to smile with a deeper meaning, an intenser life. +Indeed, at these times, her face shone with so great a brightness that +Antony's vision was dazzled, and to his gaze she seemed almost +featureless as a star. + +Once he had begged to see her eyes. + +"You know not what you ask," she had answered. "When you see my eyes you +will die. Some day, Antony, you shall see my eyes. But not yet. You +have much to do for me yet. There is yet much love for you and me before +the end." + +"Have all died who saw your eyes, Silencieux?" + +"Yes, all died." + +"You have had many lovers, Silencieux. Many lovers, and far from here, +and long ago." + +"Yes, many lovers, long ago," echoed Silencieux. + +"You have been very cruel, Silencieux." + +"Yes, very cruel, but very kind. It is true men have died for me. I have +been cruel, yes, but to die for me has seemed better than to live for +any other. And some of my lovers I have never forsaken. When they have +lost all in the world, they have had me. Lonely garrets have seemed +richly furnished because of my face, and men with foodless lips have +died blest because I was near them at the last. Sometimes I have kissed +their lips and died with them, and the world has missed my face for a +hundred unlovely years--for the world is only beautiful when I and my +lovers are in it. Antony, you are one of my lovers, one of my dearest +lovers; be great enough, be all mine, and perhaps I will die with you, +Antony--and leave the world in darkness for your sake, another hundred +years." + +"Tell me of your lovers, Silencieux." + +"Nearly three thousand years ago I loved a woman of Mitylene, very fair +and made of fire. But she loved another more than I, and for his sake +threw herself from a rock into the sea. As she fell, the rose we had +made together fell from her bosom, and was torn to pieces by the sea. +Fishermen gathered here and there a petal floating on the waters,--but +what were they?--and the world has never known how wonderful was that +rose of our love which she took with her into the depths of the sea." + +"You are faithful, Silencieux; you love her still." + +"Yes, I love her still." + +"And with whom did love come next, Silencieux?" + +"Oh, I loved many those years, for the loss of a great love sends us +vainly from hand to hand of many lesser loves, to ease a little the +great ache; and at that time the world seemed full of my lovers. I have +forgotten none of them. They pass before me, a fair frieze of +unforgotten faces; but most I loved a Roman poet, because, perhaps, he +loved so well the memory of her I had loved, and knew so skilfully to +make bloom again among his own red roses those petals of passionate +ivory which the fishermen of Lesbos had recovered from the sea." + +"Tell me of your lovers, Silencieux," said Antony again. + +"Hundreds of years after, I loved in Florence a young poet with a face +of silver. His soul was given to a little red-cheeked girl. She died, +and then I took him to my bosom, and loved him on through the years, +till his face had grown iron with many sorrows. Now at last, his +baby-girl by his side, he sits in heaven, with a face of gold. In +Paris," she went on, "have I been wonderfully beloved, and in northern +lands near the pole--" + +"But--England?" said Antony. "Tell me of your English lovers." + +"Best of them I love two: one a laughing giant who loved me three +hundred years ago, and the other a little London boy with large eyes of +velvet, who mid all the gloom of your great city saw and loved my face, +as none had seen and loved it since she of Mitylene. I found the giant +sitting by a country stream, holding a daffodil in his mighty hands and +whistling to the birds. He took and wore me like a flower. I was to him +as a nightingale that sang from his sleeve, for he loved so much +besides. Yet me he loved best, as those who can read his secret poems +understand. But my little London boy loved me only. For him the world +held nothing but my face, and it was of his great love for me that he +died." + +"But these were all poets," said Antony. + +"Yes, poets are the greatest of all lovers. Though all who since the +world began have been the makers of beautiful things have loved me, I +love my poets best. Sweeter than marble or many colours to my eyes is +the sound of a poet singing in my ears--" + +"For whom, Silencieux, did you step down into the sad waters of the +Seine?" + +"It was a young poet of Paris, beloved of many women, a drunkard of +strange dreams. He too died because he loved me, and when he died there +was none left whose voice seemed sweet after his. So I died with him. I +died with him," she repeated, "to come to life again with you. Many +lips have been pressed to mine, Antony, since the cold sleep of the +Seine fell over me, but none were warm and wild like yours. I loved my +sleep while the others kissed me, but with the touch of your lips the +dreams of life began to stir within me again. O Antony, be great enough, +be all mine, that we may fulfil our dream; and perhaps, Antony, I will +die with you--and leave the world in darkness for your sake, another +hundred years." + +Exalted above the earth with the joy of Silencieux's words, Antony +pressed his lips to hers in an ecstasy, and vowed his life and all +within it inviolably to her. + + + + +CHAPTER VIII + + +A STRANGE KISS FOR SILENCIEUX + +One hot August afternoon Antony took Silencieux with him to a +bramble-covered corner of the dark moor which bounded his little wood. A +ruined bank soaked with sunshine, a haunt of lizards, a catacomb of +little lives that creep and run and whisper, made their seat. + +Silencieux's face, out there under the open sky and in the full blaze of +the sun, at once lost and gained in reality; gained by force of a +contrast which accentuated while it limited her, lost by opposition to +the great faces of earth and sky. Her life, so concentrated, so +self-absorbed, seemed more of an essence, potently distilled, compared +with this abounding ichor of existence, that audibly sang in brimming +circulation through the veins of this carelessly immortal earth. + +For some moments of self-conscious thought she shrank into a symbol,--a +symbol of but one of the elements of the mighty world. Yet to this +element did not all the others, more brutal in force, more extended in +space, conspire? + +So in some hours will the most mortal maid of warmest flesh and blood +become an abstraction to her lover--sometimes shrink to the significance +of one more flower, and sometimes expand to the significance of a +microcosm, a firmament in mystical miniature. + +Thus in like manner for Antony did Silencieux alternate between reality +and dream that afternoon, though all the time he knew that, however now +and again the daylight seemed to create an illusion of her remoteness, +she was still his, and he of all men her chosen lover. + +Suddenly as they sat there together, silent and immovable, Antony +caught the peer of two bright little eyes fixed on the white face of +Silencieux. A tiny wedge-shaped head, with dashes of white across the +brows, reared itself out of a crevice in the bank. A forked tongue came +and went like black lightning through its eager little lips, and a +handsomely marked adder began to glide, like molten metal, along the +bank to Silencieux. The brilliant whiteness of the image had fascinated +the little creature. Antony kept very still. Darting its head from side +to side, venomously alert against the smallest sound, the adder reached +Silencieux. Then to Antony's delight it coiled itself round the white +throat, still restlessly moving its head wonderingly beneath the chin. +With a grace to which all movement from the beginning of time seemed to +have led up, it clasped Silencieux's neck and softly reared its lips to +hers. Its black tongue darted to and fro along that strange smile. + +"He has kissed her!" Antony exclaimed, and in an instant the adder was +nothing more than a terrified rustle in the brushwood. + +He took Silencieux into his hands. There was poison on her lips. For +another moment his fancy made him self-conscious, and turned Silencieux +again into a symbol,--though it was but for a moment. + +"There is always poison on the lips of Art," he said to himself. + + + + +CHAPTER IX + + +THE WONDERFUL WEEK. + +As Antony and Silencieux became more and more to each other, poor +Beatrice, though she had been the first occasion of their love, and +little as she now demanded, seldom as Antony spoke to her, seldom as he +smiled upon her, distant as were the lonely walks she took, infrequent +as was her sad footfall in the little wood,--poor Beatrice, though +indeed, so far from active intrusion upon their loves, and as if only by +her breathing with them the heavy air of that green unwholesome valley, +was becoming an irksome presence of the imagination. They longed to be +somewhere together where Beatrice had never been, where her sad face +could not follow them; and one night Silencieux whispered to Antony:-- + +"Take me to the sea, Antony--to some lonely sea." + +"To-morrow I will take you," said Antony, "where the loneliest land +meets the loneliest sea." + +On the morrow evening the High Muses had once more made Antony late for +dinner. One hour, and two hours, went by, and then Beatrice, in alarm, +took the lantern and courageously braved the blackness of the wood. + +The châlet was in darkness, and the door was locked, but through the +uncurtained glass of the window, she was able to irradiate the emptiness +of its interior. Antony was not there. + +But she noticed, with a shudder, that the space usually filled by the +Image was vacant. Then she understood, and with a hopeless sigh went +down the wood again. + +Already Antony and Silencieux had found the place where the loneliest +land meets the loneliest sea. Side by side they were sitting on a +moonlit margin of the world, and Antony was singing low to the murmur of +the waves:-- + + Hopeless of hope, past desire even of thee, + There is one place I long for, + A desolate place + That I sing all my songs for, + A desolate place for a desolate face, + Where the loneliest land meets the loneliest sea. + + Green waves and green grasses--and nought else is nigh, + But a shadow that beckons; + A desolate face, + And a shadow that beckons + The desolate face to the desolate place + Where the loneliest sea meets the loneliest sky. + + Wide sea and wide heaven, and all else afar, + But a spirit is singing, + A desolate soul + That is joyfully winging-- + A desolate soul--to that desolate goal + Where the loneliest wave meets the loneliest star. + +"It is not good," said Silencieux. + +"I know," answered Antony. + +"Throw it into the sea." + +"It is not worthy of the sea." + +"Burn it." + +"Fire is too august." + +"Throw it to the winds." + +"They are too busy." + +"Bury it." + +"It would make barren a whole meadow." + +"Forget it." + +"I will--And you?" + +"I will." + +And Antony and Silencieux laughed softly together by the sea. + +Many days Antony and Silencieux stayed together by the sea. They loved +it together in all its changes, in sun and rain, in wild wind and dreamy +calm; at morning when it shone like a spirit, at evening when it +flickered like a ghost, at noon when it lay asleep curled up like a +woman in the arms of the land. Sometimes at evening they sat in the +little fishing harbour, watching the incoming boats, till the sky grew +sad with rigging and old men's faces. + +Then at last Silencieux said: "I am weary of the sea. Let us go to the +town--to the lights and the sad cries of the human waves." + +So they went to the town and found a room high up, where they sat at the +window and watched the human lights, and listened to the human music. + +Never had it been so wonderful to be together. + +For a week Antony lived in heaven. Never had Silencieux been so kind, so +close to him. + +"Let us be little children," he said. "Let us do anything that comes +into our heads." + +So they ran in and out among pleasures together, joined strange dances +and sang strange songs. They clapped their hands to jugglers and +acrobats, and animals tortured into talent. And sometimes, as the gaudy +theatre resounded about them, they looked so still at each other that +all the rest faded away, and they were left alone with each other's eyes +and great thoughts of God. + +"I love you, Silencieux." + +"I love you, Antony." + +"You will never leave me lonely in my dream, Silencieux?" + +"Never, Antony." + +Oh, how tender sometimes was Silencieux! + +Several nights they had the whim that Silencieux should masquerade in +the wardrobe of her past. + +"To-night, you shall go clothed as when you loved that woman in +Mitylene," Antony would say. + +Or: "To-night you shall be a little shepherd-boy, with a leopard-skin +across your shoulder and mountain berries in your hair." + +Or again: "To-night you shall be Pierrot--mourning for his Columbine." + +Ah! how divine was Silencieux in all her disguises!--a divine child. Oh, +how tender those nights was Silencieux! + +Antony sat and watched her face in awe and wonder. Surely it was the +noblest face that had ever been seen in the world. + +"Is it true that that noble face is mine?" he would ask; "I cannot +believe it." + +"Kiss it," said Silencieux gaily, "and see." + + * * * * * + +Then on a sudden, what was this change in Silencieux! So cold, so +silent, so cruel, had she grown. + +"Silencieux," Antony called to her. "Silencieux," he pleaded. + +But she never spoke. + +"O Silencieux, speak! I cannot bear it." + +Then her lips moved. "Shall I speak?" she said, with a cruel smile. + +"Yes," he besought her again. + +"I shall love you no more in this world. The lights are gone out, the +magic faded." + +"Silencieux!" + +But she spoke no more, and, with those lonely words in his ears, Antony +came out of his dream and heard the rain falling miserably through the +wood. + + + + +CHAPTER X + + +SILENCIEUX WHISPERS + +So Antony first knew how cruel could be Silencieux to those who loved +her. Her sudden silences he had grown to understand, even to love. +Always they had been broken again by some wonderful word, which he had +known would come sooner or later. All great natures are full of silence. +Silence is the soil of all passion. But now it was not silence that was +between them, but terrible speech. As with a knife she had stabbed their +love right in its heart. Yet Antony knew that his love could never die, +but only suffer. + +During these days he half turned to Beatrice. How kind was her simple +earth-warm affection, after the star-cold transcendentalism in which he +had been living! How full of comfort was her unselfish humanity, after +the pitiless egoism of the divine! + +And yet, while it momentarily soothed him, he realised, with a heart sad +for Beatrice as for himself, that it could never satisfy him again. For +days he left Silencieux alone in the wood, and Beatrice's face +brightened with their renewed companionship; but all the time he seemed +to hear Silencieux calling him, and he knew that he would have to go +back. + +One night, almost happy again, as he lay by the side of Beatrice, who +was sleeping deeply, he rose stealthily, and looked out into the wood. + +The moonlight fell through it mysteriously, as on that night when he had +stolen up there to meet Silencieux--"at the rising of the moon." He +could hesitate no longer. Leaving Beatrice asleep, he was soon making +his way once more through the moonlit trees. + +The little châlet looked very still and solemn, like a temple of +Chaldean mysteries, and an unwonted chill of fear passed through Antony +as he stood in the circle of moonlight outside. His spirit seemed aware +of some dread menace to the future in that moment, and a voice was +crying within him to go back. + +But the longing that had brought him so far was too strong for such +undefined warnings. Once more he turned the key in the lock, and looked +on Silencieux once more. + +The moonlight fell over her face like a veil of silver, and on her +eyelashes was a glitter of tears. + +Her face was alive again, alive too with a softness of womanhood he had +never seen before. + +"Forgive me, Antony," she said. "I loved you all the time." + +What else need Silencieux say! + +"But it was so strange," said Antony after a while, "so strange. I +could have borne the pain, if only I could have understood." + +"Shall I tell you the reason, Antony?" + +"Yes." + +"It was because I saw in your eyes a thought of Beatrice. For a moment +your thoughts had forsaken me and gone to pity Beatrice. I saw it in +your eyes." + +"Poor Beatrice!" said Antony. "It is little indeed I give her. Could you +not spare her so little, Silencieux?" + +"I can spare her nothing. You must be all mine, Antony--your every +thought and hope and dream. So long as there is another woman in the +world for you except me, I cannot be yours in the depths of my being, +nor you mine. There must always be something withheld. It will never be +perfect, until--" + +"Until when?" + +"Until, Antony,"--and Silencieux lowered her voice to an awful +whisper,--"until you have made for me the human sacrifice." + +"The human sacrifice!" + +"Yes, Antony,--all my lovers have done that for me. They were not really +mine till then. Some have brought me many such offerings. Antony, when +will you bring me the human sacrifice?" + +"O Silencieux!" + +Antony's heart chilled with terror at Silencieux's words. It was against +this that the voices had warned him as he came up the wood. O that he +had never seen Silencieux more, never heard her poisonous voice again! + +As one fleeing before the shadow of uncommitted sin that gains upon him +at each stride, Antony fled from the place, and sought the moors. The +moon was near its setting, and soon the dawn would throw open the +eastern doors of the sky. He walked on and on, waiting, praying for, +stifling for the light; and, at last, with a freshening of the air, and +faint sounds of returning consciousness from distant farms, it came. + +High over a lake of ethereal silver welling up out of space, hung the +morning star, shining as though its heart would break, bright as a tear +that must slip down the face of heaven and fall amid the grass. + +As Antony looked up at it, his soul escaped from its prison of dark +thought, and such an exaltation had come with the quickening light, that +it seemed as though the body, with little more than pure aspiration to +wing it, might follow the soul's flight to that crystal sphere. + +In that moment, Antony knew that the love in the soul of man is mated +only with the infinite universe. In no marriage less than that shall it +find lasting fulfilment of itself. No single face, however beautiful, no +single human soul, however vast, can absorb it. Silencieux, Beatrice, +Wonder, himself, all faded away, in a trance-like sense of a stupendous +passion, an august possession. He felt that within him which rose up +gigantic from the earth, and towered into eyries of space, from whence +that morning star seemed like a dewdrop glittering low down upon the +earth. + +It was the god in him that knew itself for one brief space, a moment's +awakening in the sleep of fact. + +Could a god so great, so awakened, be again the slave of one earthly +face? + +Yes, the greater the god, the greater the slave; and so it was that, +falling plumb down from that skyey exaltation, human again with the +weakness that follows divine moments, Antony returned from the morning +star to Silencieux. + +Her face was bathed in the delicate early sunlight and looked very pure +and gentle, and he kissed her. + +Surely those terrible words had been an illusion of the dark hours. +Silencieux had never said them. He kissed her again. + +"I love you, Silencieux," he said. And then she spoke. + +"If you love me, Antony," she said, "if you love me--" + +"O what, Silencieux?" he cried, his heart growing cold once more. + +"Come nearer, Antony. Put your ear to my lips--Antony, if you love +me--the human sacrifice." + +"O God," he cried, "here in the sunlight--It is true--" + +And, a man with the doom of his nature heavy upon him, he once more went +out into the wood. + + + + +CHAPTER XI + + +WONDER IN THE WOOD + +A few days after this, little Wonder, playing about the garden, had +slipped away from her nurse, and, pleased in her little soul at her +cleverness, had found her way up to her father's châlet. Antony was +sitting at his desk, writing, with his door open. + +"Daddy," suddenly came a little voice from the bottom of the staircase, +"Daddy, where are you?" + +Antony rose and went to the door. + +"Come in, little Wonder. Well, it is a clever girl to come all the way +up the wood by herself." + +"Yes, Daddy," said the self-possessed little girl, as she toddled into +the châlet and looked round wonderingly at the books and pictures. Then +presently: + +"Daddy, what do you do all day in the wood?" + +"I make beautiful things." + +"Show me some." + +Antony showed her a page of his beautiful manuscript. + +"Why, those are only words, silly Daddy!" + +"But words, little Wonder, are the most beautiful things in the world. +Listen--" and he took the child on his knee. "Listen:-- + + In Xanadu did Kubla Khan + A stately pleasure-dome decree: + Where Alph, the sacred river, ran + Through caverns measureless to man + Down to a sunless sea. + +The child had inherited a love of beautiful sound, and, though she +understood nothing of the meaning, the music charmed her, and she +nestled close to her father, with wide eyes. + +"Say some more, Daddy." + +The sobbing cadences of the greatest of Irish songs came to Antony's +mind, and he crooned a verse or two at random: + + All day long, in unrest, + To and fro, do I move. + The very soul within my breast + Is wasted for you, love! + The heart in my bosom faints + To think of you, my queen, + My life of life, my saint of saints, + My dark Rosaleen! + My own Rosaleen! + To hear your sweet and sad complaints, + My life, my love, my saint of saints, + My dark Rosaleen!.... + + Over dews, over sands, + Will I fly for your weal: + Your holy delicate white hands + Shall girdle me with steel. + At home in your emerald bowers, + From morning's dawn till e'en, + + You'll pray for me, my flower of flowers, + My dark Rosaleen! + My fond Rosaleen! + You'll think of me thro' daylight hours, + My virgin flower, my flower of flowers, + My dark Rosaleen! + + I could scale the blue air, + I could plough the high hills, + Oh, I could kneel all night in prayer + To heal your many ills! + And one beamy smile from you + Would float like light between + My toils and me, my own, my true, + My dark Rosaleen! + My fond Rosaleen! + Would give me life and soul anew, + A second life, a soul anew, + My dark Rosaleen! + +Wonder, child-like, wearied with the length of the verses, and suddenly +the white face of Silencieux caught her eye. + +"Who is that lady, Daddy?" + +"That is Silencieux." + +"What a pretty name! Is she a kind lady, Daddy?" + +"Sometimes." + +"She is very beautiful. She is like little mother. But her face is so +white. She makes me frightened. Hold me, Daddy--" and she crouched in +his arms. + +"You mustn't be frightened of her, Wonder. She loves little girls. See +how she is smiling at you. She wants to be friends with you. She wants +you to kiss her, little Wonder." + +"Oh, no! no!" almost screamed the little girl. + +But suddenly a cruel whim to insist came over the father, and, +half-coaxingly and half-forcibly, he held her up to the image, stroking +its white cheek to reassure her. + +"See, how kind she is, little Wonder! See how she smiles--how she loves +you. She loves little girls, and she never sees any up here in the +lonely wood. It will make her so happy. Kiss her, little Wonder!" + +Reluctantly the child obeyed, and with a shudder she said:-- + +"Oh, how cold her lips are, Daddy!" + +"But were they not sweet, little Wonder?" + +"No, Daddy, they tasted of dust." + +And as Antony had lifted her up, he had said in his heart: "Silencieux, +I bring you my little child." + + + + +CHAPTER XII + + +AUTUMN IN THE VALLEY + +Autumn in the valley was autumn, melancholy and sinister, as you find +her only in such low-lying immemorial drifting places of leaves, and +oozy sinks of dank water. For the moors autumn is the spring come back +in purple, and in golden woods and many another place where the year +dies happily, she smiles like a widow so young and fair that one thinks +rather of life than death in her presence. + +But in the valley Autumn was a fearsome hag, a little crazy, two-double, +gathering sticks in a scarlet cloak. When she turned her wicked old eyes +upon you, the life died within you, and wherever you walked she was +always somewhere in the bushes muttering evil spells. All the year +round under the green cloud of summer, you might meet Autumn creeping +somewhere in the valley, like foul mists that creep from pool to pool; +for here all the year was decay to feed upon and dead leaves for her to +sleep on. Always the year round in the valley, if you listened close, +you would hear something sighing, something dying. To the happiest +walking there would come strange sinkings of the heart, unaccountable +premonitions of overhanging doom. There the least superstitious would +start at the sight of a toad, and come upon three magpies at once not +without fear. Over all was a breath of imminent disaster, a look of +sorrow from which there was no escape. It was not many yards away from a +merry high-road, but once in the shade of its lanes, it seemed as though +you had been shut away from the world of living men. Black slopes of +pine and melancholy bars of sunset walled you in, as in some funeral +hall of judgment. + +Alas! Beatrice's was not the happiest of hearts, and all day long this +autumn, as the mornings came later and darker and the evenings earlier, +always voices in the valley, voices of low-hanging mist and dripping +rain, kept saying: "Death is coming! Death is coming!" + +Tapped at the windows, ticking and crying in the rooms, was the same +message; till, in a terror of the walls, she would flee into the wider +prison of the woods, and oppressed by them in turn, would escape with a +beating heart into the honest daylight of the high-road. So one flies +from a haunted house, or comes out of an evil dream. + +Sometimes it seemed as if the white face of Silencieux looked out from +the woodside, and mocked her with the same cry: "Death is coming! Death +is coming!" + +Silencieux! Ah, how happy they had been before the coming of +Silencieux! How frail is our happiness, how suddenly it can die! One +moment it seems built for eternity, marble-based and glittering with +towers,--the next, where it stood is lonely grass and dew, not a stone +left. Ah, yes, how happy they had been; and then Antony by a heartless +chance had seen Silencieux, and in an instant their happiness had been +at an end for ever. Only a glance of the eyes and love is born, only a +glance of the eyes, and alas! love must die. + +A glance of the eyes and all the old kindness is gone, a glance of the +eyes, and from the face you love the look you seek has died out for +everlasting. + +"O Antony! Antony!" moaned Beatrice, as she wandered alone in those dank +autumn lanes, "if you would only come back to me for one short day, come +back with the old look on your face, be to me for a little while as you +once were, I think I could gladly die--" + +Die! A tattered flower caught her glance, shaking chilly in the damp +wind, and once more she heard the whisper, "Death is coming!" + +Near where she walked, stood, in the midst of a small meadow overgrown +with nettles, the blackened ruin of a cottage long since destroyed by +fire. On the edge of the little sandy lane, perilously near the feet of +the passer-by, was its forgotten well, the mouth choked with weeds and +briers. + +In her absorption Beatrice had almost walked into it. Now she parted the +bushes and looked down. A stone fell as she looked, making a sepulchral +echo. What a place to hide one's sorrow in! No one would think of +looking there. Antony might think she had gone away, or he might drag +the three black ponds, but here it was unlikely any one would come. And +in a little while--a very little while--Antony would forget, or +sometimes make himself happy with his unhappiness. + +Ah! but Wonder! No, if Antony needed her no more, Wonder did. She must +stay for Wonder's sake. And perhaps, who could say, Antony might yet +need her, might come to her some day and say "Beatrice," with the old +voice. To be really necessary to Antony again, if only for one little +hour,--yes! she could wait and suffer for that. + + + + +CHAPTER XIII + + +THE HUMAN SACRIFICE + +The valley was an ill place even for the body, a lair of rheums and +agues; and disembodied fevers waited in wells for the sunk pail. For the +valley was very beautiful, beautiful with that green beauty that only +comes of damp and decay. + +Late one October night, Antony, alone with Silencieux, as was now again +his custom, was surprised to hear footsteps coming hastily up the wood, +and even more surprised at the sudden unusual appearance of Beatrice. + +"I am sorry to disturb you, Antony," she said, noting with a pang how +the lamp had been arranged to throw a vivid light upon Silencieux, "but +I want you to come down and look at Wonder. I'm afraid she is ill." + +"Wonder, ill!" exclaimed Antony, rising with a start, "I will come at +once;" and they went together. + +Wonder was lying in her bed, with flushed cheeks and bright yet heavy +eyes. + +"Wonder, my little Wonder," said Antony caressingly, as he bent over +her. "Does little Wonder feel ill?" + +"Yes, Daddy. I feel so sick, Daddy." + +"Never mind; she will be better to-morrow." But he had noticed how +burning hot were her hands, and how dry were her fresh little lips. + +"I must go for the doctor at once," he said to his wife, when they were +outside the room. The father, so long asleep, had sprung awake at the +first hint of danger to the little child that in his neglectful way he +loved deeply all the time; and, in spite of the danger to Wonder, a +faint joy stirred in Beatrice's heart to see him thus humanly aroused +once more. + +"Kiss me, Beatrice," he said, as he set out upon his errand. "Don't be +anxious, it will be all right." It was the first time he had kissed his +wife for many days. + +The doctor's was some three miles away across the moor. It was a bright +starlit night, and Antony, who knew the moor well, had no difficulty in +making his way at a good pace along the mossy tracks. Presently he gave +a little cry of pain and stood still. + +"O God," he cried, "it cannot be that. Oh, it cannot." + +At that moment for the first time a dreadful thought had crossed his +mind. Suddenly a memory of that afternoon when he had bade Wonder kiss +Silencieux flashed upon him; and once more he heard himself saying: +"Silencieux, I bring you my little child." + +But he had never meant it so. It had all been a mad fancy. What was +Silencieux herself but a wilful, selfish dream? He saw it all now. How +could a lifeless image have power over the life of his child? + +And yet again, was Silencieux a lifeless image? And still again, if she +were an image, was it not always to an image that humanity from the +beginning had been sacrificed? Yes; perhaps if Silencieux were only an +image there was all the more reason to fear her. + +When he returned he would go to Silencieux, go on his knees and beg for +the life of his child. Silencieux had been cruel, but she could hardly +be so cruel as that. + +He drove back across the moor by the doctor's side. + +"I have always thought you unwise to live in that valley," said the +doctor. "It's pretty, but like most pretty places, it's unhealthy. +Nature can seldom be good and beautiful at the same time." The doctor +was somewhat of a philosopher. + +"Your little girl needs the hills. In fact you all do. Your wife isn't +half the woman she was since you took her into the valley. You don't +look any better for it, either. No, sir, believe me, beauty's all very +well, but it's not good to live with--And, by the way, have you had your +well looked at lately? That valley is just a beautiful sewer for the +drainage of the hills; a very market-town for all the germs and bacilli +of the district." + +And the doctor laughed, as, curiously enough, people always do at jests +about bacilli. + +But when he looked at Wonder, he took a more serious view of bacilli. + +"You must have your well looked to at once," he said. "Your little girl +is very ill. She must be kept very quiet, and on no account excited." + +Beatrice and Antony took it in turns to watch by Wonder's bed that +night, and once while Beatrice was watching, Antony found time to steal +up the wood with his prayer to Silencieux. + +Never had she looked more mask-like, more lifeless. + +"Silencieux," he cried, "I wickedly brought you my little child. O give +her back to me again! I cannot bear it. I cannot give her to you, +Silencieux. Take me, if you will. I will gladly die for you. But spare +her. O give her back to me, Silencieux!" + +But the image was impassive and made no sign. + +"Silencieux," he implored, "speak, for I know you hear me. Are you a +devil, Silencieux; a devil I have worshipped all this time? God help me! +Have you no pity,--what is her little flower-life to you? Why should you +snatch it out of the sun--" + +But Silencieux made no sign. + +Then Antony grew angry in his remorse: "I hate you, Silencieux. Never +will I look on your face again. You are an evil dream that has stolen +from me the truth of life. I have broken a true heart that loved me, +that would have died for me--for your sake; just to watch your loveless +beauty, to hear the cold music of your voice. You are like the moon that +turns men mad, a hollow shell of silver drawing all your light from the +sun of life, a silver shadow of the golden sun." + +But prayer and reproach were alike in vain. Silencieux remained +unheeding, and Antony returned to watch by Beatrice's side, with a heart +that had now no hope, and a soul weighed down with the sense of +irrevocable sin. There lay the little life he had murdered, delivered up +to the Moloch of Art. No sorrow, no agonies, were now of any avail for +ever. Little Wonder would surely die, and all the old lost opportunities +of loving her could never return. He had loved the shadow. This was a +part of the price. + +Day after day the cruel fever consumed Wonder as fire consumes a flower. +Her tiny face seemed too small for the visitation of such suffering as +burned and hammered behind the high white brow, and yellowed and drew +tight the skin upon the cheeks. She had so recently known the strange +pain of being born. Already, for so little of life, she was to endure +the pain of death. + +Day after day, hour after hour, Antony hung over her bed, with a +devotion and an unconsciousness of fatigue that made Beatrice look at +him with astonishment, and sometimes even for a moment forget Wonder in +the joy with which she saw him transfigured by simple human love. Now, +when it was too late, he had become a father indeed. And it brought some +ease to his fiercely tortured heart to notice that it was his +ministrations that the dying child seemed to welcome most. For the most +part she lay in a semi-conscious state, heeding nothing, and only +moaning now and again, a sad little moan, like an injured bird. She +seemed to say she was so little a thing to suffer so. Once, however, +when Antony had just placed some fresh ice around her head, she opened +her eyes and said, "Dear little Daddy," and the light on Antony's +face--poor victim of perverse instincts that too often drew his really +fine nature awry--was sanctifying to see. + +As terrible was the look of torture that came over his face, one night +near the end, when Wonder in a sudden nightmare of delirium had seized +his hand and cried:-- + +"O Daddy, the white lady! See her there at the end of the bed. She is +smiling, Daddy--" Then lower, "You will not make me kiss her any more, +will you, Daddy?"-- + +Beatrice had gone to snatch an hour or two's sleep, so she never heard +this, and it was no mere cowardly consolation for Antony to think +afterwards that no one but he and his little child had known of that +fatal afternoon in the wood. The dead understand all,--yes, even the +dead we have murdered. But the living can never be told a secret such as +that which Antony and his little daughter, whose soul was really grown +up, though she spoke still in baby language, shared immortally between +them. + +When Beatrice returned to the room Wonder was sleeping peacefully again, +but at the chill hour when watchers blow out the night-lights, and a +dreary greyness comes like a fog through the curtains, Antony and +Beatrice fell into each other's arms in anguish, for Wonder was dead. + + + + +CHAPTER XIV + + +A SONG OF THE LITTLE DEAD + +They carried little Wonder to a green churchyard, a place of kind old +trees and tender country bells. There were few birds to welcome her in +the grim November morning, but the grasses stole close and whispered +that very soon the thrush and the nightingale would be coming, that the +violets were already on their way, and that when May was there she +should lie all day in a bed of perfume. + +For very dear to Nature's heart are the Little Dead. The great dead lie +imprisoned in escutcheoned vaults, but for the little dead Nature +spreads out soft small graves, all snowdrops and dewdrops, where +day-long they can feel the earth rocking them as in a cradle, and at +night hear the hushed singing of the stars. + +Yes, Earth loves nothing so much as her little graves. There the tiny +bodies, like unexhausted censers, pour out all the stored sweetness they +had no time to use above the ground, turning the earth they lie in to +precious spices. There the roots of the old yew trees feel about +tenderly for the little unguided hands, and sometimes at nightfall the +rain bends over them weeping like an inconsolable mother. + +It is on the little graves that the sun first rises at morn, and it is +there at evening that the moon lays softly her first silver flowers. + +There the wren will sometimes bring her sky-blue eggs for a gift, and +the summer wind come sowing seeds of magic to take the fancy of the +little one beneath. Sometimes it shakes the hyacinths like a rattle of +silver, and spreads the turf above with a litter of coloured toys. + +Here the butterflies are born with the first warm breath of the spring. +All the winter they lie hidden in the crevices of the stone, in the +carving of little names, and with the first spring day they stand +delicately and dry their yellow wings on the little graves. There are +the honeycombs of friendly bees, and the shelters of many a timid +earth-born speck of life no bigger than a dewdrop, mysteriously small. +Radiant pin-points of existence have their palaces on the broad blades +of the grasses, and in the cellars at their roots works many a humble +little slave of the mighty elements. + +Yes, the emperors and the ants of Nature's vast economy alike love to be +kind to the little graves. + + + + +CHAPTER XV + + +SILENCIEUX ALONE IN THE WOOD. + +Beatrice's grief for Wonder was such as only a mother can know. She had +but one consolation,--the kind sad eyes of Antony. She had lost Wonder, +but Antony had come back again. Wonder was not so dead as Antony had +seemed a month ago. + +When they had left Wonder and were back in the house which was now twice +desolate, Antony took Beatrice's hands very tenderly and said:-- + +"I have been very wrong all these months. For a shadow I have missed the +lovely reality of a little child--and for a shadow, my own faithful +wife, I have all this time done you cruel wrong. But my eyes are open +now, I have come out of the evil dream that bound me--and never shall I +enter it again. Let us go from here. Let us leave this valley and never +come back to it any more." + +So it was arranged that they should winter far away, returning only to +the valley for a few short days in the spring, and then leave it for +ever. They had no heart now for more than just to fly from that haunted +place, and before night fell in the valley they were already far away. + +In vain Silencieux listened for the sound of her lover's step in the +wood, for he had vowed that he would never look upon her face again. + + + + +CHAPTER XVI + + +THE FIRST TALK ON THE HILLS + +Antony took Beatrice to the high hills where all the year long the sun +and the snow shine together. He was afraid of the sea, for the sea was +Silencieux's for ever. In its depths lay a magic harp which filled all +its waves with music--music lovely and accursed, the voice of +Silencieux. That he must never hear again. He would pile the hills +against his ears. Inland and upland, he and Beatrice should go, ever +closer to the kind heart of the land, ever nearer to the forgetful +silences of the sky, till huge walls of space were between them and that +harp of the sea. Nor in the whisper of leaves nor in the gloom of +forests should the thought of Silencieux beset them. The earth that +held least of her--to that earth they would go; the earth that rose +nearest to heaven. + +Beauty indeed should be theirs--the Beauty of Nature and Love; no more +the vampire's beauty of Art. + +It was strange to each how their souls lightened as the valleys of the +world folded away behind them, and the simple slopes mounted in their +path. In that pure unladen air which so exhilarated their very bodies, +there seemed some mysterious property of exhilaration for the soul also. +One might have dreamed that just to breathe on those heights all one's +days would be to grow holy by the more cleansing power of the air. With +such bright currents ever running through the brain, surely one's +thoughts would circle there white as stones at the bottom of a spring. + +"O Antony," said Beatrice, "why were we so long in finding the hills?" + +"We found them once before, Beatrice--do you remember?" + +"Yes! You have not forgotten?" said Beatrice, with the ray of a lost +happiness in her eyes--lost, and yet could it be dawning again? There +was a morning star in Antony's face. + +"And then," said Antony, "we went into the valley--the Valley of Beauty +and Death." + +Beatrice pressed his hand and looked all her love at him for comfort. He +knew how precious was such a forgiveness, the forgiveness of a mother +heart broken for the child, which he, directly or indirectly, had +sacrificed,--directly as he and Wonder alone knew, indirectly by taking +them with him into the Valley of Beauty. + +"Ah, Beatrice, your love is almost greater than I can bear. I am not +worthy of it. I never shall be worthy. There is something in the love of +a woman like you to which the best man is unequal. We can love--and +greatly--but it is not the same." + +"We went into the valley," he cried, "and I lost you your little +Wonder--" + +"_Our_ little Wonder," gently corrected Beatrice. "We found her +together, and we lost her together. Perhaps some day we shall find her +together again--" + +"And do you know, Antony," Beatrice continued, "I sometimes wonder if +her little soul was not sent and so taken away all as part of a mission +to us, which in its turn is a part of the working out of her own +destiny. For life is very mysterious, Antony--" + +"Alas! I had forgotten life," answered Antony with a sigh. + +"Yes, dear," Beatrice went on, pursuing her thought. "I have dared to +hope that perhaps Wonder, as she was the symbol of our coming together, +was taken away just at this time because we were being drawn apart. +Perhaps it was to save our love that little Wonder died--" + +Antony looked at Beatrice; half as one looks at a child, and half as one +might look at an angel. + +"Beatrice," he said tenderly, "you believe in God." + +"All women believe in God," answered Beatrice. + +"Yes," said Antony musingly, and with no thought of irony, "it is that +which makes you women." + + + + +CHAPTER XVII + + +ANTONY ALONE ON THE HILLS + +But although Beatrice might forgive Antony, from himself came no +forgiveness. He hid his remorse from her, sparing the mother-wound in +her heart--but always when he was walking alone he kept saying to +himself: "I have lost our little Wonder. I killed our little Wonder." + +One day he climbed up the highest hill within reach, and there leaned +into the enormous silence, that he might cry it aloud for God to hear-- + +God!--poor little Beatrice, what God was there to hear! To look at +Beatrice one might indeed believe in God--and yet was it not Beatrice +who had made God in her own image? Was not God created of all pure +overflows of the human soul, the kind light of human eyes that not all +the suffering of the world can exhaust, the idealism of the human spirit +that not all the infamies of natural law can dismay? + +Nevertheless, Antony confessed himself to God upon the hills, not indeed +as one seeking pardon, but punishment. + +Yet Heaven's benign untroubled blue carried no cloud upon its face, +because one breaking human heart had thus breathed into it its unholy +secret. Around that whole enormous circle such cries and such +confessions were being poured like noxious vapours, from a thousand +cities; but that incorruptible ether remained unsullied as on the first +morning, the black smoke of it all lost in the optimism of God. + +On some days he would live over again the scene with Wonder in the wood +with unbearable vividness. + +"Why, those are only words, silly Daddy!"--How many times a day did he +not hear that quaint little voice making, with a child's profundity, +that tremendous criticism upon literature. + +He had silenced her with the music of words, as he had silenced his own +heart and soul with the same music, but they were still only words none +the less. Ah! if she were only here to-day, he would bring her something +more beautiful than words--or toadstools. + +He shuddered as he thought of the loathsome form his decaying fancy had +taken, that morning by the Three Black Ponds. He had filled the small +outstretched hands with Nature's filth and poison. She had asked for +flowers, he had brought her toadstools. Oh, the shame, the crime, the +anguish! + +But worst of all was to hear himself saying in the silence of his soul, +over and over again without any power to still it, as one is forced +sometimes to hear the beating of one's heart: "Silencieux, I bring you +my little child." + +There were times he heard this so plainly when he was with Beatrice that +he had to leave her and walk for hours alone. Only unseen among the +hills dare he give vent to the mad despair with which that memory tore +him. + +Yes, for words--"only words"--he had sacrificed that wonderful living +thing, a child. For words he had missed that magical intercourse, the +intercourse with the mind of a child. How often had she come to him for +a story, and he had been dull and preoccupied--with words; how often +asked him to take her a walk up the lane, but he had been too busy--with +words! + +O God, if only she might come and ask again. Now when she was so far +away his fancy teemed with stories. Every roadside flower had its +fairy-tale which cried, "Tell me to little Wonder"--and once he tried +to make believe to himself that Wonder was holding his hand, and looking +up into his face with her big grave eyes, as he told some child's +nonsense to the eternal hills. He broke off--half in anger with himself. +Was he changing one illusion for another? + +"Fool, no one hears you," and he threw himself face down in the grass +and sobbed. + +But a gentle hand was laid upon his shoulder and Beatrice's voice +said,-- + +"I heard you, Antony--and loved you for it." + +So Antony had found the heart of a father when no longer he had a child. + + + + +CHAPTER XVIII + + +THE SECOND TALK ON THE HILLS + +"But to think," said Antony presently, in answer to Beatrice's soothing +hand, "to think that I might have lived with a child--and I chose +instead to live with words. In all the mysterious ways of man, is there +anything quite so mysterious as that? Poor dream-led fool, poor lover of +coloured shadows! + +"And yet, how proud I was of the madness! How I loved to say that words +were more beautiful than the things for which they stood, and that the +names of the world's beautiful women, Sappho, Fiametta, Guinivere, were +more beautiful than Sappho, Fiametta, Guinivere themselves; that the +names of the stars were lovelier than any star--who has ever found the +Pleiades so beautiful as their name, or any king so great as the sound +of Orion?--and what, anywhere in the Universe, is lovely enough to bear +Arcturus for its name?--Ah! you know how I used to talk--poor fool, poor +lover of coloured shadows!" + +"Yes, dear," said Beatrice soothingly, "but that is passed now, and you +must not dwell too persistently in the sorrow of it, or in your grief +for little Wonder. That too is to dwell with shadows, and to dwell with +shadows either of grief or joy is dangerous for the soul." + +"I know. But fear not, Beatrice. Perhaps there was the danger of my +passing from one cloudland to another--for I never knew how I loved our +Wonder till now, and I longed, if only by imagination, to follow her +where she has gone, and share with her the life together we have lost +here--" + +"But that can never be," said Beatrice; "you must accept it, Antony. We +shall only meet her again by doing that. The sooner we can say from our +hearts 'She is lost here,' the nearer is she to being found in another +world. Yes, Antony dear, even Wonder's little shadow must be left +behind, if we are to mount together the hills of life." + +"My wonderful Beatrice! Yes, the hills of life. No more its woods, but +its hills, bathed in a vast and open sunshine. Look around us--how nobly +simple is every line and shape! Far below the horizon nature is +elaborate, full of fancies,--mazy watercourses, delicate dingles, +fantastically gloomy ravines, misshapen woods, gibbering with diablerie; +but here how simple, how great, how good she is! There is not a shape +subtler than a common bowl, and the colours are alphabetical--and yet, +by what taking of thought could she have achieved an effect so grand, +at once so beautiful and so holy?" + +"Yes, one might call it the good beauty," said Beatrice. + +"Yes," continued Antony, perhaps somewhat ominously interested in the +subject, "that is a great mystery--the seeming moral meaning of the +forms of things. Some shapes, however beautiful, suggest evil; others, +however ugly, suggest good. As we look at a snake, or a spider, we know +that evil is shaped like that; and not only animate things but +inanimate. Some aspects of nature are essentially evil. There are +landscapes that injure the soul to look at, there are sunsets that are +unholy, there are trees breathing spiritual pestilence as surely as some +men breathe it--" + +"Do you remember," continued Antony with a smile, which died as he +realised he was committed to an allusion best forgotten, "that old +twisted tree that stood on the moor near our wood? I often wonder what +mysterious sin he had committed--" + +"Yes," laughed Beatrice, "he looked a terribly depraved old tree, I must +admit--but don't you think that when we have arrived at the discussion +of the mysterious sins of trees it is time to start home?" + +"Yes, indeed," said Antony gaily, "let us change the subject to the +vices of flowers." + +From which conversation it will be seen that Antony's mind was still +revolving with unconscious attraction around the mystery of Art. Was it +some far-travelled sea-wind bringing faint strains from that sunken +harp, strains too subtle for the ear, and even unrecognised by the mind? + + + + +CHAPTER XIX + + +LAST TALK ON THE HILLS + +Beatrice's prayer had been answered. Antony had come back to her. She +was necessary to him once more. The old look was in his eyes, the old +sound in his voice. One day as they were out together she was so +conscious of this happiness returned that she could not forbear speaking +of it--with an inner feeling that it was better to be happy in silence. + +What is that instinct in us which tells us that we risk our happiness in +speaking of it? Happiness is such a frightened thing that it flies at +the sound of its own name. And yet of what shall we speak if not our +happiness? Of our sorrows we can keep silence, but our joys we long to +utter. + +So Beatrice spoke of her great happiness to Antony, and told him too of +her old great unhappiness and her longing for death. + +"What a strange and terrible dream it has been--but thank God, we are +out in the daylight at last," said Antony. "O my little Beatrice, to +think that I could have forsaken you like that! Surely if you had come +and taken me by the hands and looked deep into my eyes, and called me +out of the dream, I must have awakened, for, cruel as it was, the dream +was but part of a greater dream, the dream of my love for you--" + +"But I understand it all now," he continued, "see it all. Do you +remember saying that perhaps I had never loved anything but images all +my life? It was quite true. Since I can remember, when I thought I loved +something I was sure to find sooner or later that I loved less the +object itself than what I could say about it, and when I had said +something beautiful, something I could remember and say over and over to +myself, I cared little if the object were removed. The spiritual essence +of it seemed to have passed over into my words, and I loved the +reincarnation best. Only at last have I awakened to realities, and the +shadows flee away. The worshipper of the Image is dead within me. But +alas! that little Wonder had to die first--" + +"I used to tell myself," he went on, "that human life, however +exquisite, without art to eternalise it, was like a rose showering its +petals upon the ground. For so brief a space the rose stood perfect, +then fell in a ruin of perfume. Wonderful moments had human life, but +without art were they not like pearls falling into a gulf? So I said: +there is nothing real but art. The material of art passes--human love, +human beauty--but art remains. It is the image, not the reality, that +is everlasting. I will live in the image." + +"But I know now," he once more resumed, "that there is a higher +immortality than art's,--the immortality of love. The immortality of art +indeed is one of those curious illusions of man's self-love which a +moment's thought dispels. Art, who need be told, is as dependent for its +survival on the survival of its physical media as man's body itself--and +though the epic and the great canvas escape combustion for a million +years, they must burn at last, burn with all the other accumulated +shadows of time. What we call immortality in art is but the shadow of +the soul's immortality; but the immortality of love is that of the soul +itself--" + +"O Antony," interrupted Beatrice, "you really believe that now? You will +never doubt it again?" + +"We never doubt what we have really seen, and I had never seen before," +answered Antony, taking her hand and looking deep into her eyes, "never +seen it as I see it now." + +"And you will never doubt it again?" + +"Never." + +"Whatever that voice should say to you?" + +"I shall never hear that voice again." + +"O Antony, is it really true? You have come back to me. I can hardly +believe it." + +"Listen, Beatrice; when we return to the Valley, return only to leave it +for ever, I will take the Image and smash it in a hundred pieces--for I +hate it now as much as I once loved it. Fear not; it will never trouble +our peace again." + +The mention of the valley was a momentary cloud on Beatrice's happiness, +but as she looked into Antony's resolute love-lit face, it melted away. + + + + +CHAPTER XX + + +ANTONY'S JUDGMENT UPON SILENCIEUX + +So the weeks and months went by for those two upon the hills, and the +soul of Antony grew stronger day by day, and his love with it--and the +face of Beatrice was like a bird singing. At last the spring came, and +the snow was no more needed to keep warm the flowers. With the flowers +came the snowdrop-soul of Wonder, and the thoughts of mother and father +turned to the place of kind old trees and tender country bells, where in +the unflowering November they had laid her. These dark months the chemic +earth had been busy with the little body they loved, and by this time +Wonder would be many violets. + +"Let us go to Wonder," they said; "she is awake now." + +So they went to Wonder, and found her surrounded, in her earth cradle, +by a great singing of birds, and blossoms and green leaves innumerable. +It was more like a palace than a graveyard, and they went away happy for +their little one. + +There remained now to take leave of the valley, which indeed looked its +loveliest, as though to allure them to remain. Some days they must stay +to make the necessary preparations for their departure. Among these, in +Antony's mind, the first and most necessary was that destruction of +Silencieux which he had promised himself and his wife upon the hills. + +The first afternoon Beatrice noted him take a great hammer, and set out +up the wood. She gave him a look of love and trust as he went--though +there was a secret tremor in her heart, for she knew, perhaps better +than he, how strong was the power of Silencieux. + +But in Antony's heart was no misgiving, or backsliding. In those months +on the hills he had realised human love, in the love of a true and +tender and fairy-like woman, and he knew that no illusions, however +specious, were worth that reality--a reality with all the magic of an +illusion. He gripped the hammer in his hand joyfully, eager to smite +featureless the face which had so misled him, brought such tragic sorrow +to those he had loved. + +Still, for all his unshaken purpose, it was strange to see again the +face that had meant so much to him, around which his thoughts had +circled consciously or unconsciously all these absent weeks. + +Seldom has a face seen again after long separation seemed so +disenchanted as Silencieux's. Was this she whom he had worshipped, she +who had told him in that strange voice of her immortal lovers, she with +whom he had sung by the sea, she with whom he had danced those strange +dances in the town, she who had whispered low that awful command, she to +whom he had sacrificed his little child? + +She was just a dusty, neglected cast--nothing more. + +Wonder's voice came back to him: "No, Daddy, they tasted of dust"--and +at that thought he gripped the hammer ready to strike. + +And yet, even thus, she was a beautiful work of man's hands, and Antony, +hating to destroy beauty, still forbore to strike--just as he would have +shrunk from breaking in pieces a shapely vase. Then, too, the +resemblance to Beatrice took him again. Crudely to smash features so +like hers seemed a sort of mimic murder. So he still hesitated. Was +there no other way? Then the thought came to him: "Bury her." It pleased +him. Yes, he would bury her. + +So, having found a spade, he took her from the wall, and looked from +his door into the wood, pondering where her grave should be. A whitebeam +at a little distance made a vivid conflagration of green amid the sombre +boles of the pines. Pinewoods rely on their undergrowth--bracken and +whortleberry and occasional bushes--for their spring illuminations, and +the whitebeam shone as bright in that wood as a lamp in the dark. + +"I will bury her beneath the whitebeam," said Antony, and he carried her +thither. + +Soon the grave was dug amid the pushing fronds of the young ferns, and +taking one long look at her, Antony laid her in the earth, and covered +her up from sight. Was it only fancy that as he turned away a faint +music seemed to arise from the ground, forming into the word "Resurgam" +as it died away? + +"It is done," said Antony to Beatrice. "But I could not break her, she +looked so like you; so I buried her in the wood." + +Beatrice kissed him gratefully. But her heart would have been more +satisfied had Silencieux been broken. + + + + +CHAPTER XXI + + +"RESURGAM!" + +"Resurgam!" + +Had his senses deceived him? They must have deceived him. And yet that +music at least had seemed startlingly near, sudden, and sweet, as though +one should tread upon a harp in the grass. For the next day or two +Antony could not get it out of his ears, and often, like a sweet wail +through the wood, he seemed to hear the word "Resurgam." + +Was Silencieux a living spirit, after all,--no mere illusion, but one of +those beautiful demons of evil that do possess the souls of men? + +He went and stood by Silencieux's grave. It was just as he had left it. +Only an early yellow butterfly stood fanning itself on the freshly +turned earth. + +Was it the soul of Silencieux? + +Cursing himself for a madman, he turned away, but had not gone many +yards, when once more--there was that sudden strain of music and the +word "Resurgam" somewhere on the wind. + +This time he knew he was not mistaken, but to believe it true--O God, he +must not believe it true. Reality or fancy, it was an evil thing which +he had cast out of his life--and he closed his ears and fled. + +Yet, though he loyally strove to quench that music in the sound of +Beatrice's voice, deep in his heart he knew that the night would come +when he would take his lantern and spade, wearily, as one who at length +after hopeless striving obeys once more some imperious weakness--and +look on the face of Silencieux again. + +Too surely that night came, and, as in a dream, Antony found himself in +the dark spring night hastening with lantern and spade to Silencieux's +grave. It was only just to look on her face again, to see if she really +lived like a vampire in the earth; and were she to be alive, he vowed to +kill her where she lay--for into his life again he knew she must not +come. + +As he neared the whitebeam, a gust of wind blew out his lantern, and he +stood in the profound darkness of the trees. While he attempted to +relight it, he thought he saw a faint light at the foot of the +whitebeam, as of a radiance welling out of the earth; but he dismissed +it as fancy. + +Then, having relit the lantern, he set the spade into the ground, and +speedily removed the soil from the white face below. As he uncovered it, +the wind again extinguished the lantern, and there, to his amazement and +terror, was the face of Silencieux shining radiantly in the darkness. +The hole in which she lay brimmed over with light, as a spring wells +out of the hillside. Her face was almost transparent with brightness, +and presently she spoke low, with a voice sweeter than Antony had ever +heard before. It was the voice of that magic harp at the bottom of the +sea, it was the voice that had told him of her lovers, the voice of +hidden music that had cried "Resurgam" through the wood. + +"Antony," she said, "sing me songs of little Wonder." + +And, forgetting all but the magic of her voice, the ecstasy of being +hers again, Antony carried her with him to the châlet, and setting her +in her accustomed place, gazed at her with his whole soul. + +"Sing me songs of little Wonder," she repeated. + +"You bid me sing of little Wonder!" cried Antony, half in terror of this +beautiful evil face that drew him irresistibly as the moon, "you, who +took her from me!" + +"Who but I should bid you sing of Wonder?" answered Silencieux. "I +loved her. That was why I took her from you, that by your grief she +should live for ever. There is no one but I who can give you back your +little Wonder--no one but I who can give you back anything you have +lost. If you love me faithfully, Antony--there is nothing you can lose +but in me you will find it again." + +Antony bowed his head, his heart breaking for Beatrice--but who is not +powerless against his own soul? + +"Listen," said Silencieux again. "Once on a time there was a beautiful +girl who died, and from her grave grew a wonderful flower, which all the +world came to see. 'Yet it seems a pity,' said one, 'that so beautiful a +girl should have died.' 'Ah,' said a poet standing by, 'there was no +other way of making the flower!'" + +And again, as Antony still kept silence in his agony, Silencieux said, +"Listen." + +"Listen, Antony. You have hidden yourself away from me, you have put +seas and lands between us, you have denied me with bitter curses, you +have vowed to thrust me from your life, you have given your allegiance +to the warm and pretty humanity of a day, and reviled the august cold +marble of immortality. But it is all in vain. In your heart of hearts +you love no human thing, you love not even yourself, you love only the +eternal spirit of beauty in all things, you love only me. Me you may +sacrifice, your own heart you may deny, in the weakness of human pity +for human love; but, should this be, your life will be in secret broken, +purposeless, and haunted, and to me at last you will come, at the +end--at the end and too late. This is your own heart's voice; you know +if it be true." + +"It is true," moaned Antony. + +"Many men and many loves are there in this world," continued +Silencieux, "and each knows the way of his own love, nor shall anything +turn him from it in the end. Here he may go and thither he may turn, but +in the end there is only one way of joy for each, and in that way must +he go or perish. Many faces are fair upon the earth, but for each man is +a face fairest of all, for which, unless he win it, each must go +desolate forever--" + +"Face of Eternal Beauty," said Antony, "there is but one face for me for +ever. It is yours." + + * * * * * + +On the morrow Beatrice saw once more that light in Antony's face which +made her afraid. He had brought with him some sheets of paper on which +were written the songs of little Wonder Silencieux had bidden him sing. +They were songs of grief so poignant and beautiful one grew happy in +listening to them, and Antony forgot all in the joy of having made +them. He read them to Beatrice in an ecstasy. Her face grew sadder and +sadder as he read. When he had finished she said:-- + +"Antony!--Silencieux has risen again." + +"O Beatrice, Beatrice--I would do anything in the world for you--but I +cannot live without her." + + + + +CHAPTER XXII + + +THE STRANGENESS OF ANTONY + +From this moment Silencieux took possession of Antony as she had never +taken it before. Never had he been so inaccessibly withdrawn into his +fatal dream. Beatrice forgot her own bitter sorrow in her fear for him, +so wrought was he with the fires that consumed him. Some days she almost +feared for his reason, and she longed to watch over him, but his old +irritation at her presence had returned. + +As the summer days came on, she would see him disappear through the +green door of the wood at morning and return by it at evening; but all +the day each had been alone, Beatrice alone with a solitude in which was +now no longer any Wonder. The summer beauty gave her courage, but she +knew that the end could not be very far away. + +One day there had been that in Antony's manner which had more than +usually alarmed her, and when night fell and he had not returned, she +went up the wood in search of him, her heart full of forebodings. As she +neared the châlet she seemed to hear voices. No! there was only one +voice. Antony was talking to some one. Careful to make no noise, she +stole up to the window and looked in. The sight that met her eyes filled +her with a great dread. "O God, he is going mad," she cried to herself. + +Antony was sitting in a big chair drawn up to the fire. Opposite to him, +lying back in her cushions, was the Image draped in a large black velvet +cloak. A table stood between them, and on it stood two glasses, and a +decanter nearly empty of wine, Silencieux's glass stood untasted, but +Antony had evidently been drinking deeply, for his cheeks were flushed +and his eyes wild. + +He was speaking in angry, passionate, despairing tones. One of her +strange moods of silence had come upon Silencieux, and she lay back in +her pillows stonily unresponsive. + +"For God's sake speak to me," Antony cried. "I love you with my whole +heart. I have sacrificed all I love for your sake. I would die for you +this instant--yes! a hundred thousand deaths. But you will not answer me +one little word--" + +But there was no answer. + +"Silencieux! Have you ceased to love me? Is the dream once more at an +end, the magic faded? Oh, speak--tell me--anything--only speak!" But +still Silencieux neither spoke nor smiled. + +"Listen, Silencieux," at last cried Antony, beside himself, "unless you +answer me, I will die this night, and my blood shall be upon your cruel +altar for ever." + +As he spoke he snatched a dagger from among some bibelots on his mantel, +and drew it from its sheath. + +"You are proud of your martyrs," he laughed; "see, I will bleed to death +for your sake. In God's name speak." + +But Silencieux spoke nothing at all. + +Then Beatrice, watching in terror, seeing by his face that he would +really kill himself, ran round to the door and broke in, crying, "O my +poor Antony!" but already he had plunged the dagger amid the veins of +his left wrist, and was watching the blood gush out with a strange +delight. + +As Beatrice burst in, he looked up at her, and mistook her for +Silencieux. + +"Ah!" he said, "you speak at last. You love me now, when it is too +late--when I am dying." + +As he said this his face grew white and he fainted away. + +For many days Antony lay unconscious, racked by terrible delirium. The +doctor called it brain fever. It was not the common form, he said, but a +more dangerous form, to which only imaginative men were subject. It was +a form of madness all the more malignant because the sufferer, and +particularly his friends, might go for years without suspecting it. The +doctor gave the disease no name. + +During his illness Antony spoke to Beatrice all the time as Silencieux, +but one day, when he was nearly well again, he suddenly turned upon her +in enraged disappointment, with a curious harshness he had never shown +before, as though the gentleness of his soul had died during his +illness, and exclaimed:--"Why, you are not Silencieux, after all!" + +"I am Beatrice," said his wife gently; "Beatrice, who loves you with her +whole heart." + +"But I love Silencieux--" + +Beatrice hid her face and sobbed. + +"Where is Silencieux? Bring me Silencieux. I see! You have taken her +away while I was ill--I will go and seek her myself," and he attempted +to rise. + +"You are too weak. You must not get up, Antony. I will bring you +Silencieux." + +And so, till he was well enough to leave his bed, Silencieux hung facing +Antony on his bedroom wall, and on his first walk out into the air, he +took her with him and set her once more in her old shrine in the wood. + +Now, by this time, the heart of Beatrice was broken. + + + + +CHAPTER XXIII + + +BEATRICE FULFILS HER DESTINY + +The heart of Beatrice was broken, and there was now no use or place for +her in the world. Wonder was gone, and Antony was even further away. She +knew now that he would never come back to her. Never again could return +even the illusion of those happy weeks on the hills. Antony would be +hers no more for ever. + +There but remained for her to fulfil her destiny, the destiny she had +vaguely known ever since Antony had brought home the Image, and shown +her how the Seine water had moulded the hair and made wet the eyelashes. + +For some weeks now Beatrice had been living on the border of another +world. She had finally abandoned all her hopes of earthly joy--and to +Antony she was no longer any help or happiness. He had needed her again +for a few brief weeks, but now he needed her no more. His every look +told her how he wished her out of his life. And she had no one else in +the world. + +But in another world she had her little Wonder. Lately she had begun to +meet her in the lanes. In the day she wore garlands of flowers round her +head, and in the night a great light. She would go to meet her at night, +that the light might lead her steps. + +So one night while Antony banqueted strangely with Silencieux, she drew +her cloak around her and stole up the wood, to look a last good-bye at +him as he sat laughing with his shadows. + +"Good-bye, Antony, good-bye," she cried. "I had but human love to give +you. I surrender you to the love of the divine." + +Then noting how full of blossom were the lanes, and how sweet was the +night air, and smitten through all her senses with the song and perfume +of the world she was about to leave, she found her way, with a strange +gladness of release, to the Three Black Ponds. + +It was moonlight, and the dwarf oak-trees made druid shadows all along +the leafy galleries that overhung the pools. The pools themselves shone +with a startling silver--so hushed, so dreamy was all that surrounded +them that there seemed something of an unnatural wakefulness, a daylight +observation, in their brilliant surfaces,--and on them, as last year, +the lilies floated like the crowns of sunken queens. But the third pool +lay more in shadow, and by that, as it seemed to Beatrice, a light was +shining. + +Yes, a light was shining and a voice was calling. "Mother," it called, +"little Mother. I am waiting for you. Here, little Mother. Here by the +water-lilies we could not gather." + +Beatrice, following the voice, stepped along the causeway and sank among +the lilies; and as she sank she seemed to see Antony bending over the +pond, saying: "How beautiful she looks, how beautiful, lying there among +the lilies!" + + * * * * * + +On the morrow, when they had drawn Beatrice from the pond, with lilies +in her hair, Antony bent over her and said:-- + +"It is very sad--Poor little Beatrice--but how beautiful! It must be +wonderful to die like that." + +And then again he said: "She is strangely like Silencieux." + +Then he walked up the wood, in a great serenity of mind. He had lost +Wonder, but she lived again in his songs. He had lost Beatrice, but he +had her image--did she not live for ever in Silencieux? + +So he went up the wood, whistling softly to himself--but lo! when he +opened his châlet door, there was a strange light in the room. The eyes +of Silencieux were wide open, and from her lips hung a dark moth with +the face of death between his wings. + +THE END + + + + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Worshipper of the Image +by Richard Le Gallienne + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE WORSHIPPER OF THE IMAGE *** + +***** This file should be named 10812-8.txt or 10812-8.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/1/0/8/1/10812/ + +Produced by Brendan Lane, Garrett Alley and PG Distributed Proofreaders + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Worshipper of the Image + +Author: Richard Le Gallienne + +Release Date: January 23, 2004 [EBook #10812] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE WORSHIPPER OF THE IMAGE *** + + + + +Produced by Brendan Lane, Garrett Alley and PG Distributed Proofreaders + + + + + +</pre> + + +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<h1>The Worshipper of the Image</h1> +<center> +<b>By RICHARD LE GALLIENNE </b> +</center> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<center> +JOHN LANE: THE BODLEY HEAD +LONDON AND NEW YORK +1900 +</center> +<center> +THE UNIVERSITY PRESS, CAMBRIDGE, U.S.A. +</center> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<center> +TO SILENCIEUX +</center> +<center> +THIS TRAGIC FAIRY-TALE +</center> + +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> + +<hr> + +<a name="TOC"><!-- TOC --></a> +<h2> + Contents +</h2> + +<pre> +CHAPTER +</pre> +<pre> +<a href="#CH1">I. SMILING SILENCE</a> +</pre> +<pre> +<a href="#CH2">II. THE COMING OF SILENCIEUX</a> +</pre> +<pre> +<a href="#CH3">III. THE NORTHERN SPHINX</a> +</pre> +<pre> +<a href="#CH4">IV. AT THE RISING OF THE MOON</a> +</pre> +<pre> +<a href="#CH5">V. SILENCIEUX SPEAKS</a> +</pre> +<pre> +<a href="#CH6">VI. THE THREE BLACK PONDS</a> +</pre> +<pre> +<a href="#CH7">VII. THE LOVERS OF SILENCIEUX</a> +</pre> +<pre> +<a href="#CH8">VIII. A STRANGE KISS FOR SILENCIEUX</a> +</pre> +<pre> +<a href="#CH9">IX. THE WONDERFUL WEEK</a> +</pre> +<pre> +<a href="#CH10">X. SILENCIEUX WHISPERS</a> +</pre> +<pre> +<a href="#CH11">XI. WONDER IN THE WOOD</a> +</pre> +<pre> +<a href="#CH12">XII. AUTUMN IN THE VALLEY</a> +</pre> +<pre> +<a href="#CH13">XIII. THE HUMAN SACRIFICE</a> +</pre> +<pre> +<a href="#CH14">XIV. A SONG OF THE LITTLE DEAD</a> +</pre> +<pre> +<a href="#CH15">XV. SILENCIEUX ALONE IN THE WOOD</a> +</pre> +<pre> +<a href="#CH16">XVI. THE FIRST TALK ON THE HILLS</a> +</pre> +<pre> +<a href="#CH17">XVII. ANTONY ALONE ON THE HILLS</a> +</pre> +<pre> +<a href="#CH18">XVIII. THE SECOND TALK ON THE HILLS</a> +</pre> +<pre> +<a href="#CH19">XIX. LAST TALK ON THE HILLS</a> +</pre> +<pre> +<a href="#CH20">XX. ANTONY'S JUDGMENT UPON SILENCIEUX</a> +</pre> +<pre> +<a href="#CH21">XXI. "RESURGAM!"</a> +</pre> +<pre> +<a href="#CH22">XXII. THE STRANGENESS OF ANTONY</a> +</pre> +<pre> +<a href="#CH23">XXIII. BEATRICE FULFILS HER DESTINY</a> +</pre> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> +The Worshipper of the Image +</p> + +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<a name="CH1"><!-- CH1 --></a> +<h2> + CHAPTER I +</h2> + +<center> +SMILING SILENCE +</center> +<p> +Evening was in the wood, still as the dreaming bracken, secretive, +moving softly among the pines as a young witch gathering simples. She +wore a hood of finely woven shadows, yet, though she drew it close, +sunbeams trooping westward flashed strange lights across her haunted +face. +</p> +<p> +The birds that lived in the wood had broken out into sudden singing as +she stole in, hungry for silence, passionate to be alone; and at the +foot of every tree she cried "Hush! Hush!" to the bedtime nests. When +all but one were still, she slipped the hood from her face and listened +to her own bird, the night-jar, toiling at his hopeless love from a +bough on which already hung a little star. +</p> +<p> +Then it was that a young man, with a face shining with sorrow, vaulted +lightly over the mossed fence and dipped down the green path, among the +shadows and the toadstools and the silence. +</p> +<p> +"Silencieux," he said over to himself—"I love you, Silencieux." +</p> +<p> +Far down the wood came and went through the trees the black and white +gable of a little châlet to which he was dreaming his way. +</p> +<p> +Suddenly a small bronze object caught his eye moving across the mossy +path. It was a beautiful beetle, very slim and graceful in shape, with +singularly long and fine antennae. Antony had loved these things since +he was a child,—dragonflies with their lamp-like eyes of luminous horn, +moths with pall-like wings that filled the world with silence as you +looked at them, sleepy as death—loved them with the passion of a +Japanese artist who delights to carve them on quaint nuggets of metal. +Perhaps it was that they were so like words—words to which he had given +all the love and worship of his life. Surely he had loved Silencieux[<a href="#note-1">1</a>] +more since he had found for her that beautiful name. +</p> +<p> +He held the beetle in his hand a long while, loving it. Then he said to +himself, with a smile in which was the delight of a success: "A +vase-shaped beetle with deer's horns." +</p> +<p> +The phrase delighted him. He set the insect down on the path, tenderly. +He had done with it. He had carved it in seven words. The little model +might now touch its delicate way among the ferns at peace. +</p> +<p> +"A vase-shaped beetle with deer's horns," he repeated as he walked on, +and then the gathering gloom of the wood suggested an addition: "And +some day I shall find in the wood that moth of which I have dreamed +since childhood—the dark moth with the face of death between his +wings." +</p> +<p> +The châlet stood on a little clearing, in a little circle of pines. From +it the ground sloped down towards the valley, and at some distance +beneath smoke curled from a house lost amid clouds of foliage, the +abounding green life of this damp and brooding hollow. A great window +looking down the woodside filled one side of the châlet, and the others +were dark with books, an occasional picture or figured jar lighting up +the shadow. A small fire flickered beneath a quaintly devised mantel, +though it was summer—for the mists crept up the hill at night and +chilled the souls of the books. A great old bureau, with a wonderful +belly of mahogany, filled a corner of the room, breathing antique +mystery and refinement. At one end of it, on a small vacant space of +wall, hung a cast, apparently the death-mask of a woman, by which the +eye was immediately attracted with something of a shock and held by a +curious fascination. The face was smiling, a smile of great peace, and +also of a strange cunning. One other characteristic it had: the woman +looked as though at any moment she would suddenly open her eyes, and if +you turned away from her and looked again, she seemed to be smiling to +herself because she had opened them that moment behind your back, and +just closed them again in time. +</p> +<p> +It was a face that never changed and yet was always changing. +</p> +<p> +She looked doubly strange in the evening light, and her smile softened +and deepened as the shadows gathered in the room. +</p> +<p> +Antony came and stood in front of her. +</p> +<p> +"Silencieux," he whispered, "I love you, Silencieux. Smiling Silence, I +love you. All day long on the moors your smile has stolen like a +moonbeam by my side—" +</p> +<p> +As he spoke, from far down the wood came the gentle sound of a woman's +voice calling "Antony," and coming nearer as it called. +</p> +<p> +With a shade of impatience, Antony bent nearer to the image and kissed +it. +</p> +<p> +"Good-bye, Silencieux," he whispered, "Good-bye, until the rising of the +moon." +</p> +<p> +Then he passed out on to the little staircase that led down into the +wood, and called back to the approaching voice: "I am coming, +Beatrice,"—'Beatrice' being the name of his wife. +</p> +<p> +As he called, a shaft of late sunlight suddenly irradiated the tall +slim form of a woman coming up the wood. She wore no hat, and the sun +made a misty glory of her pale gold hair. She seemed a fairy romantic +thing thus gliding in her yellow silk gown through the darkening pines. +And her face was the face of the image, feature for feature. There was +on it too the same light, the same smile. +</p> +<p> +"Antony," she called, as they drew nearer to each other, "where in the +wide world have you been? Dinner has been waiting for half-an-hour." +</p> +<p> +"Dinner!" he said, laughing, and kissing her kindly. "Fancy! the High +Muses have made me half-an-hour late for dinner. Beauty has made me +forget my dinner. Disgraceful!" +</p> +<p> +"I don't mind your forgetting dinner, Antony—but you might have +remembered me." +</p> +<p> +"Do you think I could remember Beauty and forget you? Yes! you <i>are</i> +beautiful to-night, Silen—Beatrice. You look like a lady one meets +walking by a haunted well in some old Arthurian tale." +</p> +<p> +"Hush!" said Beatrice, "listen to the night-jar. He is worth a hundred +nightingales." +</p> +<p> +"Yes; what a passion is that!" said Antony, "so sincere, and yet so +fascinating too." +</p> +<p> +"'Yet,' do you say, Antony? Why, sincerity is the most fascinating thing +in the world." +</p> +<p> +And as they listened, Antony's heart had stolen back to Silencieux, and +once more in fancy he pressed his lips to hers in the dusk: "It is with +such an eternal passion that I love you, Silencieux." +</p> +<center> +FOOTNOTES: +</center> +<p> +<a name="note-1"><!-- Note Anchor 1 --></a>[Footnote 1: Of course, the writer is aware that while "Silencieux" is +feminine, her name is masculine. In such fanciful names, however, such +license has always been considered allowable.] +</p> + +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<a name="CH2"><!-- CH2 --></a> +<h2> + CHAPTER II +</h2> + +<center> +THE COMING OF SILENCIEUX +</center> +<p> +The manner in which Antony had found and come to love Silencieux was a +strange illustration of that law by which one love grows out of +another—that law by which men love living women because of the dead, +and dead women because of the living. +</p> +<p> +One day as chance had sent him, picking his way among the orange boxes, +the moving farms, and the wig-makers of Covent Garden, he had come upon +a sculptor's shop, oddly crowded in among Cockney carters and decaying +vegetables. Faces of Greece and Rome gazed at him suddenly from a broad +window, and for a few moments he forsook the motley beauty of modern +London for the ordered loveliness of antiquity. +</p> +<p> +Through white corridors of faces he passed, with the cold breath of +classic art upon his cheek, and in the company of the dead who live for +ever he was conscious of a contagion of immortality. +</p> +<p> +Soon in an alcove of faces he grew conscious of a presence. Some one was +smiling near him. He turned, and, almost with a start, found that—as he +then thought—it was no living thing, but just a plaster cast among the +others, that was thus shining, like a star among the dead. A face not +ancient, not modern; but a face of yesterday, to-day, and for ever. +</p> +<p> +Instantly he knew he had seen the face before. Where? +</p> +<p> +Why, of course, it was the face of Beatrice, feature for feature. How +strange!—and, loving Beatrice, he bought it, because of his great love +for her! Who was the artist, what the time and circumstance, that had +anticipated in this strange fashion the only face he had ever really +loved on earth? +</p> +<p> +He sought information of the shopkeeper, who told him a strange little +story of an unknown model and an unknown artist, and two tragic fates. +</p> +<p> +When Antony had brought Silencieux home to Beatrice, she had at first +taken that delight in her which every created thing takes in a perfect, +or even an imperfect, reflection of itself. To have been anticipated in +a manner so unusual gave back in romantic suggestiveness what at first +sight it seemed to steal from one's personal originality. Only at first +sight—for, if like Beatrice, you were the possessor of a face so +uncommon in type that your lover might, with little fear of disproof, +declare, at all events in England, that there was none other like it, +you might grow superstitious as you looked at an anticipation so +creepily identical, and conceive strange fancies of re-incarnation. What +if this had been you in some former existence! Or at all events, if +there is any truth in those who tell us that in the mould and lines of +our faces and hands—yes! and in every secret marking of our bodies—our +fates are written as in a parchment; would it not be reasonable to +surmise, perhaps to fear, that the writing should mean the same on one +face as on the other, and the fates as well as the faces prove +identical? +</p> +<p> +Beatrice gave the mask back to Antony, with a little shiver. +</p> +<p> +"It is very wonderful, very strange, but she makes me frightened. What +was the story the man told you, Antony?" +</p> +<p> +"No doubt it was all nonsense," Antony replied, "but he said that it was +the death-mask of an unknown girl found drowned in the Seine." +</p> +<p> +"Drowned in the Seine!" exclaimed Beatrice, growing almost as white as +the image. +</p> +<p> +"Yes! and he said too that the story went that the sculptor who moulded +it had fallen so in love with the dead girl, that he had gone mad and +drowned himself in the Seine also." +</p> +<p> +"Can it be true, Antony?" +</p> +<p> +"I hope so, for it is so beautiful,—and nothing is really beautiful +till it has come true." +</p> +<p> +"But the pain, the pity of it—Antony." +</p> +<p> +"That is a part of the beauty, surely—the very essence of its beauty—" +</p> +<p> +"Beauty! beauty! O Antony, that is always your cry. I can only think of +the terror, the human anguish. Poor girl—" and she turned again to the +image as it lay upon the table,—"see how the hair lies moulded round +her ears with the water, and how her eyelashes stick to her cheek—Poor +girl." +</p> +<p> +"But see how happy she looks. Why should we pity one who can smile like +that? See how peaceful she looks;" and with a sudden whim, Antony took +the image and set it lying back on a soft cushion in a corner of the +couch, at the same time throwing round its neck his black cloak, which +he had cast off as he came in. +</p> +<p> +The image nestled into the cushion as though it had veritably been a +living woman weary for sleep, and softly smiling that it was near at +last. So comfortable she seemed, you could have sworn she breathed. +</p> +<p> +Antony lifted her head once or twice with his fingers, to delight +himself with seeing her sink back luxuriously once more. +</p> +<p> +Beatrice grew more and more white. +</p> +<p> +"Antony, please stop. I cannot bear it. She looks so terribly alive." +</p> +<p> +At that moment Antony's touch had been a little too forcible, the image +hung poised for a moment and then began to fall in the direction of +Beatrice. +</p> +<p> +"Oh, she is falling," she almost screamed, as Antony saved the cast from +the floor. "For God's sake, stop!" +</p> +<p> +"How childish of you, Beatrice. She is only plaster. I never knew you +such a baby." +</p> +<p> +"I cannot help it, Antony. I know it is foolish, but I cannot help it. I +think living in this place has made me morbid. She seems so alive—so +evil, so cruel. I am sorry you bought her, Antony. I cannot bear to look +at her. Won't you take her away? Take her up into the wood. Keep her +there. Take her now. I shall not be able to sleep all night if I know +she is in the house." +</p> +<p> +She was half hysterical, and Antony soothed her gently. +</p> +<p> +"Yes, yes, dear. I'm sorry. I'll take her up the wood now this minute. +Wait till I light the lantern. Poor Beatrice, I never dreamed she would +affect you so. I loved her, dear—because I love you; but I would rather +break her in pieces than that she should make you unhappy. Though to +break any image of you, dear," he added tenderly, "would seem a kind of +sacrilege. You know how I love you, Beatrice, don't you?" +</p> +<p> +"Of course I do, dear; and it was sweet of you to buy her for my sake, +and I'm quite silly to-night. To-morrow I shall think nothing about her. +Still, dear, she does frighten me, I can't tell why. There seems +something malignant about her, something that threatens our happiness. +Oh, how silly I am—" +</p> +<p> +Meanwhile, Antony had lit an old brass lantern, and presently he was +flashing his way up among the dark sounds of the black old wood, with +that ghostly face tenderly pressed against his side. +</p> +<p> +He stopped once to turn his lantern upon her. How mysterious she looked, +here in the night, under the dark pines! +</p> +<p> +He too felt a little haunted as he climbed his châlet staircase and +unlocked the door, every sound he made echoing fatefully in the silent +wood; and when he had found a place for the image and hung her there, +she certainly looked a ghostly companion for the midnight lamp, in the +middle of a wood. +</p> +<p> +How strangely she smiled, the smile almost of one taking possession. +</p> +<p> +No wonder Beatrice had been frightened. Was there some mysterious life +in the thing, after all? Why should these indefinite forebodings come +over him as he looked at her!—But he was growing as childish as +Beatrice. Surely midnight, a dark wood, a lantern, and a death-mask, +with two owls whistling to each other across the valley, were enough to +account for any number of forebodings! But Antony shivered, for all +that, as he locked the door and hastened back again down the wood. +</p> + +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<a name="CH3"><!-- CH3 --></a> +<h2> + CHAPTER III +</h2> + +<center> +THE NORTHERN SPHINX +</center> +<p> +Antony had not written a poem to his wife since their little girl Wonder +had been born, now some four years ago. Surely it was from no lack of +love, this silence, but merely due to the working of what would seem to +be a law of the artistic temperament: that to turn a muse into a wife, +however long and faithfully loved, is to bid good-bye to the muse. But a +day or two after the coming of Silencieux, Antony found himself suddenly +inspired once more to sing of his wife. It was the best poem he had +written for a long time, and when it was finished, he came down the wood +impatient to read it to Beatrice. This was the poem, which he called +"The Northern Sphinx":— +</p> +<pre> + Sphinx of the North, with subtler smile + Than hers who in the yellow South, + With make-believe mysterious mouth, + Deepens the <i>ennui</i> of the Nile; + + And, with no secret left to tell, + A worn and withered old coquette, + Dreams sadly that she draws us yet, + With antiquated charm and spell: + + Tell me your secret, Sphinx,—for mine!— + What means the colour of your eyes, + Half innocent and all so wise, + Blue as the smoke whose wavering line + + Curls upward from the sacred pyre + Of sacrifice or holy death, + Pale twisting wreaths of opal breath, + From fire mounting into fire. + + What is the meaning of your hair? + That little fairy palace wrought + With many a grave fantastic thought; + I send a kiss to wander there, + + To climb from golden stair to stair, + Wind in and out its cunning bowers,— + O garden gold with golden flowers, + O little palace built of hair! + + The meaning of your mouth, who knows? + O mouth, where many meanings meet— + Death kissed it stern, Love kissed it sweet, + And each has shaped its mystic rose. + + Mouth of all sweets, whose sweetness sips + Its tribute honey from all hives, + The sweetest of the sweetest lives, + Soft flowers and little children's lips; + + Yet rather learnt its heavenly smile + From sorrow, God's divinest art, + Sorrow that breaks and breaks the heart, + Yet makes a music all the while. + + Ah! what is that within your eyes, + Upon your lips, within your hair, + The sacred art that makes you fair, + The wisdom that hath made you wise? + + Tell me your secret, Sphinx,—for mine!— + The mystic word that from afar + God spake and made you rose and star, + The <i>fiat lux</i> that bade you shine. +</pre> +<p> +While Antony read, Beatrice's face grew sadder and sadder. When he had +finished she said:— +</p> +<p> +"It is very beautiful, Antony—but it is not written for me." +</p> +<p> +"What can you mean, Beatrice? Who else can it be written for?" +</p> +<p> +"To the Image of me that you have set up in my place." +</p> +<p> +"Beatrice, are you going mad?" +</p> +<p> +"It is quite true, all the same. Time will show. Perhaps you don't know +it yourself as yet, but you will before long." +</p> +<p> +"But, Beatrice, the poem shows its own origin. Has your image blue eyes, +or curiously coiled hair—" +</p> +<p> +"Oh, yes, of course, you thought of me. You filled in from me. But the +inspiration, the wish to write it, came from the image—" +</p> +<p> +"It is certainly true that I love to look at it, as I love to look at a +picture of you—because it is you—" +</p> +<p> +"As yet, no doubt, but you will soon love it for its own sake. You are +already beginning." +</p> +<p> +"I love an image! You are too ridiculous, Beatrice." +</p> +<p> +"Does it really seem so strange, dear? I sometimes think you have never +loved anything else." +</p> +<p> +Antony had laughed down Beatrice's fancies, yet all the time she had +been talking he was conscious that the idea she had suggested was +appealing to him with a perverse fascination. +</p> +<p> +To love, not the literal beloved, but the purified stainless image of +her,—surely this would be to ascend into the region of spiritual love, +a love unhampered and untainted by the earth. +</p> +<p> +As he said this to himself, his mind, ever pitilessly self-conscious, +knew it was but a subterfuge, a fine euphemism for a strange desire +which he had known was already growing within him; for when Beatrice had +spoken of his loving an image, it was no abstract passion he had +conceived, but some fanciful variation of earthly love—a love of +beauty centring itself upon some form midway between life and death, +inanimate and yet alive, human and yet removed from the accidents of +humanity. +</p> +<p> +To love an image with one's whole heart! If only one could achieve +that—and never come out of the dream. +</p> +<p> +These thoughts gave him a new desire to look again at the image. He felt +that in some way she would be changed, and he hastened up the wood in a +strange expectancy. +</p> + +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<a name="CH4"><!-- CH4 --></a> +<h2> + CHAPTER IV +</h2> + +<center> +AT THE RISING OF THE MOON +</center> +<p> +But a week or two more, and Beatrice's prophecy had progressed so far +towards fulfilment, that Antony was going about the woods and the moors +saying over to himself the name he had found for the Image, as we saw in +the first chapter; and his love for Silencieux, begun more or less as a +determined self-illusion, grew more and more of a reality. Every day new +life welled into Silencieux's face, as every day life ebbed from the +face of Beatrice, surely foreseeing the coming on of what she had +feared. For the love he gave to Silencieux Antony must take away from +Beatrice, from whom as the days went by he grew more and more withdrawn. +</p> +<p> +It was true that the long lonely days which he spent in the wood bore +fruit in a remarkable productiveness. Never had his imagination been so +enkindled, or his pen so winged. But this very industry, the proofs of +which he would each evening bring down the wood for that fine judgment +of Beatrice's, which, in spite of all, still remained more to him than +any other praise—this very industry was the secret confirmation for +Beatrice's sad heart. No longer the inspirer, she was yet, she bitterly +told herself, honoured among women as a critic. Her heart might bleed, +and her eyes fill with tears, as he read; but then, as he would say, the +Beauty, the Music! Is it Beautiful? Is it Music? If it be that, no +matter how it has been made! Let us give thanks for creation, though it +involves the sacrifice of our own most tender and sacred feelings. To +set mere personal feelings against Beauty—human tears against an +immortal creation! Did he spare his own feelings? Indeed he did not. +</p> +<p> +On the night when we first met him bidding good-bye to Silencieux "until +the rising of the moon," he had sat through dinner eating but little, +feverishly and somewhat cruelly gay. Though he was as yet too kind to +admit it to himself, Beatrice was beginning to bore him, not merely by +her sadness, which his absorption prevented his realising except in +flashes, but by her very resemblance to the Image—of which, from having +been the beloved original, she was, in his eyes, becoming an indifferent +materialisation. The sweet flesh he had loved so tenderly became an +offence to him, as a medium too gross for the embodiment of so beautiful +a face. Such a face as Silencieux's demanded a more celestial porcelain. +</p> +<p> +Dinner at last finished, he made an excuse to Beatrice for leaving her +alone once more at the end as he had during all the rest of the day, +and hastened to keep his tryst with Silencieux. During dinner the +conscious side of his mind had been luxuriating in the romantic sound of +"until the rising of the moon,"—for he was as yet a long way from being +quite simple even with Silencieux,—and the idea of his going out with +serious eagerness to meet one who, if she was as he knew a living being, +was an image too, delighted his sense of fantastic make-believe. +</p> +<p> +There is in all love that element of make-believe. Every woman who is +loved is partly the creation of her lover's fancy. He consciously +siderealises her, and with open eyes magnifies her importance to his +life. Antony but made believe and magnified uncommonly—and his dream of +vivifying white plaster was perhaps less desperate than the dreams of +some, that would breathe the breath of life into the colder clay of some +beloved woman, who seems spontaneously to live but is dead all the +while. +</p> +<p> +Silencieux appeared to be dead, but beneath that eternal smile, as +Beatrice had divined, as Antony was learning, she was only too terribly +alive. Yes! Antony's was the easier dream. +</p> +<p> +The moon and Antony came up the wood together from opposite ends, and +when Antony entered his châlet Silencieux was already waiting for him, +her head crowned with a moonbeam. He kissed her softly and took her with +him out into the ferns. +</p> + +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<a name="CH5"><!-- CH5 --></a> +<h2> + CHAPTER V +</h2> + +<center> +SILENCIEUX SPEAKS +</center> +<p> +So long as the moon held, Antony stole up the wood each night to meet +Silencieux—"at the rising of the moon." Sometimes he would lie in a +hollow with her head upon his knee, and gaze for an hour at a time, +entranced, into her face. He would feign to himself that she slept, and +he would hold his breath lest he should awaken her. Sometimes he would +say in a tender whisper, not loud enough for her to hear:— +</p> +<p> +"It is cold to-night, Silencieux. See, my cloak will keep you warm." +</p> +<p> +Once as he did this she heaved a gentle sigh, as though thanking him. +</p> +<p> +At other times he would place her against the gable of the châlet, so +that the moonlight fell upon her, and then he would plunge into the +wood and walk its whole length, so that, as he wound his way back +through the intervening brakes, her face would come and go, glimmering +away off through the leafage, beckoning to him to return. And once he +thought he heard her call his name very softly through the wood. +</p> +<p> +That may have been an illusion, but it was during these days that he did +actually hear her speak for the first time. He had been writing till +past midnight, with her smile just above him, and when he had turned out +the lamp and was moving to the door through the vague flickering light +of the fire, he distinctly heard a voice very luxurious and tender say +"Antony," just behind him. It was hardly more than a whisper, but its +sweetness thrilled his blood, and half in joy and fear he turned to her +again. But she was only smiling inscrutably as before, and she spoke no +more for that night. +</p> + +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<a name="CH6"><!-- CH6 --></a> +<h2> + CHAPTER VI +</h2> + +<center> +THE THREE BLACK PONDS +</center> +<p> +At the bottom of the valley, approached by sunken honeysuckle lanes that +seemed winding into the centre of the earth, lay three black ponds, +almost hidden in a <i>cul-de-sac</i> of woodland. Though long since +appropriated by nature, made her own by moss and rooted oaks, they were +so set one below the other, with green causeways between each, that an +ancient art, long since become nature, had evidently designed and dug +them, years, perhaps centuries, ago. So long dead were the old +pond-makers that great trees grew now upon the causeways, and vast +jungles of rush and water grasses choked the trickling overflows from +one pond to the other. Once, it was said, when the earth of those parts +had been rich in iron, these ponds had driven great hammers,—but long +before the memory of the oldest cottager they had rested from their +labours, and lived only the life of beauty and silence. Where iron had +once been was now the wild rose, and the grim wounds of the earth had +been healed by the kisses of five hundred springs. +</p> +<p> +About these ponds stole many a secret path, veined with clumsy roots, +shadowed with the thick bush of many a clustering parasite, and echoing +sometimes beneath from the hollowed shelter of coot or water-rat. Lilies +floated in circles about the ponds, like the crowns of sunken queens, +and sometimes a bird broke the silence with a frightened cry. +</p> +<p> +It was here that Beatrice and Wonder would often take their morning +walk,—Wonder, though but a little girl of four, having grown more and +more of a companion to her mother, since Antony's love for Silencieux. +</p> +<p> +A morning in August the two were walking hand in hand. Wonder was one of +those little girls that seem to know all the meanings of life, while yet +struggling with the alphabet of its unimportant words. +</p> +<p> +The soul of such a child is, of all things, the most mysterious. There +was that in her face, as she clung on to her mother's hand, which seemed +to say: "O mother, I understand it all, and far more; if I might only +talk to you in the language of heaven,—but my words are like my little +legs, frail and uncertain of their footing, and, while I think all your +strange grown-up thoughts, I can only talk of toys and dolls. Mother, +father's blood as well as yours is in my veins, and so I understand you +both. Poor little mother! Poor little father!" +</p> +<p> +Little Wonder looked these things, she may indeed have thought them; +but all she said was: "O mother, what was that?" +</p> +<p> +"That was a rabbit, dear. See, there is another! See his fluffy white +tail!" +</p> +<p> +And again: "O mother, what was that?" +</p> +<p> +"That was a water-hen, dear. She has a little house, a warm nest, close +to the water among the bushes yonder, and she calls like that to let her +little children know she's coming home with some dainty things for +lunch. She means 'Hush! Hush! Don't be frightened. I'm coming just as +fast as I can.'" +</p> +<p> +"Funny little mother! What pretty stories you tell me. But do the birds +really talk—Oh, but look, little mother, there's Daddy—" +</p> +<p> +It was Antony, deep in some dream of Silencieux. +</p> +<p> +"Daddy! Daddy!" cried the little girl. +</p> +<p> +He took her tenderly by the hand. +</p> +<p> +"Daddy, where have you been all this long time? You have brought me no +flowers for ever so long." +</p> +<p> +"Flowers, little Wonder—they are nearly all gone away, gone to sleep +till next year—But see, I will gather you something prettier than +flowers." +</p> +<p> +And, hardly marking Beatrice, he led Wonder up and down among the +winding underwood. Fungi of exquisite yellows and browns were popping up +all about the wood. He gathered some of the most delicate, and put them +into the fresh small hands. +</p> +<p> +"But, Daddy, I mustn't eat them, must I?" +</p> +<p> +"No, dear—they are too beautiful to eat. You must just look at them and +love them, like flowers." +</p> +<p> +"But they are not flowers, Daddy. They don't smell like flowers. I would +rather have flowers, Daddy." +</p> +<p> +"But there are no flowers till next year. You must learn to love these +too, little Wonder; they are more beautiful than flowers." +</p> +<p> +"Oh, no, Daddy, they are not—" +</p> +<p> +"Antony," said Beatrice, "how strange you are! Would you poison her? +See, dear," (turning to Wonder) "Daddy is only teasing. Let us throw +them away. They are nasty, nasty things. Promise me never to gather +them, won't you, Wonder?" +</p> +<p> +"Yes, mother. I don't like them. They frighten me." +</p> +<p> +Antony turned into a by-path with a strange laugh, and was lost to them +in the wood. +</p> + +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<a name="CH7"><!-- CH7 --></a> +<h2> + CHAPTER VII +</h2> + +<center> +THE LOVERS OF SILENCIEUX +</center> +<p> +Silencieux often spoke to Antony now. Sometimes a sudden, startling word +when he was writing late at night; sometimes long tender talks; once a +terrible whisper. But all this time she never opened her eyes. The +lashes still lay wet upon her cheeks, and when she spoke her lips seemed +hardly to move, only to smile with a deeper meaning, an intenser life. +Indeed, at these times, her face shone with so great a brightness that +Antony's vision was dazzled, and to his gaze she seemed almost +featureless as a star. +</p> +<p> +Once he had begged to see her eyes. +</p> +<p> +"You know not what you ask," she had answered. "When you see my eyes you +will die. Some day, Antony, you shall see my eyes. But not yet. You +have much to do for me yet. There is yet much love for you and me before +the end." +</p> +<p> +"Have all died who saw your eyes, Silencieux?" +</p> +<p> +"Yes, all died." +</p> +<p> +"You have had many lovers, Silencieux. Many lovers, and far from here, +and long ago." +</p> +<p> +"Yes, many lovers, long ago," echoed Silencieux. +</p> +<p> +"You have been very cruel, Silencieux." +</p> +<p> +"Yes, very cruel, but very kind. It is true men have died for me. I have +been cruel, yes, but to die for me has seemed better than to live for +any other. And some of my lovers I have never forsaken. When they have +lost all in the world, they have had me. Lonely garrets have seemed +richly furnished because of my face, and men with foodless lips have +died blest because I was near them at the last. Sometimes I have kissed +their lips and died with them, and the world has missed my face for a +hundred unlovely years—for the world is only beautiful when I and my +lovers are in it. Antony, you are one of my lovers, one of my dearest +lovers; be great enough, be all mine, and perhaps I will die with you, +Antony—and leave the world in darkness for your sake, another hundred +years." +</p> +<p> +"Tell me of your lovers, Silencieux." +</p> +<p> +"Nearly three thousand years ago I loved a woman of Mitylene, very fair +and made of fire. But she loved another more than I, and for his sake +threw herself from a rock into the sea. As she fell, the rose we had +made together fell from her bosom, and was torn to pieces by the sea. +Fishermen gathered here and there a petal floating on the waters,—but +what were they?—and the world has never known how wonderful was that +rose of our love which she took with her into the depths of the sea." +</p> +<p> +"You are faithful, Silencieux; you love her still." +</p> +<p> +"Yes, I love her still." +</p> +<p> +"And with whom did love come next, Silencieux?" +</p> +<p> +"Oh, I loved many those years, for the loss of a great love sends us +vainly from hand to hand of many lesser loves, to ease a little the +great ache; and at that time the world seemed full of my lovers. I have +forgotten none of them. They pass before me, a fair frieze of +unforgotten faces; but most I loved a Roman poet, because, perhaps, he +loved so well the memory of her I had loved, and knew so skilfully to +make bloom again among his own red roses those petals of passionate +ivory which the fishermen of Lesbos had recovered from the sea." +</p> +<p> +"Tell me of your lovers, Silencieux," said Antony again. +</p> +<p> +"Hundreds of years after, I loved in Florence a young poet with a face +of silver. His soul was given to a little red-cheeked girl. She died, +and then I took him to my bosom, and loved him on through the years, +till his face had grown iron with many sorrows. Now at last, his +baby-girl by his side, he sits in heaven, with a face of gold. In +Paris," she went on, "have I been wonderfully beloved, and in northern +lands near the pole—" +</p> +<p> +"But—England?" said Antony. "Tell me of your English lovers." +</p> +<p> +"Best of them I love two: one a laughing giant who loved me three +hundred years ago, and the other a little London boy with large eyes of +velvet, who mid all the gloom of your great city saw and loved my face, +as none had seen and loved it since she of Mitylene. I found the giant +sitting by a country stream, holding a daffodil in his mighty hands and +whistling to the birds. He took and wore me like a flower. I was to him +as a nightingale that sang from his sleeve, for he loved so much +besides. Yet me he loved best, as those who can read his secret poems +understand. But my little London boy loved me only. For him the world +held nothing but my face, and it was of his great love for me that he +died." +</p> +<p> +"But these were all poets," said Antony. +</p> +<p> +"Yes, poets are the greatest of all lovers. Though all who since the +world began have been the makers of beautiful things have loved me, I +love my poets best. Sweeter than marble or many colours to my eyes is +the sound of a poet singing in my ears—" +</p> +<p> +"For whom, Silencieux, did you step down into the sad waters of the +Seine?" +</p> +<p> +"It was a young poet of Paris, beloved of many women, a drunkard of +strange dreams. He too died because he loved me, and when he died there +was none left whose voice seemed sweet after his. So I died with him. I +died with him," she repeated, "to come to life again with you. Many +lips have been pressed to mine, Antony, since the cold sleep of the +Seine fell over me, but none were warm and wild like yours. I loved my +sleep while the others kissed me, but with the touch of your lips the +dreams of life began to stir within me again. O Antony, be great enough, +be all mine, that we may fulfil our dream; and perhaps, Antony, I will +die with you—and leave the world in darkness for your sake, another +hundred years." +</p> +<p> +Exalted above the earth with the joy of Silencieux's words, Antony +pressed his lips to hers in an ecstasy, and vowed his life and all +within it inviolably to her. +</p> + +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<a name="CH8"><!-- CH8 --></a> +<h2> + CHAPTER VIII +</h2> + +<center> +A STRANGE KISS FOR SILENCIEUX +</center> +<p> +One hot August afternoon Antony took Silencieux with him to a +bramble-covered corner of the dark moor which bounded his little wood. A +ruined bank soaked with sunshine, a haunt of lizards, a catacomb of +little lives that creep and run and whisper, made their seat. +</p> +<p> +Silencieux's face, out there under the open sky and in the full blaze of +the sun, at once lost and gained in reality; gained by force of a +contrast which accentuated while it limited her, lost by opposition to +the great faces of earth and sky. Her life, so concentrated, so +self-absorbed, seemed more of an essence, potently distilled, compared +with this abounding ichor of existence, that audibly sang in brimming +circulation through the veins of this carelessly immortal earth. +</p> +<p> +For some moments of self-conscious thought she shrank into a symbol,—a +symbol of but one of the elements of the mighty world. Yet to this +element did not all the others, more brutal in force, more extended in +space, conspire? +</p> +<p> +So in some hours will the most mortal maid of warmest flesh and blood +become an abstraction to her lover—sometimes shrink to the significance +of one more flower, and sometimes expand to the significance of a +microcosm, a firmament in mystical miniature. +</p> +<p> +Thus in like manner for Antony did Silencieux alternate between reality +and dream that afternoon, though all the time he knew that, however now +and again the daylight seemed to create an illusion of her remoteness, +she was still his, and he of all men her chosen lover. +</p> +<p> +Suddenly as they sat there together, silent and immovable, Antony +caught the peer of two bright little eyes fixed on the white face of +Silencieux. A tiny wedge-shaped head, with dashes of white across the +brows, reared itself out of a crevice in the bank. A forked tongue came +and went like black lightning through its eager little lips, and a +handsomely marked adder began to glide, like molten metal, along the +bank to Silencieux. The brilliant whiteness of the image had fascinated +the little creature. Antony kept very still. Darting its head from side +to side, venomously alert against the smallest sound, the adder reached +Silencieux. Then to Antony's delight it coiled itself round the white +throat, still restlessly moving its head wonderingly beneath the chin. +With a grace to which all movement from the beginning of time seemed to +have led up, it clasped Silencieux's neck and softly reared its lips to +hers. Its black tongue darted to and fro along that strange smile. +</p> +<p> +"He has kissed her!" Antony exclaimed, and in an instant the adder was +nothing more than a terrified rustle in the brushwood. +</p> +<p> +He took Silencieux into his hands. There was poison on her lips. For +another moment his fancy made him self-conscious, and turned Silencieux +again into a symbol,—though it was but for a moment. +</p> +<p> +"There is always poison on the lips of Art," he said to himself. +</p> + +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<a name="CH9"><!-- CH9 --></a> +<h2> + CHAPTER IX +</h2> + +<center> +THE WONDERFUL WEEK. +</center> +<p> +As Antony and Silencieux became more and more to each other, poor +Beatrice, though she had been the first occasion of their love, and +little as she now demanded, seldom as Antony spoke to her, seldom as he +smiled upon her, distant as were the lonely walks she took, infrequent +as was her sad footfall in the little wood,—poor Beatrice, though +indeed, so far from active intrusion upon their loves, and as if only by +her breathing with them the heavy air of that green unwholesome valley, +was becoming an irksome presence of the imagination. They longed to be +somewhere together where Beatrice had never been, where her sad face +could not follow them; and one night Silencieux whispered to Antony:— +</p> +<p> +"Take me to the sea, Antony—to some lonely sea." +</p> +<p> +"To-morrow I will take you," said Antony, "where the loneliest land +meets the loneliest sea." +</p> +<p> +On the morrow evening the High Muses had once more made Antony late for +dinner. One hour, and two hours, went by, and then Beatrice, in alarm, +took the lantern and courageously braved the blackness of the wood. +</p> +<p> +The châlet was in darkness, and the door was locked, but through the +uncurtained glass of the window, she was able to irradiate the emptiness +of its interior. Antony was not there. +</p> +<p> +But she noticed, with a shudder, that the space usually filled by the +Image was vacant. Then she understood, and with a hopeless sigh went +down the wood again. +</p> +<p> +Already Antony and Silencieux had found the place where the loneliest +land meets the loneliest sea. Side by side they were sitting on a +moonlit margin of the world, and Antony was singing low to the murmur of +the waves:— +</p> +<pre> + Hopeless of hope, past desire even of thee, + There is one place I long for, + A desolate place + That I sing all my songs for, + A desolate place for a desolate face, + Where the loneliest land meets the loneliest sea. + + Green waves and green grasses—and nought else is nigh, + But a shadow that beckons; + A desolate face, + And a shadow that beckons + The desolate face to the desolate place + Where the loneliest sea meets the loneliest sky. + + Wide sea and wide heaven, and all else afar, + But a spirit is singing, + A desolate soul + That is joyfully winging— + A desolate soul—to that desolate goal + Where the loneliest wave meets the loneliest star. +</pre> +<p> +"It is not good," said Silencieux. +</p> +<p> +"I know," answered Antony. +</p> +<p> +"Throw it into the sea." +</p> +<p> +"It is not worthy of the sea." +</p> +<p> +"Burn it." +</p> +<p> +"Fire is too august." +</p> +<p> +"Throw it to the winds." +</p> +<p> +"They are too busy." +</p> +<p> +"Bury it." +</p> +<p> +"It would make barren a whole meadow." +</p> +<p> +"Forget it." +</p> +<p> +"I will—And you?" +</p> +<p> +"I will." +</p> +<p> +And Antony and Silencieux laughed softly together by the sea. +</p> +<p> +Many days Antony and Silencieux stayed together by the sea. They loved +it together in all its changes, in sun and rain, in wild wind and dreamy +calm; at morning when it shone like a spirit, at evening when it +flickered like a ghost, at noon when it lay asleep curled up like a +woman in the arms of the land. Sometimes at evening they sat in the +little fishing harbour, watching the incoming boats, till the sky grew +sad with rigging and old men's faces. +</p> +<p> +Then at last Silencieux said: "I am weary of the sea. Let us go to the +town—to the lights and the sad cries of the human waves." +</p> +<p> +So they went to the town and found a room high up, where they sat at the +window and watched the human lights, and listened to the human music. +</p> +<p> +Never had it been so wonderful to be together. +</p> +<p> +For a week Antony lived in heaven. Never had Silencieux been so kind, so +close to him. +</p> +<p> +"Let us be little children," he said. "Let us do anything that comes +into our heads." +</p> +<p> +So they ran in and out among pleasures together, joined strange dances +and sang strange songs. They clapped their hands to jugglers and +acrobats, and animals tortured into talent. And sometimes, as the gaudy +theatre resounded about them, they looked so still at each other that +all the rest faded away, and they were left alone with each other's eyes +and great thoughts of God. +</p> +<p> +"I love you, Silencieux." +</p> +<p> +"I love you, Antony." +</p> +<p> +"You will never leave me lonely in my dream, Silencieux?" +</p> +<p> +"Never, Antony." +</p> +<p> +Oh, how tender sometimes was Silencieux! +</p> +<p> +Several nights they had the whim that Silencieux should masquerade in +the wardrobe of her past. +</p> +<p> +"To-night, you shall go clothed as when you loved that woman in +Mitylene," Antony would say. +</p> +<p> +Or: "To-night you shall be a little shepherd-boy, with a leopard-skin +across your shoulder and mountain berries in your hair." +</p> +<p> +Or again: "To-night you shall be Pierrot—mourning for his Columbine." +</p> +<p> +Ah! how divine was Silencieux in all her disguises!—a divine child. Oh, +how tender those nights was Silencieux! +</p> +<p> +Antony sat and watched her face in awe and wonder. Surely it was the +noblest face that had ever been seen in the world. +</p> +<p> +"Is it true that that noble face is mine?" he would ask; "I cannot +believe it." +</p> +<p> +"Kiss it," said Silencieux gaily, "and see." +</p> +<hr> +<p> +Then on a sudden, what was this change in Silencieux! So cold, so +silent, so cruel, had she grown. +</p> +<p> +"Silencieux," Antony called to her. "Silencieux," he pleaded. +</p> +<p> +But she never spoke. +</p> +<p> +"O Silencieux, speak! I cannot bear it." +</p> +<p> +Then her lips moved. "Shall I speak?" she said, with a cruel smile. +</p> +<p> +"Yes," he besought her again. +</p> +<p> +"I shall love you no more in this world. The lights are gone out, the +magic faded." +</p> +<p> +"Silencieux!" +</p> +<p> +But she spoke no more, and, with those lonely words in his ears, Antony +came out of his dream and heard the rain falling miserably through the +wood. +</p> + +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<a name="CH10"><!-- CH10 --></a> +<h2> + CHAPTER X +</h2> + +<center> +SILENCIEUX WHISPERS +</center> +<p> +So Antony first knew how cruel could be Silencieux to those who loved +her. Her sudden silences he had grown to understand, even to love. +Always they had been broken again by some wonderful word, which he had +known would come sooner or later. All great natures are full of silence. +Silence is the soil of all passion. But now it was not silence that was +between them, but terrible speech. As with a knife she had stabbed their +love right in its heart. Yet Antony knew that his love could never die, +but only suffer. +</p> +<p> +During these days he half turned to Beatrice. How kind was her simple +earth-warm affection, after the star-cold transcendentalism in which he +had been living! How full of comfort was her unselfish humanity, after +the pitiless egoism of the divine! +</p> +<p> +And yet, while it momentarily soothed him, he realised, with a heart sad +for Beatrice as for himself, that it could never satisfy him again. For +days he left Silencieux alone in the wood, and Beatrice's face +brightened with their renewed companionship; but all the time he seemed +to hear Silencieux calling him, and he knew that he would have to go +back. +</p> +<p> +One night, almost happy again, as he lay by the side of Beatrice, who +was sleeping deeply, he rose stealthily, and looked out into the wood. +</p> +<p> +The moonlight fell through it mysteriously, as on that night when he had +stolen up there to meet Silencieux—"at the rising of the moon." He +could hesitate no longer. Leaving Beatrice asleep, he was soon making +his way once more through the moonlit trees. +</p> +<p> +The little châlet looked very still and solemn, like a temple of +Chaldean mysteries, and an unwonted chill of fear passed through Antony +as he stood in the circle of moonlight outside. His spirit seemed aware +of some dread menace to the future in that moment, and a voice was +crying within him to go back. +</p> +<p> +But the longing that had brought him so far was too strong for such +undefined warnings. Once more he turned the key in the lock, and looked +on Silencieux once more. +</p> +<p> +The moonlight fell over her face like a veil of silver, and on her +eyelashes was a glitter of tears. +</p> +<p> +Her face was alive again, alive too with a softness of womanhood he had +never seen before. +</p> +<p> +"Forgive me, Antony," she said. "I loved you all the time." +</p> +<p> +What else need Silencieux say! +</p> +<p> +"But it was so strange," said Antony after a while, "so strange. I +could have borne the pain, if only I could have understood." +</p> +<p> +"Shall I tell you the reason, Antony?" +</p> +<p> +"Yes." +</p> +<p> +"It was because I saw in your eyes a thought of Beatrice. For a moment +your thoughts had forsaken me and gone to pity Beatrice. I saw it in +your eyes." +</p> +<p> +"Poor Beatrice!" said Antony. "It is little indeed I give her. Could you +not spare her so little, Silencieux?" +</p> +<p> +"I can spare her nothing. You must be all mine, Antony—your every +thought and hope and dream. So long as there is another woman in the +world for you except me, I cannot be yours in the depths of my being, +nor you mine. There must always be something withheld. It will never be +perfect, until—" +</p> +<p> +"Until when?" +</p> +<p> +"Until, Antony,"—and Silencieux lowered her voice to an awful +whisper,—"until you have made for me the human sacrifice." +</p> +<p> +"The human sacrifice!" +</p> +<p> +"Yes, Antony,—all my lovers have done that for me. They were not really +mine till then. Some have brought me many such offerings. Antony, when +will you bring me the human sacrifice?" +</p> +<p> +"O Silencieux!" +</p> +<p> +Antony's heart chilled with terror at Silencieux's words. It was against +this that the voices had warned him as he came up the wood. O that he +had never seen Silencieux more, never heard her poisonous voice again! +</p> +<p> +As one fleeing before the shadow of uncommitted sin that gains upon him +at each stride, Antony fled from the place, and sought the moors. The +moon was near its setting, and soon the dawn would throw open the +eastern doors of the sky. He walked on and on, waiting, praying for, +stifling for the light; and, at last, with a freshening of the air, and +faint sounds of returning consciousness from distant farms, it came. +</p> +<p> +High over a lake of ethereal silver welling up out of space, hung the +morning star, shining as though its heart would break, bright as a tear +that must slip down the face of heaven and fall amid the grass. +</p> +<p> +As Antony looked up at it, his soul escaped from its prison of dark +thought, and such an exaltation had come with the quickening light, that +it seemed as though the body, with little more than pure aspiration to +wing it, might follow the soul's flight to that crystal sphere. +</p> +<p> +In that moment, Antony knew that the love in the soul of man is mated +only with the infinite universe. In no marriage less than that shall it +find lasting fulfilment of itself. No single face, however beautiful, no +single human soul, however vast, can absorb it. Silencieux, Beatrice, +Wonder, himself, all faded away, in a trance-like sense of a stupendous +passion, an august possession. He felt that within him which rose up +gigantic from the earth, and towered into eyries of space, from whence +that morning star seemed like a dewdrop glittering low down upon the +earth. +</p> +<p> +It was the god in him that knew itself for one brief space, a moment's +awakening in the sleep of fact. +</p> +<p> +Could a god so great, so awakened, be again the slave of one earthly +face? +</p> +<p> +Yes, the greater the god, the greater the slave; and so it was that, +falling plumb down from that skyey exaltation, human again with the +weakness that follows divine moments, Antony returned from the morning +star to Silencieux. +</p> +<p> +Her face was bathed in the delicate early sunlight and looked very pure +and gentle, and he kissed her. +</p> +<p> +Surely those terrible words had been an illusion of the dark hours. +Silencieux had never said them. He kissed her again. +</p> +<p> +"I love you, Silencieux," he said. And then she spoke. +</p> +<p> +"If you love me, Antony," she said, "if you love me—" +</p> +<p> +"O what, Silencieux?" he cried, his heart growing cold once more. +</p> +<p> +"Come nearer, Antony. Put your ear to my lips—Antony, if you love +me—the human sacrifice." +</p> +<p> +"O God," he cried, "here in the sunlight—It is true—" +</p> +<p> +And, a man with the doom of his nature heavy upon him, he once more went +out into the wood. +</p> + +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<a name="CH11"><!-- CH11 --></a> +<h2> + CHAPTER XI +</h2> + +<center> +WONDER IN THE WOOD +</center> +<p> +A few days after this, little Wonder, playing about the garden, had +slipped away from her nurse, and, pleased in her little soul at her +cleverness, had found her way up to her father's châlet. Antony was +sitting at his desk, writing, with his door open. +</p> +<p> +"Daddy," suddenly came a little voice from the bottom of the staircase, +"Daddy, where are you?" +</p> +<p> +Antony rose and went to the door. +</p> +<p> +"Come in, little Wonder. Well, it is a clever girl to come all the way +up the wood by herself." +</p> +<p> +"Yes, Daddy," said the self-possessed little girl, as she toddled into +the châlet and looked round wonderingly at the books and pictures. Then +presently: +</p> +<p> +"Daddy, what do you do all day in the wood?" +</p> +<p> +"I make beautiful things." +</p> +<p> +"Show me some." +</p> +<p> +Antony showed her a page of his beautiful manuscript. +</p> +<p> +"Why, those are only words, silly Daddy!" +</p> +<p> +"But words, little Wonder, are the most beautiful things in the world. +Listen—" and he took the child on his knee. "Listen:— +</p> +<pre> + In Xanadu did Kubla Khan + A stately pleasure-dome decree: + Where Alph, the sacred river, ran + Through caverns measureless to man + Down to a sunless sea. +</pre> +<p> +The child had inherited a love of beautiful sound, and, though she +understood nothing of the meaning, the music charmed her, and she +nestled close to her father, with wide eyes. +</p> +<p> +"Say some more, Daddy." +</p> +<p> +The sobbing cadences of the greatest of Irish songs came to Antony's +mind, and he crooned a verse or two at random: +</p> +<pre> + All day long, in unrest, + To and fro, do I move. + The very soul within my breast + Is wasted for you, love! + The heart in my bosom faints + To think of you, my queen, + My life of life, my saint of saints, + My dark Rosaleen! + My own Rosaleen! + To hear your sweet and sad complaints, + My life, my love, my saint of saints, + My dark Rosaleen!.... + + Over dews, over sands, + Will I fly for your weal: + Your holy delicate white hands + Shall girdle me with steel. + At home in your emerald bowers, + From morning's dawn till e'en, + + You'll pray for me, my flower of flowers, + My dark Rosaleen! + My fond Rosaleen! + You'll think of me thro' daylight hours, + My virgin flower, my flower of flowers, + My dark Rosaleen! + + I could scale the blue air, + I could plough the high hills, + Oh, I could kneel all night in prayer + To heal your many ills! + And one beamy smile from you + Would float like light between + My toils and me, my own, my true, + My dark Rosaleen! + My fond Rosaleen! + Would give me life and soul anew, + A second life, a soul anew, + My dark Rosaleen! +</pre> +<p> +Wonder, child-like, wearied with the length of the verses, and suddenly +the white face of Silencieux caught her eye. +</p> +<p> +"Who is that lady, Daddy?" +</p> +<p> +"That is Silencieux." +</p> +<p> +"What a pretty name! Is she a kind lady, Daddy?" +</p> +<p> +"Sometimes." +</p> +<p> +"She is very beautiful. She is like little mother. But her face is so +white. She makes me frightened. Hold me, Daddy—" and she crouched in +his arms. +</p> +<p> +"You mustn't be frightened of her, Wonder. She loves little girls. See +how she is smiling at you. She wants to be friends with you. She wants +you to kiss her, little Wonder." +</p> +<p> +"Oh, no! no!" almost screamed the little girl. +</p> +<p> +But suddenly a cruel whim to insist came over the father, and, +half-coaxingly and half-forcibly, he held her up to the image, stroking +its white cheek to reassure her. +</p> +<p> +"See, how kind she is, little Wonder! See how she smiles—how she loves +you. She loves little girls, and she never sees any up here in the +lonely wood. It will make her so happy. Kiss her, little Wonder!" +</p> +<p> +Reluctantly the child obeyed, and with a shudder she said:— +</p> +<p> +"Oh, how cold her lips are, Daddy!" +</p> +<p> +"But were they not sweet, little Wonder?" +</p> +<p> +"No, Daddy, they tasted of dust." +</p> +<p> +And as Antony had lifted her up, he had said in his heart: "Silencieux, +I bring you my little child." +</p> + +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<a name="CH12"><!-- CH12 --></a> +<h2> + CHAPTER XII +</h2> + +<center> +AUTUMN IN THE VALLEY +</center> +<p> +Autumn in the valley was autumn, melancholy and sinister, as you find +her only in such low-lying immemorial drifting places of leaves, and +oozy sinks of dank water. For the moors autumn is the spring come back +in purple, and in golden woods and many another place where the year +dies happily, she smiles like a widow so young and fair that one thinks +rather of life than death in her presence. +</p> +<p> +But in the valley Autumn was a fearsome hag, a little crazy, two-double, +gathering sticks in a scarlet cloak. When she turned her wicked old eyes +upon you, the life died within you, and wherever you walked she was +always somewhere in the bushes muttering evil spells. All the year +round under the green cloud of summer, you might meet Autumn creeping +somewhere in the valley, like foul mists that creep from pool to pool; +for here all the year was decay to feed upon and dead leaves for her to +sleep on. Always the year round in the valley, if you listened close, +you would hear something sighing, something dying. To the happiest +walking there would come strange sinkings of the heart, unaccountable +premonitions of overhanging doom. There the least superstitious would +start at the sight of a toad, and come upon three magpies at once not +without fear. Over all was a breath of imminent disaster, a look of +sorrow from which there was no escape. It was not many yards away from a +merry high-road, but once in the shade of its lanes, it seemed as though +you had been shut away from the world of living men. Black slopes of +pine and melancholy bars of sunset walled you in, as in some funeral +hall of judgment. +</p> +<p> +Alas! Beatrice's was not the happiest of hearts, and all day long this +autumn, as the mornings came later and darker and the evenings earlier, +always voices in the valley, voices of low-hanging mist and dripping +rain, kept saying: "Death is coming! Death is coming!" +</p> +<p> +Tapped at the windows, ticking and crying in the rooms, was the same +message; till, in a terror of the walls, she would flee into the wider +prison of the woods, and oppressed by them in turn, would escape with a +beating heart into the honest daylight of the high-road. So one flies +from a haunted house, or comes out of an evil dream. +</p> +<p> +Sometimes it seemed as if the white face of Silencieux looked out from +the woodside, and mocked her with the same cry: "Death is coming! Death +is coming!" +</p> +<p> +Silencieux! Ah, how happy they had been before the coming of +Silencieux! How frail is our happiness, how suddenly it can die! One +moment it seems built for eternity, marble-based and glittering with +towers,—the next, where it stood is lonely grass and dew, not a stone +left. Ah, yes, how happy they had been; and then Antony by a heartless +chance had seen Silencieux, and in an instant their happiness had been +at an end for ever. Only a glance of the eyes and love is born, only a +glance of the eyes, and alas! love must die. +</p> +<p> +A glance of the eyes and all the old kindness is gone, a glance of the +eyes, and from the face you love the look you seek has died out for +everlasting. +</p> +<p> +"O Antony! Antony!" moaned Beatrice, as she wandered alone in those dank +autumn lanes, "if you would only come back to me for one short day, come +back with the old look on your face, be to me for a little while as you +once were, I think I could gladly die—" +</p> +<p> +Die! A tattered flower caught her glance, shaking chilly in the damp +wind, and once more she heard the whisper, "Death is coming!" +</p> +<p> +Near where she walked, stood, in the midst of a small meadow overgrown +with nettles, the blackened ruin of a cottage long since destroyed by +fire. On the edge of the little sandy lane, perilously near the feet of +the passer-by, was its forgotten well, the mouth choked with weeds and +briers. +</p> +<p> +In her absorption Beatrice had almost walked into it. Now she parted the +bushes and looked down. A stone fell as she looked, making a sepulchral +echo. What a place to hide one's sorrow in! No one would think of +looking there. Antony might think she had gone away, or he might drag +the three black ponds, but here it was unlikely any one would come. And +in a little while—a very little while—Antony would forget, or +sometimes make himself happy with his unhappiness. +</p> +<p> +Ah! but Wonder! No, if Antony needed her no more, Wonder did. She must +stay for Wonder's sake. And perhaps, who could say, Antony might yet +need her, might come to her some day and say "Beatrice," with the old +voice. To be really necessary to Antony again, if only for one little +hour,—yes! she could wait and suffer for that. +</p> + +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<a name="CH13"><!-- CH13 --></a> +<h2> + CHAPTER XIII +</h2> + +<center> +THE HUMAN SACRIFICE +</center> +<p> +The valley was an ill place even for the body, a lair of rheums and +agues; and disembodied fevers waited in wells for the sunk pail. For the +valley was very beautiful, beautiful with that green beauty that only +comes of damp and decay. +</p> +<p> +Late one October night, Antony, alone with Silencieux, as was now again +his custom, was surprised to hear footsteps coming hastily up the wood, +and even more surprised at the sudden unusual appearance of Beatrice. +</p> +<p> +"I am sorry to disturb you, Antony," she said, noting with a pang how +the lamp had been arranged to throw a vivid light upon Silencieux, "but +I want you to come down and look at Wonder. I'm afraid she is ill." +</p> +<p> +"Wonder, ill!" exclaimed Antony, rising with a start, "I will come at +once;" and they went together. +</p> +<p> +Wonder was lying in her bed, with flushed cheeks and bright yet heavy +eyes. +</p> +<p> +"Wonder, my little Wonder," said Antony caressingly, as he bent over +her. "Does little Wonder feel ill?" +</p> +<p> +"Yes, Daddy. I feel so sick, Daddy." +</p> +<p> +"Never mind; she will be better to-morrow." But he had noticed how +burning hot were her hands, and how dry were her fresh little lips. +</p> +<p> +"I must go for the doctor at once," he said to his wife, when they were +outside the room. The father, so long asleep, had sprung awake at the +first hint of danger to the little child that in his neglectful way he +loved deeply all the time; and, in spite of the danger to Wonder, a +faint joy stirred in Beatrice's heart to see him thus humanly aroused +once more. +</p> +<p> +"Kiss me, Beatrice," he said, as he set out upon his errand. "Don't be +anxious, it will be all right." It was the first time he had kissed his +wife for many days. +</p> +<p> +The doctor's was some three miles away across the moor. It was a bright +starlit night, and Antony, who knew the moor well, had no difficulty in +making his way at a good pace along the mossy tracks. Presently he gave +a little cry of pain and stood still. +</p> +<p> +"O God," he cried, "it cannot be that. Oh, it cannot." +</p> +<p> +At that moment for the first time a dreadful thought had crossed his +mind. Suddenly a memory of that afternoon when he had bade Wonder kiss +Silencieux flashed upon him; and once more he heard himself saying: +"Silencieux, I bring you my little child." +</p> +<p> +But he had never meant it so. It had all been a mad fancy. What was +Silencieux herself but a wilful, selfish dream? He saw it all now. How +could a lifeless image have power over the life of his child? +</p> +<p> +And yet again, was Silencieux a lifeless image? And still again, if she +were an image, was it not always to an image that humanity from the +beginning had been sacrificed? Yes; perhaps if Silencieux were only an +image there was all the more reason to fear her. +</p> +<p> +When he returned he would go to Silencieux, go on his knees and beg for +the life of his child. Silencieux had been cruel, but she could hardly +be so cruel as that. +</p> +<p> +He drove back across the moor by the doctor's side. +</p> +<p> +"I have always thought you unwise to live in that valley," said the +doctor. "It's pretty, but like most pretty places, it's unhealthy. +Nature can seldom be good and beautiful at the same time." The doctor +was somewhat of a philosopher. +</p> +<p> +"Your little girl needs the hills. In fact you all do. Your wife isn't +half the woman she was since you took her into the valley. You don't +look any better for it, either. No, sir, believe me, beauty's all very +well, but it's not good to live with—And, by the way, have you had your +well looked at lately? That valley is just a beautiful sewer for the +drainage of the hills; a very market-town for all the germs and bacilli +of the district." +</p> +<p> +And the doctor laughed, as, curiously enough, people always do at jests +about bacilli. +</p> +<p> +But when he looked at Wonder, he took a more serious view of bacilli. +</p> +<p> +"You must have your well looked to at once," he said. "Your little girl +is very ill. She must be kept very quiet, and on no account excited." +</p> +<p> +Beatrice and Antony took it in turns to watch by Wonder's bed that +night, and once while Beatrice was watching, Antony found time to steal +up the wood with his prayer to Silencieux. +</p> +<p> +Never had she looked more mask-like, more lifeless. +</p> +<p> +"Silencieux," he cried, "I wickedly brought you my little child. O give +her back to me again! I cannot bear it. I cannot give her to you, +Silencieux. Take me, if you will. I will gladly die for you. But spare +her. O give her back to me, Silencieux!" +</p> +<p> +But the image was impassive and made no sign. +</p> +<p> +"Silencieux," he implored, "speak, for I know you hear me. Are you a +devil, Silencieux; a devil I have worshipped all this time? God help me! +Have you no pity,—what is her little flower-life to you? Why should you +snatch it out of the sun—" +</p> +<p> +But Silencieux made no sign. +</p> +<p> +Then Antony grew angry in his remorse: "I hate you, Silencieux. Never +will I look on your face again. You are an evil dream that has stolen +from me the truth of life. I have broken a true heart that loved me, +that would have died for me—for your sake; just to watch your loveless +beauty, to hear the cold music of your voice. You are like the moon that +turns men mad, a hollow shell of silver drawing all your light from the +sun of life, a silver shadow of the golden sun." +</p> +<p> +But prayer and reproach were alike in vain. Silencieux remained +unheeding, and Antony returned to watch by Beatrice's side, with a heart +that had now no hope, and a soul weighed down with the sense of +irrevocable sin. There lay the little life he had murdered, delivered up +to the Moloch of Art. No sorrow, no agonies, were now of any avail for +ever. Little Wonder would surely die, and all the old lost opportunities +of loving her could never return. He had loved the shadow. This was a +part of the price. +</p> +<p> +Day after day the cruel fever consumed Wonder as fire consumes a flower. +Her tiny face seemed too small for the visitation of such suffering as +burned and hammered behind the high white brow, and yellowed and drew +tight the skin upon the cheeks. She had so recently known the strange +pain of being born. Already, for so little of life, she was to endure +the pain of death. +</p> +<p> +Day after day, hour after hour, Antony hung over her bed, with a +devotion and an unconsciousness of fatigue that made Beatrice look at +him with astonishment, and sometimes even for a moment forget Wonder in +the joy with which she saw him transfigured by simple human love. Now, +when it was too late, he had become a father indeed. And it brought some +ease to his fiercely tortured heart to notice that it was his +ministrations that the dying child seemed to welcome most. For the most +part she lay in a semi-conscious state, heeding nothing, and only +moaning now and again, a sad little moan, like an injured bird. She +seemed to say she was so little a thing to suffer so. Once, however, +when Antony had just placed some fresh ice around her head, she opened +her eyes and said, "Dear little Daddy," and the light on Antony's +face—poor victim of perverse instincts that too often drew his really +fine nature awry—was sanctifying to see. +</p> +<p> +As terrible was the look of torture that came over his face, one night +near the end, when Wonder in a sudden nightmare of delirium had seized +his hand and cried:— +</p> +<p> +"O Daddy, the white lady! See her there at the end of the bed. She is +smiling, Daddy—" Then lower, "You will not make me kiss her any more, +will you, Daddy?"— +</p> +<p> +Beatrice had gone to snatch an hour or two's sleep, so she never heard +this, and it was no mere cowardly consolation for Antony to think +afterwards that no one but he and his little child had known of that +fatal afternoon in the wood. The dead understand all,—yes, even the +dead we have murdered. But the living can never be told a secret such as +that which Antony and his little daughter, whose soul was really grown +up, though she spoke still in baby language, shared immortally between +them. +</p> +<p> +When Beatrice returned to the room Wonder was sleeping peacefully again, +but at the chill hour when watchers blow out the night-lights, and a +dreary greyness comes like a fog through the curtains, Antony and +Beatrice fell into each other's arms in anguish, for Wonder was dead. +</p> + +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<a name="CH14"><!-- CH14 --></a> +<h2> + CHAPTER XIV +</h2> + +<center> +A SONG OF THE LITTLE DEAD +</center> +<p> +They carried little Wonder to a green churchyard, a place of kind old +trees and tender country bells. There were few birds to welcome her in +the grim November morning, but the grasses stole close and whispered +that very soon the thrush and the nightingale would be coming, that the +violets were already on their way, and that when May was there she +should lie all day in a bed of perfume. +</p> +<p> +For very dear to Nature's heart are the Little Dead. The great dead lie +imprisoned in escutcheoned vaults, but for the little dead Nature +spreads out soft small graves, all snowdrops and dewdrops, where +day-long they can feel the earth rocking them as in a cradle, and at +night hear the hushed singing of the stars. +</p> +<p> +Yes, Earth loves nothing so much as her little graves. There the tiny +bodies, like unexhausted censers, pour out all the stored sweetness they +had no time to use above the ground, turning the earth they lie in to +precious spices. There the roots of the old yew trees feel about +tenderly for the little unguided hands, and sometimes at nightfall the +rain bends over them weeping like an inconsolable mother. +</p> +<p> +It is on the little graves that the sun first rises at morn, and it is +there at evening that the moon lays softly her first silver flowers. +</p> +<p> +There the wren will sometimes bring her sky-blue eggs for a gift, and +the summer wind come sowing seeds of magic to take the fancy of the +little one beneath. Sometimes it shakes the hyacinths like a rattle of +silver, and spreads the turf above with a litter of coloured toys. +</p> +<p> +Here the butterflies are born with the first warm breath of the spring. +All the winter they lie hidden in the crevices of the stone, in the +carving of little names, and with the first spring day they stand +delicately and dry their yellow wings on the little graves. There are +the honeycombs of friendly bees, and the shelters of many a timid +earth-born speck of life no bigger than a dewdrop, mysteriously small. +Radiant pin-points of existence have their palaces on the broad blades +of the grasses, and in the cellars at their roots works many a humble +little slave of the mighty elements. +</p> +<p> +Yes, the emperors and the ants of Nature's vast economy alike love to be +kind to the little graves. +</p> + +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<a name="CH15"><!-- CH15 --></a> +<h2> + CHAPTER XV +</h2> + +<center> +SILENCIEUX ALONE IN THE WOOD. +</center> +<p> +Beatrice's grief for Wonder was such as only a mother can know. She had +but one consolation,—the kind sad eyes of Antony. She had lost Wonder, +but Antony had come back again. Wonder was not so dead as Antony had +seemed a month ago. +</p> +<p> +When they had left Wonder and were back in the house which was now twice +desolate, Antony took Beatrice's hands very tenderly and said:— +</p> +<p> +"I have been very wrong all these months. For a shadow I have missed the +lovely reality of a little child—and for a shadow, my own faithful +wife, I have all this time done you cruel wrong. But my eyes are open +now, I have come out of the evil dream that bound me—and never shall I +enter it again. Let us go from here. Let us leave this valley and never +come back to it any more." +</p> +<p> +So it was arranged that they should winter far away, returning only to +the valley for a few short days in the spring, and then leave it for +ever. They had no heart now for more than just to fly from that haunted +place, and before night fell in the valley they were already far away. +</p> +<p> +In vain Silencieux listened for the sound of her lover's step in the +wood, for he had vowed that he would never look upon her face again. +</p> + +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<a name="CH16"><!-- CH16 --></a> +<h2> + CHAPTER XVI +</h2> + +<center> +THE FIRST TALK ON THE HILLS +</center> +<p> +Antony took Beatrice to the high hills where all the year long the sun +and the snow shine together. He was afraid of the sea, for the sea was +Silencieux's for ever. In its depths lay a magic harp which filled all +its waves with music—music lovely and accursed, the voice of +Silencieux. That he must never hear again. He would pile the hills +against his ears. Inland and upland, he and Beatrice should go, ever +closer to the kind heart of the land, ever nearer to the forgetful +silences of the sky, till huge walls of space were between them and that +harp of the sea. Nor in the whisper of leaves nor in the gloom of +forests should the thought of Silencieux beset them. The earth that +held least of her—to that earth they would go; the earth that rose +nearest to heaven. +</p> +<p> +Beauty indeed should be theirs—the Beauty of Nature and Love; no more +the vampire's beauty of Art. +</p> +<p> +It was strange to each how their souls lightened as the valleys of the +world folded away behind them, and the simple slopes mounted in their +path. In that pure unladen air which so exhilarated their very bodies, +there seemed some mysterious property of exhilaration for the soul also. +One might have dreamed that just to breathe on those heights all one's +days would be to grow holy by the more cleansing power of the air. With +such bright currents ever running through the brain, surely one's +thoughts would circle there white as stones at the bottom of a spring. +</p> +<p> +"O Antony," said Beatrice, "why were we so long in finding the hills?" +</p> +<p> +"We found them once before, Beatrice—do you remember?" +</p> +<p> +"Yes! You have not forgotten?" said Beatrice, with the ray of a lost +happiness in her eyes—lost, and yet could it be dawning again? There +was a morning star in Antony's face. +</p> +<p> +"And then," said Antony, "we went into the valley—the Valley of Beauty +and Death." +</p> +<p> +Beatrice pressed his hand and looked all her love at him for comfort. He +knew how precious was such a forgiveness, the forgiveness of a mother +heart broken for the child, which he, directly or indirectly, had +sacrificed,—directly as he and Wonder alone knew, indirectly by taking +them with him into the Valley of Beauty. +</p> +<p> +"Ah, Beatrice, your love is almost greater than I can bear. I am not +worthy of it. I never shall be worthy. There is something in the love of +a woman like you to which the best man is unequal. We can love—and +greatly—but it is not the same." +</p> +<p> +"We went into the valley," he cried, "and I lost you your little +Wonder—" +</p> +<p> +"<i>Our</i> little Wonder," gently corrected Beatrice. "We found her +together, and we lost her together. Perhaps some day we shall find her +together again—" +</p> +<p> +"And do you know, Antony," Beatrice continued, "I sometimes wonder if +her little soul was not sent and so taken away all as part of a mission +to us, which in its turn is a part of the working out of her own +destiny. For life is very mysterious, Antony—" +</p> +<p> +"Alas! I had forgotten life," answered Antony with a sigh. +</p> +<p> +"Yes, dear," Beatrice went on, pursuing her thought. "I have dared to +hope that perhaps Wonder, as she was the symbol of our coming together, +was taken away just at this time because we were being drawn apart. +Perhaps it was to save our love that little Wonder died—" +</p> +<p> +Antony looked at Beatrice; half as one looks at a child, and half as one +might look at an angel. +</p> +<p> +"Beatrice," he said tenderly, "you believe in God." +</p> +<p> +"All women believe in God," answered Beatrice. +</p> +<p> +"Yes," said Antony musingly, and with no thought of irony, "it is that +which makes you women." +</p> + +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<a name="CH17"><!-- CH17 --></a> +<h2> + CHAPTER XVII +</h2> + +<center> +ANTONY ALONE ON THE HILLS +</center> +<p> +But although Beatrice might forgive Antony, from himself came no +forgiveness. He hid his remorse from her, sparing the mother-wound in +her heart—but always when he was walking alone he kept saying to +himself: "I have lost our little Wonder. I killed our little Wonder." +</p> +<p> +One day he climbed up the highest hill within reach, and there leaned +into the enormous silence, that he might cry it aloud for God to hear— +</p> +<p> +God!—poor little Beatrice, what God was there to hear! To look at +Beatrice one might indeed believe in God—and yet was it not Beatrice +who had made God in her own image? Was not God created of all pure +overflows of the human soul, the kind light of human eyes that not all +the suffering of the world can exhaust, the idealism of the human spirit +that not all the infamies of natural law can dismay? +</p> +<p> +Nevertheless, Antony confessed himself to God upon the hills, not indeed +as one seeking pardon, but punishment. +</p> +<p> +Yet Heaven's benign untroubled blue carried no cloud upon its face, +because one breaking human heart had thus breathed into it its unholy +secret. Around that whole enormous circle such cries and such +confessions were being poured like noxious vapours, from a thousand +cities; but that incorruptible ether remained unsullied as on the first +morning, the black smoke of it all lost in the optimism of God. +</p> +<p> +On some days he would live over again the scene with Wonder in the wood +with unbearable vividness. +</p> +<p> +"Why, those are only words, silly Daddy!"—How many times a day did he +not hear that quaint little voice making, with a child's profundity, +that tremendous criticism upon literature. +</p> +<p> +He had silenced her with the music of words, as he had silenced his own +heart and soul with the same music, but they were still only words none +the less. Ah! if she were only here to-day, he would bring her something +more beautiful than words—or toadstools. +</p> +<p> +He shuddered as he thought of the loathsome form his decaying fancy had +taken, that morning by the Three Black Ponds. He had filled the small +outstretched hands with Nature's filth and poison. She had asked for +flowers, he had brought her toadstools. Oh, the shame, the crime, the +anguish! +</p> +<p> +But worst of all was to hear himself saying in the silence of his soul, +over and over again without any power to still it, as one is forced +sometimes to hear the beating of one's heart: "Silencieux, I bring you +my little child." +</p> +<p> +There were times he heard this so plainly when he was with Beatrice that +he had to leave her and walk for hours alone. Only unseen among the +hills dare he give vent to the mad despair with which that memory tore +him. +</p> +<p> +Yes, for words—"only words"—he had sacrificed that wonderful living +thing, a child. For words he had missed that magical intercourse, the +intercourse with the mind of a child. How often had she come to him for +a story, and he had been dull and preoccupied—with words; how often +asked him to take her a walk up the lane, but he had been too busy—with +words! +</p> +<p> +O God, if only she might come and ask again. Now when she was so far +away his fancy teemed with stories. Every roadside flower had its +fairy-tale which cried, "Tell me to little Wonder"—and once he tried +to make believe to himself that Wonder was holding his hand, and looking +up into his face with her big grave eyes, as he told some child's +nonsense to the eternal hills. He broke off—half in anger with himself. +Was he changing one illusion for another? +</p> +<p> +"Fool, no one hears you," and he threw himself face down in the grass +and sobbed. +</p> +<p> +But a gentle hand was laid upon his shoulder and Beatrice's voice +said,— +</p> +<p> +"I heard you, Antony—and loved you for it." +</p> +<p> +So Antony had found the heart of a father when no longer he had a child. +</p> + +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<a name="CH18"><!-- CH18 --></a> +<h2> + CHAPTER XVIII +</h2> + +<center> +THE SECOND TALK ON THE HILLS +</center> +<p> +"But to think," said Antony presently, in answer to Beatrice's soothing +hand, "to think that I might have lived with a child—and I chose +instead to live with words. In all the mysterious ways of man, is there +anything quite so mysterious as that? Poor dream-led fool, poor lover of +coloured shadows! +</p> +<p> +"And yet, how proud I was of the madness! How I loved to say that words +were more beautiful than the things for which they stood, and that the +names of the world's beautiful women, Sappho, Fiametta, Guinivere, were +more beautiful than Sappho, Fiametta, Guinivere themselves; that the +names of the stars were lovelier than any star—who has ever found the +Pleiades so beautiful as their name, or any king so great as the sound +of Orion?—and what, anywhere in the Universe, is lovely enough to bear +Arcturus for its name?—Ah! you know how I used to talk—poor fool, poor +lover of coloured shadows!" +</p> +<p> +"Yes, dear," said Beatrice soothingly, "but that is passed now, and you +must not dwell too persistently in the sorrow of it, or in your grief +for little Wonder. That too is to dwell with shadows, and to dwell with +shadows either of grief or joy is dangerous for the soul." +</p> +<p> +"I know. But fear not, Beatrice. Perhaps there was the danger of my +passing from one cloudland to another—for I never knew how I loved our +Wonder till now, and I longed, if only by imagination, to follow her +where she has gone, and share with her the life together we have lost +here—" +</p> +<p> +"But that can never be," said Beatrice; "you must accept it, Antony. We +shall only meet her again by doing that. The sooner we can say from our +hearts 'She is lost here,' the nearer is she to being found in another +world. Yes, Antony dear, even Wonder's little shadow must be left +behind, if we are to mount together the hills of life." +</p> +<p> +"My wonderful Beatrice! Yes, the hills of life. No more its woods, but +its hills, bathed in a vast and open sunshine. Look around us—how nobly +simple is every line and shape! Far below the horizon nature is +elaborate, full of fancies,—mazy watercourses, delicate dingles, +fantastically gloomy ravines, misshapen woods, gibbering with diablerie; +but here how simple, how great, how good she is! There is not a shape +subtler than a common bowl, and the colours are alphabetical—and yet, +by what taking of thought could she have achieved an effect so grand, +at once so beautiful and so holy?" +</p> +<p> +"Yes, one might call it the good beauty," said Beatrice. +</p> +<p> +"Yes," continued Antony, perhaps somewhat ominously interested in the +subject, "that is a great mystery—the seeming moral meaning of the +forms of things. Some shapes, however beautiful, suggest evil; others, +however ugly, suggest good. As we look at a snake, or a spider, we know +that evil is shaped like that; and not only animate things but +inanimate. Some aspects of nature are essentially evil. There are +landscapes that injure the soul to look at, there are sunsets that are +unholy, there are trees breathing spiritual pestilence as surely as some +men breathe it—" +</p> +<p> +"Do you remember," continued Antony with a smile, which died as he +realised he was committed to an allusion best forgotten, "that old +twisted tree that stood on the moor near our wood? I often wonder what +mysterious sin he had committed—" +</p> +<p> +"Yes," laughed Beatrice, "he looked a terribly depraved old tree, I must +admit—but don't you think that when we have arrived at the discussion +of the mysterious sins of trees it is time to start home?" +</p> +<p> +"Yes, indeed," said Antony gaily, "let us change the subject to the +vices of flowers." +</p> +<p> +From which conversation it will be seen that Antony's mind was still +revolving with unconscious attraction around the mystery of Art. Was it +some far-travelled sea-wind bringing faint strains from that sunken +harp, strains too subtle for the ear, and even unrecognised by the mind? +</p> + +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<a name="CH19"><!-- CH19 --></a> +<h2> + CHAPTER XIX +</h2> + +<center> +LAST TALK ON THE HILLS +</center> +<p> +Beatrice's prayer had been answered. Antony had come back to her. She +was necessary to him once more. The old look was in his eyes, the old +sound in his voice. One day as they were out together she was so +conscious of this happiness returned that she could not forbear speaking +of it—with an inner feeling that it was better to be happy in silence. +</p> +<p> +What is that instinct in us which tells us that we risk our happiness in +speaking of it? Happiness is such a frightened thing that it flies at +the sound of its own name. And yet of what shall we speak if not our +happiness? Of our sorrows we can keep silence, but our joys we long to +utter. +</p> +<p> +So Beatrice spoke of her great happiness to Antony, and told him too of +her old great unhappiness and her longing for death. +</p> +<p> +"What a strange and terrible dream it has been—but thank God, we are +out in the daylight at last," said Antony. "O my little Beatrice, to +think that I could have forsaken you like that! Surely if you had come +and taken me by the hands and looked deep into my eyes, and called me +out of the dream, I must have awakened, for, cruel as it was, the dream +was but part of a greater dream, the dream of my love for you—" +</p> +<p> +"But I understand it all now," he continued, "see it all. Do you +remember saying that perhaps I had never loved anything but images all +my life? It was quite true. Since I can remember, when I thought I loved +something I was sure to find sooner or later that I loved less the +object itself than what I could say about it, and when I had said +something beautiful, something I could remember and say over and over to +myself, I cared little if the object were removed. The spiritual essence +of it seemed to have passed over into my words, and I loved the +reincarnation best. Only at last have I awakened to realities, and the +shadows flee away. The worshipper of the Image is dead within me. But +alas! that little Wonder had to die first—" +</p> +<p> +"I used to tell myself," he went on, "that human life, however +exquisite, without art to eternalise it, was like a rose showering its +petals upon the ground. For so brief a space the rose stood perfect, +then fell in a ruin of perfume. Wonderful moments had human life, but +without art were they not like pearls falling into a gulf? So I said: +there is nothing real but art. The material of art passes—human love, +human beauty—but art remains. It is the image, not the reality, that +is everlasting. I will live in the image." +</p> +<p> +"But I know now," he once more resumed, "that there is a higher +immortality than art's,—the immortality of love. The immortality of art +indeed is one of those curious illusions of man's self-love which a +moment's thought dispels. Art, who need be told, is as dependent for its +survival on the survival of its physical media as man's body itself—and +though the epic and the great canvas escape combustion for a million +years, they must burn at last, burn with all the other accumulated +shadows of time. What we call immortality in art is but the shadow of +the soul's immortality; but the immortality of love is that of the soul +itself—" +</p> +<p> +"O Antony," interrupted Beatrice, "you really believe that now? You will +never doubt it again?" +</p> +<p> +"We never doubt what we have really seen, and I had never seen before," +answered Antony, taking her hand and looking deep into her eyes, "never +seen it as I see it now." +</p> +<p> +"And you will never doubt it again?" +</p> +<p> +"Never." +</p> +<p> +"Whatever that voice should say to you?" +</p> +<p> +"I shall never hear that voice again." +</p> +<p> +"O Antony, is it really true? You have come back to me. I can hardly +believe it." +</p> +<p> +"Listen, Beatrice; when we return to the Valley, return only to leave it +for ever, I will take the Image and smash it in a hundred pieces—for I +hate it now as much as I once loved it. Fear not; it will never trouble +our peace again." +</p> +<p> +The mention of the valley was a momentary cloud on Beatrice's happiness, +but as she looked into Antony's resolute love-lit face, it melted away. +</p> + +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<a name="CH20"><!-- CH20 --></a> +<h2> + CHAPTER XX +</h2> + +<center> +ANTONY'S JUDGMENT UPON SILENCIEUX +</center> +<p> +So the weeks and months went by for those two upon the hills, and the +soul of Antony grew stronger day by day, and his love with it—and the +face of Beatrice was like a bird singing. At last the spring came, and +the snow was no more needed to keep warm the flowers. With the flowers +came the snowdrop-soul of Wonder, and the thoughts of mother and father +turned to the place of kind old trees and tender country bells, where in +the unflowering November they had laid her. These dark months the chemic +earth had been busy with the little body they loved, and by this time +Wonder would be many violets. +</p> +<p> +"Let us go to Wonder," they said; "she is awake now." +</p> +<p> +So they went to Wonder, and found her surrounded, in her earth cradle, +by a great singing of birds, and blossoms and green leaves innumerable. +It was more like a palace than a graveyard, and they went away happy for +their little one. +</p> +<p> +There remained now to take leave of the valley, which indeed looked its +loveliest, as though to allure them to remain. Some days they must stay +to make the necessary preparations for their departure. Among these, in +Antony's mind, the first and most necessary was that destruction of +Silencieux which he had promised himself and his wife upon the hills. +</p> +<p> +The first afternoon Beatrice noted him take a great hammer, and set out +up the wood. She gave him a look of love and trust as he went—though +there was a secret tremor in her heart, for she knew, perhaps better +than he, how strong was the power of Silencieux. +</p> +<p> +But in Antony's heart was no misgiving, or backsliding. In those months +on the hills he had realised human love, in the love of a true and +tender and fairy-like woman, and he knew that no illusions, however +specious, were worth that reality—a reality with all the magic of an +illusion. He gripped the hammer in his hand joyfully, eager to smite +featureless the face which had so misled him, brought such tragic sorrow +to those he had loved. +</p> +<p> +Still, for all his unshaken purpose, it was strange to see again the +face that had meant so much to him, around which his thoughts had +circled consciously or unconsciously all these absent weeks. +</p> +<p> +Seldom has a face seen again after long separation seemed so +disenchanted as Silencieux's. Was this she whom he had worshipped, she +who had told him in that strange voice of her immortal lovers, she with +whom he had sung by the sea, she with whom he had danced those strange +dances in the town, she who had whispered low that awful command, she to +whom he had sacrificed his little child? +</p> +<p> +She was just a dusty, neglected cast—nothing more. +</p> +<p> +Wonder's voice came back to him: "No, Daddy, they tasted of dust"—and +at that thought he gripped the hammer ready to strike. +</p> +<p> +And yet, even thus, she was a beautiful work of man's hands, and Antony, +hating to destroy beauty, still forbore to strike—just as he would have +shrunk from breaking in pieces a shapely vase. Then, too, the +resemblance to Beatrice took him again. Crudely to smash features so +like hers seemed a sort of mimic murder. So he still hesitated. Was +there no other way? Then the thought came to him: "Bury her." It pleased +him. Yes, he would bury her. +</p> +<p> +So, having found a spade, he took her from the wall, and looked from +his door into the wood, pondering where her grave should be. A whitebeam +at a little distance made a vivid conflagration of green amid the sombre +boles of the pines. Pinewoods rely on their undergrowth—bracken and +whortleberry and occasional bushes—for their spring illuminations, and +the whitebeam shone as bright in that wood as a lamp in the dark. +</p> +<p> +"I will bury her beneath the whitebeam," said Antony, and he carried her +thither. +</p> +<p> +Soon the grave was dug amid the pushing fronds of the young ferns, and +taking one long look at her, Antony laid her in the earth, and covered +her up from sight. Was it only fancy that as he turned away a faint +music seemed to arise from the ground, forming into the word "Resurgam" +as it died away? +</p> +<p> +"It is done," said Antony to Beatrice. "But I could not break her, she +looked so like you; so I buried her in the wood." +</p> +<p> +Beatrice kissed him gratefully. But her heart would have been more +satisfied had Silencieux been broken. +</p> + +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<a name="CH21"><!-- CH21 --></a> +<h2> + CHAPTER XXI +</h2> + +<center> +"RESURGAM!" +</center> +<p> +"Resurgam!" +</p> +<p> +Had his senses deceived him? They must have deceived him. And yet that +music at least had seemed startlingly near, sudden, and sweet, as though +one should tread upon a harp in the grass. For the next day or two +Antony could not get it out of his ears, and often, like a sweet wail +through the wood, he seemed to hear the word "Resurgam." +</p> +<p> +Was Silencieux a living spirit, after all,—no mere illusion, but one of +those beautiful demons of evil that do possess the souls of men? +</p> +<p> +He went and stood by Silencieux's grave. It was just as he had left it. +Only an early yellow butterfly stood fanning itself on the freshly +turned earth. +</p> +<p> +Was it the soul of Silencieux? +</p> +<p> +Cursing himself for a madman, he turned away, but had not gone many +yards, when once more—there was that sudden strain of music and the +word "Resurgam" somewhere on the wind. +</p> +<p> +This time he knew he was not mistaken, but to believe it true—O God, he +must not believe it true. Reality or fancy, it was an evil thing which +he had cast out of his life—and he closed his ears and fled. +</p> +<p> +Yet, though he loyally strove to quench that music in the sound of +Beatrice's voice, deep in his heart he knew that the night would come +when he would take his lantern and spade, wearily, as one who at length +after hopeless striving obeys once more some imperious weakness—and +look on the face of Silencieux again. +</p> +<p> +Too surely that night came, and, as in a dream, Antony found himself in +the dark spring night hastening with lantern and spade to Silencieux's +grave. It was only just to look on her face again, to see if she really +lived like a vampire in the earth; and were she to be alive, he vowed to +kill her where she lay—for into his life again he knew she must not +come. +</p> +<p> +As he neared the whitebeam, a gust of wind blew out his lantern, and he +stood in the profound darkness of the trees. While he attempted to +relight it, he thought he saw a faint light at the foot of the +whitebeam, as of a radiance welling out of the earth; but he dismissed +it as fancy. +</p> +<p> +Then, having relit the lantern, he set the spade into the ground, and +speedily removed the soil from the white face below. As he uncovered it, +the wind again extinguished the lantern, and there, to his amazement and +terror, was the face of Silencieux shining radiantly in the darkness. +The hole in which she lay brimmed over with light, as a spring wells +out of the hillside. Her face was almost transparent with brightness, +and presently she spoke low, with a voice sweeter than Antony had ever +heard before. It was the voice of that magic harp at the bottom of the +sea, it was the voice that had told him of her lovers, the voice of +hidden music that had cried "Resurgam" through the wood. +</p> +<p> +"Antony," she said, "sing me songs of little Wonder." +</p> +<p> +And, forgetting all but the magic of her voice, the ecstasy of being +hers again, Antony carried her with him to the châlet, and setting her +in her accustomed place, gazed at her with his whole soul. +</p> +<p> +"Sing me songs of little Wonder," she repeated. +</p> +<p> +"You bid me sing of little Wonder!" cried Antony, half in terror of this +beautiful evil face that drew him irresistibly as the moon, "you, who +took her from me!" +</p> +<p> +"Who but I should bid you sing of Wonder?" answered Silencieux. "I +loved her. That was why I took her from you, that by your grief she +should live for ever. There is no one but I who can give you back your +little Wonder—no one but I who can give you back anything you have +lost. If you love me faithfully, Antony—there is nothing you can lose +but in me you will find it again." +</p> +<p> +Antony bowed his head, his heart breaking for Beatrice—but who is not +powerless against his own soul? +</p> +<p> +"Listen," said Silencieux again. "Once on a time there was a beautiful +girl who died, and from her grave grew a wonderful flower, which all the +world came to see. 'Yet it seems a pity,' said one, 'that so beautiful a +girl should have died.' 'Ah,' said a poet standing by, 'there was no +other way of making the flower!'" +</p> +<p> +And again, as Antony still kept silence in his agony, Silencieux said, +"Listen." +</p> +<p> +"Listen, Antony. You have hidden yourself away from me, you have put +seas and lands between us, you have denied me with bitter curses, you +have vowed to thrust me from your life, you have given your allegiance +to the warm and pretty humanity of a day, and reviled the august cold +marble of immortality. But it is all in vain. In your heart of hearts +you love no human thing, you love not even yourself, you love only the +eternal spirit of beauty in all things, you love only me. Me you may +sacrifice, your own heart you may deny, in the weakness of human pity +for human love; but, should this be, your life will be in secret broken, +purposeless, and haunted, and to me at last you will come, at the +end—at the end and too late. This is your own heart's voice; you know +if it be true." +</p> +<p> +"It is true," moaned Antony. +</p> +<p> +"Many men and many loves are there in this world," continued +Silencieux, "and each knows the way of his own love, nor shall anything +turn him from it in the end. Here he may go and thither he may turn, but +in the end there is only one way of joy for each, and in that way must +he go or perish. Many faces are fair upon the earth, but for each man is +a face fairest of all, for which, unless he win it, each must go +desolate forever—" +</p> +<p> +"Face of Eternal Beauty," said Antony, "there is but one face for me for +ever. It is yours." +</p> +<hr> +<p> +On the morrow Beatrice saw once more that light in Antony's face which +made her afraid. He had brought with him some sheets of paper on which +were written the songs of little Wonder Silencieux had bidden him sing. +They were songs of grief so poignant and beautiful one grew happy in +listening to them, and Antony forgot all in the joy of having made +them. He read them to Beatrice in an ecstasy. Her face grew sadder and +sadder as he read. When he had finished she said:— +</p> +<p> +"Antony!—Silencieux has risen again." +</p> +<p> +"O Beatrice, Beatrice—I would do anything in the world for you—but I +cannot live without her." +</p> + +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<a name="CH22"><!-- CH22 --></a> +<h2> + CHAPTER XXII +</h2> + +<center> +THE STRANGENESS OF ANTONY +</center> +<p> +From this moment Silencieux took possession of Antony as she had never +taken it before. Never had he been so inaccessibly withdrawn into his +fatal dream. Beatrice forgot her own bitter sorrow in her fear for him, +so wrought was he with the fires that consumed him. Some days she almost +feared for his reason, and she longed to watch over him, but his old +irritation at her presence had returned. +</p> +<p> +As the summer days came on, she would see him disappear through the +green door of the wood at morning and return by it at evening; but all +the day each had been alone, Beatrice alone with a solitude in which was +now no longer any Wonder. The summer beauty gave her courage, but she +knew that the end could not be very far away. +</p> +<p> +One day there had been that in Antony's manner which had more than +usually alarmed her, and when night fell and he had not returned, she +went up the wood in search of him, her heart full of forebodings. As she +neared the châlet she seemed to hear voices. No! there was only one +voice. Antony was talking to some one. Careful to make no noise, she +stole up to the window and looked in. The sight that met her eyes filled +her with a great dread. "O God, he is going mad," she cried to herself. +</p> +<p> +Antony was sitting in a big chair drawn up to the fire. Opposite to him, +lying back in her cushions, was the Image draped in a large black velvet +cloak. A table stood between them, and on it stood two glasses, and a +decanter nearly empty of wine, Silencieux's glass stood untasted, but +Antony had evidently been drinking deeply, for his cheeks were flushed +and his eyes wild. +</p> +<p> +He was speaking in angry, passionate, despairing tones. One of her +strange moods of silence had come upon Silencieux, and she lay back in +her pillows stonily unresponsive. +</p> +<p> +"For God's sake speak to me," Antony cried. "I love you with my whole +heart. I have sacrificed all I love for your sake. I would die for you +this instant—yes! a hundred thousand deaths. But you will not answer me +one little word—" +</p> +<p> +But there was no answer. +</p> +<p> +"Silencieux! Have you ceased to love me? Is the dream once more at an +end, the magic faded? Oh, speak—tell me—anything—only speak!" But +still Silencieux neither spoke nor smiled. +</p> +<p> +"Listen, Silencieux," at last cried Antony, beside himself, "unless you +answer me, I will die this night, and my blood shall be upon your cruel +altar for ever." +</p> +<p> +As he spoke he snatched a dagger from among some bibelots on his mantel, +and drew it from its sheath. +</p> +<p> +"You are proud of your martyrs," he laughed; "see, I will bleed to death +for your sake. In God's name speak." +</p> +<p> +But Silencieux spoke nothing at all. +</p> +<p> +Then Beatrice, watching in terror, seeing by his face that he would +really kill himself, ran round to the door and broke in, crying, "O my +poor Antony!" but already he had plunged the dagger amid the veins of +his left wrist, and was watching the blood gush out with a strange +delight. +</p> +<p> +As Beatrice burst in, he looked up at her, and mistook her for +Silencieux. +</p> +<p> +"Ah!" he said, "you speak at last. You love me now, when it is too +late—when I am dying." +</p> +<p> +As he said this his face grew white and he fainted away. +</p> +<p> +For many days Antony lay unconscious, racked by terrible delirium. The +doctor called it brain fever. It was not the common form, he said, but a +more dangerous form, to which only imaginative men were subject. It was +a form of madness all the more malignant because the sufferer, and +particularly his friends, might go for years without suspecting it. The +doctor gave the disease no name. +</p> +<p> +During his illness Antony spoke to Beatrice all the time as Silencieux, +but one day, when he was nearly well again, he suddenly turned upon her +in enraged disappointment, with a curious harshness he had never shown +before, as though the gentleness of his soul had died during his +illness, and exclaimed:—"Why, you are not Silencieux, after all!" +</p> +<p> +"I am Beatrice," said his wife gently; "Beatrice, who loves you with her +whole heart." +</p> +<p> +"But I love Silencieux—" +</p> +<p> +Beatrice hid her face and sobbed. +</p> +<p> +"Where is Silencieux? Bring me Silencieux. I see! You have taken her +away while I was ill—I will go and seek her myself," and he attempted +to rise. +</p> +<p> +"You are too weak. You must not get up, Antony. I will bring you +Silencieux." +</p> +<p> +And so, till he was well enough to leave his bed, Silencieux hung facing +Antony on his bedroom wall, and on his first walk out into the air, he +took her with him and set her once more in her old shrine in the wood. +</p> +<p> +Now, by this time, the heart of Beatrice was broken. +</p> + +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<a name="CH23"><!-- CH23 --></a> +<h2> + CHAPTER XXIII +</h2> + +<center> +BEATRICE FULFILS HER DESTINY +</center> +<p> +The heart of Beatrice was broken, and there was now no use or place for +her in the world. Wonder was gone, and Antony was even further away. She +knew now that he would never come back to her. Never again could return +even the illusion of those happy weeks on the hills. Antony would be +hers no more for ever. +</p> +<p> +There but remained for her to fulfil her destiny, the destiny she had +vaguely known ever since Antony had brought home the Image, and shown +her how the Seine water had moulded the hair and made wet the eyelashes. +</p> +<p> +For some weeks now Beatrice had been living on the border of another +world. She had finally abandoned all her hopes of earthly joy—and to +Antony she was no longer any help or happiness. He had needed her again +for a few brief weeks, but now he needed her no more. His every look +told her how he wished her out of his life. And she had no one else in +the world. +</p> +<p> +But in another world she had her little Wonder. Lately she had begun to +meet her in the lanes. In the day she wore garlands of flowers round her +head, and in the night a great light. She would go to meet her at night, +that the light might lead her steps. +</p> +<p> +So one night while Antony banqueted strangely with Silencieux, she drew +her cloak around her and stole up the wood, to look a last good-bye at +him as he sat laughing with his shadows. +</p> +<p> +"Good-bye, Antony, good-bye," she cried. "I had but human love to give +you. I surrender you to the love of the divine." +</p> +<p> +Then noting how full of blossom were the lanes, and how sweet was the +night air, and smitten through all her senses with the song and perfume +of the world she was about to leave, she found her way, with a strange +gladness of release, to the Three Black Ponds. +</p> +<p> +It was moonlight, and the dwarf oak-trees made druid shadows all along +the leafy galleries that overhung the pools. The pools themselves shone +with a startling silver—so hushed, so dreamy was all that surrounded +them that there seemed something of an unnatural wakefulness, a daylight +observation, in their brilliant surfaces,—and on them, as last year, +the lilies floated like the crowns of sunken queens. But the third pool +lay more in shadow, and by that, as it seemed to Beatrice, a light was +shining. +</p> +<p> +Yes, a light was shining and a voice was calling. "Mother," it called, +"little Mother. I am waiting for you. Here, little Mother. Here by the +water-lilies we could not gather." +</p> +<p> +Beatrice, following the voice, stepped along the causeway and sank among +the lilies; and as she sank she seemed to see Antony bending over the +pond, saying: "How beautiful she looks, how beautiful, lying there among +the lilies!" +</p> +<hr> +<p> +On the morrow, when they had drawn Beatrice from the pond, with lilies +in her hair, Antony bent over her and said:— +</p> +<p> +"It is very sad—Poor little Beatrice—but how beautiful! It must be +wonderful to die like that." +</p> +<p> +And then again he said: "She is strangely like Silencieux." +</p> +<p> +Then he walked up the wood, in a great serenity of mind. He had lost +Wonder, but she lived again in his songs. He had lost Beatrice, but he +had her image—did she not live for ever in Silencieux? +</p> +<p> +So he went up the wood, whistling softly to himself—but lo! when he +opened his châlet door, there was a strange light in the room. The eyes +of Silencieux were wide open, and from her lips hung a dark moth with +the face of death between his wings. +</p> +<center> +THE END +</center> + +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> + + + + + + + +<pre> + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Worshipper of the Image +by Richard Le Gallienne + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE WORSHIPPER OF THE IMAGE *** + +***** This file should be named 10812-h.htm or 10812-h.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/1/0/8/1/10812/ + +Produced by Brendan Lane, Garrett Alley and PG Distributed Proofreaders + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Worshipper of the Image + +Author: Richard Le Gallienne + +Release Date: January 23, 2004 [EBook #10812] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE WORSHIPPER OF THE IMAGE *** + + + + +Produced by Brendan Lane, Garrett Alley and PG Distributed Proofreaders + + + + + +The Worshipper of the Image + + +By +RICHARD LE GALLIENNE + + +JOHN LANE: THE BODLEY HEAD +LONDON AND NEW YORK +1900 + +THE UNIVERSITY PRESS, CAMBRIDGE, U.S.A. + +TO SILENCIEUX + +THIS TRAGIC FAIRY-TALE + + + + +Contents + + +CHAPTER + +I. SMILING SILENCE + +II. THE COMING OF SILENCIEUX + +III. THE NORTHERN SPHINX + +IV. AT THE RISING OF THE MOON + +V. SILENCIEUX SPEAKS + +VI. THE THREE BLACK PONDS + +VII. THE LOVERS OF SILENCIEUX + +VIII. A STRANGE KISS FOR SILENCIEUX + +IX. THE WONDERFUL WEEK + +X. SILENCIEUX WHISPERS + +XI. WONDER IN THE WOOD + +XII. AUTUMN IN THE VALLEY + +XIII. THE HUMAN SACRIFICE + +XIV. A SONG OF THE LITTLE DEAD + +XV. SILENCIEUX ALONE IN THE WOOD + +XVI. THE FIRST TALK ON THE HILLS + +XVII. ANTONY ALONE ON THE HILLS + +XVIII. THE SECOND TALK ON THE HILLS + +XIX. LAST TALK ON THE HILLS + +XX. ANTONY'S JUDGMENT UPON SILENCIEUX + +XXI. "RESURGAM!" + +XXII. THE STRANGENESS OF ANTONY + +XXIII. BEATRICE FULFILS HER DESTINY + + + +The Worshipper of the Image + + + + +CHAPTER I + + +SMILING SILENCE + +Evening was in the wood, still as the dreaming bracken, secretive, +moving softly among the pines as a young witch gathering simples. She +wore a hood of finely woven shadows, yet, though she drew it close, +sunbeams trooping westward flashed strange lights across her haunted +face. + +The birds that lived in the wood had broken out into sudden singing as +she stole in, hungry for silence, passionate to be alone; and at the +foot of every tree she cried "Hush! Hush!" to the bedtime nests. When +all but one were still, she slipped the hood from her face and listened +to her own bird, the night-jar, toiling at his hopeless love from a +bough on which already hung a little star. + +Then it was that a young man, with a face shining with sorrow, vaulted +lightly over the mossed fence and dipped down the green path, among the +shadows and the toadstools and the silence. + +"Silencieux," he said over to himself--"I love you, Silencieux." + +Far down the wood came and went through the trees the black and white +gable of a little chalet to which he was dreaming his way. + +Suddenly a small bronze object caught his eye moving across the mossy +path. It was a beautiful beetle, very slim and graceful in shape, with +singularly long and fine antennae. Antony had loved these things since +he was a child,--dragonflies with their lamp-like eyes of luminous horn, +moths with pall-like wings that filled the world with silence as you +looked at them, sleepy as death--loved them with the passion of a +Japanese artist who delights to carve them on quaint nuggets of metal. +Perhaps it was that they were so like words--words to which he had given +all the love and worship of his life. Surely he had loved Silencieux[1] +more since he had found for her that beautiful name. + +He held the beetle in his hand a long while, loving it. Then he said to +himself, with a smile in which was the delight of a success: "A +vase-shaped beetle with deer's horns." + +The phrase delighted him. He set the insect down on the path, tenderly. +He had done with it. He had carved it in seven words. The little model +might now touch its delicate way among the ferns at peace. + +"A vase-shaped beetle with deer's horns," he repeated as he walked on, +and then the gathering gloom of the wood suggested an addition: "And +some day I shall find in the wood that moth of which I have dreamed +since childhood--the dark moth with the face of death between his +wings." + +The chalet stood on a little clearing, in a little circle of pines. From +it the ground sloped down towards the valley, and at some distance +beneath smoke curled from a house lost amid clouds of foliage, the +abounding green life of this damp and brooding hollow. A great window +looking down the woodside filled one side of the chalet, and the others +were dark with books, an occasional picture or figured jar lighting up +the shadow. A small fire flickered beneath a quaintly devised mantel, +though it was summer--for the mists crept up the hill at night and +chilled the souls of the books. A great old bureau, with a wonderful +belly of mahogany, filled a corner of the room, breathing antique +mystery and refinement. At one end of it, on a small vacant space of +wall, hung a cast, apparently the death-mask of a woman, by which the +eye was immediately attracted with something of a shock and held by a +curious fascination. The face was smiling, a smile of great peace, and +also of a strange cunning. One other characteristic it had: the woman +looked as though at any moment she would suddenly open her eyes, and if +you turned away from her and looked again, she seemed to be smiling to +herself because she had opened them that moment behind your back, and +just closed them again in time. + +It was a face that never changed and yet was always changing. + +She looked doubly strange in the evening light, and her smile softened +and deepened as the shadows gathered in the room. + +Antony came and stood in front of her. + +"Silencieux," he whispered, "I love you, Silencieux. Smiling Silence, I +love you. All day long on the moors your smile has stolen like a +moonbeam by my side--" + +As he spoke, from far down the wood came the gentle sound of a woman's +voice calling "Antony," and coming nearer as it called. + +With a shade of impatience, Antony bent nearer to the image and kissed +it. + +"Good-bye, Silencieux," he whispered, "Good-bye, until the rising of the +moon." + +Then he passed out on to the little staircase that led down into the +wood, and called back to the approaching voice: "I am coming, +Beatrice,"--'Beatrice' being the name of his wife. + +As he called, a shaft of late sunlight suddenly irradiated the tall +slim form of a woman coming up the wood. She wore no hat, and the sun +made a misty glory of her pale gold hair. She seemed a fairy romantic +thing thus gliding in her yellow silk gown through the darkening pines. +And her face was the face of the image, feature for feature. There was +on it too the same light, the same smile. + +"Antony," she called, as they drew nearer to each other, "where in the +wide world have you been? Dinner has been waiting for half-an-hour." + +"Dinner!" he said, laughing, and kissing her kindly. "Fancy! the High +Muses have made me half-an-hour late for dinner. Beauty has made me +forget my dinner. Disgraceful!" + +"I don't mind your forgetting dinner, Antony--but you might have +remembered me." + +"Do you think I could remember Beauty and forget you? Yes! you _are_ +beautiful to-night, Silen--Beatrice. You look like a lady one meets +walking by a haunted well in some old Arthurian tale." + +"Hush!" said Beatrice, "listen to the night-jar. He is worth a hundred +nightingales." + +"Yes; what a passion is that!" said Antony, "so sincere, and yet so +fascinating too." + +"'Yet,' do you say, Antony? Why, sincerity is the most fascinating thing +in the world." + +And as they listened, Antony's heart had stolen back to Silencieux, and +once more in fancy he pressed his lips to hers in the dusk: "It is with +such an eternal passion that I love you, Silencieux." + +FOOTNOTES: + +[Footnote 1: Of course, the writer is aware that while "Silencieux" is +feminine, her name is masculine. In such fanciful names, however, such +license has always been considered allowable.] + + + + +CHAPTER II + + +THE COMING OF SILENCIEUX + +The manner in which Antony had found and come to love Silencieux was a +strange illustration of that law by which one love grows out of +another--that law by which men love living women because of the dead, +and dead women because of the living. + +One day as chance had sent him, picking his way among the orange boxes, +the moving farms, and the wig-makers of Covent Garden, he had come upon +a sculptor's shop, oddly crowded in among Cockney carters and decaying +vegetables. Faces of Greece and Rome gazed at him suddenly from a broad +window, and for a few moments he forsook the motley beauty of modern +London for the ordered loveliness of antiquity. + +Through white corridors of faces he passed, with the cold breath of +classic art upon his cheek, and in the company of the dead who live for +ever he was conscious of a contagion of immortality. + +Soon in an alcove of faces he grew conscious of a presence. Some one was +smiling near him. He turned, and, almost with a start, found that--as he +then thought--it was no living thing, but just a plaster cast among the +others, that was thus shining, like a star among the dead. A face not +ancient, not modern; but a face of yesterday, to-day, and for ever. + +Instantly he knew he had seen the face before. Where? + +Why, of course, it was the face of Beatrice, feature for feature. How +strange!--and, loving Beatrice, he bought it, because of his great love +for her! Who was the artist, what the time and circumstance, that had +anticipated in this strange fashion the only face he had ever really +loved on earth? + +He sought information of the shopkeeper, who told him a strange little +story of an unknown model and an unknown artist, and two tragic fates. + +When Antony had brought Silencieux home to Beatrice, she had at first +taken that delight in her which every created thing takes in a perfect, +or even an imperfect, reflection of itself. To have been anticipated in +a manner so unusual gave back in romantic suggestiveness what at first +sight it seemed to steal from one's personal originality. Only at first +sight--for, if like Beatrice, you were the possessor of a face so +uncommon in type that your lover might, with little fear of disproof, +declare, at all events in England, that there was none other like it, +you might grow superstitious as you looked at an anticipation so +creepily identical, and conceive strange fancies of re-incarnation. What +if this had been you in some former existence! Or at all events, if +there is any truth in those who tell us that in the mould and lines of +our faces and hands--yes! and in every secret marking of our bodies--our +fates are written as in a parchment; would it not be reasonable to +surmise, perhaps to fear, that the writing should mean the same on one +face as on the other, and the fates as well as the faces prove +identical? + +Beatrice gave the mask back to Antony, with a little shiver. + +"It is very wonderful, very strange, but she makes me frightened. What +was the story the man told you, Antony?" + +"No doubt it was all nonsense," Antony replied, "but he said that it was +the death-mask of an unknown girl found drowned in the Seine." + +"Drowned in the Seine!" exclaimed Beatrice, growing almost as white as +the image. + +"Yes! and he said too that the story went that the sculptor who moulded +it had fallen so in love with the dead girl, that he had gone mad and +drowned himself in the Seine also." + +"Can it be true, Antony?" + +"I hope so, for it is so beautiful,--and nothing is really beautiful +till it has come true." + +"But the pain, the pity of it--Antony." + +"That is a part of the beauty, surely--the very essence of its beauty--" + +"Beauty! beauty! O Antony, that is always your cry. I can only think of +the terror, the human anguish. Poor girl--" and she turned again to the +image as it lay upon the table,--"see how the hair lies moulded round +her ears with the water, and how her eyelashes stick to her cheek--Poor +girl." + +"But see how happy she looks. Why should we pity one who can smile like +that? See how peaceful she looks;" and with a sudden whim, Antony took +the image and set it lying back on a soft cushion in a corner of the +couch, at the same time throwing round its neck his black cloak, which +he had cast off as he came in. + +The image nestled into the cushion as though it had veritably been a +living woman weary for sleep, and softly smiling that it was near at +last. So comfortable she seemed, you could have sworn she breathed. + +Antony lifted her head once or twice with his fingers, to delight +himself with seeing her sink back luxuriously once more. + +Beatrice grew more and more white. + +"Antony, please stop. I cannot bear it. She looks so terribly alive." + +At that moment Antony's touch had been a little too forcible, the image +hung poised for a moment and then began to fall in the direction of +Beatrice. + +"Oh, she is falling," she almost screamed, as Antony saved the cast from +the floor. "For God's sake, stop!" + +"How childish of you, Beatrice. She is only plaster. I never knew you +such a baby." + +"I cannot help it, Antony. I know it is foolish, but I cannot help it. I +think living in this place has made me morbid. She seems so alive--so +evil, so cruel. I am sorry you bought her, Antony. I cannot bear to look +at her. Won't you take her away? Take her up into the wood. Keep her +there. Take her now. I shall not be able to sleep all night if I know +she is in the house." + +She was half hysterical, and Antony soothed her gently. + +"Yes, yes, dear. I'm sorry. I'll take her up the wood now this minute. +Wait till I light the lantern. Poor Beatrice, I never dreamed she would +affect you so. I loved her, dear--because I love you; but I would rather +break her in pieces than that she should make you unhappy. Though to +break any image of you, dear," he added tenderly, "would seem a kind of +sacrilege. You know how I love you, Beatrice, don't you?" + +"Of course I do, dear; and it was sweet of you to buy her for my sake, +and I'm quite silly to-night. To-morrow I shall think nothing about her. +Still, dear, she does frighten me, I can't tell why. There seems +something malignant about her, something that threatens our happiness. +Oh, how silly I am--" + +Meanwhile, Antony had lit an old brass lantern, and presently he was +flashing his way up among the dark sounds of the black old wood, with +that ghostly face tenderly pressed against his side. + +He stopped once to turn his lantern upon her. How mysterious she looked, +here in the night, under the dark pines! + +He too felt a little haunted as he climbed his chalet staircase and +unlocked the door, every sound he made echoing fatefully in the silent +wood; and when he had found a place for the image and hung her there, +she certainly looked a ghostly companion for the midnight lamp, in the +middle of a wood. + +How strangely she smiled, the smile almost of one taking possession. + +No wonder Beatrice had been frightened. Was there some mysterious life +in the thing, after all? Why should these indefinite forebodings come +over him as he looked at her!--But he was growing as childish as +Beatrice. Surely midnight, a dark wood, a lantern, and a death-mask, +with two owls whistling to each other across the valley, were enough to +account for any number of forebodings! But Antony shivered, for all +that, as he locked the door and hastened back again down the wood. + + + + +CHAPTER III + + +THE NORTHERN SPHINX + +Antony had not written a poem to his wife since their little girl Wonder +had been born, now some four years ago. Surely it was from no lack of +love, this silence, but merely due to the working of what would seem to +be a law of the artistic temperament: that to turn a muse into a wife, +however long and faithfully loved, is to bid good-bye to the muse. But a +day or two after the coming of Silencieux, Antony found himself suddenly +inspired once more to sing of his wife. It was the best poem he had +written for a long time, and when it was finished, he came down the wood +impatient to read it to Beatrice. This was the poem, which he called +"The Northern Sphinx":-- + + Sphinx of the North, with subtler smile + Than hers who in the yellow South, + With make-believe mysterious mouth, + Deepens the _ennui_ of the Nile; + + And, with no secret left to tell, + A worn and withered old coquette, + Dreams sadly that she draws us yet, + With antiquated charm and spell: + + Tell me your secret, Sphinx,--for mine!-- + What means the colour of your eyes, + Half innocent and all so wise, + Blue as the smoke whose wavering line + + Curls upward from the sacred pyre + Of sacrifice or holy death, + Pale twisting wreaths of opal breath, + From fire mounting into fire. + + What is the meaning of your hair? + That little fairy palace wrought + With many a grave fantastic thought; + I send a kiss to wander there, + + To climb from golden stair to stair, + Wind in and out its cunning bowers,-- + O garden gold with golden flowers, + O little palace built of hair! + + The meaning of your mouth, who knows? + O mouth, where many meanings meet-- + Death kissed it stern, Love kissed it sweet, + And each has shaped its mystic rose. + + Mouth of all sweets, whose sweetness sips + Its tribute honey from all hives, + The sweetest of the sweetest lives, + Soft flowers and little children's lips; + + Yet rather learnt its heavenly smile + From sorrow, God's divinest art, + Sorrow that breaks and breaks the heart, + Yet makes a music all the while. + + Ah! what is that within your eyes, + Upon your lips, within your hair, + The sacred art that makes you fair, + The wisdom that hath made you wise? + + Tell me your secret, Sphinx,--for mine!-- + The mystic word that from afar + God spake and made you rose and star, + The _fiat lux_ that bade you shine. + +While Antony read, Beatrice's face grew sadder and sadder. When he had +finished she said:-- + +"It is very beautiful, Antony--but it is not written for me." + +"What can you mean, Beatrice? Who else can it be written for?" + +"To the Image of me that you have set up in my place." + +"Beatrice, are you going mad?" + +"It is quite true, all the same. Time will show. Perhaps you don't know +it yourself as yet, but you will before long." + +"But, Beatrice, the poem shows its own origin. Has your image blue eyes, +or curiously coiled hair--" + +"Oh, yes, of course, you thought of me. You filled in from me. But the +inspiration, the wish to write it, came from the image--" + +"It is certainly true that I love to look at it, as I love to look at a +picture of you--because it is you--" + +"As yet, no doubt, but you will soon love it for its own sake. You are +already beginning." + +"I love an image! You are too ridiculous, Beatrice." + +"Does it really seem so strange, dear? I sometimes think you have never +loved anything else." + +Antony had laughed down Beatrice's fancies, yet all the time she had +been talking he was conscious that the idea she had suggested was +appealing to him with a perverse fascination. + +To love, not the literal beloved, but the purified stainless image of +her,--surely this would be to ascend into the region of spiritual love, +a love unhampered and untainted by the earth. + +As he said this to himself, his mind, ever pitilessly self-conscious, +knew it was but a subterfuge, a fine euphemism for a strange desire +which he had known was already growing within him; for when Beatrice had +spoken of his loving an image, it was no abstract passion he had +conceived, but some fanciful variation of earthly love--a love of +beauty centring itself upon some form midway between life and death, +inanimate and yet alive, human and yet removed from the accidents of +humanity. + +To love an image with one's whole heart! If only one could achieve +that--and never come out of the dream. + +These thoughts gave him a new desire to look again at the image. He felt +that in some way she would be changed, and he hastened up the wood in a +strange expectancy. + + + + +CHAPTER IV + + +AT THE RISING OF THE MOON + +But a week or two more, and Beatrice's prophecy had progressed so far +towards fulfilment, that Antony was going about the woods and the moors +saying over to himself the name he had found for the Image, as we saw in +the first chapter; and his love for Silencieux, begun more or less as a +determined self-illusion, grew more and more of a reality. Every day new +life welled into Silencieux's face, as every day life ebbed from the +face of Beatrice, surely foreseeing the coming on of what she had +feared. For the love he gave to Silencieux Antony must take away from +Beatrice, from whom as the days went by he grew more and more withdrawn. + +It was true that the long lonely days which he spent in the wood bore +fruit in a remarkable productiveness. Never had his imagination been so +enkindled, or his pen so winged. But this very industry, the proofs of +which he would each evening bring down the wood for that fine judgment +of Beatrice's, which, in spite of all, still remained more to him than +any other praise--this very industry was the secret confirmation for +Beatrice's sad heart. No longer the inspirer, she was yet, she bitterly +told herself, honoured among women as a critic. Her heart might bleed, +and her eyes fill with tears, as he read; but then, as he would say, the +Beauty, the Music! Is it Beautiful? Is it Music? If it be that, no +matter how it has been made! Let us give thanks for creation, though it +involves the sacrifice of our own most tender and sacred feelings. To +set mere personal feelings against Beauty--human tears against an +immortal creation! Did he spare his own feelings? Indeed he did not. + +On the night when we first met him bidding good-bye to Silencieux "until +the rising of the moon," he had sat through dinner eating but little, +feverishly and somewhat cruelly gay. Though he was as yet too kind to +admit it to himself, Beatrice was beginning to bore him, not merely by +her sadness, which his absorption prevented his realising except in +flashes, but by her very resemblance to the Image--of which, from having +been the beloved original, she was, in his eyes, becoming an indifferent +materialisation. The sweet flesh he had loved so tenderly became an +offence to him, as a medium too gross for the embodiment of so beautiful +a face. Such a face as Silencieux's demanded a more celestial porcelain. + +Dinner at last finished, he made an excuse to Beatrice for leaving her +alone once more at the end as he had during all the rest of the day, +and hastened to keep his tryst with Silencieux. During dinner the +conscious side of his mind had been luxuriating in the romantic sound of +"until the rising of the moon,"--for he was as yet a long way from being +quite simple even with Silencieux,--and the idea of his going out with +serious eagerness to meet one who, if she was as he knew a living being, +was an image too, delighted his sense of fantastic make-believe. + +There is in all love that element of make-believe. Every woman who is +loved is partly the creation of her lover's fancy. He consciously +siderealises her, and with open eyes magnifies her importance to his +life. Antony but made believe and magnified uncommonly--and his dream of +vivifying white plaster was perhaps less desperate than the dreams of +some, that would breathe the breath of life into the colder clay of some +beloved woman, who seems spontaneously to live but is dead all the +while. + +Silencieux appeared to be dead, but beneath that eternal smile, as +Beatrice had divined, as Antony was learning, she was only too terribly +alive. Yes! Antony's was the easier dream. + +The moon and Antony came up the wood together from opposite ends, and +when Antony entered his chalet Silencieux was already waiting for him, +her head crowned with a moonbeam. He kissed her softly and took her with +him out into the ferns. + + + + +CHAPTER V + + +SILENCIEUX SPEAKS + +So long as the moon held, Antony stole up the wood each night to meet +Silencieux--"at the rising of the moon." Sometimes he would lie in a +hollow with her head upon his knee, and gaze for an hour at a time, +entranced, into her face. He would feign to himself that she slept, and +he would hold his breath lest he should awaken her. Sometimes he would +say in a tender whisper, not loud enough for her to hear:-- + +"It is cold to-night, Silencieux. See, my cloak will keep you warm." + +Once as he did this she heaved a gentle sigh, as though thanking him. + +At other times he would place her against the gable of the chalet, so +that the moonlight fell upon her, and then he would plunge into the +wood and walk its whole length, so that, as he wound his way back +through the intervening brakes, her face would come and go, glimmering +away off through the leafage, beckoning to him to return. And once he +thought he heard her call his name very softly through the wood. + +That may have been an illusion, but it was during these days that he did +actually hear her speak for the first time. He had been writing till +past midnight, with her smile just above him, and when he had turned out +the lamp and was moving to the door through the vague flickering light +of the fire, he distinctly heard a voice very luxurious and tender say +"Antony," just behind him. It was hardly more than a whisper, but its +sweetness thrilled his blood, and half in joy and fear he turned to her +again. But she was only smiling inscrutably as before, and she spoke no +more for that night. + + + + +CHAPTER VI + + +THE THREE BLACK PONDS + +At the bottom of the valley, approached by sunken honeysuckle lanes that +seemed winding into the centre of the earth, lay three black ponds, +almost hidden in a _cul-de-sac_ of woodland. Though long since +appropriated by nature, made her own by moss and rooted oaks, they were +so set one below the other, with green causeways between each, that an +ancient art, long since become nature, had evidently designed and dug +them, years, perhaps centuries, ago. So long dead were the old +pond-makers that great trees grew now upon the causeways, and vast +jungles of rush and water grasses choked the trickling overflows from +one pond to the other. Once, it was said, when the earth of those parts +had been rich in iron, these ponds had driven great hammers,--but long +before the memory of the oldest cottager they had rested from their +labours, and lived only the life of beauty and silence. Where iron had +once been was now the wild rose, and the grim wounds of the earth had +been healed by the kisses of five hundred springs. + +About these ponds stole many a secret path, veined with clumsy roots, +shadowed with the thick bush of many a clustering parasite, and echoing +sometimes beneath from the hollowed shelter of coot or water-rat. Lilies +floated in circles about the ponds, like the crowns of sunken queens, +and sometimes a bird broke the silence with a frightened cry. + +It was here that Beatrice and Wonder would often take their morning +walk,--Wonder, though but a little girl of four, having grown more and +more of a companion to her mother, since Antony's love for Silencieux. + +A morning in August the two were walking hand in hand. Wonder was one of +those little girls that seem to know all the meanings of life, while yet +struggling with the alphabet of its unimportant words. + +The soul of such a child is, of all things, the most mysterious. There +was that in her face, as she clung on to her mother's hand, which seemed +to say: "O mother, I understand it all, and far more; if I might only +talk to you in the language of heaven,--but my words are like my little +legs, frail and uncertain of their footing, and, while I think all your +strange grown-up thoughts, I can only talk of toys and dolls. Mother, +father's blood as well as yours is in my veins, and so I understand you +both. Poor little mother! Poor little father!" + +Little Wonder looked these things, she may indeed have thought them; +but all she said was: "O mother, what was that?" + +"That was a rabbit, dear. See, there is another! See his fluffy white +tail!" + +And again: "O mother, what was that?" + +"That was a water-hen, dear. She has a little house, a warm nest, close +to the water among the bushes yonder, and she calls like that to let her +little children know she's coming home with some dainty things for +lunch. She means 'Hush! Hush! Don't be frightened. I'm coming just as +fast as I can.'" + +"Funny little mother! What pretty stories you tell me. But do the birds +really talk--Oh, but look, little mother, there's Daddy--" + +It was Antony, deep in some dream of Silencieux. + +"Daddy! Daddy!" cried the little girl. + +He took her tenderly by the hand. + +"Daddy, where have you been all this long time? You have brought me no +flowers for ever so long." + +"Flowers, little Wonder--they are nearly all gone away, gone to sleep +till next year--But see, I will gather you something prettier than +flowers." + +And, hardly marking Beatrice, he led Wonder up and down among the +winding underwood. Fungi of exquisite yellows and browns were popping up +all about the wood. He gathered some of the most delicate, and put them +into the fresh small hands. + +"But, Daddy, I mustn't eat them, must I?" + +"No, dear--they are too beautiful to eat. You must just look at them and +love them, like flowers." + +"But they are not flowers, Daddy. They don't smell like flowers. I would +rather have flowers, Daddy." + +"But there are no flowers till next year. You must learn to love these +too, little Wonder; they are more beautiful than flowers." + +"Oh, no, Daddy, they are not--" + +"Antony," said Beatrice, "how strange you are! Would you poison her? +See, dear," (turning to Wonder) "Daddy is only teasing. Let us throw +them away. They are nasty, nasty things. Promise me never to gather +them, won't you, Wonder?" + +"Yes, mother. I don't like them. They frighten me." + +Antony turned into a by-path with a strange laugh, and was lost to them +in the wood. + + + + +CHAPTER VII + + +THE LOVERS OF SILENCIEUX + +Silencieux often spoke to Antony now. Sometimes a sudden, startling word +when he was writing late at night; sometimes long tender talks; once a +terrible whisper. But all this time she never opened her eyes. The +lashes still lay wet upon her cheeks, and when she spoke her lips seemed +hardly to move, only to smile with a deeper meaning, an intenser life. +Indeed, at these times, her face shone with so great a brightness that +Antony's vision was dazzled, and to his gaze she seemed almost +featureless as a star. + +Once he had begged to see her eyes. + +"You know not what you ask," she had answered. "When you see my eyes you +will die. Some day, Antony, you shall see my eyes. But not yet. You +have much to do for me yet. There is yet much love for you and me before +the end." + +"Have all died who saw your eyes, Silencieux?" + +"Yes, all died." + +"You have had many lovers, Silencieux. Many lovers, and far from here, +and long ago." + +"Yes, many lovers, long ago," echoed Silencieux. + +"You have been very cruel, Silencieux." + +"Yes, very cruel, but very kind. It is true men have died for me. I have +been cruel, yes, but to die for me has seemed better than to live for +any other. And some of my lovers I have never forsaken. When they have +lost all in the world, they have had me. Lonely garrets have seemed +richly furnished because of my face, and men with foodless lips have +died blest because I was near them at the last. Sometimes I have kissed +their lips and died with them, and the world has missed my face for a +hundred unlovely years--for the world is only beautiful when I and my +lovers are in it. Antony, you are one of my lovers, one of my dearest +lovers; be great enough, be all mine, and perhaps I will die with you, +Antony--and leave the world in darkness for your sake, another hundred +years." + +"Tell me of your lovers, Silencieux." + +"Nearly three thousand years ago I loved a woman of Mitylene, very fair +and made of fire. But she loved another more than I, and for his sake +threw herself from a rock into the sea. As she fell, the rose we had +made together fell from her bosom, and was torn to pieces by the sea. +Fishermen gathered here and there a petal floating on the waters,--but +what were they?--and the world has never known how wonderful was that +rose of our love which she took with her into the depths of the sea." + +"You are faithful, Silencieux; you love her still." + +"Yes, I love her still." + +"And with whom did love come next, Silencieux?" + +"Oh, I loved many those years, for the loss of a great love sends us +vainly from hand to hand of many lesser loves, to ease a little the +great ache; and at that time the world seemed full of my lovers. I have +forgotten none of them. They pass before me, a fair frieze of +unforgotten faces; but most I loved a Roman poet, because, perhaps, he +loved so well the memory of her I had loved, and knew so skilfully to +make bloom again among his own red roses those petals of passionate +ivory which the fishermen of Lesbos had recovered from the sea." + +"Tell me of your lovers, Silencieux," said Antony again. + +"Hundreds of years after, I loved in Florence a young poet with a face +of silver. His soul was given to a little red-cheeked girl. She died, +and then I took him to my bosom, and loved him on through the years, +till his face had grown iron with many sorrows. Now at last, his +baby-girl by his side, he sits in heaven, with a face of gold. In +Paris," she went on, "have I been wonderfully beloved, and in northern +lands near the pole--" + +"But--England?" said Antony. "Tell me of your English lovers." + +"Best of them I love two: one a laughing giant who loved me three +hundred years ago, and the other a little London boy with large eyes of +velvet, who mid all the gloom of your great city saw and loved my face, +as none had seen and loved it since she of Mitylene. I found the giant +sitting by a country stream, holding a daffodil in his mighty hands and +whistling to the birds. He took and wore me like a flower. I was to him +as a nightingale that sang from his sleeve, for he loved so much +besides. Yet me he loved best, as those who can read his secret poems +understand. But my little London boy loved me only. For him the world +held nothing but my face, and it was of his great love for me that he +died." + +"But these were all poets," said Antony. + +"Yes, poets are the greatest of all lovers. Though all who since the +world began have been the makers of beautiful things have loved me, I +love my poets best. Sweeter than marble or many colours to my eyes is +the sound of a poet singing in my ears--" + +"For whom, Silencieux, did you step down into the sad waters of the +Seine?" + +"It was a young poet of Paris, beloved of many women, a drunkard of +strange dreams. He too died because he loved me, and when he died there +was none left whose voice seemed sweet after his. So I died with him. I +died with him," she repeated, "to come to life again with you. Many +lips have been pressed to mine, Antony, since the cold sleep of the +Seine fell over me, but none were warm and wild like yours. I loved my +sleep while the others kissed me, but with the touch of your lips the +dreams of life began to stir within me again. O Antony, be great enough, +be all mine, that we may fulfil our dream; and perhaps, Antony, I will +die with you--and leave the world in darkness for your sake, another +hundred years." + +Exalted above the earth with the joy of Silencieux's words, Antony +pressed his lips to hers in an ecstasy, and vowed his life and all +within it inviolably to her. + + + + +CHAPTER VIII + + +A STRANGE KISS FOR SILENCIEUX + +One hot August afternoon Antony took Silencieux with him to a +bramble-covered corner of the dark moor which bounded his little wood. A +ruined bank soaked with sunshine, a haunt of lizards, a catacomb of +little lives that creep and run and whisper, made their seat. + +Silencieux's face, out there under the open sky and in the full blaze of +the sun, at once lost and gained in reality; gained by force of a +contrast which accentuated while it limited her, lost by opposition to +the great faces of earth and sky. Her life, so concentrated, so +self-absorbed, seemed more of an essence, potently distilled, compared +with this abounding ichor of existence, that audibly sang in brimming +circulation through the veins of this carelessly immortal earth. + +For some moments of self-conscious thought she shrank into a symbol,--a +symbol of but one of the elements of the mighty world. Yet to this +element did not all the others, more brutal in force, more extended in +space, conspire? + +So in some hours will the most mortal maid of warmest flesh and blood +become an abstraction to her lover--sometimes shrink to the significance +of one more flower, and sometimes expand to the significance of a +microcosm, a firmament in mystical miniature. + +Thus in like manner for Antony did Silencieux alternate between reality +and dream that afternoon, though all the time he knew that, however now +and again the daylight seemed to create an illusion of her remoteness, +she was still his, and he of all men her chosen lover. + +Suddenly as they sat there together, silent and immovable, Antony +caught the peer of two bright little eyes fixed on the white face of +Silencieux. A tiny wedge-shaped head, with dashes of white across the +brows, reared itself out of a crevice in the bank. A forked tongue came +and went like black lightning through its eager little lips, and a +handsomely marked adder began to glide, like molten metal, along the +bank to Silencieux. The brilliant whiteness of the image had fascinated +the little creature. Antony kept very still. Darting its head from side +to side, venomously alert against the smallest sound, the adder reached +Silencieux. Then to Antony's delight it coiled itself round the white +throat, still restlessly moving its head wonderingly beneath the chin. +With a grace to which all movement from the beginning of time seemed to +have led up, it clasped Silencieux's neck and softly reared its lips to +hers. Its black tongue darted to and fro along that strange smile. + +"He has kissed her!" Antony exclaimed, and in an instant the adder was +nothing more than a terrified rustle in the brushwood. + +He took Silencieux into his hands. There was poison on her lips. For +another moment his fancy made him self-conscious, and turned Silencieux +again into a symbol,--though it was but for a moment. + +"There is always poison on the lips of Art," he said to himself. + + + + +CHAPTER IX + + +THE WONDERFUL WEEK. + +As Antony and Silencieux became more and more to each other, poor +Beatrice, though she had been the first occasion of their love, and +little as she now demanded, seldom as Antony spoke to her, seldom as he +smiled upon her, distant as were the lonely walks she took, infrequent +as was her sad footfall in the little wood,--poor Beatrice, though +indeed, so far from active intrusion upon their loves, and as if only by +her breathing with them the heavy air of that green unwholesome valley, +was becoming an irksome presence of the imagination. They longed to be +somewhere together where Beatrice had never been, where her sad face +could not follow them; and one night Silencieux whispered to Antony:-- + +"Take me to the sea, Antony--to some lonely sea." + +"To-morrow I will take you," said Antony, "where the loneliest land +meets the loneliest sea." + +On the morrow evening the High Muses had once more made Antony late for +dinner. One hour, and two hours, went by, and then Beatrice, in alarm, +took the lantern and courageously braved the blackness of the wood. + +The chalet was in darkness, and the door was locked, but through the +uncurtained glass of the window, she was able to irradiate the emptiness +of its interior. Antony was not there. + +But she noticed, with a shudder, that the space usually filled by the +Image was vacant. Then she understood, and with a hopeless sigh went +down the wood again. + +Already Antony and Silencieux had found the place where the loneliest +land meets the loneliest sea. Side by side they were sitting on a +moonlit margin of the world, and Antony was singing low to the murmur of +the waves:-- + + Hopeless of hope, past desire even of thee, + There is one place I long for, + A desolate place + That I sing all my songs for, + A desolate place for a desolate face, + Where the loneliest land meets the loneliest sea. + + Green waves and green grasses--and nought else is nigh, + But a shadow that beckons; + A desolate face, + And a shadow that beckons + The desolate face to the desolate place + Where the loneliest sea meets the loneliest sky. + + Wide sea and wide heaven, and all else afar, + But a spirit is singing, + A desolate soul + That is joyfully winging-- + A desolate soul--to that desolate goal + Where the loneliest wave meets the loneliest star. + +"It is not good," said Silencieux. + +"I know," answered Antony. + +"Throw it into the sea." + +"It is not worthy of the sea." + +"Burn it." + +"Fire is too august." + +"Throw it to the winds." + +"They are too busy." + +"Bury it." + +"It would make barren a whole meadow." + +"Forget it." + +"I will--And you?" + +"I will." + +And Antony and Silencieux laughed softly together by the sea. + +Many days Antony and Silencieux stayed together by the sea. They loved +it together in all its changes, in sun and rain, in wild wind and dreamy +calm; at morning when it shone like a spirit, at evening when it +flickered like a ghost, at noon when it lay asleep curled up like a +woman in the arms of the land. Sometimes at evening they sat in the +little fishing harbour, watching the incoming boats, till the sky grew +sad with rigging and old men's faces. + +Then at last Silencieux said: "I am weary of the sea. Let us go to the +town--to the lights and the sad cries of the human waves." + +So they went to the town and found a room high up, where they sat at the +window and watched the human lights, and listened to the human music. + +Never had it been so wonderful to be together. + +For a week Antony lived in heaven. Never had Silencieux been so kind, so +close to him. + +"Let us be little children," he said. "Let us do anything that comes +into our heads." + +So they ran in and out among pleasures together, joined strange dances +and sang strange songs. They clapped their hands to jugglers and +acrobats, and animals tortured into talent. And sometimes, as the gaudy +theatre resounded about them, they looked so still at each other that +all the rest faded away, and they were left alone with each other's eyes +and great thoughts of God. + +"I love you, Silencieux." + +"I love you, Antony." + +"You will never leave me lonely in my dream, Silencieux?" + +"Never, Antony." + +Oh, how tender sometimes was Silencieux! + +Several nights they had the whim that Silencieux should masquerade in +the wardrobe of her past. + +"To-night, you shall go clothed as when you loved that woman in +Mitylene," Antony would say. + +Or: "To-night you shall be a little shepherd-boy, with a leopard-skin +across your shoulder and mountain berries in your hair." + +Or again: "To-night you shall be Pierrot--mourning for his Columbine." + +Ah! how divine was Silencieux in all her disguises!--a divine child. Oh, +how tender those nights was Silencieux! + +Antony sat and watched her face in awe and wonder. Surely it was the +noblest face that had ever been seen in the world. + +"Is it true that that noble face is mine?" he would ask; "I cannot +believe it." + +"Kiss it," said Silencieux gaily, "and see." + + * * * * * + +Then on a sudden, what was this change in Silencieux! So cold, so +silent, so cruel, had she grown. + +"Silencieux," Antony called to her. "Silencieux," he pleaded. + +But she never spoke. + +"O Silencieux, speak! I cannot bear it." + +Then her lips moved. "Shall I speak?" she said, with a cruel smile. + +"Yes," he besought her again. + +"I shall love you no more in this world. The lights are gone out, the +magic faded." + +"Silencieux!" + +But she spoke no more, and, with those lonely words in his ears, Antony +came out of his dream and heard the rain falling miserably through the +wood. + + + + +CHAPTER X + + +SILENCIEUX WHISPERS + +So Antony first knew how cruel could be Silencieux to those who loved +her. Her sudden silences he had grown to understand, even to love. +Always they had been broken again by some wonderful word, which he had +known would come sooner or later. All great natures are full of silence. +Silence is the soil of all passion. But now it was not silence that was +between them, but terrible speech. As with a knife she had stabbed their +love right in its heart. Yet Antony knew that his love could never die, +but only suffer. + +During these days he half turned to Beatrice. How kind was her simple +earth-warm affection, after the star-cold transcendentalism in which he +had been living! How full of comfort was her unselfish humanity, after +the pitiless egoism of the divine! + +And yet, while it momentarily soothed him, he realised, with a heart sad +for Beatrice as for himself, that it could never satisfy him again. For +days he left Silencieux alone in the wood, and Beatrice's face +brightened with their renewed companionship; but all the time he seemed +to hear Silencieux calling him, and he knew that he would have to go +back. + +One night, almost happy again, as he lay by the side of Beatrice, who +was sleeping deeply, he rose stealthily, and looked out into the wood. + +The moonlight fell through it mysteriously, as on that night when he had +stolen up there to meet Silencieux--"at the rising of the moon." He +could hesitate no longer. Leaving Beatrice asleep, he was soon making +his way once more through the moonlit trees. + +The little chalet looked very still and solemn, like a temple of +Chaldean mysteries, and an unwonted chill of fear passed through Antony +as he stood in the circle of moonlight outside. His spirit seemed aware +of some dread menace to the future in that moment, and a voice was +crying within him to go back. + +But the longing that had brought him so far was too strong for such +undefined warnings. Once more he turned the key in the lock, and looked +on Silencieux once more. + +The moonlight fell over her face like a veil of silver, and on her +eyelashes was a glitter of tears. + +Her face was alive again, alive too with a softness of womanhood he had +never seen before. + +"Forgive me, Antony," she said. "I loved you all the time." + +What else need Silencieux say! + +"But it was so strange," said Antony after a while, "so strange. I +could have borne the pain, if only I could have understood." + +"Shall I tell you the reason, Antony?" + +"Yes." + +"It was because I saw in your eyes a thought of Beatrice. For a moment +your thoughts had forsaken me and gone to pity Beatrice. I saw it in +your eyes." + +"Poor Beatrice!" said Antony. "It is little indeed I give her. Could you +not spare her so little, Silencieux?" + +"I can spare her nothing. You must be all mine, Antony--your every +thought and hope and dream. So long as there is another woman in the +world for you except me, I cannot be yours in the depths of my being, +nor you mine. There must always be something withheld. It will never be +perfect, until--" + +"Until when?" + +"Until, Antony,"--and Silencieux lowered her voice to an awful +whisper,--"until you have made for me the human sacrifice." + +"The human sacrifice!" + +"Yes, Antony,--all my lovers have done that for me. They were not really +mine till then. Some have brought me many such offerings. Antony, when +will you bring me the human sacrifice?" + +"O Silencieux!" + +Antony's heart chilled with terror at Silencieux's words. It was against +this that the voices had warned him as he came up the wood. O that he +had never seen Silencieux more, never heard her poisonous voice again! + +As one fleeing before the shadow of uncommitted sin that gains upon him +at each stride, Antony fled from the place, and sought the moors. The +moon was near its setting, and soon the dawn would throw open the +eastern doors of the sky. He walked on and on, waiting, praying for, +stifling for the light; and, at last, with a freshening of the air, and +faint sounds of returning consciousness from distant farms, it came. + +High over a lake of ethereal silver welling up out of space, hung the +morning star, shining as though its heart would break, bright as a tear +that must slip down the face of heaven and fall amid the grass. + +As Antony looked up at it, his soul escaped from its prison of dark +thought, and such an exaltation had come with the quickening light, that +it seemed as though the body, with little more than pure aspiration to +wing it, might follow the soul's flight to that crystal sphere. + +In that moment, Antony knew that the love in the soul of man is mated +only with the infinite universe. In no marriage less than that shall it +find lasting fulfilment of itself. No single face, however beautiful, no +single human soul, however vast, can absorb it. Silencieux, Beatrice, +Wonder, himself, all faded away, in a trance-like sense of a stupendous +passion, an august possession. He felt that within him which rose up +gigantic from the earth, and towered into eyries of space, from whence +that morning star seemed like a dewdrop glittering low down upon the +earth. + +It was the god in him that knew itself for one brief space, a moment's +awakening in the sleep of fact. + +Could a god so great, so awakened, be again the slave of one earthly +face? + +Yes, the greater the god, the greater the slave; and so it was that, +falling plumb down from that skyey exaltation, human again with the +weakness that follows divine moments, Antony returned from the morning +star to Silencieux. + +Her face was bathed in the delicate early sunlight and looked very pure +and gentle, and he kissed her. + +Surely those terrible words had been an illusion of the dark hours. +Silencieux had never said them. He kissed her again. + +"I love you, Silencieux," he said. And then she spoke. + +"If you love me, Antony," she said, "if you love me--" + +"O what, Silencieux?" he cried, his heart growing cold once more. + +"Come nearer, Antony. Put your ear to my lips--Antony, if you love +me--the human sacrifice." + +"O God," he cried, "here in the sunlight--It is true--" + +And, a man with the doom of his nature heavy upon him, he once more went +out into the wood. + + + + +CHAPTER XI + + +WONDER IN THE WOOD + +A few days after this, little Wonder, playing about the garden, had +slipped away from her nurse, and, pleased in her little soul at her +cleverness, had found her way up to her father's chalet. Antony was +sitting at his desk, writing, with his door open. + +"Daddy," suddenly came a little voice from the bottom of the staircase, +"Daddy, where are you?" + +Antony rose and went to the door. + +"Come in, little Wonder. Well, it is a clever girl to come all the way +up the wood by herself." + +"Yes, Daddy," said the self-possessed little girl, as she toddled into +the chalet and looked round wonderingly at the books and pictures. Then +presently: + +"Daddy, what do you do all day in the wood?" + +"I make beautiful things." + +"Show me some." + +Antony showed her a page of his beautiful manuscript. + +"Why, those are only words, silly Daddy!" + +"But words, little Wonder, are the most beautiful things in the world. +Listen--" and he took the child on his knee. "Listen:-- + + In Xanadu did Kubla Khan + A stately pleasure-dome decree: + Where Alph, the sacred river, ran + Through caverns measureless to man + Down to a sunless sea. + +The child had inherited a love of beautiful sound, and, though she +understood nothing of the meaning, the music charmed her, and she +nestled close to her father, with wide eyes. + +"Say some more, Daddy." + +The sobbing cadences of the greatest of Irish songs came to Antony's +mind, and he crooned a verse or two at random: + + All day long, in unrest, + To and fro, do I move. + The very soul within my breast + Is wasted for you, love! + The heart in my bosom faints + To think of you, my queen, + My life of life, my saint of saints, + My dark Rosaleen! + My own Rosaleen! + To hear your sweet and sad complaints, + My life, my love, my saint of saints, + My dark Rosaleen!.... + + Over dews, over sands, + Will I fly for your weal: + Your holy delicate white hands + Shall girdle me with steel. + At home in your emerald bowers, + From morning's dawn till e'en, + + You'll pray for me, my flower of flowers, + My dark Rosaleen! + My fond Rosaleen! + You'll think of me thro' daylight hours, + My virgin flower, my flower of flowers, + My dark Rosaleen! + + I could scale the blue air, + I could plough the high hills, + Oh, I could kneel all night in prayer + To heal your many ills! + And one beamy smile from you + Would float like light between + My toils and me, my own, my true, + My dark Rosaleen! + My fond Rosaleen! + Would give me life and soul anew, + A second life, a soul anew, + My dark Rosaleen! + +Wonder, child-like, wearied with the length of the verses, and suddenly +the white face of Silencieux caught her eye. + +"Who is that lady, Daddy?" + +"That is Silencieux." + +"What a pretty name! Is she a kind lady, Daddy?" + +"Sometimes." + +"She is very beautiful. She is like little mother. But her face is so +white. She makes me frightened. Hold me, Daddy--" and she crouched in +his arms. + +"You mustn't be frightened of her, Wonder. She loves little girls. See +how she is smiling at you. She wants to be friends with you. She wants +you to kiss her, little Wonder." + +"Oh, no! no!" almost screamed the little girl. + +But suddenly a cruel whim to insist came over the father, and, +half-coaxingly and half-forcibly, he held her up to the image, stroking +its white cheek to reassure her. + +"See, how kind she is, little Wonder! See how she smiles--how she loves +you. She loves little girls, and she never sees any up here in the +lonely wood. It will make her so happy. Kiss her, little Wonder!" + +Reluctantly the child obeyed, and with a shudder she said:-- + +"Oh, how cold her lips are, Daddy!" + +"But were they not sweet, little Wonder?" + +"No, Daddy, they tasted of dust." + +And as Antony had lifted her up, he had said in his heart: "Silencieux, +I bring you my little child." + + + + +CHAPTER XII + + +AUTUMN IN THE VALLEY + +Autumn in the valley was autumn, melancholy and sinister, as you find +her only in such low-lying immemorial drifting places of leaves, and +oozy sinks of dank water. For the moors autumn is the spring come back +in purple, and in golden woods and many another place where the year +dies happily, she smiles like a widow so young and fair that one thinks +rather of life than death in her presence. + +But in the valley Autumn was a fearsome hag, a little crazy, two-double, +gathering sticks in a scarlet cloak. When she turned her wicked old eyes +upon you, the life died within you, and wherever you walked she was +always somewhere in the bushes muttering evil spells. All the year +round under the green cloud of summer, you might meet Autumn creeping +somewhere in the valley, like foul mists that creep from pool to pool; +for here all the year was decay to feed upon and dead leaves for her to +sleep on. Always the year round in the valley, if you listened close, +you would hear something sighing, something dying. To the happiest +walking there would come strange sinkings of the heart, unaccountable +premonitions of overhanging doom. There the least superstitious would +start at the sight of a toad, and come upon three magpies at once not +without fear. Over all was a breath of imminent disaster, a look of +sorrow from which there was no escape. It was not many yards away from a +merry high-road, but once in the shade of its lanes, it seemed as though +you had been shut away from the world of living men. Black slopes of +pine and melancholy bars of sunset walled you in, as in some funeral +hall of judgment. + +Alas! Beatrice's was not the happiest of hearts, and all day long this +autumn, as the mornings came later and darker and the evenings earlier, +always voices in the valley, voices of low-hanging mist and dripping +rain, kept saying: "Death is coming! Death is coming!" + +Tapped at the windows, ticking and crying in the rooms, was the same +message; till, in a terror of the walls, she would flee into the wider +prison of the woods, and oppressed by them in turn, would escape with a +beating heart into the honest daylight of the high-road. So one flies +from a haunted house, or comes out of an evil dream. + +Sometimes it seemed as if the white face of Silencieux looked out from +the woodside, and mocked her with the same cry: "Death is coming! Death +is coming!" + +Silencieux! Ah, how happy they had been before the coming of +Silencieux! How frail is our happiness, how suddenly it can die! One +moment it seems built for eternity, marble-based and glittering with +towers,--the next, where it stood is lonely grass and dew, not a stone +left. Ah, yes, how happy they had been; and then Antony by a heartless +chance had seen Silencieux, and in an instant their happiness had been +at an end for ever. Only a glance of the eyes and love is born, only a +glance of the eyes, and alas! love must die. + +A glance of the eyes and all the old kindness is gone, a glance of the +eyes, and from the face you love the look you seek has died out for +everlasting. + +"O Antony! Antony!" moaned Beatrice, as she wandered alone in those dank +autumn lanes, "if you would only come back to me for one short day, come +back with the old look on your face, be to me for a little while as you +once were, I think I could gladly die--" + +Die! A tattered flower caught her glance, shaking chilly in the damp +wind, and once more she heard the whisper, "Death is coming!" + +Near where she walked, stood, in the midst of a small meadow overgrown +with nettles, the blackened ruin of a cottage long since destroyed by +fire. On the edge of the little sandy lane, perilously near the feet of +the passer-by, was its forgotten well, the mouth choked with weeds and +briers. + +In her absorption Beatrice had almost walked into it. Now she parted the +bushes and looked down. A stone fell as she looked, making a sepulchral +echo. What a place to hide one's sorrow in! No one would think of +looking there. Antony might think she had gone away, or he might drag +the three black ponds, but here it was unlikely any one would come. And +in a little while--a very little while--Antony would forget, or +sometimes make himself happy with his unhappiness. + +Ah! but Wonder! No, if Antony needed her no more, Wonder did. She must +stay for Wonder's sake. And perhaps, who could say, Antony might yet +need her, might come to her some day and say "Beatrice," with the old +voice. To be really necessary to Antony again, if only for one little +hour,--yes! she could wait and suffer for that. + + + + +CHAPTER XIII + + +THE HUMAN SACRIFICE + +The valley was an ill place even for the body, a lair of rheums and +agues; and disembodied fevers waited in wells for the sunk pail. For the +valley was very beautiful, beautiful with that green beauty that only +comes of damp and decay. + +Late one October night, Antony, alone with Silencieux, as was now again +his custom, was surprised to hear footsteps coming hastily up the wood, +and even more surprised at the sudden unusual appearance of Beatrice. + +"I am sorry to disturb you, Antony," she said, noting with a pang how +the lamp had been arranged to throw a vivid light upon Silencieux, "but +I want you to come down and look at Wonder. I'm afraid she is ill." + +"Wonder, ill!" exclaimed Antony, rising with a start, "I will come at +once;" and they went together. + +Wonder was lying in her bed, with flushed cheeks and bright yet heavy +eyes. + +"Wonder, my little Wonder," said Antony caressingly, as he bent over +her. "Does little Wonder feel ill?" + +"Yes, Daddy. I feel so sick, Daddy." + +"Never mind; she will be better to-morrow." But he had noticed how +burning hot were her hands, and how dry were her fresh little lips. + +"I must go for the doctor at once," he said to his wife, when they were +outside the room. The father, so long asleep, had sprung awake at the +first hint of danger to the little child that in his neglectful way he +loved deeply all the time; and, in spite of the danger to Wonder, a +faint joy stirred in Beatrice's heart to see him thus humanly aroused +once more. + +"Kiss me, Beatrice," he said, as he set out upon his errand. "Don't be +anxious, it will be all right." It was the first time he had kissed his +wife for many days. + +The doctor's was some three miles away across the moor. It was a bright +starlit night, and Antony, who knew the moor well, had no difficulty in +making his way at a good pace along the mossy tracks. Presently he gave +a little cry of pain and stood still. + +"O God," he cried, "it cannot be that. Oh, it cannot." + +At that moment for the first time a dreadful thought had crossed his +mind. Suddenly a memory of that afternoon when he had bade Wonder kiss +Silencieux flashed upon him; and once more he heard himself saying: +"Silencieux, I bring you my little child." + +But he had never meant it so. It had all been a mad fancy. What was +Silencieux herself but a wilful, selfish dream? He saw it all now. How +could a lifeless image have power over the life of his child? + +And yet again, was Silencieux a lifeless image? And still again, if she +were an image, was it not always to an image that humanity from the +beginning had been sacrificed? Yes; perhaps if Silencieux were only an +image there was all the more reason to fear her. + +When he returned he would go to Silencieux, go on his knees and beg for +the life of his child. Silencieux had been cruel, but she could hardly +be so cruel as that. + +He drove back across the moor by the doctor's side. + +"I have always thought you unwise to live in that valley," said the +doctor. "It's pretty, but like most pretty places, it's unhealthy. +Nature can seldom be good and beautiful at the same time." The doctor +was somewhat of a philosopher. + +"Your little girl needs the hills. In fact you all do. Your wife isn't +half the woman she was since you took her into the valley. You don't +look any better for it, either. No, sir, believe me, beauty's all very +well, but it's not good to live with--And, by the way, have you had your +well looked at lately? That valley is just a beautiful sewer for the +drainage of the hills; a very market-town for all the germs and bacilli +of the district." + +And the doctor laughed, as, curiously enough, people always do at jests +about bacilli. + +But when he looked at Wonder, he took a more serious view of bacilli. + +"You must have your well looked to at once," he said. "Your little girl +is very ill. She must be kept very quiet, and on no account excited." + +Beatrice and Antony took it in turns to watch by Wonder's bed that +night, and once while Beatrice was watching, Antony found time to steal +up the wood with his prayer to Silencieux. + +Never had she looked more mask-like, more lifeless. + +"Silencieux," he cried, "I wickedly brought you my little child. O give +her back to me again! I cannot bear it. I cannot give her to you, +Silencieux. Take me, if you will. I will gladly die for you. But spare +her. O give her back to me, Silencieux!" + +But the image was impassive and made no sign. + +"Silencieux," he implored, "speak, for I know you hear me. Are you a +devil, Silencieux; a devil I have worshipped all this time? God help me! +Have you no pity,--what is her little flower-life to you? Why should you +snatch it out of the sun--" + +But Silencieux made no sign. + +Then Antony grew angry in his remorse: "I hate you, Silencieux. Never +will I look on your face again. You are an evil dream that has stolen +from me the truth of life. I have broken a true heart that loved me, +that would have died for me--for your sake; just to watch your loveless +beauty, to hear the cold music of your voice. You are like the moon that +turns men mad, a hollow shell of silver drawing all your light from the +sun of life, a silver shadow of the golden sun." + +But prayer and reproach were alike in vain. Silencieux remained +unheeding, and Antony returned to watch by Beatrice's side, with a heart +that had now no hope, and a soul weighed down with the sense of +irrevocable sin. There lay the little life he had murdered, delivered up +to the Moloch of Art. No sorrow, no agonies, were now of any avail for +ever. Little Wonder would surely die, and all the old lost opportunities +of loving her could never return. He had loved the shadow. This was a +part of the price. + +Day after day the cruel fever consumed Wonder as fire consumes a flower. +Her tiny face seemed too small for the visitation of such suffering as +burned and hammered behind the high white brow, and yellowed and drew +tight the skin upon the cheeks. She had so recently known the strange +pain of being born. Already, for so little of life, she was to endure +the pain of death. + +Day after day, hour after hour, Antony hung over her bed, with a +devotion and an unconsciousness of fatigue that made Beatrice look at +him with astonishment, and sometimes even for a moment forget Wonder in +the joy with which she saw him transfigured by simple human love. Now, +when it was too late, he had become a father indeed. And it brought some +ease to his fiercely tortured heart to notice that it was his +ministrations that the dying child seemed to welcome most. For the most +part she lay in a semi-conscious state, heeding nothing, and only +moaning now and again, a sad little moan, like an injured bird. She +seemed to say she was so little a thing to suffer so. Once, however, +when Antony had just placed some fresh ice around her head, she opened +her eyes and said, "Dear little Daddy," and the light on Antony's +face--poor victim of perverse instincts that too often drew his really +fine nature awry--was sanctifying to see. + +As terrible was the look of torture that came over his face, one night +near the end, when Wonder in a sudden nightmare of delirium had seized +his hand and cried:-- + +"O Daddy, the white lady! See her there at the end of the bed. She is +smiling, Daddy--" Then lower, "You will not make me kiss her any more, +will you, Daddy?"-- + +Beatrice had gone to snatch an hour or two's sleep, so she never heard +this, and it was no mere cowardly consolation for Antony to think +afterwards that no one but he and his little child had known of that +fatal afternoon in the wood. The dead understand all,--yes, even the +dead we have murdered. But the living can never be told a secret such as +that which Antony and his little daughter, whose soul was really grown +up, though she spoke still in baby language, shared immortally between +them. + +When Beatrice returned to the room Wonder was sleeping peacefully again, +but at the chill hour when watchers blow out the night-lights, and a +dreary greyness comes like a fog through the curtains, Antony and +Beatrice fell into each other's arms in anguish, for Wonder was dead. + + + + +CHAPTER XIV + + +A SONG OF THE LITTLE DEAD + +They carried little Wonder to a green churchyard, a place of kind old +trees and tender country bells. There were few birds to welcome her in +the grim November morning, but the grasses stole close and whispered +that very soon the thrush and the nightingale would be coming, that the +violets were already on their way, and that when May was there she +should lie all day in a bed of perfume. + +For very dear to Nature's heart are the Little Dead. The great dead lie +imprisoned in escutcheoned vaults, but for the little dead Nature +spreads out soft small graves, all snowdrops and dewdrops, where +day-long they can feel the earth rocking them as in a cradle, and at +night hear the hushed singing of the stars. + +Yes, Earth loves nothing so much as her little graves. There the tiny +bodies, like unexhausted censers, pour out all the stored sweetness they +had no time to use above the ground, turning the earth they lie in to +precious spices. There the roots of the old yew trees feel about +tenderly for the little unguided hands, and sometimes at nightfall the +rain bends over them weeping like an inconsolable mother. + +It is on the little graves that the sun first rises at morn, and it is +there at evening that the moon lays softly her first silver flowers. + +There the wren will sometimes bring her sky-blue eggs for a gift, and +the summer wind come sowing seeds of magic to take the fancy of the +little one beneath. Sometimes it shakes the hyacinths like a rattle of +silver, and spreads the turf above with a litter of coloured toys. + +Here the butterflies are born with the first warm breath of the spring. +All the winter they lie hidden in the crevices of the stone, in the +carving of little names, and with the first spring day they stand +delicately and dry their yellow wings on the little graves. There are +the honeycombs of friendly bees, and the shelters of many a timid +earth-born speck of life no bigger than a dewdrop, mysteriously small. +Radiant pin-points of existence have their palaces on the broad blades +of the grasses, and in the cellars at their roots works many a humble +little slave of the mighty elements. + +Yes, the emperors and the ants of Nature's vast economy alike love to be +kind to the little graves. + + + + +CHAPTER XV + + +SILENCIEUX ALONE IN THE WOOD. + +Beatrice's grief for Wonder was such as only a mother can know. She had +but one consolation,--the kind sad eyes of Antony. She had lost Wonder, +but Antony had come back again. Wonder was not so dead as Antony had +seemed a month ago. + +When they had left Wonder and were back in the house which was now twice +desolate, Antony took Beatrice's hands very tenderly and said:-- + +"I have been very wrong all these months. For a shadow I have missed the +lovely reality of a little child--and for a shadow, my own faithful +wife, I have all this time done you cruel wrong. But my eyes are open +now, I have come out of the evil dream that bound me--and never shall I +enter it again. Let us go from here. Let us leave this valley and never +come back to it any more." + +So it was arranged that they should winter far away, returning only to +the valley for a few short days in the spring, and then leave it for +ever. They had no heart now for more than just to fly from that haunted +place, and before night fell in the valley they were already far away. + +In vain Silencieux listened for the sound of her lover's step in the +wood, for he had vowed that he would never look upon her face again. + + + + +CHAPTER XVI + + +THE FIRST TALK ON THE HILLS + +Antony took Beatrice to the high hills where all the year long the sun +and the snow shine together. He was afraid of the sea, for the sea was +Silencieux's for ever. In its depths lay a magic harp which filled all +its waves with music--music lovely and accursed, the voice of +Silencieux. That he must never hear again. He would pile the hills +against his ears. Inland and upland, he and Beatrice should go, ever +closer to the kind heart of the land, ever nearer to the forgetful +silences of the sky, till huge walls of space were between them and that +harp of the sea. Nor in the whisper of leaves nor in the gloom of +forests should the thought of Silencieux beset them. The earth that +held least of her--to that earth they would go; the earth that rose +nearest to heaven. + +Beauty indeed should be theirs--the Beauty of Nature and Love; no more +the vampire's beauty of Art. + +It was strange to each how their souls lightened as the valleys of the +world folded away behind them, and the simple slopes mounted in their +path. In that pure unladen air which so exhilarated their very bodies, +there seemed some mysterious property of exhilaration for the soul also. +One might have dreamed that just to breathe on those heights all one's +days would be to grow holy by the more cleansing power of the air. With +such bright currents ever running through the brain, surely one's +thoughts would circle there white as stones at the bottom of a spring. + +"O Antony," said Beatrice, "why were we so long in finding the hills?" + +"We found them once before, Beatrice--do you remember?" + +"Yes! You have not forgotten?" said Beatrice, with the ray of a lost +happiness in her eyes--lost, and yet could it be dawning again? There +was a morning star in Antony's face. + +"And then," said Antony, "we went into the valley--the Valley of Beauty +and Death." + +Beatrice pressed his hand and looked all her love at him for comfort. He +knew how precious was such a forgiveness, the forgiveness of a mother +heart broken for the child, which he, directly or indirectly, had +sacrificed,--directly as he and Wonder alone knew, indirectly by taking +them with him into the Valley of Beauty. + +"Ah, Beatrice, your love is almost greater than I can bear. I am not +worthy of it. I never shall be worthy. There is something in the love of +a woman like you to which the best man is unequal. We can love--and +greatly--but it is not the same." + +"We went into the valley," he cried, "and I lost you your little +Wonder--" + +"_Our_ little Wonder," gently corrected Beatrice. "We found her +together, and we lost her together. Perhaps some day we shall find her +together again--" + +"And do you know, Antony," Beatrice continued, "I sometimes wonder if +her little soul was not sent and so taken away all as part of a mission +to us, which in its turn is a part of the working out of her own +destiny. For life is very mysterious, Antony--" + +"Alas! I had forgotten life," answered Antony with a sigh. + +"Yes, dear," Beatrice went on, pursuing her thought. "I have dared to +hope that perhaps Wonder, as she was the symbol of our coming together, +was taken away just at this time because we were being drawn apart. +Perhaps it was to save our love that little Wonder died--" + +Antony looked at Beatrice; half as one looks at a child, and half as one +might look at an angel. + +"Beatrice," he said tenderly, "you believe in God." + +"All women believe in God," answered Beatrice. + +"Yes," said Antony musingly, and with no thought of irony, "it is that +which makes you women." + + + + +CHAPTER XVII + + +ANTONY ALONE ON THE HILLS + +But although Beatrice might forgive Antony, from himself came no +forgiveness. He hid his remorse from her, sparing the mother-wound in +her heart--but always when he was walking alone he kept saying to +himself: "I have lost our little Wonder. I killed our little Wonder." + +One day he climbed up the highest hill within reach, and there leaned +into the enormous silence, that he might cry it aloud for God to hear-- + +God!--poor little Beatrice, what God was there to hear! To look at +Beatrice one might indeed believe in God--and yet was it not Beatrice +who had made God in her own image? Was not God created of all pure +overflows of the human soul, the kind light of human eyes that not all +the suffering of the world can exhaust, the idealism of the human spirit +that not all the infamies of natural law can dismay? + +Nevertheless, Antony confessed himself to God upon the hills, not indeed +as one seeking pardon, but punishment. + +Yet Heaven's benign untroubled blue carried no cloud upon its face, +because one breaking human heart had thus breathed into it its unholy +secret. Around that whole enormous circle such cries and such +confessions were being poured like noxious vapours, from a thousand +cities; but that incorruptible ether remained unsullied as on the first +morning, the black smoke of it all lost in the optimism of God. + +On some days he would live over again the scene with Wonder in the wood +with unbearable vividness. + +"Why, those are only words, silly Daddy!"--How many times a day did he +not hear that quaint little voice making, with a child's profundity, +that tremendous criticism upon literature. + +He had silenced her with the music of words, as he had silenced his own +heart and soul with the same music, but they were still only words none +the less. Ah! if she were only here to-day, he would bring her something +more beautiful than words--or toadstools. + +He shuddered as he thought of the loathsome form his decaying fancy had +taken, that morning by the Three Black Ponds. He had filled the small +outstretched hands with Nature's filth and poison. She had asked for +flowers, he had brought her toadstools. Oh, the shame, the crime, the +anguish! + +But worst of all was to hear himself saying in the silence of his soul, +over and over again without any power to still it, as one is forced +sometimes to hear the beating of one's heart: "Silencieux, I bring you +my little child." + +There were times he heard this so plainly when he was with Beatrice that +he had to leave her and walk for hours alone. Only unseen among the +hills dare he give vent to the mad despair with which that memory tore +him. + +Yes, for words--"only words"--he had sacrificed that wonderful living +thing, a child. For words he had missed that magical intercourse, the +intercourse with the mind of a child. How often had she come to him for +a story, and he had been dull and preoccupied--with words; how often +asked him to take her a walk up the lane, but he had been too busy--with +words! + +O God, if only she might come and ask again. Now when she was so far +away his fancy teemed with stories. Every roadside flower had its +fairy-tale which cried, "Tell me to little Wonder"--and once he tried +to make believe to himself that Wonder was holding his hand, and looking +up into his face with her big grave eyes, as he told some child's +nonsense to the eternal hills. He broke off--half in anger with himself. +Was he changing one illusion for another? + +"Fool, no one hears you," and he threw himself face down in the grass +and sobbed. + +But a gentle hand was laid upon his shoulder and Beatrice's voice +said,-- + +"I heard you, Antony--and loved you for it." + +So Antony had found the heart of a father when no longer he had a child. + + + + +CHAPTER XVIII + + +THE SECOND TALK ON THE HILLS + +"But to think," said Antony presently, in answer to Beatrice's soothing +hand, "to think that I might have lived with a child--and I chose +instead to live with words. In all the mysterious ways of man, is there +anything quite so mysterious as that? Poor dream-led fool, poor lover of +coloured shadows! + +"And yet, how proud I was of the madness! How I loved to say that words +were more beautiful than the things for which they stood, and that the +names of the world's beautiful women, Sappho, Fiametta, Guinivere, were +more beautiful than Sappho, Fiametta, Guinivere themselves; that the +names of the stars were lovelier than any star--who has ever found the +Pleiades so beautiful as their name, or any king so great as the sound +of Orion?--and what, anywhere in the Universe, is lovely enough to bear +Arcturus for its name?--Ah! you know how I used to talk--poor fool, poor +lover of coloured shadows!" + +"Yes, dear," said Beatrice soothingly, "but that is passed now, and you +must not dwell too persistently in the sorrow of it, or in your grief +for little Wonder. That too is to dwell with shadows, and to dwell with +shadows either of grief or joy is dangerous for the soul." + +"I know. But fear not, Beatrice. Perhaps there was the danger of my +passing from one cloudland to another--for I never knew how I loved our +Wonder till now, and I longed, if only by imagination, to follow her +where she has gone, and share with her the life together we have lost +here--" + +"But that can never be," said Beatrice; "you must accept it, Antony. We +shall only meet her again by doing that. The sooner we can say from our +hearts 'She is lost here,' the nearer is she to being found in another +world. Yes, Antony dear, even Wonder's little shadow must be left +behind, if we are to mount together the hills of life." + +"My wonderful Beatrice! Yes, the hills of life. No more its woods, but +its hills, bathed in a vast and open sunshine. Look around us--how nobly +simple is every line and shape! Far below the horizon nature is +elaborate, full of fancies,--mazy watercourses, delicate dingles, +fantastically gloomy ravines, misshapen woods, gibbering with diablerie; +but here how simple, how great, how good she is! There is not a shape +subtler than a common bowl, and the colours are alphabetical--and yet, +by what taking of thought could she have achieved an effect so grand, +at once so beautiful and so holy?" + +"Yes, one might call it the good beauty," said Beatrice. + +"Yes," continued Antony, perhaps somewhat ominously interested in the +subject, "that is a great mystery--the seeming moral meaning of the +forms of things. Some shapes, however beautiful, suggest evil; others, +however ugly, suggest good. As we look at a snake, or a spider, we know +that evil is shaped like that; and not only animate things but +inanimate. Some aspects of nature are essentially evil. There are +landscapes that injure the soul to look at, there are sunsets that are +unholy, there are trees breathing spiritual pestilence as surely as some +men breathe it--" + +"Do you remember," continued Antony with a smile, which died as he +realised he was committed to an allusion best forgotten, "that old +twisted tree that stood on the moor near our wood? I often wonder what +mysterious sin he had committed--" + +"Yes," laughed Beatrice, "he looked a terribly depraved old tree, I must +admit--but don't you think that when we have arrived at the discussion +of the mysterious sins of trees it is time to start home?" + +"Yes, indeed," said Antony gaily, "let us change the subject to the +vices of flowers." + +From which conversation it will be seen that Antony's mind was still +revolving with unconscious attraction around the mystery of Art. Was it +some far-travelled sea-wind bringing faint strains from that sunken +harp, strains too subtle for the ear, and even unrecognised by the mind? + + + + +CHAPTER XIX + + +LAST TALK ON THE HILLS + +Beatrice's prayer had been answered. Antony had come back to her. She +was necessary to him once more. The old look was in his eyes, the old +sound in his voice. One day as they were out together she was so +conscious of this happiness returned that she could not forbear speaking +of it--with an inner feeling that it was better to be happy in silence. + +What is that instinct in us which tells us that we risk our happiness in +speaking of it? Happiness is such a frightened thing that it flies at +the sound of its own name. And yet of what shall we speak if not our +happiness? Of our sorrows we can keep silence, but our joys we long to +utter. + +So Beatrice spoke of her great happiness to Antony, and told him too of +her old great unhappiness and her longing for death. + +"What a strange and terrible dream it has been--but thank God, we are +out in the daylight at last," said Antony. "O my little Beatrice, to +think that I could have forsaken you like that! Surely if you had come +and taken me by the hands and looked deep into my eyes, and called me +out of the dream, I must have awakened, for, cruel as it was, the dream +was but part of a greater dream, the dream of my love for you--" + +"But I understand it all now," he continued, "see it all. Do you +remember saying that perhaps I had never loved anything but images all +my life? It was quite true. Since I can remember, when I thought I loved +something I was sure to find sooner or later that I loved less the +object itself than what I could say about it, and when I had said +something beautiful, something I could remember and say over and over to +myself, I cared little if the object were removed. The spiritual essence +of it seemed to have passed over into my words, and I loved the +reincarnation best. Only at last have I awakened to realities, and the +shadows flee away. The worshipper of the Image is dead within me. But +alas! that little Wonder had to die first--" + +"I used to tell myself," he went on, "that human life, however +exquisite, without art to eternalise it, was like a rose showering its +petals upon the ground. For so brief a space the rose stood perfect, +then fell in a ruin of perfume. Wonderful moments had human life, but +without art were they not like pearls falling into a gulf? So I said: +there is nothing real but art. The material of art passes--human love, +human beauty--but art remains. It is the image, not the reality, that +is everlasting. I will live in the image." + +"But I know now," he once more resumed, "that there is a higher +immortality than art's,--the immortality of love. The immortality of art +indeed is one of those curious illusions of man's self-love which a +moment's thought dispels. Art, who need be told, is as dependent for its +survival on the survival of its physical media as man's body itself--and +though the epic and the great canvas escape combustion for a million +years, they must burn at last, burn with all the other accumulated +shadows of time. What we call immortality in art is but the shadow of +the soul's immortality; but the immortality of love is that of the soul +itself--" + +"O Antony," interrupted Beatrice, "you really believe that now? You will +never doubt it again?" + +"We never doubt what we have really seen, and I had never seen before," +answered Antony, taking her hand and looking deep into her eyes, "never +seen it as I see it now." + +"And you will never doubt it again?" + +"Never." + +"Whatever that voice should say to you?" + +"I shall never hear that voice again." + +"O Antony, is it really true? You have come back to me. I can hardly +believe it." + +"Listen, Beatrice; when we return to the Valley, return only to leave it +for ever, I will take the Image and smash it in a hundred pieces--for I +hate it now as much as I once loved it. Fear not; it will never trouble +our peace again." + +The mention of the valley was a momentary cloud on Beatrice's happiness, +but as she looked into Antony's resolute love-lit face, it melted away. + + + + +CHAPTER XX + + +ANTONY'S JUDGMENT UPON SILENCIEUX + +So the weeks and months went by for those two upon the hills, and the +soul of Antony grew stronger day by day, and his love with it--and the +face of Beatrice was like a bird singing. At last the spring came, and +the snow was no more needed to keep warm the flowers. With the flowers +came the snowdrop-soul of Wonder, and the thoughts of mother and father +turned to the place of kind old trees and tender country bells, where in +the unflowering November they had laid her. These dark months the chemic +earth had been busy with the little body they loved, and by this time +Wonder would be many violets. + +"Let us go to Wonder," they said; "she is awake now." + +So they went to Wonder, and found her surrounded, in her earth cradle, +by a great singing of birds, and blossoms and green leaves innumerable. +It was more like a palace than a graveyard, and they went away happy for +their little one. + +There remained now to take leave of the valley, which indeed looked its +loveliest, as though to allure them to remain. Some days they must stay +to make the necessary preparations for their departure. Among these, in +Antony's mind, the first and most necessary was that destruction of +Silencieux which he had promised himself and his wife upon the hills. + +The first afternoon Beatrice noted him take a great hammer, and set out +up the wood. She gave him a look of love and trust as he went--though +there was a secret tremor in her heart, for she knew, perhaps better +than he, how strong was the power of Silencieux. + +But in Antony's heart was no misgiving, or backsliding. In those months +on the hills he had realised human love, in the love of a true and +tender and fairy-like woman, and he knew that no illusions, however +specious, were worth that reality--a reality with all the magic of an +illusion. He gripped the hammer in his hand joyfully, eager to smite +featureless the face which had so misled him, brought such tragic sorrow +to those he had loved. + +Still, for all his unshaken purpose, it was strange to see again the +face that had meant so much to him, around which his thoughts had +circled consciously or unconsciously all these absent weeks. + +Seldom has a face seen again after long separation seemed so +disenchanted as Silencieux's. Was this she whom he had worshipped, she +who had told him in that strange voice of her immortal lovers, she with +whom he had sung by the sea, she with whom he had danced those strange +dances in the town, she who had whispered low that awful command, she to +whom he had sacrificed his little child? + +She was just a dusty, neglected cast--nothing more. + +Wonder's voice came back to him: "No, Daddy, they tasted of dust"--and +at that thought he gripped the hammer ready to strike. + +And yet, even thus, she was a beautiful work of man's hands, and Antony, +hating to destroy beauty, still forbore to strike--just as he would have +shrunk from breaking in pieces a shapely vase. Then, too, the +resemblance to Beatrice took him again. Crudely to smash features so +like hers seemed a sort of mimic murder. So he still hesitated. Was +there no other way? Then the thought came to him: "Bury her." It pleased +him. Yes, he would bury her. + +So, having found a spade, he took her from the wall, and looked from +his door into the wood, pondering where her grave should be. A whitebeam +at a little distance made a vivid conflagration of green amid the sombre +boles of the pines. Pinewoods rely on their undergrowth--bracken and +whortleberry and occasional bushes--for their spring illuminations, and +the whitebeam shone as bright in that wood as a lamp in the dark. + +"I will bury her beneath the whitebeam," said Antony, and he carried her +thither. + +Soon the grave was dug amid the pushing fronds of the young ferns, and +taking one long look at her, Antony laid her in the earth, and covered +her up from sight. Was it only fancy that as he turned away a faint +music seemed to arise from the ground, forming into the word "Resurgam" +as it died away? + +"It is done," said Antony to Beatrice. "But I could not break her, she +looked so like you; so I buried her in the wood." + +Beatrice kissed him gratefully. But her heart would have been more +satisfied had Silencieux been broken. + + + + +CHAPTER XXI + + +"RESURGAM!" + +"Resurgam!" + +Had his senses deceived him? They must have deceived him. And yet that +music at least had seemed startlingly near, sudden, and sweet, as though +one should tread upon a harp in the grass. For the next day or two +Antony could not get it out of his ears, and often, like a sweet wail +through the wood, he seemed to hear the word "Resurgam." + +Was Silencieux a living spirit, after all,--no mere illusion, but one of +those beautiful demons of evil that do possess the souls of men? + +He went and stood by Silencieux's grave. It was just as he had left it. +Only an early yellow butterfly stood fanning itself on the freshly +turned earth. + +Was it the soul of Silencieux? + +Cursing himself for a madman, he turned away, but had not gone many +yards, when once more--there was that sudden strain of music and the +word "Resurgam" somewhere on the wind. + +This time he knew he was not mistaken, but to believe it true--O God, he +must not believe it true. Reality or fancy, it was an evil thing which +he had cast out of his life--and he closed his ears and fled. + +Yet, though he loyally strove to quench that music in the sound of +Beatrice's voice, deep in his heart he knew that the night would come +when he would take his lantern and spade, wearily, as one who at length +after hopeless striving obeys once more some imperious weakness--and +look on the face of Silencieux again. + +Too surely that night came, and, as in a dream, Antony found himself in +the dark spring night hastening with lantern and spade to Silencieux's +grave. It was only just to look on her face again, to see if she really +lived like a vampire in the earth; and were she to be alive, he vowed to +kill her where she lay--for into his life again he knew she must not +come. + +As he neared the whitebeam, a gust of wind blew out his lantern, and he +stood in the profound darkness of the trees. While he attempted to +relight it, he thought he saw a faint light at the foot of the +whitebeam, as of a radiance welling out of the earth; but he dismissed +it as fancy. + +Then, having relit the lantern, he set the spade into the ground, and +speedily removed the soil from the white face below. As he uncovered it, +the wind again extinguished the lantern, and there, to his amazement and +terror, was the face of Silencieux shining radiantly in the darkness. +The hole in which she lay brimmed over with light, as a spring wells +out of the hillside. Her face was almost transparent with brightness, +and presently she spoke low, with a voice sweeter than Antony had ever +heard before. It was the voice of that magic harp at the bottom of the +sea, it was the voice that had told him of her lovers, the voice of +hidden music that had cried "Resurgam" through the wood. + +"Antony," she said, "sing me songs of little Wonder." + +And, forgetting all but the magic of her voice, the ecstasy of being +hers again, Antony carried her with him to the chalet, and setting her +in her accustomed place, gazed at her with his whole soul. + +"Sing me songs of little Wonder," she repeated. + +"You bid me sing of little Wonder!" cried Antony, half in terror of this +beautiful evil face that drew him irresistibly as the moon, "you, who +took her from me!" + +"Who but I should bid you sing of Wonder?" answered Silencieux. "I +loved her. That was why I took her from you, that by your grief she +should live for ever. There is no one but I who can give you back your +little Wonder--no one but I who can give you back anything you have +lost. If you love me faithfully, Antony--there is nothing you can lose +but in me you will find it again." + +Antony bowed his head, his heart breaking for Beatrice--but who is not +powerless against his own soul? + +"Listen," said Silencieux again. "Once on a time there was a beautiful +girl who died, and from her grave grew a wonderful flower, which all the +world came to see. 'Yet it seems a pity,' said one, 'that so beautiful a +girl should have died.' 'Ah,' said a poet standing by, 'there was no +other way of making the flower!'" + +And again, as Antony still kept silence in his agony, Silencieux said, +"Listen." + +"Listen, Antony. You have hidden yourself away from me, you have put +seas and lands between us, you have denied me with bitter curses, you +have vowed to thrust me from your life, you have given your allegiance +to the warm and pretty humanity of a day, and reviled the august cold +marble of immortality. But it is all in vain. In your heart of hearts +you love no human thing, you love not even yourself, you love only the +eternal spirit of beauty in all things, you love only me. Me you may +sacrifice, your own heart you may deny, in the weakness of human pity +for human love; but, should this be, your life will be in secret broken, +purposeless, and haunted, and to me at last you will come, at the +end--at the end and too late. This is your own heart's voice; you know +if it be true." + +"It is true," moaned Antony. + +"Many men and many loves are there in this world," continued +Silencieux, "and each knows the way of his own love, nor shall anything +turn him from it in the end. Here he may go and thither he may turn, but +in the end there is only one way of joy for each, and in that way must +he go or perish. Many faces are fair upon the earth, but for each man is +a face fairest of all, for which, unless he win it, each must go +desolate forever--" + +"Face of Eternal Beauty," said Antony, "there is but one face for me for +ever. It is yours." + + * * * * * + +On the morrow Beatrice saw once more that light in Antony's face which +made her afraid. He had brought with him some sheets of paper on which +were written the songs of little Wonder Silencieux had bidden him sing. +They were songs of grief so poignant and beautiful one grew happy in +listening to them, and Antony forgot all in the joy of having made +them. He read them to Beatrice in an ecstasy. Her face grew sadder and +sadder as he read. When he had finished she said:-- + +"Antony!--Silencieux has risen again." + +"O Beatrice, Beatrice--I would do anything in the world for you--but I +cannot live without her." + + + + +CHAPTER XXII + + +THE STRANGENESS OF ANTONY + +From this moment Silencieux took possession of Antony as she had never +taken it before. Never had he been so inaccessibly withdrawn into his +fatal dream. Beatrice forgot her own bitter sorrow in her fear for him, +so wrought was he with the fires that consumed him. Some days she almost +feared for his reason, and she longed to watch over him, but his old +irritation at her presence had returned. + +As the summer days came on, she would see him disappear through the +green door of the wood at morning and return by it at evening; but all +the day each had been alone, Beatrice alone with a solitude in which was +now no longer any Wonder. The summer beauty gave her courage, but she +knew that the end could not be very far away. + +One day there had been that in Antony's manner which had more than +usually alarmed her, and when night fell and he had not returned, she +went up the wood in search of him, her heart full of forebodings. As she +neared the chalet she seemed to hear voices. No! there was only one +voice. Antony was talking to some one. Careful to make no noise, she +stole up to the window and looked in. The sight that met her eyes filled +her with a great dread. "O God, he is going mad," she cried to herself. + +Antony was sitting in a big chair drawn up to the fire. Opposite to him, +lying back in her cushions, was the Image draped in a large black velvet +cloak. A table stood between them, and on it stood two glasses, and a +decanter nearly empty of wine, Silencieux's glass stood untasted, but +Antony had evidently been drinking deeply, for his cheeks were flushed +and his eyes wild. + +He was speaking in angry, passionate, despairing tones. One of her +strange moods of silence had come upon Silencieux, and she lay back in +her pillows stonily unresponsive. + +"For God's sake speak to me," Antony cried. "I love you with my whole +heart. I have sacrificed all I love for your sake. I would die for you +this instant--yes! a hundred thousand deaths. But you will not answer me +one little word--" + +But there was no answer. + +"Silencieux! Have you ceased to love me? Is the dream once more at an +end, the magic faded? Oh, speak--tell me--anything--only speak!" But +still Silencieux neither spoke nor smiled. + +"Listen, Silencieux," at last cried Antony, beside himself, "unless you +answer me, I will die this night, and my blood shall be upon your cruel +altar for ever." + +As he spoke he snatched a dagger from among some bibelots on his mantel, +and drew it from its sheath. + +"You are proud of your martyrs," he laughed; "see, I will bleed to death +for your sake. In God's name speak." + +But Silencieux spoke nothing at all. + +Then Beatrice, watching in terror, seeing by his face that he would +really kill himself, ran round to the door and broke in, crying, "O my +poor Antony!" but already he had plunged the dagger amid the veins of +his left wrist, and was watching the blood gush out with a strange +delight. + +As Beatrice burst in, he looked up at her, and mistook her for +Silencieux. + +"Ah!" he said, "you speak at last. You love me now, when it is too +late--when I am dying." + +As he said this his face grew white and he fainted away. + +For many days Antony lay unconscious, racked by terrible delirium. The +doctor called it brain fever. It was not the common form, he said, but a +more dangerous form, to which only imaginative men were subject. It was +a form of madness all the more malignant because the sufferer, and +particularly his friends, might go for years without suspecting it. The +doctor gave the disease no name. + +During his illness Antony spoke to Beatrice all the time as Silencieux, +but one day, when he was nearly well again, he suddenly turned upon her +in enraged disappointment, with a curious harshness he had never shown +before, as though the gentleness of his soul had died during his +illness, and exclaimed:--"Why, you are not Silencieux, after all!" + +"I am Beatrice," said his wife gently; "Beatrice, who loves you with her +whole heart." + +"But I love Silencieux--" + +Beatrice hid her face and sobbed. + +"Where is Silencieux? Bring me Silencieux. I see! You have taken her +away while I was ill--I will go and seek her myself," and he attempted +to rise. + +"You are too weak. You must not get up, Antony. I will bring you +Silencieux." + +And so, till he was well enough to leave his bed, Silencieux hung facing +Antony on his bedroom wall, and on his first walk out into the air, he +took her with him and set her once more in her old shrine in the wood. + +Now, by this time, the heart of Beatrice was broken. + + + + +CHAPTER XXIII + + +BEATRICE FULFILS HER DESTINY + +The heart of Beatrice was broken, and there was now no use or place for +her in the world. Wonder was gone, and Antony was even further away. She +knew now that he would never come back to her. Never again could return +even the illusion of those happy weeks on the hills. Antony would be +hers no more for ever. + +There but remained for her to fulfil her destiny, the destiny she had +vaguely known ever since Antony had brought home the Image, and shown +her how the Seine water had moulded the hair and made wet the eyelashes. + +For some weeks now Beatrice had been living on the border of another +world. She had finally abandoned all her hopes of earthly joy--and to +Antony she was no longer any help or happiness. He had needed her again +for a few brief weeks, but now he needed her no more. His every look +told her how he wished her out of his life. And she had no one else in +the world. + +But in another world she had her little Wonder. Lately she had begun to +meet her in the lanes. In the day she wore garlands of flowers round her +head, and in the night a great light. She would go to meet her at night, +that the light might lead her steps. + +So one night while Antony banqueted strangely with Silencieux, she drew +her cloak around her and stole up the wood, to look a last good-bye at +him as he sat laughing with his shadows. + +"Good-bye, Antony, good-bye," she cried. "I had but human love to give +you. I surrender you to the love of the divine." + +Then noting how full of blossom were the lanes, and how sweet was the +night air, and smitten through all her senses with the song and perfume +of the world she was about to leave, she found her way, with a strange +gladness of release, to the Three Black Ponds. + +It was moonlight, and the dwarf oak-trees made druid shadows all along +the leafy galleries that overhung the pools. The pools themselves shone +with a startling silver--so hushed, so dreamy was all that surrounded +them that there seemed something of an unnatural wakefulness, a daylight +observation, in their brilliant surfaces,--and on them, as last year, +the lilies floated like the crowns of sunken queens. But the third pool +lay more in shadow, and by that, as it seemed to Beatrice, a light was +shining. + +Yes, a light was shining and a voice was calling. "Mother," it called, +"little Mother. I am waiting for you. Here, little Mother. Here by the +water-lilies we could not gather." + +Beatrice, following the voice, stepped along the causeway and sank among +the lilies; and as she sank she seemed to see Antony bending over the +pond, saying: "How beautiful she looks, how beautiful, lying there among +the lilies!" + + * * * * * + +On the morrow, when they had drawn Beatrice from the pond, with lilies +in her hair, Antony bent over her and said:-- + +"It is very sad--Poor little Beatrice--but how beautiful! It must be +wonderful to die like that." + +And then again he said: "She is strangely like Silencieux." + +Then he walked up the wood, in a great serenity of mind. He had lost +Wonder, but she lived again in his songs. He had lost Beatrice, but he +had her image--did she not live for ever in Silencieux? + +So he went up the wood, whistling softly to himself--but lo! when he +opened his chalet door, there was a strange light in the room. The eyes +of Silencieux were wide open, and from her lips hung a dark moth with +the face of death between his wings. + +THE END + + + + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Worshipper of the Image +by Richard Le Gallienne + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE WORSHIPPER OF THE IMAGE *** + +***** This file should be named 10812.txt or 10812.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/1/0/8/1/10812/ + +Produced by Brendan Lane, Garrett Alley and PG Distributed Proofreaders + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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